Live, Laugh, and Let Shit Go

My new book, Move on Motherfucker: Live, Laugh, and Let Shit Go, comes out August 1, 2020. It is available for pre-order on IndieBound.com, BarnesandNoble.com and Amazon.com.

I advertised it on social media recently, and someone asked for examples of what shit to let go.

Let me tell you a story:

I am a psychologist. I know stuff about finding happy and being happy…. but still, I’m human.

A few years ago, I took a “great” new job, and quickly learned that it was a complete toxic shitshow. (I find myself wanting to go into gory detail here, but let your imagination run wild.) There was another person who started about the same time as me, and we bonded as people in horrible situations do.

At first, we would get together and say, “Did you see that? What in the fresh hell is going on here?” This quickly evolved into 20 minute bitch sessions involving military grade profanity. It was making both of us sick. I gained weight. I hated work. I was not happy. Bitching didn’t help.

So, I tried to fix myself with my psychologist tool box. Nothing worked. One day, when my co-worker was going off on the latest SNAFU, I blurted out, “You need to move on, motherfucker.” He was dumbfounded at first, and then he had a deep belly laugh. We developed the word MOMF (pronounced mom-f) so that we could cue each other in public to move on.

That did it. We were MOMF’ing each other all over the place — in meetings, in the hall, at lunch. Okay, it didn’t solve the problem, which was that we were working in a toxic wasteland. What it did was two important things:

1. MOMF provided us with a momentary release of pent up emotions accompanied with laughter at ourselves and the role we played. It was the laughter that somehow eased the pain of guilt and shame for being a part of something ugly and not being able to fix it.
2. MOMF reminded us that we are accountable for doing something about it. We could let something go and move on because there was no point. I mean if you can’t fix something that is bad, what is the point of ruminating on it? The other choice was that we could literally move on to another job. We were not victims. We had a choice to stop playing the motherfucker in the equation by becoming sick over something that we couldn’t change.

In the end, we both MOMF’d to new jobs, but this whole thing got me thinking. Could this work for others who struggle to let things go?

I actually found research that shows cussing up a storm while you are experiencing pain makes the pain feel less intense and go away more quickly. (Like if you yell “shit” when you stub your toe.) There is growing evidence that this can also work for emotional pain.

It is because we have been taught from an early age that profanity is bad. We store it in a special part of the brain, which gives it extra effect, extra punch. As long as we save cussing for the really important stuff, it retains this punch. Bingo!

When I combined profanity with awareness (mindfulness) of what I was thinking (negative self-talk), I could call it out with profanity and humor (MOMF). The calling it out reminded me that I choose to play the motherfucker. It reminded me to laugh. It reminded me that I am able to let go in some form. Perhaps I let go of judging myself, beating myself up, holding myself hostage to “what if” thinking, trying to control the uncontrollable, calling myself unworthy or not good enough. The list goes on.

Move on Motherfucker: Live, Laugh, and Let Shit go is all about how to use evidence-based psychological tools (cognitive behavioral tools, mindfulness, positive psychology, humor, and profanity) to let of hurtful thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that we inflict on ourselves. It is not about being self-abusive. It is about being a friend to ourselves, and friends have the best things to say.

Life is hard at baseline. MOMF’ing is about letting go of what we do to make it even harder.

MOMF is ideal for:

· Increasing your self-awareness in tough situations

· Catching and letting go of the negative things you say to yourself habitually

· Changing your patterns of self-defeating behavior

· Managing your daily stress

· Dealing with difficult people and relationships

· Building healthier relationships (and letting go of the unfixable ones)

· Managing disappointment

· Managing work stress

Setting boundaries

· Managing excessive worry

· Overcoming regret

· Managing negative emotions

· Coaching yourself to become a better version of yourself

I have so much more to share with you. If I’ve piqued your interested, check out Move on Motherfucker: Live, Laugh, and Let Shit Go. I am a recovering people pleaser, control freak, worrier, and motherfucker. We are all in this together. #MOMF