Category Archives: Mind Management

1COMMENTS

Gift of Thanks

I usually write early in the mornings. It seems that if I want to get things done, it’s best to start early, before everyone else is up and the day snowballs out of control. So I get up, pray and meditate, read my bible and write. Some weeks, that’s the only way this blog gets written.

But today was different. It’s supposed to be my day off, which really means I don’t go out to work, I just work at home on my kids and grocery shop and whatever else has to be done. I wanted to go to a yoga class this morning and swim a few laps at our neighborhood pool. But I knew I had to get some groceries (even though I just went two days ago), stop at the library and pick up the books on hold, get some writing done and prepare for moving the kid’s rooms around this weekend. I also still have tons of coursework to get through for my board exam in October, the dog food needed to be ordered, and I needed to make a plan for meals for the weekend. But what I really wanted to do was sit down, read a magazine, be still and think. That just didn’t seem very likely…

Recently it’s just been too much. Life has been too much. We started with a new homeschool teacher a few weeks ago and my kids haven’t been adjusting as well as I’d hope. Planned, really. So I’ve been spending every morning and evening working with them and their attitudes and behavior, making sure I’m supporting the teacher every chance I get, and updating my husband and adjusting our parenting accordingly. Not to mention praying constantly for them to get it together and for our little homeschool to get back on track. As an aside, have you ever noticed that when one thing is off kilter in your life (especially when it was running well before), it seems like your whole life is upended? Well, it’s been feeling that way for me.

Anyway, in addition to managing our homeschool transition, we’ve been asked to help facilitate a group series at church, I’m supposed to be starting a sex ed curriculum for the kids at church this fall (which is right around the corner!), the kids need extra-curricular activities set up for the fall, semi-annual reviews for my practice are due (and I have to give them), and I’m training my colleague to take over my position as the lead MD in our group. I’m tired. All I’ve wanted to think about is my solo retreat at the end of next week.

But I have to come back, so getting away isn’t really the answer. We love to live for vacations and recreation time, don’t we? But in the end, real life awaits. Don’t get me wrong, I’m just as guilty of looking forward to the next break as anyone and missing the good moments right in front of me. But two things happened that reminded me how to find joy and peace right now, instead of the worry and overwhelm I’ve been living.

First, we had an outdoor midweek church service at a park this week. People brought dinner and birthday cakes for people who had recent birthdays, and we sang and prayed for an hour. Being together outside helped, but as different men and women prayed and shared their needs, I could see how much good there is in my life. I might be busy and tired sometimes, but the things that are happening are gifts. They’re gifts that are growing me in some way, or they’re gifts that nurture me in another way.

Second, I picked up my grateful list again. We’ve been working with the kids on their thoughts, attitudes, choices, and character, and we’re finding more and more that the way to address the heart of it all comes from gratitude. “Gratitude is one of the keys to life!”, my husband keeps telling them over and over. Having trouble being respectful to your teacher? Write down all the things about her you’re grateful for. Woke up tired and short tempered? Write down a few things you see around you to be thankful for. Feeling good and happy about it being the weekend? Write down all the good things that are happening for you right now. Gratitude changes us! It’s so easy for me to slip back into a complaining, negative mindset – it’s my default position. Besides, I can’t very well teach them to do something that I won’t practice. So I’m working on myself through my grateful list again…

Life can be a challenge. Sometimes the pace is brutal and it seems like the work will never end. Yet there are rays of sunshine that peek through, even when it’s dark out. Practicing gratitude helps me remember that God has my work, plans, and rest all in mind. He shows me all the time in the little gifts – I just have to notice!

Do you have a gratitude practice? How do you practice gratitude and how does it help you? Please share in the comments below!

NOCOMMENTS

Inspirations, Mind Management

Rest and Listen

I’m back in that place again.

Last night, I stayed up later with the puppy, hoping she’d sleep a few minutes later this morning. When I woke early to the sound of puppy whining, I realized that tactic was unsuccessful. Add not enough sleep to the past week and a half with multiple shifts in the hospital overnight and I’m dragging. Sometimes it feels like I’ll never get caught up and feel rested…

This is the guilty look after she chewed up the insole to my shoe…

So I’ve been reading (actually, I’m always reading multiple books at once). It seems like I get on a theme and the books I stack up at the side of my bed are about the same topics. A few months ago, I was reading about emotional eating. That was a tough one! This past month’s reading was about environmental stewardship, and this month I’ve been reading about the sabbath and rest.

Doesn’t seem related, does it? Here’s what’s odd: While I was reading my book on Christian environmental stewardship, I switched over to the book on sabbath rest and both books were talking about the same thing. Both books were making the point that humans and land need care, and part of that care is rest. Just as the land needs rest for regeneration to continue to yield the crops, so do people.

