All posts by Karen

Tool Kit for Keeping Spirits Up

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As humans, uncertainty is something we don’t really like. And we’re current all experiencing the biggest period of uncertainty in our history.

Uncertainty is contagious, fueling anxiety in many of us. We try to pay attention to every opinion or scenario, ending up feeling overwhelmed. And that’s because uncertainty triggers the fear part of our brains.

Fear is a normal human emotion. Our brain has developed considerably over millions of years. The earlier part allowed us to sense threat from tigers and mammoths, so that we could protect ourselves and survive. It looks for any threat so that we can fight, run away or freeze. As we advanced, our brains developed the ability to plan, become aware of ourselves, be creative. The problem was it also gave us the ability to worry, to think negatively (about life and ourselves) and become anxious about the future.

But there’s also a positive, in that we can learn to take back control, once we become aware of the emotions that we’re experiencing. We are responsible for our own thinking and our own behaviours – not matter how much we might try and blame others or the situations we’re in. The situation may be out of our control, but how we react to it is.

Our emotions are great signals for us to become aware of and be curious about. They hold useful messages. We don’t “have to” be positive all the time, or beat ourselves up if we feel negative from time to time. Give yourself a break, as it’s OK to not be OK for a while.

However, staying in a negative state can adversely affect your mental and physical health in the long run. While fear helps us survive, when mixed with emotions around uncertainty, it can lead to something bad for our health: anxiety.

When we are in a negative emotional state like anxiety, we move into Fight, Flight or Freeze. When we’re in this mode, we also tend to see more negatives and this ends up spiralling out of control. (This is bad… and this happened…. and then this …. and then this etc).

And when we worry, our worries can seem huge. We think if we worry about something, we’re more prepared. But actually the opposite is true. If we stay in this “survival” mode for long it can increase feelings of irritability and low mood, impacting our focus, clarity and logical thinking. Who wants to live like this for any length of time?

But we can, and do, get out of this spiral of negativity. We can start to utilize another part of our brain that gets a buzz from seeing positives, can make connections, can be creative and find flexible solutions to our current situations. Not only is this better for your mental health, it also has a better and significant impact on your body’s health too.

So, how do we dial down the negativity and dial up the positivity?

Below are a few suggestions for you to try. You may find one that seems easier for you to do every day, or do a different one each day, or mix and match as you want.

STAY IN THE MOMENT
 When we’re having negative emotions (like anger, sadness, guilt, fear, hurt), we’re thinking about our past. When we’re anxious or worried, we’re thinking about our future. Staying in the moment (in the NOW) helps alleviate these emotions, reducing their power. Stay in the here and now, not too many steps or days ahead. If you start to wander too far, bring your thinking into what is right in front of you in that moment and concentrate on it for a few minutes.

MEDITATION
Meditation is about engaging in a process of thinking that allows thoughts to just come and go. This is a powerful way to bring yourself into NOW. There are apps and videos online that you can use or, for those new to this, you can listen to our recording of a 10 minute meditation.

BREATH
When you’re feeling anxiety, take a breath and allow yourself a few seconds of calm.
• Inhale through your nose for five counts
• Hold your breath for two to four counts
• Exhale slowly through your mouth for seven counts.
• Allow your rib cage to rise and fall without forcing it

SIX POSITIVES
When you start to recognise positives, this signals the brain to find even more of them! They become easier to find. Just like training your body muscles by regularly practicing a technique, you can do the same for your brain. So, every day, write out 6 positive statements about that day. They can be about anything, big or small, but must be positive. For example, a bird singing, a chat with a friend, achieving a new exercise, a delicious cup of coffee, the moon shining, the radio playing your favourite song, the perfect parking spot – the little things that make life enjoyable. Writing them down also gives you something nice to look back on and remember too.

JOURNALLING
If you start to feel overwhelmed, write out your concerns, thoughts and beliefs in a journal. Getting them out of your head and onto the paper stops them going round and round in your mind. Then look at what you’ve written and challenge whether they are real or something that you think “might” happen. If they’re real, can you do anything about it, or is it out of your control? If it’s in your control, what is the one small next step that you can do to help solve it? Just one step at a time.

