Newsletter 10

Good morning,

Hope you are having a nice week and enjoying the sunshine again.

Its mental health week so here’s my thoughts and some practical tips.

Learning how to be resilient during these difficult times is of primary importance for your physical, emotional, and mental health. If you simply try to hang on, to hold your breath until the coast is clear; until it’s safe again to go out, you may experience greater upset, tension and stress, and possibly miss an opportunity for growth.

The pandemic is here, and the difficult conditions are included in the deal. The more you are able to experience this as part of your life journey, as a challenge to embrace, the more you will learn and grow from this experience.

The more you will learn the depth of your courage, your “grit”, and your strength. But it’s not just how much strength you have. Your courageous approach to this worldwide crisis, to how you show up for family, friends and colleagues will result in growing your strength, and your capacity for coping.  Your positive framing and mind set will result in your own personal development, and self-confidence beyond its current limits. 

Some of you are very tuned in to how this crisis is triggering your emotions. You notice the anxiety and worry. You feel the tension in your body. You know that your difficulty with sleep is due to current uncertainty. Some of you however, may cope by disregarding how you are being impacted, not noticing the signs of being emotionally burdened. Many of us try to distract ourselves from these emotions because we don’t think we can do anything about them. If we can’t change the outside world, we can’t change our inside world!

The good news is that – not only must we address our emotional state – but this is possible to do even though the crisis is ongoing. Your emotions are your responsibility; to notice, feel, express and then release and let go. If you allow them to build up, they will become distractions, and worse, they will make you more sensitive to over reacting and more likely to become either anxious or depressed.  

Give yourself time to sit and identify what you are feeling, recognising that feelings are not right or wrong. Find a way to express these feelings and then decide to let them go – at least for the moment. Tomorrow you might experience similar feelings. Pay attention to them and give yourself another opportunity to release them. By staying current with your feelings, you will be more resilient and better able to cope with this crisis.

Practical things to do to support your mental health

Keep a Routine

Routine often falls by the wayside as soon as we are outside our normal constraints. It may surprise you that despite our desire to be totally free and easy, our body and our mind often prefers regularity. This is because a routine means that we don’t have to constantly make decisions that cost us valuable time and energy.

It helps to get things done, which gives us that little boost that makes us happy. Good routines are going to bed and waking up at a reasonable time, planning your day out and then following it.

Physical Activity

Physical movement stops our brain from shrinking and therefore keeps you smart!  Take at least a ½ hour’s walk twice a day in a green space, if you can. Being outside will give you a range of other stimulus which your brain craves.  There is evidence that when we are outward focused, we become happier and are less likely to be self-absorbed and therefore less likely to find fault with ourselves and others. Plus, the fresh air gives you an oxygen boost especially now that there is very little traffic.  If you can’t get out because you are self-isolating then try to join in on exercise or activity classes online, as dancing, free-movement, etc.

Connect with People

Essentially, we are social beings and therefore by increasing social connections we are able to destress. It also helps us recognise that we are all in the same boat and this gives us a feeling of collective support. Try to organise set times to reconnect regularly with friends and relatives and especially give more time for children to do this using various social media. It may be better to use the Social Media platforms such as Skype, Zoom, Messenger, etc., so that you can see the person you are talking to. This gives us at least two points of sensory connection, as isolation can result in diminishing our sensory stimulus, which is helpful in making us feel connected.

Boundaries

This will be different for everyone, as generally the younger the person is, the less space they need away from others. Most of us cannot have constant high impact sensory stimulus, we need down time and just having time for sleep is not enough. We need a space where we can retreat, rest and regroup. If you haven’t already done this, organise a family discussion and create a schedule and if possible – within reason, get agreement by all family members.

Make sure that the times and place where the person will be, is listed and put the schedule up somewhere prominent, where every member of the family can be aware of these agreements. Often what happens in most families, we enmesh with each other boundaries and this can make it difficult when you want your space. Creating a boundary not only engenders respect, but it allows for people to develop skills in self-soothing. 

Give Grace

This is about giving people benefit of the doubt. Tolerance levels greatly diminish and tempers can often rise, when we are stressed and being cooped up for long periods.

Try to stop, take a breath and then count to 3 before you respond to something that is causing you to get angry, upset, hurt, scared, etc. These are feelings that are often not actually about the person that is in front of you, rather than what they are doing is reminding you of some aspect of your past. So be kind to yourself – you and they are human and this is not an ordinary situation – you are all just doing the best that you can, given the circumstance.

Instead you can get to learn a little more about the feeling so that you can change your old story by:

Naming the feeling – research shows that simply doing this alone reduces negative feeling

Then ask yourself what is the meaning I am giving to this i.e. they don’t care about me, I am not important enough, etc.

Recognise that this is an old story – it isn’t true

Acceptance

Lower your expectations of how you need to be and accept that you are imperfectly perfect. You are always a work in progress. Uncertainty will always generate anxiety and fear and in some cases distress. The crazy thing is, we are designed for change neurologically, but stability and growth requires that we build the frameworks of the structures we are in. It is like two part of ourselves are at loggerheads.

How we manage that is to accept and see ourselves as simply doing the best that we can and don’t get it right. It is good to remember that there is no perfect road map for the journey we are on at the moment.

Be thankful

Find three things that you are thankful for everyday and write it down. It doesn’t have to be a big thing. It could simply be something like; thanking your body for doing such a good job at keeping you safe, or that you are not alone, there is enough food, etc.

Just above our heart is our Thymus gland which is involved with immune system. When we are grateful it tells our body that we are safe and we can go back to normal functioning. 

This Too Will Pass

 Try to keep in mind our situation is temporary. When we are in the midst of a crisis, it can seem never ending but the truth is, it will end – just like the sun comes up everyday life will continue. To help set about doing a combination of short- and long-term projects.

A nice recipe for you to try

Fruit Crumble

Ingredients

• 6 cups of mixed berries (raspberries, blueberries, strawberries)
• 1 small lemon, freshly squeezed
• 1 tbsp arrowroot powder
• ½ cup coconut flour
• ½ cup shredded coconut
• ¼ cup coconut oil
• 2 tbsp maple syrup
• Cinnamon
• Sea salt

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 350°
2. In a cast iron skillet or baking dish, toss berries, lemon juice, arrowroot powder and 1 tbsp of maple syrup until the fruit is coated. Smooth the filling into an even layer
3. In a mixing bowl, combine the coconut flour, shredded coconut, coconut oil, 1 tbsp of maple syrup, a sprinkle of cinnamon and a pinch of sea salt. Mix with a fork until crumbly
4. Poor crumble mixture over the fruit filling
5. Bake for 30 minutes or until the topping is golden brown

Enjoy and wishing you a relaxing bank holiday weekend

Emma