Now, this isn’t exactly a foreign concept to me. I regularly note that rest (primarily sleep) is an absolute requirement to function well. My kids behave better when they get enough sleep, and I certainly can get through the day better when I’ve slept well. The issue of rest is somehow different to me though. I don’t know why, but my normal way of being is to run as hard as a can all day long, from waking to bedtime. Even if I take a nap, I rarely block an afternoon or an evening to rest. What is rest anyway? I wrote about rest vs recreation before, but I can tell you for sure I still don’t have it right. When I take an evening away from my normal to-do lists, I still fill up the time with a TV show, or a stack of books I want to read, or try out a new recipe. I can’t remember a time I sat down to just think and reflect. I’m not even sure I know how to do it.

My stack of books doesn’t even fit in the basket anymore…

So what does rest really look like anyway? I think most of us make the mistake of thinking that if an activity is fun that it qualifies as rest. Reading books and watching TV certainly is fun to me. I enjoy accomplishing goals I’ve set, so I actually like making to-do lists and crossing things off. Going out to dinner and hanging out at an outdoor concert is recreation, but I’m not sure it qualifies as rest. The best I can figure is that rest needs to result in restored well-being. The dictionary definition is “to cease work or movement in order to refresh oneself or to recover strength”. I think restored well=being is pretty close to that! That’s where I run into trouble: So much of what I do doesn’t qualify as rest according to my own definition. And no matter how much I want it and how much I believe that rest is critical to my well-being, I keep filling my time with things that seem more important.

Let’s call that what it is – a lack of faith. Seems extreme? It’s not, and here’s why. Why do I prioritize doing things over rest? It’s because primarily I’m afraid that I won’t get things done if I rest. Here’s why I know it’s a lie: I still watch TV and read books. When I’m recreating, I don’t think as hard about the fact that I’m not getting things done, mostly because I’m too distracted to notice. If I rest, the worry that I’m not getting things done gets louder. The worry comes from my lack of trust that what needs to be done to move my life ahead is dependent on me and my efforts. It comes from the thought that the direction of my life depends on me and not on God. I know better, but I don’t act like it. Romans 9:16 says, “It does not. therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy”, and Matt 6:25-34 tells us not to worry, as if doing so could add even on hour to our lives. And even though I know this, living it still challenges me. But isn’t that life; just one faith journey after another? Learning to trust the plan that we don’t completely see, in the details we think we do see, and knowing that God knows them all.

The good news is that I’m taking a solo retreat weekend away again soon. The temptation for me is to plan to fill up the time away with things to do and catch up on. I’m fighting it though! I wonder what it would be like to just rest into the time and allow it to pass, to listen to God in the peace, and to practice the rest and listening so I can keep it with me, moment to moment. That’s what I’m going to practice, and I’m sure God will bring from it what he has in mind.

How about you? Do you make time to rest, or do you run from work to recreation and back again? How do you make room for rest in your life? Please share in the comments below!

NOCOMMENTS

Help Getting It Done, Mind Management

Finding Your Why

We had an interesting discussion at dinner the other night.

After I came home from the Plant-Based conference, I decided that I wanted to try to move our family toward eating plant-based instead of doing it alone. Now, while I’d read a book or articles, do research and look up expert opinions, I knew the best tactic in our house to jump-start this discussion was to do what would make the biggest splash: We’d have to look at a screen. We may be a family of readers, but this time drastic measures had to be taken. I mean, I wanted something to happen now, not in a few weeks after everyone had read a book that I recommended. Besides, my six year old needed to come along too and the books I have are a little above her comprehension level. Nope, a screen would be the best approach.

So we sat down as a family and watched Forks Over Knives on Netflix. Now, I already knew about the health benefits of plant based eating, but seeing it on a screen and seeing patients who radically changed their health prognosis was powerful. Even with all the amazing stories and information in the movie, it was after it was over that the most shocking thing happened. My husband looked over at me and said, ” OK, I’m on board.” I almost fell off the couch! My husband has never considered even trying to be vegetarian, much less eating vegan. Even though he’s in good health, he knows his family medical history, and the health benefits really are that compelling. The kids jumped in with their support too. So I got busy figuring out what we’d eat that week.

In the background, I was working my master plan. See, I know the health benefits and I agree with the need to eat a whole foods, plant based diet, but I also know that it can be really hard to stick to a healthy eating plan, especially if you’re feeling well and have no medical problems. No, I needed to light other fires that would keep us convinced when we started to waver.

