mindfulness

Gentle Ways To Welcome The New Year With Self Care

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I have declared that this upcoming year will be the year of self care for myself and my family. So, this year, rather than having a specific resolution (that I’m not likely to stick to) I’ve decided to explore different ways to really improve my personal well-being through self care. I’m going to let my intuition guide me to figure out what I need at any given time to provide myself with the best self care possible.

What Does Self Care Mean To Me?

There are four major themes I’m going to focus on this year, which we’ll explore together below. My intention is to let my self care evolve as I make changes and become more grounded and focused.

Here are my four main focuses for a better me include;

  1. Become more gentle with myself
  2. Move my body in different ways, everyday
  3. Remove ‘junk’ from my diet
  4. Grow my list of hobbies – try new activities and visit new places
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Become More Gentle With Myself

I have begun by allowing myself time to rest (and I don’t mean sleep). By taking time to;

I am providing myself with valuable time to relax and feel satisfied. My goal is to step away from the chaos in the world and work at keeping my life more tranquil and serene. I am working on pushing out the negative thoughts, media outlets, and interactions to maintain a more positive outlook.

I believe that gentleness is the cornerstone of self-care and my mission is to inject gentleness into my daily life, and routine. Even the mundane tasks, to experience them in a more meaningful way.

best stretches

Move My Body In Different Ways Every Day

My goal is to get off the treadmill (of life) and step into different ways to move my body.  I have already begun by incorporating;

I’ve been mindful to listen to my body and really connect with the sensations that are left behind in my body from a good workout. That also includes listening to my body when it is tired and needs a break from exercise.

best diet

Remove ‘Junk’ From My Diet

Over the holidays we tend to loosen our grip on our normal daily eating habits. This usually means ‘junk’ foods start to creep in and become the new “norm”. So, I have started focusing on removing the simple sugars, and foods high in unhealthy fats. I’ve also been more conscious of my portion sizes and making good food choices that are going to nourish my body and provide me with a clean source of energy.

Click here to read, “How To Find The Best Diet For You”.

Remember to be gentle with yourself here – we are not always going to make good food choices and feeling guilty about our choices is not a means to be gentle with yourself. Work towards a healthy balance that still allows some flexibility in your diet so you feel fulfilled and satisfied.

new hobbies

Grow My List Of Hobbies – Try New Activities And Visit New Places

This one is like a mini bucket list for me. Trying new things is exhilarating and it can help to strengthen relationships with our loved ones as we try new things together. My intention is to feel more free and alive with excitement to have the opportunity for new experiences.

Hopefully during this new year, you too will find ways to improve your self-care and infuse gentleness into your daily life. Let’s make this year more fulfilling, successful, and joyful than the last.

The Healing Power Of Mantra Meditation

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mantra meditation

A Mantra is a Sanskrit word for “sound tool”.  Along with only a few other ancient languages, Sanskrit evolved as a complex system of onomatopoeia – where the sounds evoke movements of energy.  The sounds themselves create actual interactions or events, while resonating in different parts of the body and mind, like ‘Mantra Meditation’.

OM (AUM), SO HUM and SA TA NA MA are well studied mantras used for healing bodily tissues, lowering blood pressure, reducing bad habits and staving off Alzheimer’s.  In fact the Alzheimer Society uses Kirtan Kriya (SA TA NA MA) as an effective Kundalini Yoga meditation for brain and memory vitality.

Words like screeeeech, craaaaash and purrrrr are examples of English words that resonate both sound of meaning.  Cats will even vibrate their “purr” at certain frequencies to heal themselves from ailments.  Many animals (just like us humans) can be highly sensitive and greatly affected by the influx of sensory stimuli all around us.

Those wi-fi waves can mess with our natural and relaxed states.  They are invisible and subtle but very, very powerful!  Laying a foundation for the conscious construct of good vibes is where all the magic in relationships and family dynamics begin.

Mantra Meditation

Mantras are information, and in the Sanskrit language, it’s like an information sequencing system that mimics the process of nature’s repeating patterns.  As the Sanskrit scholar, Dr. Douglas Brooks has said, “Sanskrit tells us what Nature shows us.  The way Nature goes about doing its thing, Sanskrit goes about its language.”  Much like the way that music “moves” us and can bring us into different feeling and being states, Mantra uses sound to evoke movement of physical and emotional energy.  Stimulating the nervous system which then informs our experiences.  Click here to read, “Nervous System – What Conventional Medicine Doesn’t Want You To Know” for more information about your nervous system.

