Mind Your Stress

I looked up to notice the date and realized it is September already.  I am so looking forward to the Fall.  My energy level always soars during those first chilly mornings.  I always find myself wanting to get back to nature, walk in the woods, stay in a cabin in the mountains, go to arts festivals.  This is my favorite season.

My summer flew by!!  I have been working hard in my practice and I am enjoying working with such a wonderful diverse set of folks.  I have been too busy working the new practice and still working weekends at my old job that I have not had much down time/reflection time (and no time to blog, obviously).  I have to be careful to not go back to that place of overworked and overstressed.  It looks like I will only have to keep working the two jobs until the end of the year or so (waiting on those pesky insurance companies to pay!!!).  I am limiting myself to five full workdays per week and taking Friday and Saturday for me and family.  It’s all about balance!!!

Sometimes it is hard to practice what you preach, but I am working towards an ultimate goal of balance between work, family, home and ME.  Peace to all.

God bless! 

 Jackie

If you haven’t read the articles “It’s All in Your Head” and “Nurture Your Soul” you may want to read these prior to the current post  as I will be expanding on these ideas.  I recently watched wonderful movie called The Secret and it brought together many of the ideas I have been studying in my inspirational books.  I will be spending time expanding on many of these ideas, but the first one I want to talk about is the attitude of gratitude.

Remember, how we react to events in our life and the beliefs we have about those events affect our stress level.  But our reactions, self talk and attitude affect more than our stress level, these things affect our overall life focus and entire emotional make up!  If you have read any material on abundance and prosperity or the law of attraction, you begin to realize that our thoughts can affect what we attract into our lives.  This goes a step further from the power of positive thinking affecting our emotional state to say that this can also affect the very fabric/structure of our lives.  It means trusting God to oversee your life and guide you to your destiny. 

In my life I have been through many trials and in younger times I would wonder “Where is God while I am suffering?”  “Why did He let so many hurtful things happen to me?”  In my older and hopefully wiser mind I have come to understand that everything I have experienced up to this point in my life has had a purpose or lesson for me.  All of the “bad” things I experienced shaped me to be the person I am today and without these I would not have gained the knowledge and life experience it takes to be the counselor I am.  I don’t just listen to people and give support; I can understand and empathize with my patients.  I have been where they are and understand many of the emotional stages one must go through to heal.  If not for those lessons in my early life, I would not be who I am today.  For those lessons, I can now thank God because I do finally understand their significance and necessity. 

It’s a pretty big step to thank God for the lessons, but it is at that point that I have finally found peace.

As this is Mother’s Day weekend, I wanted to remind all of the moms out there to take some time for self nurturing.  And to all of the dads and kids, remember how wonderful and special that lovely lady is on this day.  So what are my plans for Sunday?  My son’s gift is to be my servant for the day, so while I lounge in bed on Sunday reading magazines and possibly a paperback, he will bring me breakfast and coffee refills.  At come point in the afternoon, when I make it down the stairs, we will be BBQing on the back porch.  My favorite way to spend this holiday is at home having a lazy day with my family.  Your idea may be a lovely brunch out, a picnic in the park, or an afternoon at the beach.  However you spend your day, make sure to take some time for rest and reflection and let your family take care of you for a day!

See related article on self-nurturing:

http://mindyourstress.com/time-for-self-nurturing/

Also, here is a link to a great site on moms and families with an article on ways to take time for yourself:

 http://familysanitysavers.com/timeouttopamper.html

Have a most lovely day.  And last but not least for my own dear mom, 

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY GRANNY MARGIE !!!

 

As I have mentioned the increased stress related to working at home after hours (answering email, phone calls, and pagers) and the importance of personal time, I wanted to share this great website.  What I really like about this fellow is that, like me, he is a former workaholic.  I see so much of my former life as a financial analyst here.

I especially like the article “Company collapses: CEO forgot to check e-mail last night” 

Here’s the link - enjoy!!!

http://itzy.wordpress.com/tag/stress-management/

Personal time, home time, and family time seem to have gone the way of the rotary dial telephone.  However, one of the best ways to start de-stressing your life is to establish some healthy boundaries and begin to experience true down time.

Two of the best new gadgets that have come out in the last few years are caller ID and voice mail.  Most people already have these and if you don’t, I would suggest investing the few dollars it takes to add this service.  Now the hard part of this is training the family and having the self discipline to actually begin setting house rules on private time.

Schedule time after work each day when you don’t answer the phone, pager, or e-mail.  Better yet, put all devices on silent and let all calls go to voice mail for that time.  Start with an hour during dinner and slowly expand that time to include most of the hours after work.  Decide which calls automatically go to voice mail in the evenings if you do decide to leave the ringer on.  Most everyone in my family knows not to answer work related calls for me after 5pm unless they ask first.  (The call I got last evening at 8pm from my boss was answered by my dear hubby before he checked the caller ID.  I would have let it go to voice mail.)  If there is an “urgent” issue, the person can leave a voice mail and I can decide if it is an urgent matter for me.  Remember – someone else’s lack of planning does not make a matter your emergency! 

For kids and teens, set ground rules for telephone conversations during dinnertime, homework time, and after a certain hour in the evenings.  I don’t take kindly to folks calling my house after 9pm.  It was considered rude when I was a kid and I still think it is rude today. Call me old fashioned if you must.  I also don’t mind giving a free lesson in manners to any kid who calls my house after 9pm!!!  It’s never too early to learn good habits.  

I will be covering the importance of self-nurturing in a later article, but for now make sure you use at least some of this unplugged time to begin connecting with your family, your friends, or to spend some much needed time on YOU, not for laundry catch up, paying the bills, or other have-to’s.