Inner Balance: Time for Yourself 30 July 2019 Bliss Team No comments Categories: Fitness, Guest Post, Inspiration, Life Coaching, Self Care Finding time for yourself is something we all struggle with, but it’s essential for peace of mind and mental wellbeing. If you want to know how those zen-like friends of yours do it, all you have to do is take a look at how they spend those precious few hours of spare time they get each week. It can be tempting to just pull out Facebook and see what everyone’s up to, but all that does is set your mind racing as you inundate yourself with information. Take a look at the following wise words and you’ll be able to enjoy every second of life as you restore your inner balance. Take Some Time to Just Sit and Listen to the Birds There’s a lot to be said for embracing boredom and leaving your phone in your pocket, so why not give it a try? It’s something we could all do with doing a little more often, and it’s a great way to start your day. Taking the time to make yourself a cup of coffee and sit outside in the garden is the ideal quiet start to what will likely prove to be a hectic day. It’s a chance to ground yourself, to relax, and to take in the simple things in life. If you do it every day for a week, it’ll become a key part of your daily routine that you can’t do without. Head to a Clinic for a Pampering Session Cosmetic clinics are the place to go to if you want to really pamper yourself. By having an expert use their skills to soothe your body and put your mind at ease you can get the best of both worlds. Ideal if you want to feel refreshed the moment you wake up the next morning. It’s also a great way to spend some time with the best friend you’ve been meaning to catch up with for ages now. Get together for some coffee beforehand, and then show each other the results of your latest beauty session. It won’t just help you love the way you look, it’ll also make you feel at home in your own skin as you centre yourself. Take a Walk Late in the Evening The evenings aren’t solely devoted to TV and social media if you don’t want them to be. Taking the dog for a walk as the sun goes down is a great way to let your hair down and enjoy one of the simple things in life. It’s a chance to get plenty of fresh air before bed, and the break from screens will give your eyes a chance to rest. Some people even leave their phone at home so they can totally disconnect for an hour so. Binge Watch Your Favourite Shows Despite what we just said in the last point, binge watching is one of the most fun ways to rest and relax. It allows you to immerse yourself in a whole new universe of entertainment, and to lose yourself in a story. If you find a series you’re hooked on, keep watching it. There’s nothing better than getting into a plot and picking out your favourite characters. Find a friend who’s watching the same show and you’ll have something to chat about when you meet up next week. Join the Gym and Take Pride in Your Fitness Joining the gym is a great way to restore your inner balance, and it’s easier to do than you might think. If you’re new to exercise it can feel intimidating going to a muscle bound gym, so why not go with a friend? You could avoid the peak hours straight after work, and go on the weekend morning for a little while as you build your confidence. One thing is for sure, once you start going and you see some gains, you’ll be hooked. It’ll give you confidence, balance, and something to focus on. Start Baking Healthy Sweet Treats Baking is a great mindful activity that will have you feeling at ease in no time at all. Pick a recipe you’ve been meaning to try, walk to the shop, and then get busy rustling up something amazing. It doesn’t even matter if you don’t nail it the first time — the key point is that you’ve got yourself moving and thinking about something new. Just by working with your hands you’ll be stimulating new parts of your brain that you don’t necessarily use during work hours. Take your pick from the options above, think about how you can fit them into your daily routine, and then dive in feet first. It might sound easier said than done, but when you make a start you’ll find you really don’t want to stop. It’ll certainly be worth it when you wake up relaxed and refreshed every single morning. About the Author: Rebecca is a translator by day, and a traveler mostly at night. She is an expert on living with jet lag – and packing in tiny suitcases. You can read more of her exploits at RoughDraft.