What Does All This MEAN?

It means that Mantras can positively or negatively “charge” and affect our feelings, emotions, and thought patterns, as well as the people and environments that surround us.  There are Mantras for anger, stress, grief, fighting, love, healing, addiction, insomnia, anxiety, asthma, joy…the list goes on and on!  Attune sound currents like a finely crafted symphony of sound and energy!

By repeating UPLIFTING & HEALING sound currents or “Mantras”, over and again, you’re intentionally attuning your mood and energy into a desired state with a specific sound current.  It’s like tuning an instrument to refine and manipulate its sound.  We can REDIRECT all our energy beyond the anger, fear and frustration (this is an act of self-love).  We know that our children absorb and pick up on the subtleties and nuances of our tones and expressions.  Even if it’s subconscious, it’s vibe passes through the nervous system.

We can feel wildly emotional when triggered and it feels good to release the ROAR!  In fact it feels “so good” and “so necessary” in the moment that we can hardly feel it flowing out the floodgates!  In the aftermath of heavy energy and hurt feelings, the guilt ensues.  That is unless we chime a new Mantra that is intentional and fueled by love.  In between the frustration and the ROAR is a beautiful, neutral, silent space.  If we can tap into that very small windowed space in time, we can change our reactive, ha-BITCH-ual rants, into Mantras that serve to transform, the current feel and mood and allow us to better RESPOND, Not REACT.  This will reverberate a ripple effect of positive vibes through the home, and the hearts & souls of your loves.

How To Use Mantra Meditation

A good place to start is by first recognizing your OWN Mantras.  Ask your kids and they’ll tell you straight up.  Just don’t take it personal because it’s not!  You can get the kids to talk about theirs too.  Once you catch on to your daily drone, you will have cultivated an awareness to continuously recognize it and switch on the GOOD VIBES.  You will notice your kids really digging your new energy and try to match it.  This is a fun way to watch an energy exchange in action.

Mimic exactly the vibe you want back from them and see what you get.  If you like the power packed punch of “swear” words, try shouting SAT NAM instead!  This means “true self” and it’s pronounced like, “but mom” (go figure) and will have you tapping into deeper states of joy, love, and gratitude in no time.  You can also use any words or sounds that FEEL uplifting and happy.  Come up with clever CODES to establish personal boundaries and other family agreements.

You can also use mantra or music in the background for hours on repeat.  Infuse your home with classical music, nature sounds, or other good vibe beats, that uplift your soul and give calm to your space.  FEEL out the new vibrations, give it some time and then see what you notice.  The ripple effect is real.  When WE do the work to EMPOWER ourselves, we EMPOWER our children.  What we put out is what we’ll attract.  Click here to learn How to Create Your Own Personal Mantra.

Got that Mantra ready?  Now get out there and start flexing your victorious vibes!
Sat Nam xo

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About The Author:

Melanie Woolsey is an established Yoga Therapist, KundaliniYogini, and Ayurveda Practitioner with over 10 years of experience journeying through study, self discovery, healing and teaching. She is also a mama to one little guru who has been her greatest teacher yet.

Master The Psychology of the Supermarket

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This information is courtesy of bon appetit and the research they have put together from a massive study on how we buy food.

Here, we summarize the most interesting pieces of information discovered about how supermarkets are designed, how and why we buy what we choose, and how it’s all a trap!!

I want you to be aware of these things the next time you go to the grocery store so you can be mindful about why you’re walking the direction you are, what you are choosing to put in your cart (with which hand!) and how many items you are walking past to get to what you actually wanted in the first place!

The five experts who contributed to the original study are:

• BA senior food editor Dawn Perry
• Environmental psychologist Paco Underhill and author of What Women Want: The Science of Female Shopping
• Architect and supermarket designer Kevin Kelley, of the firm Shook Kelley
• The director of the graduate nutrition program at the Institute of Human Nutrition at Columbia University, Sharon Akabas
• Efficiency expert Gwynnae Byrd

• “Upward of 50 percent of what we buy in a supermarket we had no intention of buying as we walked in the door,” psychologist Underhill says.

• The average supermarket has 64,000 products (you’d have to eat or use more than 175 different products every day for a year before you tried everything once).

