The mind, stress, gratitude and kindness
By Wellbeing Specialist
Introduction
Lockdown has started and most of us are wondering how will we survive this? Worry and fear have been lurking within us, which is OKAY! Change can be scary! We are emerging into the unknown and that can be intimidating! We do have to remind ourselves, we are ALL in this together! We are ALL going through the emotions. So let’s prevent the doom & gloom and focus on how to make these four weeks healthy and positive ones!
Time to take care of one and other
How many of you are so used to putting others’ needs first on a daily basis? It’s like a first nature to you? You might be a parent, a caretaker, a friend, an empath etc.
Think of firefighters as an example, they have to work out, eat well, do mental training, practice good communication within the team, wear safety gear, all to get you out of an extreme and vulnerable situation. First things first, take care of yourself! In that way, you can better take care of each other.
Now with the lockdown, it’s a perfect chance to recover and build your health up again without the stress from your work surroundings. We have been given the chance for a four-week Do-Over!
So where to start? I’m going to share with you weekly some basics to help keep you keep on top of your health.
It’s all in the mind – How to practice mind health
The transition from busy routine to suddenly cooped up in the house can be a huge change, transition and even a challenge for some. What to do now? Netflix and chill for four weeks straight? Even though that might be fun, your body & brain will not like it after a while! We need some sort of routine to keep us healthy, energized and it all starts with your MINDSET! Your view on life has a bigger impact than you might realize!
I am going to give you an example. Some of you might have heard this one.
Two people can be staring at a glass with 50% water in it. One person might say “it is half EMPTY” and another might say it’s “half FULL”, even though they are looking at the same glass of water, their perceptions are two different aspects of it.
Bearing this mind both their truths are right. So if you are seeing it from a negative perspective, you will draw more negative proof to back you up. If you choose to look at it positively you tend to draw more positive proof or aspect as well. Therefore both are correct BUT the one thing we as humans forget is we can CHOOSE which perception to look from. I like to call it “looking at life with different glasses on”. One person wearing negative glasses and the other with the positive glasses. The best bit about it is we can SWAP or CHOOSE which glasses we want to view things from. It can be a struggle at first if we are used to wearing only one pair of glasses. I want you to know it is nothing impossible at all. We have been training our minds since day one on this earth. So this will only be a new way of training our minds to improve or upgrade our mind, our health and our wellbeing.
When we are wound up, stressed, frustrated or angry etc, when someone tells you to take a chill pill you won’t just switch mindset. What I am going to share with you is a few practices of calming down your nervous system into a calm state of being. This by following will help increase your wellbeing and health as well.
Deep belly breathing. Breath is an essential part of life. If you hold your breath long enough you will know how important it is.
When stressed our breath is shallow, rapid and up in the chest. This means we aren’t getting enough oxygen to the brain or the rest of the body, which. This is bad news. Deep belly breathing or abdominal breathing helps clear the mind and reduce any anxiety or distress.
Practice:
1. Sitting or lying in a comfortable position, close your eyes, relax your shoulders and allow any tension in your muscles to disappear if at all possible.
2. Inhale deeply and slowly through your nose. Your bellow should expand whilst your chest rises very little. If it helps, you can put your hand on your belly and feel the inhaled breath pushing that hand up.
3. Exhale slowly through your mouth. Keeping your jaw relaxed, purse your lips as you blow, though remember to keep the exhale nice and gentle. Again, you can keep your hand on your stomach and very lightly push down as you exhale.
4. Repeat for several minutes until you feel calm again.
For best effect set a timer for every 30 minutes. When it goes off, stop what you’re doing and take five to ten deep breaths down to your lower abdomen. Like filling a balloon with air.
Focus on slowing inhaling, filling the “balloon” up and holding for a second at the top of the breath. Then make a long, deep exhale.
When you train your body and mind to press pause and nourish your breath regularly, you feel calmer. You also enhance your immune system by staying in this state.
Mindfulness- is a practice on being present in the now. It’s like training and strengthening our conscious mind and to focus on one thing fully at a time. This has proven to reduce stress, improve sleep quality, improve mental and physical health, and increase our focus, our learning capacity and our attention span. It helps us become aware of our bad habits such as Stressful eating etc. It even improves our relationships, how we approach stressful situations with family or partner and decrease depression.
Practice:
At home, sit or lie down in a comfortable position, close your eyes (for less overstimulation) and focus on your breathing. How are you breathing right now? Can you feel any tensions in your body? If you do, try and relax more with every out-breath. How does the air feel in your nose while breathing in? Can you feel it going all the way down to your belly? Be present in your body. Can you feel your pulse? How does it feel to be alive in this vessel? Where is your body touching the ground? GO back to your breathing. Deeply in and out.
Go for Mindful walks. Observe around you. What can you see? Can you feel the breeze or sunlight on your face? What can you smell? What sounds can you hear? Can you spot the beauty around you? How do you feel? How does your body feel moving? Enjoy your walk!