Fortunately, God was helping me out. When the kids went to the library, my twin girl saw a book that she knew I’d like and brought it home. It was called Food Is The Solution, and the first 60-70 pages are all about the environmental impact of animal agriculture. It’s incredibly powerful – the graphics, essays, and stories shared will move you. When I shared that the foreword was written by James Cameron (director of Avatar, Titanic and others), Perry got interested. The kids passed it around and took turns reading. I talked about it at work. And since Forks Over Knives was so successful, I looked for more documentaries to watch. This time we started watching Cowspiracy, which emphasizes the environmental impact of animal agriculture and what forces are at play to prevent the public from becoming educated about it. It was maddening – but also galvanizing.

It’s been weeks since our family has eaten any animal foods except a few things that were left over in the freezer. And when I’ve suggested that we eat some meat that is in the frig, the kids have wanted to know why. They want a good reason to go against their commitment, and I’m so proud of their integrity! My husband has started making his own veggie sandwiches for lunch instead of ordering out. He’s lost 10 lbs and feels full and healthy. I feel good (even with a mild head cold I picked up yesterday), and even more, I feel inspired and strong.

Buffalo chickpea quesadilla with vegan sour cream – so good!

Everyone needs their own why to make change. For some people, it takes a health threat to do it. Sometimes, the ethical reasons are the reason. For others, that the environment we live in needs saving is the compelling why. There are also people like me for whom all the reasons matter. I want to live a healthy life and not live a slow, painful decline on multiple medications. I also want to restore and care for this earth we are responsible for. The ethics matter to me too: I can’t eat a piece of chicken knowing that the ammonia dust from chicken waste is poisoning poor communities who can’t stop the spread of chicken houses being built in their backyards. I can’t live with the thought that my demand for eggs and chicken drives worsening health for communities full of people, many who look like me. I can’t eat pork knowing the horrific conditions the pigs live under for the duration of their lives (same for most chickens and cattle). I don’t want my desire for a steak to contribute to the growing dead zones in the oceans and pollution in our waters. I’d rather eat grains and fruits and veggies. I know there is environmental impact from the mass production of any food – but by far the heaviest impact is coming from animal food. With 7 billion people of the planet (and heading toward 9 billion), we can’t keep eating such a meat heavy diet and think we’ll never run out of our natural resources. We already are. And for those of us in the US, we are the number one users of these resources. As people who have a powerful sense of self determination, ingenuity, and creativity, I think we can do better.

This is true for any change we want to make, diet or otherwise. Change is hard! We are creatures of habit, and changing habits takes a lot of effort and momentum. Do you want to start exercising, develop a meditation practice, eat more plants, or get more sleep? Without a reason, we generally just fall back into our normal routines – it”s just human nature. But we can choose to change if we have good motivation, and that takes finding a compelling why for making the change. It doesn’t have to be a good reason for everyone: It just has to be one for you.

Have you thought about eating a whole foods, plant based diet? What’s your why? Or why not? Please share in the comments below!

NOCOMMENTS

Help Getting It Done, Mind Management

All The Time I Need

They did it!

My big kids did their Memory Master thing! They all successfully finished their exams without any mistakes and earned their titles as Memory Masters. I wrote about the specifics of the test last week (you can read about it here), but suffice it to say that they each had to memorize hundreds of pieces of information for this exam (and my big girl over 1000!) and they did it! So I have two Memory Masters and one Mega Memory Master, and they have the t shirts to prove it!

So we’ve wrapped up the official school year, celebrated with ice cream, and I taught my meditation class. And yet, I woke up morning after morning this week feeling worried and behind. No matter what milestones we reach, there’s always more to do. It feels like I should catch up at some point, since I’m always running so hard to get everything done! Time keeps passing, and things need to be done, so I keep my feet moving. But just because my feet are moving, something in me thinks that my mind has to be wound up and frenetic or I’ll miss something.

That’s not really working well though. If I let my mind run the show, I’ll be locked up in a straightjacket before my kids get to college! That or drinking heavily to calm the racket in my brain. Since neither of those are a good option, I meditate. Every. Day. It’s that important. It’s my time in the early morning to still my mind and listen to God so I can get calm for the day ahead. Now, don’t get me wrong: Every day I sit down to meditate isn’t some zen nirvana experience. Plenty of mornings I watch my mind race around like a two year old after a massive slice of birthday cake with ice cream on top! But it’s good to know where my mind is so I can help it settle back down. It’s the practice of stilling the mind that makes it easier to settle when I need to.

So this week I got up feeling anxious and sat down on my pillow to meditate. Some days my mind zipped around. But one of the days as it tried to worry about all that needed to be done, it got quiet for a minute and I heard it. This quiet voice said, ” You have all the time you need.” And I said, “Really?” I mean, that doesn’t seem right. I don’t feel like I ever have enough time! But that quiet statement just kept coming back.

