Archive for the ‘Lifestyle’ Category

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How to Deal Powerfully with Crappy Circumstances

May 2nd, 2012 by Jane

Have you ever wondered why some people are able to deal so well with terrible life circumstances and grow from them, whilst others are heavily weighed down by their problems to the point where they can’t even get out of bed in the morning?

Life can be tough and certainly isn’t perfect for many of us. Whether you have a sick relative, are struggling with your work or feel lonely, each of us is dealing with our own unique challenges.

Unless you’ve lived a completely sheltered life, it’s highly likely that you’ve had moments when you received some challenging news that knocked you about a bit.

No matter how positive and upbeat you usually are, bad news can send you into a state of paralysis where all you want to do is lay in bed.

Unfortunately, worrying in bed all day doesn’t result in much getting done. In fact, usually it only makes matters worse.

So how does one remain powerful in the face of crappy circumstances?

I believe asking yourself the following question can make a huge difference-

“What’s the smallest action step I can take to move my situation forward?”

For example, if you’re laying in bed you may decide that you need to have a shower, but that may still seem like a mammoth task. Too hard. Too overwhelming. No thanks.

If this is the case, break the task down into even smaller action steps. For example, say to yourself –

“Just lift your head off the pillow”.

Then you want to be like a broken record. Just keep asking yourself the question all day long – “What is the next little action step I can take?”

This strategy works a treat. When I recently received some crappy news, I asked myself this question over and over.

What was the result?

Phone calls were made. Emails were sent. My desk got tidied.

Sure, my crappy circumstances didn’t miraculously disappear, but at least I was in action and as a result, I felt much better about things.

As Eric Jenson states –

“One cannot always choose every aspect of their circumstances, job, relationships or family. What we can choose, every single waking moment of our lives, is our RESPONSE to those things. And it is our response that determines the quality of life, not our circumstances.”

So next time your life dishes you up something not so flash, you have a choice – you can stay in bed and worry all day or you can take the next little action step. It’s up to you. But whatever you decide will influence how your day and life plays out.

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Can you afford not to exercise?

April 22nd, 2012 by Jane

I was never particularly sporty at school. I was usually the last person to be picked for the team in sports class and I hated competition, so naturally I developed an aversion to physical activity.

I thought exercise was for other students (i.e. the popular guys and girls), but it certainly wasn’t for me. I looked down on exercise with a “who needs it!” attitude.

But then one day I realised that I was missing out on something quite special.

Somehow after studying for hours on end and not getting anywhere, my mum convinced me to take a break and attend a local boxercise class (if you’re not familiar with boxercise, it’s a boxing aerobics class).

To my amazement, boxercise was nothing like school sports class. I wasn’t being graded on executing the perfect punch and there was no pressure to win. What a relief!

1 hour of upper cuts, jabs and hook punches cleared my mind and left me feeling energised and refreshed.

I was hooked (no pun intended). Regular exercise became my way to a clearer and calmer mind as well as boosted grades and performance.

As Dr Atkinsons states –

“Exercise is the closest thing we’ll ever get to the miracle pill that everyone is seeking. It brings weight loss, appetite control, improved mood and self-esteem, an energy kick and longer life by decreasing the risk of heart disease, diabetes, stroke, osteoporosis and chronic disabilities”

Engaging in regular exercise is not just a great investment in your body, but also in your studies and work. Research shows that exercise helps us to learn more effectively, stimulates neuron growth, improves our thinking skills and enhances our motivation.

A study by Shephard and Lavaellee at the University of Toronto took two groups of students – a control and experimental group. The experimental group had 1 extra hour of physical education each day. Despite the fact that the control group had 13-14% more time studying than the other group, the researchers found that the experimental group were outperforming the control group in academic achievement after one year.

It’s clear – if you’re more physically active then you can think more clearly and focus on what you need to do (as opposed to feeling tired, less alert and easily distracted).

We need to start to relate to movement and exercise as an opportunity to sharpen our minds, not as a waste of time or inconvenience.

