Blog – Page 50

How To Beat The Winter Blues – Week 4 – Is It Time To Get Moving? Discover the power of simple stretches to unlock your energy and set you free from winter lethargy

Welcome to week four of How To Beat The Winter Blues!

How did you get on with last week’s techniques, for roping in the power of your Monkey Mind? I’d love to hear from you, over at our Facebook Group.

Today we’re talking about “getting moving”.

For many of us, winter can feel like a time to hibernate, wrapped up in our duvets like a hedgehog in a leaf pile. We find ourselves pulling on ever more layers, until we can barely move. And, before we know it, we are literally hardly moving, which has a major impact on our body. Yet simple stretches and other simple techniques have the power to unlock your energy and set you free from winter lethargy.

How To Beat The Winter Blues – Week Three: What On Earth Are You Thinking? Roping in the power of your Monkey Mind, to help you handle the winter blues

Inspirational Messages

Welcome to week 3 of How To Beat The Winter Blues!

How did you get on with last week’s strategies, for keeping your energy levels feeling great this winter? I’d love to hear how you’re getting on, over at the forum.

This week we’re moving on to your Monkey Mind and the vital role it plays in the winter blues.

It’s not winter that’s the problem – it’s the stories we tell ourselves about it.

When it comes to dealing with the winter blues, your Monkey Mind (the chattering bit that runs a commentary on every aspect of your life) can be your worst enemy. It can take a cold breeze and turn it into a gale. It can take a few spots of rain and turn them into a downpour. It can take a few flakes of snow and turn them into a blizzard.

But your Monkey Mind can also be your best friend, when you know how to handle it.

Want to find out how?

Want to discover How To Beat The Winter Blues? Join this online course today and you can start changing your life in the next five minutes.

Want to join in with this course? Upgrade to discover How To Beat The Winter Blues today.

How To Beat The Winter Blues – Week 2 – Essential Strategies For Revitalising A Sluggish Winter Body – and keeping your energy levels where they need to be.

Inspirational Messages

Welcome to week 2 of How To Beat The Winter Blues!

How did you get on with last week’s techniques, of figuring out how you ‘do’ the winter blues – and what you want instead? I’d love to hear how you’re getting on, over at the forum.

This week we’re moving on to a really important topic for the winter blues – how to revitalise yourself, so you don’t end up feeling sluggish and exhausted all winter – that would be a sure-fire recipe for the blues!

And I’m bringing you a 5-step strategy, to help you keep your energy levels high, throughout the winter.

Interested?

But before I dive in and talk about how to keep your energy levels where they need to be, I want to let you in on a perhaps obvious secret, but one which most of us forget in our modern, hectic lifestyle:

Want to discover How To Beat The Winter Blues? Join this online course today and you can start changing your life in the next five minutes.

Want to join in with this course? Upgrade to discover How To Beat The Winter Blues today.

How To Magically Make More Time – In Under A Minute

featured, Inspirational Messages

How often do we spend our time fretting about not having enough time? It seems to fly by. And the more stressed we are, the faster it goes.

In our fast-paced society, there’s a common thread in most of our lives – we don’t have enough time.

Most of us would love to find more time – for the things we have to do – and for the things we’d rather do.

I’d like to share with you a near-magic-wand for creating more time in your day.

Interested?

No, it’s not a time machine. You don’t have to give up eating or sleeping. And it’s completely legal! 😉

It’s a single gratitude phrase – a mantra – that you can choose to say, with mindfulness. And its effects can feel miraculous.

But before I dive in and share the technique with you, first I’d like to share a secret about how time runs away so easily – and why time feels so different, when we’re having fun or doing something we hate:

The way we feel about time is determined by the stories we tell ourselves about it.

And the stories we tell ourselves about time dictate how much of it we have.

When we’re hiding away in the realms of the Monkey Mind and its stories of stress, time is a scarce resource over which we have no control. We run the mantra, “I don’t have enough time.” And we prove ourselves right. In fact:

Whether you think you have enough time or you think you don’t, you’re right.

Time is largely a matter of perception. When we convince ourselves that we don’t have enough time, we trigger the body’s sympathetic nervous system’s ‘fight or flight’ stress responses, setting off chemical reactions that pump you full of adrenalin and other stress hormones. These shift your thinking to the primal part of the brain, responsible for life-or-death short-term decision making, meaning it’s harder for you to concentrate and you will get less done.

It’s as though getting stressed about time steals time form you. Yes, sometimes we don’t have enough time. But mindfulness can help you to make the most of the time you have.

We all have the same number of minutes in a day. And, within reason, we have a huge amount of choice over how we spend them. The whole concept of ‘have to’ and ‘not enough time’ is a story concocted by the good old Monkey Mind, based on the diet we have fed it over the decades.

So how can you magically create the feeling of having more time?

By being grateful for the time you have.

Giving gratitude for the time you have lets go of the Monkey Mind’s stress-stories and helps time to expand. So if you feel rushed and need more time, here’s what you can do:

Could This Be The Solution To Not Having Enough Time?

Take three mindful breaths, breathing in through your nose and breathing out with an ‘ahhh’ sound, as you relax, release tension and come back to this present moment.

Allow yourself to settle in your body, rebalancing the body’s stress and relaxation systems for a few moments.

Now allow yourself to experience the effects of the mantra:
I am grateful for the time I have.

Consciously choose to focus, mindfully, on feeling grateful for the time you have. Notice the shift – you’ll feel it in your body and mind.