I’ve been giving it a lot of thought this week. Do I really have all the time I need? Certainly, we all have the same 24 hours in a day. Most of us sleep for 6-7 hours a day, so we all have the same waking hours. With all the things I worried about not getting done, what did I do with the time I had?

Prepared for three potlucks.

Wrote cards and wrapped gifts for the kid’s teachers for the end of the school year.

Washed my hair.

Went shoe shopping with my middle girl.

Made multiple raw food meals for myself.

Lunch! Raw cucumber gaspazcho…

Did surgery and food shopping when I was in the city.

Saw patients in the office.

Did some writing.

Finished my laundry.

Worked on the August office schedule.

Celebrated the kid’s accomplishments by looking at puppies and eating frozen custard!

I’m sure I’m leaving some things out – you know, there are always the things that you do as you go that weren’t planned for. But in the end, it all got done. And yes, there are still things on my list, and since I’m working this weekend, I won’t be able to use that time for catch up. But worrying about the things I did this week didn’t help me get it done. In fact, because I listened to God’s quiet whisper, I stopped worrying about how I was going to get it all done and did what I could each day. Worrying would have made it so much harder! Try it – when you feel worried about getting it all done, use this as a mantra. “I have all the time I need.” Or, “God gives me all the time I need.”

What I’m learning is that everything can get done in the time I’m given. I may not be able to get it all done and watch all the TV shows I’m interested in, or read all the books I have stacked up to read. At least, I can’t do it as fast as I want! But that would be having all the time I want, not all the time I need. Learning to trust that I have what I need helps me to calm my mind when it wants to whirl around in worry. And living in a calm mind is a wonderful place to be!

How do you manage your mind when it worries? What do you do to calm your anxiety? Please share in the comments below!

NOCOMMENTS

Mind Management

Spring Gratitude

Spring is here! It’s the season of new beginnings, new birth, longer days, and lots and lots of pollen! I don’t have allergies, but you really can’t get away from the yellow haze over everything. My favorite season is fall, but there’s just something about the warming air and return to sunny days that makes me feel hopeful.

On the other hand, although the warm air and sunshine is good for my mood and I can get outside despite the pollen, the busyness of the season conspires to steal away my contentment. I know spring in the south is short, but with all the activities I often feel like I miss spring altogether! Let me explain. Our formal homeschool program ends in late April, which means presentations, papers, memory master exam prep, and other end of year events. That includes pot luck and teacher thank you gift shopping, and while I love to shop and buy gifts, I just don’t have a lot of free time to get it done. My big girl has a middle school dance at church this weekend, so dress and shoe shopping was on the agenda. Easter is coming up, so candy and eggs for the Easter egg hunt in our neighborhood had to be purchased and assembled, as well as getting the kits for Easter egg dying. Our church is having our cultural Sunday on Easter this year, which involves a huge potluck lunch afterwards (which I need to cook for). Did I mention that nurses’s week and Mother’s day is coming soon too?

That kind of busyness makes me feel overwhelmed if I’m not careful. I’ve still got to go to work too! The best ways I’ve learned to fight the anxiety is to use outside time and my grateful list to stay thankful and present in the moment. So this week I’m going to do some of my grateful list here to keep reminding me (and you!) of the beauty in our lives, even when we struggle to be here in it. Here are some highlights from the week so far…

This is a beautiful hydrangea I saw in the yard of one of my neighbors. I just stood there for a few breaths and enjoyed it.

Sunrise in my neighborhood – a moment I was able to witness as I set out on a walk this week.

These are my big kids dressed and made up for their Faces Of History presentation. They each wrote a research paper on a historical figure for their writing course. Then they presented as the character in front of their peers and families without identifying themselves for the community to guess their identity. They did so well! I’m amazed I get to be their mom…

I made tiny snacks for the kids and the little baggie of treats was so cute! I put little pieces of dark chocolate in them so they’d be happy to eat the almonds. (I told them it was my special chocolate, which was true. I just didn’t mention that it was sugar free…)

Taking some time to notice the lovely and beautiful moments in my life keeps my heart and mind peaceful. I can choose where my mind spends its time, whether worrying and anxious or calm and grateful. It doesn’t really matter if I’m busy or on vacation – my mind is always looking for the danger, the threat, the problem. It’s ok – that’s how humans are wired. But the mind can be trained to respond to normal life as a gift and not a threat. I enjoy my life much more as a gift!

How about you? What do you do to neutralize that sense of overwhelm or anxiety? Please share in the comments below!

NOCOMMENTS

Mind Management

Doing The Wrong Thing

Ever feel like you don’t know where things fell apart?