3 Ways to Do Meditation: When You Feel Stress 18 June 2019 Bliss Team No comments Categories: Guest Post, Self Care Are you someone who feels stressed out a lot? Then you are not alone. The world is a stressful place, and it can often have a major impact on the way that we live our lives. We often find that our lives are pressure-filled and stressful to the point where it can make it quite hard for us to do things as we would normally have intended. When you feel stressed, though, you can find it hard to get a solution. Some of us put our stress down to our diets and lifestyles, so we change how we eat and drink. We do what we can to stay hydrated, and we stop eating so many foods high in fats, sugars, and salts. However, when you feel like you aren’t making any progress through conventional lifestyle means, you might want to take a look at getting into a bout of meditation. One of the main issues that we find with meditation is that many people do not appreciate just how powerful it is as a source of mental wellness. Our mind is often the biggest barrier that we need to overcome if we wish to live our happiest, healthiest quality of life. Mediation has been shown to have a serious impact on that: the bottom line is that meditation is great for both physical and mental rejuvenation. Sound like a common problem? Then you should definitely look to the following three ways to do meditation. Alongside making other lifestyle changes like staying hydrated, cutting down on work hours, and being more productive in the hours we do work, the following forms of meditation are almost certain to help you live your happiest, healthiest life. So, what matters when you wish to take on meditation? How can various forms of meditation help with stress? 1. Focus with Concentrative Meditation Probably the best form of meditation to start with when you just need to find a focus is to start with some concentrative meditation. This means taking a single object, sound, mantra, whatever, and focusing on that entirely. Turning your thoughts to that entirely. For example, do you have holiday time coming up and you know you just need to get through the next 2-3 weeks to get there? Then focus your mind on the beach where you are going to be staying. Think about the location, the sights, the sounds, the soothing of the sand on your skin. It gives you an immense sense of focus when you have something so specific to concentrate on. A bit of focus and visualization can go a long, long way to making sure you can stay entirely focused on the task and journey at hand. Get used to doing that, and before long you will be in a much better place with regards to the quality and intensity of your ability to remain focused on the task at hand. 2. Rhythmic Movement and Mindful Exercise Another good place to start with meditation is with some exercise mixed in with the meditation itself. While most of us don’t imagine going for a run, a swim, or a cycling session can be particularly calming for the mind, it can be very good for us in some ways. We recommend that you find an exercise that you can do with repetition: for example, riding a bicycle on a stationary surface will ensure that you can rest, relax, and get into your own frame of thinking whilst working the body at the same time. Like many of us, though, you might find that you try to problem solve when you are working out. Instead, let yourself enjoy the repetition of the physical movement whilst letting your mind get a bit of a rest as well. Instead of thinking about what you will do in work tomorrow, think about all the things happening around you. Think about the feeling of your feet on the pedals, the picking up of the pace of your breathing, the way that your body adjusts and adapts to match and re-balance yourself. Exercise becomes more soothing when we just let ourselves think of the feelings that the exercise creates in the first place. When you try to exercise and do a bit of life organizing all at once, you will be very much likely to find it hard to make enough of a difference. Instead, concentrate on the repetitive movement and the feelings those movements create nothing else. Before long, your workouts will produce both mental relaxation and physical improvement! 3. Muscle Relaxation Lastly, one of the best ways to use meditation is to help make your muscles feel a bit more relaxed. Do you ever feel as if all of your muscles are tight and tense? That you cannot get any kind of relaxation in the arms and legs? Then you should look to try out using mediation to help with this. To do so, start working on each of the muscles that you feel needs help by simply tensing them up. Honestly, just try it! Tensing up a muscle – holding it as tense as you can, while taking in slow, deep breaths – is excellent for then relaxing the muscle. Our body will start to immediately let a tense muscle relax, and you will feel an immediate sense of relief and comfort as soon as you do so. By simply relaxing the muscles after tensing them up until the count of 10, you can start to feel a sense of total relief in a previously distressed muscle. Do this with one foot, then the other, then move up the body until you have tensed just about every muscle group that you can. About the Author: Jessica Max is the community manager at hydration calculator. She is a fitness writer. She uses her training to help other women struggling to get fit in mid-life. When not working, Jessica enjoys cycling and swimming.
