After 22 months of pandemic ups and downs, almost everyone I talk to these days is experiencing Covid fatigue. With a high percentage of people vaccinated, it appeared we were out of the woods and moving towards a new normal. Now with Omicron, we’ve been back to restrictions, additional boosters, and no end in sight. Staying positive and living from a place of “it is what it is” takes a lot of inner work and energy. Now, more than every we need to use every tool in our toolbox to stay mentally and emotionally healthy.
My primary tools for staying resilient in the face of life’s constant ups and downs are regular NeurOptimal® sessions and daily walks. I think of NeurOptimal® as a mindfulness tool as it constantly brings my brain back to the present moment.
Another mindfulness tool I use is Tara Brach’s practice of RAIN (recognize, allow, investigate and nurture). For more information on this excellent practice, refer to my past newsletter that outlines all the steps of RAIN.
In order to bring daily focus to mindfulness, my word for 2022 is joy. As I started looking at definitions of joy, I came across a great article about the difference between joy and happiness.
The ones that spoke to me the most were:
Joy is of the soul. Happiness is of the moment.
Joy is an inner feeling. Happiness is an outward expression.
Joy being an inner feeling is based on the idea that circumstances, experience, and things will always change, however, our inner response to the changes can come from a place of joy.
James Baraz in his book Awakening Joy, says that “awakening joy…is about training the mind and heart to live in a way that allows us to be truly happy with our life as it is right now,…that happiness is not a place you arrive at but rather the result of training your mind to ride with ease and flexibility the roller coaster of life.”
This year I am focused on being more intentional about seeking opportunities to experience joy and to adopt additional practices that help me to hardwire joy more deeply into my neural connections.
One of the practices I’ve started incorporating into my day this year is Dr. Rick Hanson’s practice called “Take in the Good“
As he says, our brains have long been wired with a negativity bias. The ability to move quickly into fight, flight or freeze served our distant ancestors well, when ignoring a predator or natural hazard could result in death. Today, the need to be constantly on alert for danger is still part of daily life for those living in unsafe situations, however, for most people there isn’t a need to be on continual alert. Our brain, however, is often “still like Velcro for negative experiences, but Teflon for positive ones”, Dr. Hanson says.
He suggests that we don’t have to accept this bias and can learn how to take in the good by following three steps:
- Look for good facts and turn them into good experiences. Aim to consciously look for at least a 6 positive events during the day. It can be simple things, like your steaming cup of coffee or tea or something you see out your window.
- Really enjoy the experience. Hold the awareness of the experience for 15 – 30 seconds. If you see something beautiful in nature or sit down to a delicious meal, really drink it in for that longer time. At first, even 15 seconds seems like a long time and the mind may drift. Not to worry, keep the practice going and it gets easier, more natural and it’s amazing how the experience deepens.
- Intend and sense that the good experience is sinking into you. Feel it in your body or visualize something happening in your body from the experience. Do your shoulders relax a little, do you feel an opening in your chest, less tension in your gut?
As with any new endeavour, this is a practice and needs to be repeated again and again. Gradually the positive experiences become woven into the fabric of your brain.
Take good care and let me know how it goes!