CONNECTION
Connection is one our biggest human needs, and the current situation is stopping our normal ways of feeling connected to others. Use the various online facilities and those on your phone to talk to friends and family. It’s OK to ask for help and to ask for a chat.

Making more time for phone calls with your friends and family is fantastic, but that leaves a lot of free time either side of those calls. Connection is often about just being with someone, without having to saying anything. This is a challenge with social distancing and isolation. So if you are alone, you could organize a time with a loved one, where you sit down and watch a film, work together, read together etc (but in a different way to normal). Each of you sets up your phone, tablet or laptop, Facetime or one of the video conferencing sites, where you can see the other person. And you can sit quietly together, without having to say anything at all.

Helping others is another form of connection (be that a small gesture, a phone call, giving assistance) – it helps the other person, but you get a dopamine and feel good hit too.

EXERCISE
Rather than being tempted by the chocolate bar, comfort food or glass of wine for a quick “feel good” boost, use exercise to reduce anxiety and stress. Exercising helps to release endorphins which give you a natural high. This helps to relieve the stress you’re feeling, allowing your body to relax and break the “fight or flight” cycle it’s stuck in. Find enjoyable ways to exercise indoors, take a walk round the garden (or other outdoor places, where you can).

LAUGHTER
It’s perfectly OK to laugh – in fact, us humans are very good at finding the funny side of life to get us through the tougher times. You’ll be able to cope better and see worries as less important, if you can start to see the humour around it. Find a fun film or TV show, call friends to share funny stories, play games with the kids etc. Just think, 2020 will also be known for it’s interesting hair styles!

Use Moodshifters, which help you change your mood from negative to positive in an instant. Think of two or three different events in your life that have really made you laugh, giggle, feel extremely happy. Clearly visualize and remember what you saw, heard and felt emotionally. When you need a mood boost, then think of those times and dwell in the good feelings. It really works, as the same “feel good” hormones flow round the body, just like when it originally happened.

Smile – Strange as it may sound, forcing a smile onto your face can often make you feel happy. This is one of the strange ways in which we humans are wired. Try it – you may be surprised!

LISTEN TO MUSIC
Listening to music lifts our spirits. We play our favourite song and a smile spreads across our faces. Find the music that works for you – you can dance around the room to the upbeat ones, or chill to the calming ones. You can always take a photo of you dancing and send it to friends and family – bringing in connection and laughter too!!

CHILL TIME
Take some time every day to do what makes you feel good. This could be a warm bath, massage, walk in the countryside, or reading a book in the sunshine for instance.

MAKE YOUR OWN PLANS
Set some actions or targets for your day or week, write up a planner of the things you want to achieve, list the tasks you want to accomplish that you’ve not had time to do before. Just small actions are required, and they’ll give you a bit of certainty in your life! Remember they’re there for guidance and not something to beat yourself up with.
Keep a sense of normality wherever you can, such as getting up at the same time you usually do, eating at your regular times etc.

BE CREATIVE
Solitude allows creative thoughts to blossom. Research suggests that people are better able to conceive their best ideas alone. How can you use your creativity for your future? You can come up with wonderful new ideas to bring laughter to others, find new ways of helping others etc. Are there new hobbies you’d like to try, courses you’ve always wanted to do, a book to write or an artist inside you just waiting to be let loose on the world??
Your day is yours to make the most of.

PROTECT YOUR OWN ENERGY
Other people can drag you into their dramas or leave you feeling exhausted after talking to them. They’ll want you to agree with their view about how bad things are. But this won’t make you feel better. Protect your energy levels. They are responsible for their minds, you are responsible for yours. So, you can try one of the tools here to bring you back into your own positive state. And if you feel OK you certainly don’t need to feel guilty about it.