It can be really hard to trace things back to where they started going the wrong direction. Since this week is spring break, I decided to work because so many of my partners needed this week off to be with their kids. So at the same time that so many people are wanting to come in for a doctor visit while they’re on break, there are very few of us in the office to see them. I was the only doctor in the office all day yesterday. I knew it was coming. I knew it would be hectic. I also knew I had my day off the next day, so I figured I’d put my head down, get through it and rest the next day. And – it was crazy. My schedule was fully booked and we had multiple walk-ins and double books throughout the day. But we got through it, I got home and took the kids to church. My husband had a cold and was in the bed, so I figured once I got them home and in the bed I would take a rare break and watch some TV alone. I knew I could sleep a little later in the morning, and even though I know it’s harder for me to get in my meditation and walking and bible reading if I get up late, I decided I would do it anyway.

At 730 when I woke up, only one child was up and eating breakfast. No biggie – they sleep a little later after we’ve been out the night before to church. So I grabbed my laundry out of the dryer and went to meditate and pray since it was still pretty quiet. My plan was to get to all the stuff on my list as soon as I got back downstairs. When I got on the scale and saw the number is still going nowhere, I got frustrated. What am I doing wrong? And that’s where things really fell apart.

Instead of getting on my mat or going for my walk, I went down to find out what the kids were doing. I cleaned out under the sink in their bathroom. I got in a conversation about our family presentation at our homeschool group on Monday with our teacher. I made our bed. I fussed at the kids about the house cleaning they weren’t doing thoroughly. I started cleaning the floors in my room and bathroom. While I was sweeping out the dust bunnies under the bed, I found a stack of worksheets I used when I was losing weight after the last baby. As I was sitting there flipping through the sheets, something became very clear: I don’t eat this way anymore. Even though I thought I was eating very little (and certainly less than I want!), it’s definitely more than I was eating when I was losing weight. Hmmm…

Cleaning as my distraction…

I looked up and it was almost eleven am. Then I got really mad – at myself. I had all these things to do – emails to send, forms to complete, a post to write, groceries to buy – and I still hadn’t done any exercise or bible study. What was happening to my day off? I decided to recoup my losses. I sat down at my computer to get something – anything – done. As I sat in front of the blank screen, I figured it out. I was angry because I thought things should be different than they are. I think that my house should be eternally clean. I think I should be able to stay up late, get up late, and still get everything done that I want to do. I think my six year old should do exactly what I say without getting distracted. I think that I should be able to eat when and what I want even if I’m not hungry and still lose weight. None of these thoughts are based in reality, but I react to them as if they are. I want them to be true, even though they’re not. And because I’m not getting what I think I should, I get angry and frustrated.

So here’s some truth. If I want my house cleaned expertly, I will have to hire someone to do it, because I don’t have the time unless I eliminate something else. My six year old is learning to obey quickly, but she’s still easily distracted. If I want to be highly productive in the mornings, I need to go to bed on time and skip the TV. If I want to lose weight, then I have to eat in a way that causes me to lose weight, even if I want to eat more. None of this is difficult or painful, it’s just the truth. As long as I can be at peace with the truth, I don’t have to be frustrated. The alternative is to keep trying to make what’s not true into the truth – and that’s a form of insanity. And that is painful. I don’t like pain. And while I know that life brings pain sometimes, so much of my pain is self inflicted by my own thinking. But the mind work I’m doing through the works of Marianne Williamson and Byron Katie in addition to prayer, meditation and bible study are helping me to retrain my thoughts. As my thoughts go, so do my emotions and actions. So I’m digging down to capture my thoughts and teach them to be truthful!

How about you? What do you do to get back on track when you’ve fallen off? Do the thoughts in your head that don’t line up with reality cause you pain? Please share in the comments below!

NOCOMMENTS

Mind Management

Swimming In The Deep End

I thought I had this parenting thing going. I mean, I didn’t think I had it all figured out, but I thought I was at least keeping up. How did I end up so behind?

Many years ago when we decided to homeschool the kiddos, we had lots of reasons for doing it, not the least of which was their academic and spiritual educations. But I thought a fringe benefit was that when it came to educating them about their bodies, puberty, sex, growth and maturity, I’d be able to educate as questions arose. I wouldn’t have to answer questions about crazy advanced things they didn’t need to know about yet because they heard about it from a friend with an older sibling at school. And I had no fear. I’m a gynecologist for goodness sake’s, so surely I could handle whatever they threw at me. Right?

Except that my oldest is very reserved and doesn’t ask questions. At least not many. And we need to be alone and in a quiet and peaceful space and the stars and moon have to be aligned in the correct orientation and – well, suffice it to say, she’s not asking much.

