Staying Calm In A Time Of Crisis

The world as we know it, is being turned upside at the moment, every time there is news on the radio or TV it adds to the heightened feeling of stress, fear and worry.

So how do you stay calm in the midst of turbulence and anxiety?

It is the principal question we are challenged to resolve during this troubling moment in time.

In the quest for balance and alignment between body and soul, use  as many tricks and tools learned along the way to keep you on course and not to give in to the unstillness, panic and chaos surrounding you.

Here are some tips to keep calm and centered:

Your Physical Space

Transform our physical space into a haven, a place of nurturing and safety by:

Playing soothing or upbeat music. 

Burning scented candles or incense in the living room.

Placing a bouquet of fresh flowers on the table.

Once you having established tranquility in your space you can....... 

Focus your Attention

On staying calm by:

Not allowing continuous news coverage to invade the serenity of your space.

Keeping TV, radio and online news coverage to a minimum

Instead switch to comedy shows, nature documentaries and the like.

Once you aware of what kind of content creates anxiety and fear you can then eliminate it immediately.

Start Practicing:

Meditate to create an inner safe place. Meditation is easy, sit calmly in front of a burning candle, go inward with your breath.Calm the busy mind with deep breathing and focus on the candle. With the breath, become aware of your body inside and create a secret garden of safety and peace you can go back and visit.

Physical activity such as Yoga, Tai Chi, Dance or whatever sport you prefer are invaluable tools for alignment.

Singing in a choir or at home in the kitchen, shower, wherever, builds up the joy factor.

Cooking your favourite recipes, comfort food, and pastry making are remarkably effective ways in cutting down stress. 

Communal projects with friends and neighbours, such as book clubs, meditation and support groups, wine tastings, parties are great morale boosters.

By creating a safe place inside yourself, fully anchored in your cozy physical space, you are well-armed to venture out into the outside world.

This calmness is contagious. 

We are all linked together in a chain of peace. Remember the words of the song, “We are the world”.

With thanks to Madeleine Czigler

https://inspirelle.com/ways-to-stay-calm-during-turbulent-times/

The Art Of Contentment

Contentment is the greatest wealth.  If you happen to be discontented with your life right now, I would assume that you have never encountered these words before. While happiness is something that we want to achieve in this life, it is something that we can never fully attain. Contentment, on the other hand, is readily available to us and all we need to do is take a hold of it. There is nothing wrong with striving to be happy, but happiness is fleeting and can go up or down each moment. Contentment, on the other hand, is more stable. It allows you to get rid of things from your life and still feel happy. In other words, contentment is a far better goal to achieve than happiness. The question is how to master the art of contentment. Here are a few steps:

Take Time To Meditate

A lot of people are discontented because they fail to take time to step back and consider everything that is going on in their lives. By taking time to sit back, relax, and meditate, you give yourself the opportunity to reflect, which in turn gives you the power to think rationally whenever a problem arises. It also helps you understand and realise that true happiness cannot be found in external things such as eating, shopping, partying, or even working. Meditation can be done in a number of ways, from praying, to writing in your journal, to going on long walks once in a while, to going on retreats.

One Step At A Time

If you have lived your entire life being discontented most of the time, it is going to be a challenge for you to change your mindset. You have to realise that it is going to take time before you can fully grasp what contentment is all about. For this reason, be patient with yourself and take it a step at a time. You do not build trust with someone right away instead, you start in small steps. In the same manner, avoid taking huge steps, but do the little things first. Be faithful doing the little things first, and see the trust building up gradually. Over time, you will open yourself up to more, and before you know it, feeling content and happy despite your circumstances will not be that difficult anymore.

Stop Feeling Bad About Yourself

One of the biggest problems for finding contentment in this life is having ideals. Ideals are not bad, but when we constantly feel bad about ourselves for not being able to meet our ideals, that is when the problem comes in. Our ideals usually come from what we see on TV, read online, and mostly from what we see in our news feed. We compare ourselves to our friends who have bigger houses and  cars, and then we start feeling bad and wished we also had what they have. What is interesting is, that most of these people we compare ourselves to also struggle with comparing themselves to others, perhaps even to us! Once you let go of your ideals and unreal expectations in life, you will start feeling good about yourself, and that is a good place to start to find contentment.

Find Opportunities To Give

“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.” – Tenzin Gyatzo

Nothing could be further from the truth of what the 14^th Dalai Lama said. Many times, we feel discontented with our lives because we fail to see that there are other people who are less fortunate than we are. We think and feel that we are deprived just because our neighbours’ houses and cars are much bigger, or because our friends get to go places when the furthest we can travel to is the grocery store. However, once we realise that we actually have more capacity to give than we think, we will feel joy and happiness that we can never have by acquiring more stuff. Instead of thinking that you are poor and feeling depressed about the idea all the time, why not find opportunities to give? It does not necessarily have to be in the form of money. You can give a hug to a friend who is feeling alone. You can give food and clothing to the homeless man on the street. You can offer to babysit even just for an hour for the single mom next door. You can offer to teach a few unfortunate children in your community for free. You actually have more to give than you think. All you need to do is to stop looking at yourself and start opening your eyes and your heart to the circumstances around you.

