Mindfulness for the perpetually stressed



If there ever was a woman who needed mindfulness I would be her. I am a big ball of stress, sugar and coffee most of the time and the rest of the time I run on stress alone. For those of you not familiar with mindfulness, its not a new concept. Eckhart Tolle is quite well known in spiritual circles for bring the idea to light with his Power of Now and its quite straightforward. It's about living in the moment and actually enjoying and experiencing things as they happen. I am not very good at this. I frequently find myself driving somewhere and realise I have missed a good chunk of the journey. This is probably because I know the route well enough that I am driving on automatic but this is worrying both from a mental and safety point of view. I eat much too fast. Often I don't quite taste the food. As you can imagine this plays havoc on my digestive system as well as meaning I often eat more than I intended at any one sitting. Just recently I ate a sour dough sandwich so fast I blocked my airway and started choking on it. Pretty scary stuff but luckily I pulled through and even finished my sandwich. I know I should eat slower and not read or watch shows while I eat but quite frankly I get very bored just eating. I once decided to try really slowing down my eating and started running a timer so I could leave a decent pause between each mouthful but my food got very cold and I got bored of it before I could change my eating habits forever. 

 Logically I know if I keep going at this pace I'll wear myself out and I did actually read the Power Of Now nodding along because even though he sounds like Gollum (from Lord of the rings) Eckhart Tolle is a smart man and there's a lot to be said for his way of thinking. I found that implementing his thinking into my everyday life a little more difficult however. I am often so busy worrying about things coming up or fretting things that have already happened that I forget to enjoy what I am doing in that moment in time. I am working on changing that and sorry to my parents but meditation never really took off for me. I could not still my mind long enough to actually relax so I found all it did was give me more mental space to worry about my life. I do have lots of lovely relaxing tea which is nice and all but obviously there's more to my plan than that. I have dug out my adult colouring book I received last year and I have been colouring up a storm. In fact when I showed my parents some of my handiwork they said wow you must have been really stressed ( I was !) and I even treated myself to a lovely pack of colouring pencils for my mini mindfulness colouring book so I can start bringing it with me. As well as that I have Crossfit which some days feels like the only thing keeping me sane. The great thing about it aside from all the endorphins is that when you are just trying to finish the workout or get the next rep it really doesn't leave a whole lot of mental space for everything else. The moment is the only place you can be. So I'll keep on going with that and will get through the holiday season a happier, calmer person unless I run out of things to colour. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The darker side of romance

Image
  For some reason I felt compelled to write about a corner of my past that hasn't been part of my blog before. a heads up to anyone who might be upset by this topic I will be delving into emotional abuse so feel free to stop reading now if you don't feel able to carry on. When I was in my late 20's I met a guy on a night out. He was a few years younger than me and honestly looking back threw up a couple of red flags early but I didn't trust my own intuition plus I was only a few months away from finishing college and planned to move to Edinburgh in a few months so it wasn't like it was going to be anything more than a brief fling. However as time went on I became more infatuated with him, there was an intensity there and he seemed sweet but damaged. Like a perfect modern fairytale I thought I would be the one to fix him. somehow plans changed and he was going to follow me over to Edinburgh, get a job there and we were going to live happily ever after. at this point
Read more

Help, I think I'm autistic

Image
 So I, at the age of 41, have come to the realization that I am autistic.  Growing up I always had a feeling something about me was a little bit off. I never quite fit in and I wasn't sure why. It was like everyone had been given a book of rules of how to exist in society but no one had thought to hand me a copy. Looking back with hindsight the signs were there. I was a super sensitive kid, a sensitivity I have not lost in adulthood, I cried very easily and felt every emotion very deeply. I was a picky eater and very particular about the textures of different food. I was very sensitive to light and noise and the feel of different fabrics. I was never a hugger. all of these things are as true about me now as they were when I was younger. I am socially awkward, I don't make friends that easily and will joke I am an acquired taste. Eye contact is something I have to actively work on and small talk feels like torture.  I thrive on alone time, I am incredibly sensitive to the moods
Read more

Sometimes I open my mouth and my mother comes out ..

Image
I have been told on more than one occasion that I'm sarcastic. Often that I'm too sarcastic (as though there could be such a thing) and I have retort up my sleeve for such occasions which is if you think I'm sarcastic you should meet my mother. No, really you should because my sarcasm is but a pale imitation of hers. Every so often though I come out without something that makes my friends or other family members pause because sometimes when I open my mouth, my mother comes out.  It's funny how people always take the words you are turning into your mother as such an insult because the reality of the matter is it's a both a good and bad thing. Obviously there are certain qualities I am perfectly happy to emulate and others not so much and on the whole I am not entirely sure how much control I have over it. It's not quite a pick and mix counter here. I think there are some habits you are not even aware you have picked up until someone else kindly points it out.
Read more