Tune out to tune in
Often we are so busy consuming the news, social media, the constant stream of WhatsApp messages, immediately clicking onto the next ping or notification on our phones, that we forget to check in with ourselves. Hands up if this is you 🙋🏻♀️ (I know I'm guilty of this!)
These constant distractions fight for our attention, coaxing us into spending our time on them and before we know it an hour has gone by and we don’t quite know what happened to the time.
In becoming so attached to our phones, devices or any form of content, we can get so caught up in our heads and our thoughts and this becomes the driver for our behaviour. We can forget how we are in that moment, how our body feels and what we are really about.
So my question as I write this is - are you really tuned into you? Your true needs and wants? Do you have space in your mind to be able to respond rather than react to the constant media articles, messages and notifications we are bombarded with?
After a difficult few years for many, one in which has meant for most a heightened sense of danger, fear, insecurity; what we need most of all right now is to look after ourselves and then we can be there more fully for others too.
My tips (and what I’ve been doing are):
Box breathing in the morning and before going to bed to reset the nervous system - getting from sympathetic mode ‘fight and flight’ to parasympathetic ‘rest and digest’. Breathe in for 4 seconds, hold for 4 seconds, breathe out for 4 seconds and hold for 4 seconds and repeat.
Getting out into nature each day
Switching off your phone at night, switching off almost all app notifications and having it on silent during the day
Switching off all electronic devices by 9pm
Having an Epsom salt bath 3 evenings a week
Getting into bed by 10pm (or as close to as possible)
Gentle movement practice in the morning - yoga / stretching
Remember, tuning in and centering the self, is not being “self-centred” - it is vital for our emotional, physical and psychological wellbeing.