So I have to draw her out. One of the ways she likes best to get information is in a book. So I started buying books on growing up and adolescence and puberty and realized fast that there was A LOT of ground to cover. But I didn’t worry at first, because I just had to help the oldest, and we were reading and talking and it seemed to be going well. Then we went to the pediatrician for check ups and she recommended some good books on the subject based on their ages. I realized that I’d needed to catch up the others, including the six year old…

Ever go swimming and think you know exactly where you are in the water and then put your feet down and realize you can’t stand up? Scary, right? It’s no fun to be out of your depth. And right now, that’s how I feel. Why does it seem like every time I think I’ve got a grip on my role as a mom, it changes? I mean, who thought it was a good idea to give me these four humans to raise and educate? Oh, I forgot.

Sometimes I have to talk myself off the ledge, you know? I get wrapped up in what hasn’t been done or what needs to be done and miss what I’m being given to do right now. I can spend a lot of time in the past or future missing the present. My mind wants to fret over why isn’t your book finished yet, or what about that online weight loss course you’re creating that’s not done, and why haven’t you finished helping the kids learn what they need to know about puberty when it’s already here? But that thinking is a waste of time. The time I’m spending worrying is all spent in the past, and it’s doing nothing in the present except mental flagellation. I’m still not making any progress!

And then I woke up this morning, worried and anxious about all the things that are coming up, my mind bouncing around at light speed. I rolled over looking for a hug, but my husband was already downstairs in his office. I wandered into the twin’s room and asked one for a hug because I woke up worried. They both wandered over to me, sat down on the bed and held me. Then it happened: My son asked me if I wanted to pray. And then I saw it. They are growing. They are remembering that we have taught them to go to God with their worries and fears, and they are becoming kind, patient, wise and spiritual people. Together with God, we are helping them to become the people they are meant to be.

The moment I have is this moment now. I can talk to them now. I can read with them now, I can learn and review and plan what I want to teach them and make a plan to share it with them as I work on it now. Of course I can’t do everything at once, but moment by moment we are building a life. I want mine to include my kids in these lessons on life and growth and maturity and mind management, both the ones I’ve already learned and the ones I’m learning now. For this learning on puberty, I’ve got lots of help. I’ve got my books. I know what I want them to know. I’m praying and I know God is moving for them. So piece by piece, we will build – together.

Have you ever felt like you’re not measuring up? How do you remind yourself that you’re right where you need to be? Please share in the comments below!

NOCOMMENTS

Mind Management

Spring Start

Ever feel like you need a reset button?

I certainly do. Sometimes I feel like I’m spinning around going nowhere fast. We spent the last week away on the beach in Florida and I thought that would be enough rest and time to get some perspective. It wasn’t. Don’t get me wrong – we had a great time, played in the sand and sun and enjoyed each other. But even though we spent most days laying on the beach, there were still meals to cook, clean up for eight to do, and kids who needed stuff (like hydrocortisone for my baby who got a chemical burn from the sensitive sunscreen I bought her). Just lots to do…

Our family sand castle…

So here I am back, feeling out of sorts because I still have a million things to do and I feel like my focus is off. The good news is I know why, and I know what I need to do. The bad news is that I’m having trouble doing it. Let me explain…

About eleven years ago I lost 60 pounds. I wrote about it in my very first post How I Lost My Weight. For years after, even with two more pregnancies, I was able to maintain my weight loss. Four years ago when I started seriously studying holistic nutrition, I started to struggle with my weight again. Nothing too serious at first, but a very gradual creep of a few pounds a year which has resulted in being 10-15 pounds above where I feel comfortable in my body. And despite all my nutritional knowledge and former success, the weight hasn’t gone away. Now, I could blame it on being in my 40’s, but that’s not completely true. But I have identified two major reasons why I’m struggling right now.

After one of the last Tea Talks, the feedback I got from the participants was that they’d like to hear more about emotional eating. At the time, I just wasn’t sure I was equipped to teach on that – it’s a BIG topic! But I filed it away for future research. And recently I started reading lots of books on the subject, including many by Geneen Roth (an expert and author in emotional eating). That reading has opening up a rabbit hole that I’ve fallen into – and there’s no way I can describe it all in this post. But here are the highlights: I didn’t know I was an emotional eater, weight maintenance is different from weight loss, and this is a very big deal. So one reason I know I’m struggling is that I never figured out what weight was where I should stay, and when I was there how to eat for maintenance. I learned how to eat to lose, and I can go back to that (and need to). But then what?