The goods news is that to experience the full benefits of exercise you don’t need to spend hours at the gym each day. Engaging in 30 minutes of moderate intensity physical activity on most (if not all) days of the week is all you need.

The key is to find as many ways as possible to be active in your day. For instance: take the stairs instead of the elevator, instead of watching TV after dinner go for a walk, and if you want to play a video game choose the Wii Fit instead (sure, it’s not the same as engaging in actual exercise but it’s better than nothing).

So next time you find yourself feeling overwhelmed by the amount of work you need to do, consider getting active and going out for a walk, run, bike ride or swim. As a poster at my old gym states –

The question isn’t “Can I afford to exercise?” but “Can I afford not to exercise?”


References

Shephard RJ, Lavallee H, Volle M, La Barre R, C B. Academic skills and required physical education: The Trois Rivieres Experience. Canadian Association for Health, Physical Education, and Recreation Research Supplements. 1994;1(1):1-12.

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Don’t strain your cerebral cortex: The importance of brain warm ups

March 12th, 2012 by Jane

My dad is 65 years old and he’s been running marathons for the last 4 years. Before a race he prepares himself mentally and physically by doing the following –

  • Getting a good night sleep (8 hours)
  • Having a healthy low GI breakfast
  • Stretching his muscles with a 500 metre jog

    • As a marathon runner he knows that to perform at his best he needs to prepare himself for the big event. Even with the best training, he knows that to run sleep deprived, in a low mood or without having warmed up would be a recipe for disaster.

    The importance of warming up seems obvious when we think of athletes, but what about for the rest of us? Do you mentally prepare yourself and warm up your brain before you start your work and study?

    Just as my dad and world class athletes prepare themselves for an event, if you have a project that you need to be able to really focus on then you’ll need to prepare yourself mentally and physically for it.

    How can you do this?

    Here is a list of 10 ways you can warm up your brain and mentally prepare for a big day at school or work.

    1. Get a good night sleep

    If you want to be able to concentrate on your work then you need to get a good night’s sleep (8.5 – 9.5 hours for adolescents, a little less for adults).

    If you’re averaging around 6 hours, that’s not enough. It’s highly likely that you will feel tired and sluggish and have great difficulty concentrating on your work.

    2. Drink plenty of water

    When you wake up have a glass of water. Why? Performance coach Harriet Griffey states -

    “Water makes up about 80% of the brain and is an essential element in neurological transmissions”.

    If you want to think better, then drink plenty of water. Often when you can’t concentrate or think properly it’s because you’re dehydrated. Have a bottle of water within arms reach when you work.

    3. Move your body

    Morning exercise can help clear and focus your mind. In addition, it can boost your endorphin levels which lifts your mood (thereby further enhancing your ability to concentrate on your work).

    4. Lift your mood and energy levels

    Think of a time when you felt stressed and irritable – how easy was it for you to concentrate? It’s tough work! On the other hand, when you feel calm and happy it’s significantly easier to concentrate.

    So if you find yourself in a negative mood, you need to find a way to stabilise your mood for the day ahead. Going for a quick 15 – 20 minute jog or taking 5 minutes to meditate may be all it takes.

    5. Do a brain dump

    When you wake up your mind can be full of different thoughts (e.g. “Why didn’t John respond to my text?”, “How am I going to get all my work done by Friday?” and “Must remember to buy milk”). If these thoughts just stay in your head they can often leave you feeling overwhelmed. Overwhelm = stress.

    So what’s the antidote? It’s simple – get the thoughts out of your head and onto paper. Spend 5 minutes writing down whatever thoughts come to mind. The act of writing them down will give you a greater sense of control.

    6. Sit still and focus on your breath for 5 minutes

    Find yourself a quiet place and sit upright. Close your eyes and focus on your breathe for 5 minutes. If a thought comes into your mind, acknowledge it and let it go, returning your focus to your breath.