Conquering Self-Doubt 3 June 2019 Bliss Team No comments Categories: Individual Therapy, Inspiration, Self Care, Therapy Self-doubt is that awful voice in our head that tells us we can’t do something, that we won’t be successful, or that we will fail. Self-doubt is something that builds over time, maybe it developed from a chaotic childhood, a parent we couldn’t please, a time we failed at something, a relationship that didn’t work out, a rejection from a job, or even a person or loved one. Most of us deal with a form of self-doubt at some point in our lives. It is amazing to me how quickly our brains can automatically turn to doubt. These automatic thoughts often leave us stuck and holding ourselves back from achieving goals, when we should be taking risks in either our jobs or relationships and enjoying a fulfilling life. So what do we do to conquer self-doubt? The process itself isn’t an easy one, but can be very rewarding if you are able to consciously make an effort to combat it. Here are some tips to help you conquer your own self doubt 1. Recognize it exists – recognition is the impetus for any change. We can’t change what we don’t acknowledge. When self-doubt rears its ugly head, pay attention to it. Acknowledge that it’s there, but work toward identifying that these negative thoughts aren’t facts. 2. Challenge the thought – if you went on a date with someone and they didn’t call you back, is your first assumption that the rejection was because of you? What if the person’s mother fell ill? Or their ex-partner contacted them and wanted to reconcile and give the relationship another chance. What if you got rejected for a job? Not because you weren’t qualified but because the company decided to take a different route due to budget cuts. There are many explanations that have absolutely no connection to you or your worth. 3. If your doubt is related to past mistakes, then acknowledge them, but remind yourself that the past is in the past. If we attempted something in the past and weren’t successful, it doesn’t mean that we won’t be successful now. We have grown since then, we have looked back on what didn’t work, and we have experienced some new learning since then. Instead of looming in your doubt, remind yourself of the things you did to overcome the failure from the past. 4. Think of some positive thoughts. Instead of looking at only what could go wrong, ask yourself what could go right. Give yourself some positive messages. Why are the negative ones the only ones you are allowing in? 5. DO NOT COMPARE. In the age of social media this is an important one. You have no idea what is happening in someone else’s life, they may have a great partner but hate their job, or may be dealing with a sick child or ailing parents. 6. Remember that we aren’t only our failures, we are also our successes. If you weren’t successful at something reflect on what you would do differently the next time. For example, if you don’t feel you did well at a job interview, how might you go about it differently next time. Could you practice with someone? Do more research about the position? Self doubt exists in all of us, maybe at different times and for different reasons, but all of us have it. The key is to work towards combating the things that are holding us back or keeping us stuck and causing us to beat ourselves up. If you continue to struggle, it may be best to speak with a therapist. They can provide you with additional tools to help you overcome self-doubt. Written by Bliss therapist Tammy Benwell. Learn more about Tammy and get her secret “Tips From the Couch” here. If you liked this article on self-doubt, you might enjoy these too: What Does it Mean to be Authentic? Others Will Treat You the Way You Let Them – 3 Keys to Boundary Setting Why we Need to Stop “Agreeing to Disagree” Are you ready to speak with a therapist about some of the self-doubt you’ve been experiencing? We’re happy to help! Get in touch with us here. If you’re interested in booking your first appointment at Bliss, you can do that here.