KNOW THIS TIME WILL PASS
Nothing stays the same for very long. There will be a time when this will be in the past, albeit having made history! You can still think about plans and dreams for the future.

BELIEVE IN YOURSELF
We are amazing and resilient, adaptable, clever and capable of change for the good. We are unique from other species in that we have the ability to control our behaviour, to train ourselves to be emotionally fit and create an inner strength. Our lives are shaped by the difficult times we’ve gone through and learnt from. We are strong and will find a way through our challenges – we always have, and always will. You’ve done it before, you can do it now.

Stay safe, stay inside. When we work together, we all win.

Breathing Out Stress

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As we breathe approximately 20,000 times a day, inhaling and exhaling about 15 to 20 times a minute, you’d think we’d have it all under control.  But no!!

Think about the last time you were in a stressful situation, made a big mistake, or were asked a question in a meeting you couldn’t answer.  What probably happened was that you held your breath!

Even my hobby causes me issues –  whenever I’m learning a new dance step, I hold my breath as I concentrate.  I get to the end of the routine, exhausted – and then I can start breathing again!  You may have noticed your dance teacher or fitness trainers reminding people to breath!

This “concentration” reflex evolved to keep our bodies still when focusing on a physical task that requires concentration and precision. By slowing or stopping our breathing, we reduce the background movements of our bodies and, hopefully, achieve better accuracy in the execution of our carefully planned action.

Nowadays, stress is often the trigger and can affect our breathing pattern without us even noticing.  Then we start to feel anxious and our emotions feel out of control.

Unconsciously, we have moved into our sympathetic nervous system and, as a consequence, it’s likely that the muscles in our head, neck and shoulders have become tense. Our adrenal glands will have started to produce adrenaline – the ‘fight or flight’ hormone – and cortisol.   At this stage, not only are we likely to get frustrated (fight) or feel like giving up (flight), our ability to be cope with new challenges also shuts down.

This stress reaction can cause many issues.  We want to be able to come up with creative and innovative ways of dealing with our circumstances (like the dance floor, competitors, judges), not have a mind that goes blank.  But we can’t.

A personal coaching client recently identified that when they are feeling confident and a customer asks a difficult question, they take a breath, allow themselves a few seconds of calm, and then they can answer.   Realising this allowed them to use the same technique at other stressful times in their working life.  Something that had been alluding them up to now.

A few seconds of silence can often feel like a lifetime when we’re under pressure to respond.  But it is only a few seconds, and the following technique can help you get back a sense of control.

  • Inhale through your nose for one count
  • Hold your breath for two to four counts
  • Exhale slowly through your mouth for two counts.
  • Allow your stomach to rise and fall without forcing it.

This will eliminate toxins and fully oxygenate your body. It will also start to regulate excess adrenaline and cortisol levels and help you feel calmer.

Next time you’re in a stressful situation, try breathing!  It helps 😊

 

If you’d like to find out more about how coaching can help you with stress, anxiety, self-esteem and confidence, then please contact us for an initial discussion.

Stress or Anxiety: Differences

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Do you know when you are stressed, or could you be anxious instead?  There are vital differences which everyone would benefit from being aware of.  Both are caused by our own thinking and “perceptions”, as in they are experiences we have decided in our own minds are concerning, and in many cases others wouldn’t react the same way.

Finding the right label can be the first step in determining how best to improve the situation. Below are the main differences:

  • Anxiety: panic, apprehensiveness, dry mouth, sweaty palms, performance anxiety, difficulty concentrating, pacing around thinking of what’s causing the anxiety.   Anxiety is caused by increased vigilance in situations that are perceived as threatening, when most people wouldn’t find it threatening.  Some will find ingenious ways to avoid the situations that have made them anxious in the past.
  • Stress: difficulty relaxing, impatient, easily reactive, intolerant of interruption and delay. People feel they have to get on with the task and don’t want people stopping them to ask questions. Many will become over-engaged in tasks as they feel there is no choice, it has to be done, no-one else can do it (and the time available can also feel too short).  Stress also reduces the links to your long term memory functionality, which is not useful for exams etc.

