E4 HALT and Inform - Alessandra White

Hi,  I'm Alessandra White. And I'm coming to you with this little podcast that I like to call, "Maybe It's Just me." Today we're going to talk about "HALT and Inform."

You may have heard of this acronym before called HALT. I find it very helpful and I wish I had found it much earlier. I'm going to share it with you or remind you of it if it sounds familiar. Halt. In self-care, in self-awareness, there is a little pause that we can take. What I like to call a breath mark. And in that breath mark. There is a pause to just make a simple evaluation. Am I one of these four things? Am I, "H," hungry or hangry? LOL Am I, "A," Am I angry? Am I, "L," Am I lonely? Am I, "T," am I tired? And of course, you can mix up your letters any way that you like to come up with whatever kind of combo mood you might be in. And it's all okay. It's called HALT We got that rabbit in the hat. But the other side of that. I never read about. But I believe in it. One HALT, Two,  inform. And they're two sides of the same coin. When we had a kid in the house, there was a little policy that we came up with that saved us all. A lot of hurt. And it went like this. It's okay to be grumpy. Grumpy happens. It's okay to be moody. Moody happens. It's okay to be hungry. Angry. Lonely, tired. That's all fine. The responsibility comes in In- form. And the way that I used to say it is, "Let a sister know!" And likewise. And I still do it to this day. In fact, even when I'm hosting creative work hour, if I am in some kind of a state or combination of HALT, I will say, "I didn't sleep," or. "I'm pissed off, and I'm not sure I can do the meditation today. Somebody else want to take it?" It's fine. It's fine. People love that. They find it endearing when you can own up to shape your in. Not in a whiny way, not not complaining way, but just like, "Okay, here's where I am. I'm owning it. There's no drama here." It's just "I'm going to let you know because I'm a nice person. I wouldn't want you to get in harm's way. This will get you a long way in your creativity because this is the relationship you have with yourself. So, HALT and inform. I hope you found that helpful. If you want to come and join us in Creative Work Hour, you can learn about us at LU.MA/CreativeWork. That's "L U dot M A Forward Slash Creative Work."