The second reason I’m struggling is that I never really made peace with the sensation of hunger. I’m afraid of it. That’s hard to admit. I don’t like being uncomfortable, and I still think hunger is a discomfort to be avoided at all costs. So even if I muster up the will to go back to tolerating the sensation of hunger for the purpose of weight loss, I won’t be committed to obeying that signal for the rest of my life. And that’s what it will take to maintain my normal, comfortable body weight. Hunger will be the only signal I will use to eat, and I will need to learn to wait and welcome it. I won’t muscle through from one hunger to the next, resenting having to wait for hunger or stop when I’m politely full.

So what am I going to do? There are times when you know you have to change what you do because it’s just not working. And sometimes, you have to realize you’ve wandered and you need to get back and start over fresh. That’s why I love spring – it’s a fresh new start! I got out this morning for a walk (even though it was 37 degrees!) and I got some clarity. Getting out, walking and talking to God helps my mind, and I had let that go in favor of meditating and listening to God. Neither is better than the other, but I need both to be balanced. So I’m getting back to my walks – something about that fresh air changes me. I’m also going to get back to the basics of eating when I’m hungry and stopping when I’m full. It doesn’t matter the dietary philosophy if you eat without these basic boundaries. Diets lead to feeling restricted, and this leads to binges (small or big), and these cause weight gain. So it’s back to basics for me. And I’m hopeful. It may be the fresh air and the new flowers sprouting up here in Georgia, but whatever it is, the new start feels good. And my prayer is for my loving commitment and consistency to last!

How are you feeling about this season you’re in now – hopeful or discouraged? What are you want to do about it? Please share in the comments below!

1COMMENTS

Inspirations, Mind Management

Noticing

I’d like to try something different this week.

Recently I’ve been writing about living in the moment. And while I’ve written about how I tend to rush through my time, and how I’m learning how important it is for me to experience the moments as they happen, I haven’t really spent time talking about how to do it. It’s all very well to know that your mind is running ahead of you. It’s a wholly different thing to practice slowing it down and teaching it to notice what’s happening around and in you. And it definitely is a practice. It just doesn’t come naturally to most of us.

So this week we are going to practice! I’m going to guide you through two simple exercises in experiencing the moment. Then you can use it anytime to slow yourself and really be in your life as it’s happening. Ready?

Funny story first though – it’s a good example of how staying present can help you, even in simple ways. I was in the car riding with the family, and my husband was talking about something to me. The topic itself wasn’t hard or contentious, but I felt myself becoming irritated with him and wishing he’d stop talking to me. Somehow, I recognized this was irrational. So I took a deep breath and scanned through my body: Was I hungry/tired/in pain? Actually, the knot at the top of the scarf on my hair was too tight and was digging into my scalp. As soon as I loosened it, the irritation disappeared and it was much easier to listen. So simple, right? But it’s a good example of how little things and my sensitivity to them can affect how I show up in the moment, so it helps me to be aware.

Ok, let’s try an exercise. Right now, wherever you’re sitting, take a slow deep breath, all the way down to the bottom of your lungs. Make sure you let your belly expand and get full with the breath. Then let it all the way out, like you’ve wrung all the air out of your lungs. Then keep breathing, slow and regular. As you breathe, notice the sensation of the air going in and out of your nose. Is it cold or warm? Are you breathing into the top of your chest or deeper into your belly? Neither is wrong, just notice. Then feel the sensation of the chair touching your legs. Feel how hard or soft it is. If your legs are crossed, feel what it’s like to have one leg touching the other. Does it feel heavy, warm, strong? Just notice the sensation.

Interesting, isn’t it? Total, that probably took you 2-3 minutes to complete the exercise. But it probably felt longer. It’s odd how when we really stay in the moment, the time we have seems fuller, richer. When we stay up in our heads thinking about what’s next, we lose what’s happening right now.

Ready for the second exercise? Get a glass of water and sit down with it. For this exercise, try room temperature water so the glass doesn’t fog up. First, look at the water in the glass. Notice how the light in the room you’re in shines through the clear water. See how if you look through the water, it distorts the image of whatever is on the other side? Before you take a drink, pay attention to your mouth. Is it dry? Are you actually thirsty? Now take some of the water into your mouth and feel the wetness on your lips and tongue. Feel the water in your mouth before you swallow, and when you do, sense it traveling down into your stomach. Does it make you feel full/quenched or do you want more? Notice the sensation of the glass in your hand. Would you like to keep holding it or are you ready to put it down? When you’ve finished drinking, put the glass down and take one more breath, in and out. How do you feel?

These are exercises you can do at anytime, wherever you are. When you feel like time is spinning out of control, slow it down by noticing exactly what you’re doing at that moment. You can do it as you eat your lunch, sit at your desk, drink your morning coffee. The key is to only do the one thing at a time, and that can be harder than it sounds. We tend to distract ourselves with noise from the TV or radio, eat while watching TV or reading, or “multitask”, which just means we try to do multiple things at once but really just switch back and forth between tasks, often decreasing our efficiency in the process. That’s another topic for another time. But wherever you are, you can take a deep breath and feel the air move through you. You can notice what you’re doing. And you can experience the moments as they happen, not just looking back and trying to remember how they were. Here’s to your practice in noticing!