You’ll be surprised though, how many different experiences people have when they are anxious and stressed, and how different they are to your own.  As an experiment, take stock and write a list of your own symptoms of anxiety, acute stress (short-term) and chronic stress (long-term).  Then, ask trusted friends and colleagues to do the same – and notice how many variations there are.

REDUCING ANXIETY

An article on my Personal Coaching website highlighted our ability to check our level of anxiety (looking for threats that aren’t there) and balance or adjust this in our minds by considering the positive and “rewarding” aspects of the situation. Some level of anxiety can be useful and channelled to our benefit i.e. it can be OK.  But when you are in anxiety overwhelm take a look at the recommendations for balancing out to the right level in the “Cocktail for Every Occasion”.

RESILIENCE TO STRESS

Studies around the resilience to stress has found that it relates to positivity i.e. people who are more positive about their experiences are less stressed.  Much of our stress-related perceptions are based on our past experiences and current events.  For example, how tired, hungry, cross or discontent we are in the moment will influence the degree to which particular events will make us feel stressed.  If we are energised, fully fed and content with life, difficulties affect us less.

To reduce stress it’s useful to start to think of other (and more positive) ways you may be able to think about the situation you are in and reduce the temptation to catastrophize. Could we be assuming a worse possible future for ourselves than is truly necessary?  Here are some useful techniques:

Visualisation:  including all day-dreaming.

Relaxation: What would nourish you?  Warm bath? Massage?  Walking in the countryside?  NB: Some people say they only have one way of relaxing and that’s to watch TV.  However, this is actually just a mild trance and after a while may not feel so great.

Contemplation: muse upon something positive.

Meditation: engaging in a process of thinking that allows thoughts to just come and go (also known as restful alertness). As an added benefit, this time gives the opportunity for reviewing and connecting important information which is vital for insight and creativity.

Research has also shown that resilience to stressful events is increased by successfully completing tasks that would be considered stressful.  People that take on challenges that stretch their comfort zone and, importantly, are supported to complete these, are likely to be less reactive to similar events in the future.  So setting the right level of challenge for individuals can increase resilience.

Next time you say you’re stressed, check that you actually are and then find ways to improve your resilience for now and the future.

Find out how personal coaching can help you further by contacting us for an initial discussion.

Is Your Best Face On?

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At work, whenever someone came up to my desk to ask me something, I automatically put a smile on my face to greet them.  I had learnt over the years that apparently I look miserable if I’m not smiling!  And it came as a shock to people when I wasn’t smiling!  More recently I’ve learnt there is a phrase for that in that I apparently have a “bitchy resting face”!!!  Nice! 🙂

But unfortunately it’s true!  I had thought that I was just being encouraging, but actually I was also helping others feel better about approaching me for a completely different reason.

This is a useful part of self-awareness, or emotional intelligence – knowing how you could be affecting others, even unconsciously.

I also knew someone who never smiled at those approaching him and he genuinely couldn’t understand why he had a reputation for being cross and scary, and no-one wanted to ask him anything or even approach his desk.  However, as well as not smiling, his pupils always appeared small – and most of us are aware that we unconsciously notice when pupils are larger as a sign that a person likes us.  So, like me and my “face” he had a “look” that was giving the wrong impression of him.

Similarly, you may have had a judge in a competition or dance exam look at you in a way that you felt was negative.

Ever considered what your expressions could be conveying?   Another example could be if we are annoyed at someone in a previous dance routine/competition/conversation etc, and whether that annoyance is showing on our face when we speak to the next person we meet, or go into the next dance.  Could the person on the receiving end then be interpreting it as you being annoyed with them personally?  So, it might be worth first thinking about what you are unconsciously conveying by your mannerisms, expressions etc.