• There are too many choices!! With this vast array of options, our brains overload and instead of the two items on our list, we come out with 20! Marketers are really good at getting us to buy stuff we don’t need.

• The primary goal of supermarkets is to subtly convince shoppers to spend more time inside, to give products more opportunities to fly into your cart!

• Very similar to casinos, it is rare to see many indicators of the time, like clocks, skylights, or even windows.

• Dairy is generally in the back corner—the deepest section of the store, because virtually everyone who walks in has some dairy product on their list. (aka stop buying dairy!! check out this blog for the reasons why!)

• About nine in ten people are right-handed, and a counterclockwise route through the store makes it easier for right-handed people to put stuff in their carts. (really!! can you imagine who studied and realized this!)

• Most stores work better with a counterclockwise circulation pattern because you tend to push your cart with your left hand and pick things up with your right hand.

• Of every ten people who walk through the entrance, only one will go down the soda aisle, so supermarkets hijack shoppers’ subconscious to linger in these aisles, often by literally slowing them down with bumpier or tackier floor surfaces. (or giant bins in the centre of the aisle that need stop lights to navigate)

• It is not a coincidence that brightly coloured, sugar-laden cereals with the new kiddie-cartoon craze is on the shelf at knee level – it’s in the perfect line of sight for a six-year-old kid.

• The point of those bite-sized food samples is not only to get you to buy a particular product. It’s to trick your body into thinking it’s hungry. And we all know what happens when we shop hungry!!

These are really interesting points to consider when you are navigating your grocery store. Be aware of these subconscious tricks to get us to buy more, eat more, spend more and consume more and be sure you are only buying what you set out to buy! (Stay in the produce section as much as possible!)

With Sources From:

http://www.bonappetit.com/test-kitchen/how-to/article/supermarket-psychology

Do You Want to Kill Your Stress Once and For All? Do This.

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Kill Stress Once and For All

Stress has become an epidemic in our society. When someone asks “How are you?” the majority of people now answer “stressed”.

This is now a normal, accepted answer to which the reply is a nod in understanding, “Yes, me too.” It’s like we’re keeping up with the Jones’ to see who can be busier and more stressed out.

This has got to stop!!!!

There are obviously major reasons why we would feel stress, and this is our body’s way to kick on our adrenaline processes and potentially our fight or flight so that we can get through a trauma, injury, major life change or passing of a loved one.

But the daily stresses that are climbing and adding up need to be seriously revised.

The first problem is not having enough time to get everything done that life demands. The answer is that you need to ask for help.

Your children can be a great source of your home stress, so ask them to help you. Depending on their ages, give them special tasks to complete to help out around the house.

There is no reason your teenagers should hit the couch when they get home from school. They can help to start dinner, get their lunches ready for the next day and help to care for their siblings.

This is not taking away their freedom and childhood, it is giving them life skills and responsibilities that I promise, they will thank you for in the future. (What student wants to get to college or university, away from home for the first time and have absolutely no idea how to feed themselves? Let’s give them a chance!)

The most important thing you can do is to live in the present moment.

Right here in this moment (the only moment we actually have) there is no stress. We are consciously present. We are just working on this one task. There is no worrying about getting it done in time, ohh I only have 2 more hours, etc. because that is not living in the present moment. The stress arrives when we think about the future and think about how something will affect us when it arrives. But if we try to stay just in the moment we have, your stress will diminish drastically.

The other important thing you need to do is to detach from outcomes.

Put no weight or importance on the outcome of any event. This is again, living in the present moment. For many things, we literally have no control over many situations and worrying about them can make us crazy. The outcome will unfold over time and we will deal with whatever happens at the time. Because we will be practicing being present in each moment and taking things minute by minute.

We must begin to consciously decide how our lives want to look and feel.

I’m sure that you are in agreement with me, we’ve all experienced enough stress for the rest of our lives just in the past few years. It’s time to let go of the panic of worrying about the future and fretting about the past and choose, decide today, to make every moment one of joy and contentment.

It’s so much nicer to live in a mindset that you actively choose, rather than to be sucked into the societal pressure of being stressed all the time. Your health will be so much better, and your personal and family life will be much happier. Share this new mindset with your family and friends to help them reduce their stress. Obviously it takes some time to train your mind to stay present but over time it will get easier and you will have a much more serene life.