After all, this moment is all the time we’re ever going to get, so why on earth waste even a moment of it by feeling grumpy about it?

I invite you play with this technique for a few days and notice what happens!

I’m curious: What are your ‘time stories’?

Did this gratitude technique bring anything up for you?
Any resistance?
Any insights from using it? Any questions?

Feel free to share, via the comments box, below. Thanks!

Namaste,

P.S. This technique is based on one from my book Gratitude: A Daily Journal. If you’d like to discover how a few minutes a day of gratitude can transform your life in just a couple of weeks, then it’s worth checking it out!

And if you’d like to experience how mindfulness can help you to cut your stress levels, in under sixty seconds, then you might enjoy 52 Mindful Moments.

What To Do When You Say The Wrong Thing – How To ‘SAM’ Your Way Back To Peace Of Mind

How To Change Your Life

Ever done a ‘Boris’? Put your foot in it? Said the wrong thing? Here’s how to ‘SAM’ your way back to peace of mind.

“I may have small feet, but they’re a great fit in my mouth.“

How many times have we done it?

We all know that sinking feeling, as we realise we’ve said the wrong thing – really “put our foot in it”. And as for how we feel afterwards…

You know the kind of conversation.

For example:

Talking to a work colleague in a hotel at a conference, you comment that it would be a great place to bring a family for a holiday. “As I told you yesterday, my wife and kids left me last month.”

In a bar, chatting with friends, you complain – again – about having to get up at 6 to go to work. “Actually, five of my team are being made redundant this week and I have to tell them the news tomorrow.”

Bumping into a friend you haven’t seen for a while, you ask her when the baby is due. “What do you mean? I’m not pregnant!“

Whether we say the wrong thing on a major scale or it’s just a minor slip-up, it’s easy to do. Sometimes it’s because something has happened to the other person that we couldn’t possibly know about. Sometimes it’s because we’re not concentrating on what they’re saying. Sometimes it’s just ‘bad luck’.

Whatever the reason, we want to cringe and disappear, full of embarrassment and even guilt. It can lead to us avoiding the other person – who hasn’t even done anything wrong. This can leave them feeling potentially confused and hurt.

How You Could Handle It Differently

At the time:

S – A – M

Stop
Stop talking. Even if you’re mid-sentence.

Admit
Admit your mistake. “I put my foot in it. I didn’t mean to offend…” You’ll know the words that work for you.

Move On
Move on. You’ve apologised. It was an accident. It’s up to them how they choose to respond and you dwelling on it will only make things worse.

After the event:

If it’s appropriate, go back and do S-A-M.
If not, then do it in your head! Run a conversation with the other person where you say sorry and ask them to forgive you. Then move on. It doesn’t matter that the conversation didn’t really take place, it will still help.
Learn from it, so you don’t repeat history. Then let it go. There’s no point in holding onto guilt and embarrassment. It doesn’t help anybody.
Most importantly: don’t go around telling everyone about it… Yes, it makes a great story, but that just leaves you stuck where you are. And if the other person hears the story through the grapevine, you’ll be causing them that pain, all over again, not to mention damaging your relationship with them.

Bottom Line: If you want to feel happier in life, it’s important to learn from mistakes and then let go of them. Saying sorry goes a long way towards making things better, but forgiving yourself – letting yourself off the hook – is an essential step towards feeling happier, too.

Need to go a bit deeper?

If, after trying S-A-M you find you’re still telling yourself (or others! ;-)) stories about what happened and how awful it was – and what a terrible person that makes you – then you need drastic measures!

We’re talking Mindfulness!

If you find yourself stuck in the ‘beat yourself up’ mode of thinking, after you have put your foot in it, then it’s vital to learn more about techniques like mindfulness, which can help you to:

train yourself to let go of thoughts that cause you pain
take back control of your Monkey Mind
come back to living in the present moment, rather than stressing about the past or worrying about the future
let go of old stories, hurts, stresses and worries
smile more!

For a micro-mindfulness fix for this problem, how about trying out this exercise – it only takes a moment:

Mindfulness – For when you have put your foot in it!

As you spot your mind replaying the “I can’t believe I said that!” story (again!), pause for a moment and move your focus to your breathing.
As you breathe in, say to yourself: “I accept what happened.”
As you breathe out, say to yourself: “I release what happened.”
Keep going – gently watching your breathing, until you feel a sense of relief.
Smile. It’s ok.

How did that feel? Did you notice the shift, as you let go?

If you’d like to discover more about how mindfulness can change your life – in under 60 seconds – then you might enjoy the easy-to-learn, quick-to-use life-changing techniques in my best-selling book: 52 Mindful Moments. No pressure – it’s just that it could be what you’re looking for, right now.

I’d love to hear how you get on with this technique – and how it helps you, especially if you use it to heal and let go of an old situation when you put your foot in it. Please feel free to share, via the comments box, below!

Namaste,

Is It Time To Banish The Winter Blues? Here’s A 7 Step Strategy To Get You Started.

How To Change Your Life

You don’t need to be suffering from full-blown Seasonal Affective Disorder to feel generally down, low on energy and warmth in winter time. Yet the winter blues are a fact of life, for millions of people. Want a fail-safe 7 step strategy to help you set yourself free from the winter blues this year?
[Read more…] about Is It Time To Banish The Winter Blues? Here’s A 7 Step Strategy To Get You Started.