    This simple exercise allows you to calm your mind and body for the day, helping you to focus and deal more effectively with what the day throws at you.

    7. Have a low GI healthy breakfast

    Low GI breakfasts, such as muesli with chopped fruit and wholemeal toast with baked beans, will give you the energy you need to get through the first part of the day and will allow you to concentrate better on your work.

    8. Spend 5 seconds de-cluttering

    A messy, disorganised environment can result in you being easily distracted from what you need to do. Spend 5 minutes cleaning your desk of anything that you won’t need to do the task at hand. If this means picking up all the papers and dumping them into a box behind you, then so be it. You can deal with them later.

    9. Get clear with lists

    Ask yourself the question -

    “What are the most important things I need to do today?”

    Start a list. Write down all the things, then cull that list back to 3 things to focus your mind on.

    10. Visualise yourself working with focus

    Visualisation is the act of mentally rehearsing something over and over in your minds eye. Athletes use this strategy to help them perfect executing certain moves. I have found this strategy to be particularly effective in helping me to prepare for engaging in work that I have a lot of mental resistance towards.

    An example of this was a 12,000 word essay I had to complete in my final year of studying psychology at university. Every morning I would imagine myself sitting at my laptop and my hands tapping away wildly at the keyboard. As simple as this may sound, this actually made it easier for me to get up and start writing my essay.

    In conclusion, we need to approach our work days as a marathon. In order for the day to go smoothly and effectively, it may help to do a brain warm up before you launch into your work. Without it, you’ll probably still be able to function at a reasonable level, but it may take you longer and be harder to get into the work you need to do. Try combining a few of the suggestions above and let me know how you go.

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    Can you Survive the Zombie Apocalypse?

    February 29th, 2012 by Jane

    Motivating yourself to exercise isn’t always easy. When you’ve been at school or work for over 6 – 8 hours, the last thing you probably want to do is go for a run, walk or lift some weights.

    But what if a horde of zombies was chasing after you? Would that motivate you to start running?

    The latest craze in exercise isn’t Zumba, it’s Zombies, run!

    Adrian Hon and Naomi Alderman created and launched the iPhone exercise application, Zombies, Run!, earlier this year.

    How it works is pretty straight forward – you pop your head phones in, press play and you hear instructions in between your usual running track playlist telling you to collect supplies, such as medicines and batteries, as your chased by zombies.

    Every time you go for a run a story unfolds.

    In addition, the application records your distance, time, pace and calories burned of each run.

    The inspiration for Zombies, run! came when Naomi was taking part in an online running training group and she was asked the question, “Why do you want to run?” One participant in the group responded with “to outrun the zombie horde” and the idea was born.

    Naomi states –

    “We want to know that if things go bad we’d be able to rely on our bodies to get us through and keep us safe. And it’s cool to imagine yourself in an action movie – I dorkily do that all the time when I’m on the treadmill”

    Zombies, run! may not be for everyone, but you have to hand it to the creators of this application, it’s a highly original idea!

    Some people may think that the idea of being chased by zombies is too far-fetched and hard to imagine. But I beg to differ. Just look around you. Have you ever noticed that many people seem to be a little zombified these days? Vacant looks on their faces? There are zombies everywhere.

    So if the gym or running bores the pants off you or you simply need to spice up your exercise program, then consider trying Zombies, run!

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    Perfecting the Power Nap

    February 21st, 2012 by Jane

    Feeling tired? Forget coffee or a redbull.

    Try a power nap instead.

    You may not realise, but you’ve already had plenty of practice at power napping. Think back to your days at kindergarten and pre-primary– nap time. Whilst you may have been forced to nap against your will, this was your time to re-energise and re-charge. And for most of us, it worked.

    There is a plethora of research that illustrates power naps can yield great benefits in our lives. Dr Sara Mednick, author of Take a nap! Change your life, states that a good nap can reset your system, give you a burst of alertness and increase motor performance on tasks such as typing.

