We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Amy Hooyer a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Amy, sincerely appreciate your selflessness in agreeing to discuss your mental health journey and how you overcame and persisted despite the challenges. Please share with our readers how you overcame. For readers, please note this is not medical advice, we are not doctors, you should always consult professionals for advice and that this is merely one person sharing their story and experience.
You are so stupid Your hair is ridiculous
You have no idea what you’re talking about
You idiot
She is so much prettier than you
You’ll never get it
You are not good enough
You’re so ugly
You don’t even have a degree, idiot
You are so loud
You talk too much
You’re just not smart enough
You always say the wrong thing
There is no way you can do that
Suck it up sissy
You are worthl00ess
Nobody would miss you if you died
Seems harsh doesn’t? How many of you would say these things to someone that you know and care about? How many of you have heard one or more of these things from a loved one? If you have heard one of these, did you believe it?
I will be transparent here and tell you that I have been hearing all of these things and more for most of my life. I also believed these things most of my life. You may be thinking that I need to get this negative, mean bully out of my life and you would be absolutely right. Except, the bully telling me I’m an idiot, and ugly, and worthless, and a burden is…me. More specifically it’s my inner voice and she is the worst bully I have ever encountered.
How many of you have an inner voice who is a bully? You can call it low self esteem, or negative thinking or whatever you want, but for me, those phrases are like trying to put lipstick on a pig. My inner voice is a bully plain and simple. She’s mean, relentless some days, and exhausting. Worst of all she’s a big fat liar! It’s taken me 50+ years to figure that out. That’s a long time!
It is true that this bully of mine has been encouraged along the way by some outside voices, but the fact is she doesn’t need those outside voices to be as ruthless as she is.
When I was in my teens, my bully pretty much had free reign. Every time anything went wrong, or seemed impossible she would jump right in with, “you’re an idiot, you don’t know anything and you can’t do anything right” as so on and so on. As I got older I realized that I could do some things well and I really liked to try new things no matter what. That’s when I started to think that maybe my bully was wrong about some things. When my bully would call me an idiot, I could start to argue back a bit. Of course, she always won the argument, , but I was slowly beginning to think a little differently.
Things started to change for me after my Parkinson’s diagnosis. Don’t get me wrong, in the beginning my inner voice had a party! Here was something she could really use against me. I mean, what better ammunition than a chronic progressive disease that will sooner or later disable me enough to need a caregiver. And nobody can give me a timeline of when that will happen or just how disabled I will become. So now I am a burden to my husband and family, and nobody could ever love me now, because I am even more damaged than before, blah blah blah.
Then, I started Rock Steady Boxing West Michigan without having any idea how to start and run a business, no time to start and run a business, and no money to start a business. And here we are 10 years later still going strong. Don’t get me wrong, I did not get here by myself. I can’t even tell you how many people have helped me and supported me all these years. But I took the chance in the beginning. And this year I opened a non-profit organization called West Michigan Parkinson’s Support Center to add more support to the West Michigan Parkinson’s community. Apparently, my inner voice hasn’t worn me down yet! Apparently somewhere deep inside I am realizing more and more what a big fat liar she is.
Then I started to listen to the things people around me were saying to themselves and it broke my heart. They sounded like they had an inner voice that was a bully too. People I cared about couldn’t accept a compliment because they didn’t really believe it could be true. And if something went wrong in their lives, big or little, their inner voice was saying the same things my was, stupid, idiot, worthless blah blah blah.
Then a quite wise woman put it to me this way. If someone pays me a0 compliment, who am I to say they are wrong or lying? Someone just noticed something good about me and took the time to let me know they noticed and I turn around and say no you are wrong, or no you’re lying to me? Think about that.
I know there are things I am good at and I know there are things that I am not good at. I’ve decided to accept all of it about myself because that makes me who I am. I don’t look at people I care about and only see the negative. I see them for the whole person they are. I give them grace and patients and acceptance. Why in the world do I not do that for myself? And If I deny myself grace, patients, and acceptance, how can anyone believe me when I extend those things to them? What do we tell our kids these days about bullies? We tell them not to believe them, to ignore them and to report them. Why would that change because we are adults?
Think about that.
To be fair, I still fight with my inner voice because she is very much still there and telling lies. I’ve just decided to talk louder than her and to put her in her place more and more. It isn’t easy, and I still struggle, but it sure feels nice to be able to accept a compliment as truth and to really know that there are things I am good at, there are things I do know, and I do have some good qualities and I am working on not letting my bully take any of that away from me anymore. I feel like I’ve wasted so much time giving my bully too much time and attention and I’m sad about that, but I am so glad that I have finally seen her for what she is, a mean, lying, bully.
I hope if any of what I’ve talked about feels familiar or relates to you that you will join me in putting your bully in his or her place. I know it’s hard work and some days feels impossible but I promise you the result is incredibly rewarding and freeing. I hope that you can see the real truth and stop wasting precious time and attention on the lies of a mean, lying bully.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
This January I opened a new non-profit organization called West Michigan Parkinson’s Support Center, WMPSC, This center will bring several different exercise programs, including Rock Steady Boxing, to one location along with support groups, a medical equipment lending closet, an information library, and community events. In fact, our first community event on February 10 is a Valentines succulent planting party. The event is open to everyone but we are offering it to people with Parkinson’s for half the regular cost. Bringing all of these things to one location can help take away the obstacle of inconvenience to our community., We also want to open up new opportunities to exercise and socialize with folks who know what you are going thru. Because people with Parkinson’s disease tend to isolate themselves, the WMPSC hopes to give them a safe place to go to exercise, and also a safe place to interact and spread awareness with the community. The goal of this non-profit is to offer all of these opportunities to people with Parkinson’s disease at no cost.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
I think one of my qualities that has been helpful in my journey is being impatient. I know that doesn’t sound like a good quality, but it drives me to dig in and get things done in a timely fashion. It helps me stay focused on the tasks ahead. I’m also naturally curious, so research is exciting to me. I love to search for answers in unexpected places and apply them to my life and business. A third quality of mine is optimism. I always believe something can be done somehow. That helps me keep on searching, working and achieving! We tend to believe that qualities that seem to be bad can be used to propel us ahead. I very much believe that all of a persons qualities can be honed and used in positive ways to accomplish our goals.
Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?
The biggest challenge I am facing at this point is one I think most small non profits face, fundraising. I have always been the kind of person to not ask for help. to do everything myself. Asking for money from people goes completely against that tendency. Also, finding grant opportunities and applying are daunting tasks in which I have very little experience. I have been researching daily and consulting with other non profits to better understand the process.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://westmichiganparkinsonssupportc.godaddysites.com/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61553411252450