Learn To Appreciate The Little Things

Happiness is a choice, they all say, and that is true. If you want to have a life of contentment, you have to learn how to appreciate the little things. The fact that you are alive right now and are able to read up to this part should be reason enough for you to be happy and content. One practical example of appreciating the little things in life is to simply be thankful for the air you breathe. Oxygen is free, so being thankful that you do not have to buy air in order to breathe and stay alive is one way to show appreciation. Another example is to just be thankful for the people who love you. You have your family, your friends and colleagues, not a lot of people have that privilege.

The principles in this article may not apply to everyone, but for most people, I believe that they will. Happiness is a choice and contentment is the greatest wealth. Choose happiness and you will realise that you are the richest person in the world. Choose to be content, and you will be the happiest person on the planet.

With thanks to Eric James 
https://servingjoy.com/how-to-master-the-art-of-contentment/

Emotions Are Energy In Motion

Have you ever experienced an upward and downward spiral of emotions in the matter of a few minutes/hours/days? If this is a frequent occurrence, one minute clinging on tightly to upward feelings of joy, before suddenly letting go and plunging downwards into a pit of dread and fear.

Do not worry, we have sadly all been there.

But it does not have to be that way. With a simple change of perception, it is possible to lesser the power emotions have over you.

What Is Energy In Motion?

Let us start at the beginning.

The Latin word for emotion is ’emotere’, which literally means energy in motion.

Believe it or not, emotional energy in itself is neutral. That is to say, it is only once we react to the sensation (expansion/contraction) in our body created by the emotion, that we interpret a desired response (thought),based on like or dislike, and give power to the feeling through attachment and labelling (reaction). In most cases, this results in a vocal outburst, giving even more strength to the ‘reality’ of this emotion.

Without an interpretation, all we are left with is moving energy in the body that resembles expansion (usually associated with good feelings) and contraction (bad feelings).

Given that fact, we need to learn to treat this fluid energy with respect and allow it to move and change as it is designed to do. Like everything else, these sensations are impermanent.

“Emotions are like a wave, constantly rising and falling. They are part of a much bigger ocean worth noticing.”

The mistake lies with labelling an energy in motion as good or bad. If we can recognise that every feeling will pass in time, attaching a reaction is pointless. It is pure and simply wasted energy. Instead, we must stay out of the thoughts and strengthen our observation muscle by staying with the sensations. This constant flow of reliable information (in the form of sensation) is a gateway to who you really are at the deepest level.

Voicing the story of how you feel is powerful, but only to a certain point. Though it is in itself a release, the next level can only be reached when you allow yourself to feel your emotions without justifying or sharing them with others.

By bringing a mindful observation to the sensations, you are basically allowing your body to communicate with your mind. It has something to show you about how you feel at your deepest level, and only when your mind can stop and listen, will it invite the energy to be released. Otherwise you are affectively ignoring that inner voice, that knowing.

You know that old saying “listen to your gut”? It turns out it truly does have a lot of important things to say.

Learn to listen, accept and release the e-motion and an internal sigh of relief will come over your entire body and mind.

Get to a point where you can feel an uncomfortable emotion and sit with it anyway, do not judge yourself, ride the wave and watch it slow down.

But the ego is crafty, it wants to stop every energy in motion in its tracks. Using the monkey mind as its unknowing slave, the ego loves to cling to sensations and use them to help define a sense of self and strengthen this identity we have become so attached to.

This e-motion becomes a thought. This thought is then aligned with good or bad. Suddenly our words, overall mood and actions become defined by this thought reaction to a sensation. Good work, ego.

So you could argue that this is a good thing if the sensation happens to be expanding, releasing feelings of happiness. We are all searching for happiness right?

The problem is, if you allow expansion to instantly affect your mood (via thought and story), you are also going to be affected when contraction once again kicks in. To become enlightened from blind reaction, one must cut ties from old habit patterns created to all energy in motion.

It is important to remember that we are not aiming to ignore and suppress any emotion, but learn how to affectively feel and release them instead.

We want to listen to our gut; tap in to how we really feel about a given situation without allowing our monkey mind to take control and swerve in all manner of directions. Before you know it, you are completely lost and unsure where you started.

This is of course easier said than done, and it takes time.

Yet being aware of sensations is the first step towards increasing your emotional intelligence.

How to Deal with Energy In Motion

Here are a few ways in which to practise the art of energy in motion observation:

Find time in the day to sit and meditate, even just 5 minutes will help. Observe any sensation that arises with pure curiosity and zero judgement. It is the first step to acceptance and over time the pattern of reaction becomes weaker. 

Allow a moment of space between a strong emotion and reaction. This is where thought is encouraged as a means of analysing the feeling. Simple deep breaths or taking yourself away from the situation at hand to think through the sensation rather than react can really help in better understanding where it came from.