What did you notice when you did the exercises? Were you antsy or uncomfortable or was the slowness refreshing? Please share your experiences in the comments below!

1COMMENTS

Mind Management

Are We There Yet?

No, not that question! That’s got to be the number one most annoying question to any parent on a road trip with kids. You want to just say, “Does this stretch of asphalt look like our beach/mountain/getaway? Would you like to have me let you out here?” No, I wouldn’t really leave my kid out on the highway. And truly, I get it, because I don’t particularly like long car rides either: I can’t sleep in the car, reading for too long makes me nauseous, and besides I just wanna get there already! Just like the kids…

It’s funny. Sometimes I feel so far away from being a child that I can’t relate to what they’re worried about. I promised myself when I was a kid that I’d remember when I was the adult, but it isn’t always happening. The car ride thing is a good example, because I know now how to take things to entertain myself and not worry about how long it’s taking to get there. There’s always food if I need it, we stop if I need to use the bathroom, and eventually we get there. Whining about it doesn’t get us there faster, so I can’t understand why kids bother fussing about it. Just sit back and enjoy the ride.

If I want to be truthful about it, I’m not a good example of this in my normal life. But like any good adult, I certainly take it up a few notches. Let me explain. We are preparing for a family trip to the beach soon. Of course, this involves planning and list-making and packing, not to mention tying up loose ends at work and at home. All I want to do is make it to D-Day – the day we depart for the beach! So I burn through the days leading up to the break, hair on fire, thinking that I can just enjoy myself when we get outta town. And what about all the non-work projects I haven’t gotten to yet? Maybe I should spend some of the vacation making some progress on those. Should I take my laptop?

And then we get to the beach house and I rush around thinking about meal plans and activities and clean up, and all the time I’m counting the days I have left before I have to go back to work. Before I know it, it’s the day before we leave and I’m not sure I even had a vacation. Now two weeks have flown by and I’m dreading going back to the hustle of catching up on the work I missed while I was out. Where did all the time go?

I just spent two weeks in three places: getting there, getting back home, and getting back into work. And not one of them was the place I actually was at the time my mind was in each of those places. When I was getting there, I was at home with a happy healthy family, a good job, a wonderful home and delicious food, but my mind was on the day we were leaving town, so I didn’t enjoy any of those good things. When I’m on the vacation, I’m so busy watching the time fly by and thinking about how few days are left, I’m not sitting in the moments that I have right then. Dreading the inevitable catch up time at work is a painful place to be. When I get it done it never seems to be as bad as I anticipated, but I spent all this angst worrying about it while I could have been wondering at the beautiful stones and shells on the sand.

The hard truth of the whole thing is that I do this all the time. Not just around vacations. I can be eating dinner and thinking about how to get the laundry done and when I have time to get to the grocery store this week. I’ll sit down to enjoy a rare moment of TV with my husband and worry about how to register for my upcoming medical conference. There’s a time for planning and getting things done, for sure. But when I spend each moment I have working, planning or thinking about working or planning, I’m not actually present. I’m not even there, because my mind is in another time altogether, either future or past.

So what? Maybe I get a lot done and I can take satisfaction in the accomplishment. I guess. At this point in my life though, I’m starting to feel time move. I could be halfway through my life by now. I’m not really interested in speeding through with my mind running at top speed only to look up at the end and realize that I missed it. It’s possible I’ll have gotten a lot done, but I missed all the moments along the way.

My practice now is to be in the moment. I’m trying to spend less time asking “Am I there yet?” and more time experiencing the place I’m in right now. It’s a challenge, especially when I don’t like where I am at the moment. Sometimes, I’d rather not be uncomfortable or busy or tired. Yet even in those moments I can take a deep breath and feel my lungs fill up and empty. I can feel my feet in my soft slippers and wiggle my toes. I can taste the soup in my mouth and feel the warmth filling my stomach, instead of looking up and realizing the food is gone and I didn’t get to enjoy it. It’s an effort! My mind is very used to that pattern of working out what’s next, and not so facile at staying put for a minute or two. But I keep reminding myself, and each time I do, I experience another moment of my life. Each of these moments is my life. There will always be more to accomplish, to create, to do. But each moment getting there is the journey, and they are definitely as good as the destination!

What about you – do you rush through the moments in your life? Have you found a way to enjoy and experience your moments? Please share in the comments below!

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