Stop the Worry Trance and Simplify Your Choices 5 March 2019 Bliss Team No comments Categories: Individual Therapy, Inspiration, Self Care, Therapy I’m currently renovating my living room and wanted to paint the walls a shade of white. There are almost 100 different shades of white. I felt overwhelmed while at the paint store, I wanted to choose a colour that would make the living room lighter and brighter. I decided to pick “pebble white”, but questioned whether I had made the best decision or not. You may not be experiencing a paint dilemma right now, but perhaps you have had to make a choice related to your health, school, parenting, finances, relationships, work, travelling or planning an event recently that resulted in anxious feelings. Research is showing that more choices are leading to increased accounts of self-blame and depression. The happiness equation by Neil Pasricha describes that, “We are exhausted by making decisions. We want to go to the movie theatre with the most movies playing, we like the restaurants with the long menu. Having more choice reduces our happiness. We get decision fatigue. We avoid the decision or we make a bad decision and we always worry we made the wrong choice.” I really started to understand choice fatigue after travelling to India. I travelled to the Himalayans and stayed at an Ashram. I used the same plate and spoon at every meal. I had a bucket of water to wash my clothes at the end of the day. I wore the same clothing almost every day. It was a cultural adjustment at first, however I enjoyed the simplicity of it, which created more clarity and focus. There is a reason why Steve Jobs wore a black t-shirt every day, and the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, also embraces a simple clothing style. Simplifying your clothing choices at the start of your day gives you more brainpower for other decisions. Researchers at Columbia University discovered a striking pattern while looking at the verdicts reached by judges in the Israeli court system. Prisoners that were seen in the morning for charges of fraud and assault received parole 65% of the time. Prisoners who appeared late in the day for similar cases received parole less then 10% of the time. There were other common variables noticed in the study, if the judge had taken a lunch break, the cases after the break-received parole 60% of the time. Each choice you make depletes your energy. As you become more fatigued, you’re more likely to make decisions with less clarity. If you’re curious about other choice fatigue research studies, then you may want to read the book Willpower by Roy Raumeister and John Tierney. There is a Ted Talk on the paradox of choice by Barry Schwartz, which describes that choices can produce paralysis instead of liberation. I didn’t fully understand this until my experience in a third world country. When I was staying in India there was only one store in walking distance. At the store there was only one face wash to choose from, you were lucky to find a roll of toilet paper, and only one cold beverage was available – coconut water. Unlike the corner stores here in North America, where we are inundated with 100 different drink options, having only one choice made the selection process very easy. This saved me time, mental exhaustion, and overall I appreciated every drop of that delicious cold coconut water. Having an abundance of choices can lead to depression. When you enter a grocery store and have over 100 different drink options, you can feel paralyzed over what choice to make. Once that choice is finally made, then you may even start to ponder if a different choice would have been better, which can lead to self-blame and depression. So, what can you do to combat the choice fatigue that leaves you exhausted day after day? Below are seven daily tips to create more brainpower! 1. Eating the same thing every day. I enjoy eating oatmeal every day, and when I start to get bored I spice it up with some cinnamon, almond milk and apples! 2. Wearing the same thing. I choose to wear solid colours, and will wear the same cozy clothes each week, rotating approximately 30 items. 3. Embrace daily routines. I enjoy making myself a schedule for the next day the night before. I will plan out a yoga class to attend in the morning, make a grocery list and will meal plan every Monday. I make one soup every week, and will make an abundant amount to take to work with me each day for the week. 4. Limit choices. Fewer choices lead to more time for other things. Reserve your energy for time that matters. I enjoy attending a yoga class before going to work. The yoga instructor creates the flow and instructs me to move from pose to pose. I feel energized when I leave and have more focus and clarity for other decisions during my day. 5. Single-tasking. Schedule time each day to check your email and provide a response. I check my email twice a day, once at 7am and again at the end of the day. I allocate a 30-minute window to go though my email and provide a response. I keep this time distraction free so I can focus on each person to provide the best response. 6. Focus on your intention instead of the outcome. When I injured my IT Band, I had difficulty walking for almost two months. I really wanted my leg to heal so that I could be pain free and move about my day easily. I felt disappointed and sad that it wasn’t healing faster. I had stopped my yoga practice and started float therapy. In order to address the disappointment that I was experiencing, I changed my mindset. Instead of focusing on the outcome I focused on my intention, which was to relieve stress and sooth my pain. Once I became intention focused, I valued and enjoyed the experience of float therapy much more. I stopped focusing on the outcome and enjoyed being in the moment, floating on water like a frog lounging on a lily pad. 7. Trust your intuition! Recently during my home renovations, I was debating whether or not I should keep the popcorn ceiling in my living room. I made a poll on Instagram to see what others thought, but before looking at the results I had already made the decision to embrace the popcorn ceiling. Many people voted not to keep the popcorn ceiling, which made me ponder whether or not I was making the right choice. In the end, I stayed true to my decision to embrace the popcorn ceiling because it not only saved me time and money, but also added character to my living room. Have faith in the decisions you make and trust your gut! “May your choices reflect your hopes not your fears.” – Nelson Mandela Written by Bliss therapist Stacey Harris. Learn more about Stacey and get her secret “Tips From the Couch” here!