Label the feeling, but do not attach to it. For instance, if you notice a feeling of guilt, think “this thought/feeling is linked to guilt”, observe and at some point it will pass. By noticing and watching this process play out, attachment is avoided and the energy fails to take control.

Talk out loud to yourself about how you feel. Sometimes this is easier than listening to the voice in your head. See it as self compassion, lending an ear to your body to find out why you feel this way. At the end of the day nobody else truly knows how you are feeling, and so nobody else can truly help you to feel better.

Talk it out and let it go. Once you feel you have properly understood the emotion through observation and analysis, feel free to share your feelings with someone close to you. But do not do so with the intention of receiving an answer. Advice is great, but by sharing your feelings along with an already discovered meaning (done so by yourself), you will naturally release the energy and let it go.

With time you will begin to realise that every emotion, or energy in motion, you experience is generated from within and so therefore can only be dealt with from within. External stimuli can only affect you if you let it. This is, unfortunately, a hard-wired habit pattern we all fall prey to, because it is all we have ever known growing up. We react based on what happens outside of us, and allow it to fully control how we think and feel on the inside.

Be patient, persistant and loving with yourself. It takes time to tame that monkey mind and strength to look within.

Emotions are always going to be there and that is okay. It is how we deal with them that makes all the difference.

"With your mind power, your determination, your instinct, and the experience as well, you can fly very high." - Ayrton Senna

With thanks to Kelly  http://blueyedview.com/energy-in-motion/

Maintaining Your Re-Solutions

We have all done it, we make New Year resolutions, maybe struggle to keep them for a few days, make ourselves miserable and then lapse back into our old habits.

Sure, we keep a few of these resolutions during our life but, for most, it is a losing battle. Now there is a vital formula that can ensure that you can keep every resolution without fail.

We could all benefit from this simple procedure, the key lies in the world ‘resolution’. When we make these promises to ourselves, we should drop the ‘re’ bit of the word and concentrate on the solution.

Many people benefit from this simple change to their thinking. Consider why people make resolutions. It is usually because there is some aspect of their life that they want to change for the better. Then, instead of focusing on the great benefits that they will achieve, they focus on what they are giving up so, of course they fail.

In this life you attract whatever it is that you think about the most. If you think about negative words like giving up, stopping, doing less or changing something that you have enjoyed for years, then it is inevitable that your subconscious will rebel to ensure that it does not happen.

Instead of thinking about resolutions, think about solutions. Think about how you will look, feel and sound when you have found the solution. Instead of thinking about what you may be giving up, think about what you will gain. Remember too that there is no success or failure, there is only a result. Do not beat yourself up if the result is not what you planned, just change something and start again.

Here are some pointers about why so many people get results that they see as failure. There are two main reasons. The first is that you try to change the habits of a lifetime overnight and the human mind and body does not work like that. The other is that you attempt to do it alone. The help and support of a nonjudgmental and uncritical third party is crucial to a good outcome.

Many people think that setting a resolution is all that it needs. It is important to take time to fully appreciate why you have chosen a certain resolution and to examine your commitment to the change. Then  define strategies for creating the change with small action steps that will gradually bring you closer to your goals. 

Achieving solutions begins with setting them correctly and then having support to make them happen in a timescale that the body and mind can and will accept.

New Year solutions are great if they get you thinking about your life. Remember, you can start work on a new solution at any time. The power of the personal change is just too good to be limited to the first few days of the year and it really is possible to keep every resolution without fail.

Copyright The Coaching Academy

Wishing you a Happy Prosperous New Year

A Time For Special Relationships

Christmas is for many overwhelming and stressful, presents and food to be bought, family gatherings to be arranged. It is therefore a time when relationships are foremost on their minds. But for some, it is a time of deception, when the printed words of peace and love are in direct opposition to what they really feel inside.

“At this time of year, any relationships that are under strain may totally split asunder. As families gather together old animosities and rivalries can bubble to the surface. The mature approach is to just let them go but it is not easy. It takes two people to have a disagreement. If one of them (you) decides that life is too short and makes a personal commitment to let the real happiness and peace that is Christmas become a reality, then there is no argument. There is no point in winning a series of battles if you can simply end the war”.

Now is the time to review relationships at home, work, and in a social environment, to create a strategy for repairing any relationships that are suspect and terminating those that are beyond repair. It takes inner strength to make the decisions and the commitment. Even small achievements can create their motivation. “If you use your energy to perpetuate a feeling of grudge, envy or hurt, then you are using energy that could, and should be directed to more positive things – like building yourself the life that you truly desire”.

When repairing relationships there is no blame, no right and no wrong. There is simply an outcome or result that arises from an action. If you can learn the actions that create harmony and peace, then the joy of Christmas really will, as the cards say, stay with you throughout the rest of the year. If you want to change somebody else the only place you can begin is with changing yourself. And, the only time you can start is right now”.

Copyright the Coaching Academy

Happy Christmas - Happy Hanukkah - Happy Holidays