Additionally, with that in mind, it’s important to consider your emotional state from one dance to the next.  Not only could you be sending the wrong messages, but you could also be colouring your own thoughts eg. If you are angry (even about something completely different) you yourself could mistakenly interpret anger in other people and be inviting confrontation.  Alternatively, when someone genuinely smiles, you can feel that positively (and it’s widely reported that you can also hear it in someone’s voice on the phone).

So, there are two things I’d consider here.  One is that when someone else looks angry, sad etc, question yourself as to whether that really is in response to you, or it could be something else that they are dealing with.  Think about what are you feeling in response to their expressions and question yourself about the validity.  Secondly, bear in mind what your expressions and emotions could be signalling to others.

Having that self awareness as part of emotional intelligence could really help day to day.  You may need to consciously alter your facial expressions and posture in a given situation.  And, if you’re like me …… keep smiling!

If you’re interested in finding out more about self-awareness and emotional intelligence, then please contact us to discuss how personal coaching could help you.

Negative Emotions

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Negative emotions can be very useful, as they show us when something is wrong or not acceptable.  The presence of emotions is part of being human, and we should be using our emotions (positive and negative) as lessons for life and stepping stones for developing new strategies.

However, the issue with negative emotions is that people can get stuck in them, which isn’t good.  In the moment they are useful, but to hold on to them isn’t.  What would be useful is to learn what you need to learn from the emotion, retain the memory for the future, but let go of the negative emotion.

Holding on to negative emotions and conflicts (often unconsciously, so you’re not even aware) can prevent you from moving forward.  Additionally, holding on to or bottling up negative emotions has been shown to affect our body’s health as well (including the increased risk of cancer, heart disease, bowel problems).

Here are some examples:

Anger (including fury, rage, resentment):  It does make you take some action (although not always the correct action!), and then we often feel a number of other negative emotions such as guilt, shame, regret, sadness.  Additionally, some people may repress anger if it was not the right situation to express their anger at the time.  These bottled emotions could show as out of control behaviour.

Sadness (including regret, sorrow):  These negative emotions can spiral out of control into deep unhappiness, stopping our ability to recover from stressful events and causing low self-esteem and self-confidence.

Fear (including anxiety, panic, terror):   Fear often keeps people stuck – scared of not being liked or good enough, to act, change things, say “no”, the future, debt, success, failure, illness or death, being alone – and many, many more.  Many fears are irrational (as in phobias).  Rather than try and control it or face it, it’s better to let go of fear.  You will then find the power you have inside to do the things you really want to do.

Guilt (including remorse, shame, blame – of yourself and others):  Guilt connects us forever with a mistake we’ve made, although never actually stops us repeating the old mistake.  This can them make us feel inferior, not good enough or worthy of love, compassion or acceptance.  We need guilt to know when we should feel responsible for a wrong action and stop us from being capable of horrendous deeds, but we don’t need to keep hold of old guilt.  To change our behaviour and stop us repeating mistakes that we feel guilty about, we need to recognise it and learn from it.

Hurt (such as wounded, heartbroken):  We have all been hurt at some time in our life.  When we’re subjected to behaviours that we don’t deserve, it can take us by surprise and hit us like a ton of bricks.  But holding on to it, or “stuffing it down” can make us feel powerless and stuck in our suffering.  If we allow others to have power over us by holding onto the hurt for years, we remain their victims and therefore unhappy and unfulfilled.  And the one who caused the hurt could have moved on without ever understanding their impact.  The people who are happiest will have also suffered hurt, but have recognised it, accepted it has happened and then decided that to no longer put up with it.

There are often pressures to deny our feelings and not express our emotions, and if you’re not constantly happy there must be something wrong with you.  However, negative emotions are useful in the moment, but not when they’re held on to.  The presence of unresolved negative emotions can make the difference between a fulfilled life or a miserable one.

So, if you are holding on to negative emotions, you can ask yourself – do you want to do something about it?

Applied Neuroscience, Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) and Time Line Therapy™are techniques which can help you discover your fears, learn the lessons you need to learn from them, and let them go so that you can fulfil your potential.

Contact us if you would like to discuss how Personal Coaching could help you achieve your goals.