Outside, lie under a tree observe everything around you. The birds, the leaves, the sky, the clouds. How many colours can you see? What sounds can you hear? Now feel which areas of your body are touching the ground,
Gratitude – By practising what we are grateful for in life our happiness levels increase. Neuroscience has proven that our neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin (the feel-good and happy hormones) get released while practising gratefulness, which is a natural antidepressant. Some of the happiest people in the world are some of the poorest in the world. We might wonder how are they so happy in such bad circumstances? The trick is they are thankful for what they already have instead of what they don’t have.
Our brain can’t deal with being both negative and positive at the same time. So by practising being grateful, our positivity and wellbeing naturally increases.
Keep a Gratitude journal. By writing down and expressing our thoughts instead of just thinking them gives you a higher advantage. It helps you acknowledge your thoughts more, and process them at a deeper level emotionally. By dealing with your thoughts this way you might realize patterns or things you’ve never noticed before. It can help you “put on a different pair of glasses” as I mentioned earlier. It could even help you find a solution to a problem that you couldn’t see before.
This will by far help us appreciate what we have during these unsure times!
Practice:
Simple Starting Tips
- Keep your gratitude journal in a spot that you will see regularly each day. Your nightstand is a good spot where you will see it first thing when you wake up and the last thing when you go down for bed. I like to keep mine in the bathroom counter so that I do it first thing when I’m getting ready to start my day.
- You don’t have to come up with the “right” answers. Start by keeping things simple and write anything that comes to mind. You can be thankful for things like a meal you just ate, a movie you just watched or a friend you spent time with.
- Develop consistency. Try to make it a habit to take some time regularly to slow down and just engage in reflecting on the things you are thankful for. Spending as little as five minutes a day has shown to be effective. If you miss a day, it’s totally fine.
To get more information about Gratitude journaling visit www.lifehack.org or https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/tips_for_keeping_a_gratitude_journal
Move-in nature- Going for a walk or run outside is brilliant! It is such a stress reliever! Nature is proven to increase our wellbeing. Our brains get stimulated by natures beauty, oxygen, colours and smells. Walking barefoot helps reduce inflammation through earthing. We receive The essential Vitamin D! Our body is in action, all our systems are flowing and pumping, strengthening and keeping our bodies feeling ALIVE! ENERGIZED! This is what strengthens our immunity and kicks in the endorphins which makes us feel on top of the world! Please do keep your distance in check. It’s respect for all of us, including yourself. Make this an enjoyable time for you or your family.
If the weather isn’t on your side, do consider practising rhythmic activities like putting on your favourite song and dancing around the house. Kids love this! And adults too! If you are not much of a dancer there are loads of free workout apps and youtube channels available for moving!
Remember stress collects tension in the body so all you need to do is SHAKE IT OFF!
For more information about Earthing check our online store for books.
Act of kindness-
“Kindness makes you happy…and happiness makes you kind” by Alex Dixon. One study showed that doing a daily act of kindness gives us as much of a happiness boost as doing something new every day. Even remembering a time when we spent money on someone else can boost happiness, and the happier we are when reminiscing, the more likely we’ll choose to spend money on others again (when given the option).
The kindness-happiness loop (Dacher Keltner). Many studies have linked kindness to happiness, health, and a decrease in negative emotions. Kindness makes us less lonely and less depressed. It strengthens our immune system, reduces aches and pains, improves our cardiovascular profile, and boosts energy and strength in elderly people. In fact, people who volunteer live longer, and elderly people who care for others are less likely to die over a certain period of time.
In one famous study, people who spent $5 or $20 on others were happier at the end of the day, while people who spent it on themselves got less happy – a finding that is being confirmed across cultures. If we enrol for a two-month program in loving-kindness meditation, we’ll see an increase in our daily positive emotions.
Practice:
– Random acts of kindness
Do five kind things – that you wouldn’t normally do – in a single day. To maximize the effects, make them all different and take time later to write down what you did and how you felt. The five kindnesses don’t have to be for the same person, and the person doesn’t even have to know about it (like making mum and dad breakfast or doing the shopping for your lonely neighbour).
Other awesome methods to try out: Meditation, Pilates, Qigong, Yoga.
Reading a book, Singing/learning a favourite song, Listening to music (be respectful of your neighbours please). Getting enough sleep to rest the mind, Having fun and a good laugh (try laughter yoga or give a friend a call and tell them a bad joke).
Book tips to read:
– The biology of Belief by Bruce Lipton, ( a great book about how our belief system impacts our health and body)
– The Miracle of Water (a great book about how the thought can impact our body)
– Earthing by Clinton Ober (why walking barefoot outside is one of the best & cheapest things you can do for your health)
– Breaking The Habit of Being Yourself by Dr Joe Dispenza (How to rewire your mind and recreate healthy habits into your life)
I hope you guys enjoyed these tips. I am looking forward to hearing about your experiences.
If you are looking for some extra support I highly recommend our Practitioners:
– Hester Scott who does Psych-K (works with reprogramming your belief systems in your subconscious mind.)
– Vivienne Berry who does an amazing integration called Multiple Brain Integration, aligning the “thought” brain, the “emotional” brain (heart) and the “gut “brain. Through an advanced but simple breathing technique, she helps calm down your nervous system into a pure state of bliss and calm.
Have a beautiful day!
By Wellbeing Specialist
Global Health Clinics, 409 Lake Rd, Takapuna, Auckland 0622
www.globalhealthclinics.co.nz