    In fact, studies have found that a 10-minute daytime nap can improve alertness and performance for about 2.5 hours when you‘re sleep deprived and for 4 hours when you’re not sleep deprived.

    Naps also seem to be beneficial for memory consolidation of new information, improving our mood and subjective levels of sleepiness and fatigue.

    So why do most of us stop napping after the age of 5? Beats me.

    I love my daily power nap. In fact, it’s an essential part of my day.

    In my office at university, you’ll find an inflatable mattress and 2 cushions – one to cover my eyes and the other to rest my head on.

    On most days at around 1pm or 2pm I set my timer for 15 minutes and take a power nap. Not only does this leave me feeling energised, but I also often get new ideas and insights in relation to projects I’m working on.

    So what constitutes the perfect power nap?

    Below I have outlined some key features of perfect power naps based on the research literature and my own personal experience as a power nap enthusiast.

    Avoid the Groggy Zone (i.e. sleep inertia) – Keep your naps short and sweet

    Hayashi and his team at the department of Behavioural Sciences at Hiroshima University found you need to enter sleep stages 1 and 2 to experience the perfect power nap, with all the benefits that come with it (e.g. improved alertness and performance). They also found that you need a minimum of 3 minutes of stage 2 sleep to experience the full restorative power of a nap.

    Napping for less than 30 minutes seems to do the trick, they say. Other sleep experts suggest that naps between 14 – 24 minutes is what you should aim for.

    Feel like that’s too short? Think again.

    Generally speaking, the shorter the power nap, the better.

    Have you ever had the experience when you came home from school or work, fell asleep and woke up 1 or 2 hours later as the sun was setting? Most likely you felt groggy and disoriented. You may have even felt slightly panicked as you thought it was the next day.

    The reason for experiencing this grogginess is that you entered your deep sleep cycle and failed to complete it. To avoid feeling groggy and worse than you felt before, you need to limit the duration of your power nap to between 14 – 24 minutes, so you don’t go beyond stage 2 sleep. Any more than this and you’ll be entering the groggy zone.

    Nap before 5pm, preferably after lunch

    In addition, you want to make sure you nap before 5pm to avoid disrupting your sleep at night. The best time to nap seems to be when you experience the post lunch dip (1pm – 3pm).

    Block out the light

    Where should you nap? A dark room is best, but if that’s not available, put something over your eyes (e.g. an eye mask) to block out the light. This will allow you to fall asleep quickly.

    You need to actually sleep

    A student once asked me -

    “Do you need to actually fall asleep or can just lying down with your eyes closed be enough?”

    The key is to enter stage 1 and 2 sleep, so if you’re just resting on the couch but your mind is still active, this won’t cut it.

    Nap regularly

    Ultimately, the key to perfecting your power naps is to just do it – nap. And do it regularly. If you can make napping a regular part of your routine it will allow you to see what works best for you – what position allows you to fall asleep quickly, what environment allows you to relax the most and what length of time suits you.

    At the end of the day, power naps are hugely beneficial but you need to remember, we’re all different. What may work for me, may not work as well for you.

    So as an experiment, after you next have lunch, grab yourself a cosy pillow, close the blinds and treat yourself to a power nap. See how much of a difference it makes to your alertness, creativity and performance.

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    Lessons from Failbook: The Benefits of Gratitude

    February 11th, 2012 by Jane

    “Failbook” is a site that allows you to anonymously submit tragic and funny Facebook and Twitter status updates of your “friends”, many of which show the uglier side of Homo sapiens.

    One page on this site that stands out is called “Spoiled brats who didn’t get what they wanted for Christmas”. Some of the status updates include -

    “No iPhone. I hate my dad”

    “Was I the only person who didn’t get an iPad? I mean I got a car but that’s a different story all together :/”

    “I’m so jealous of everyone with the white iPhone and I have this ugly black one”

    These people surely can’t be serious?

    After all, nearly half the worlds’ population live on less than $2.50 a day, 1.1 billion people in developing countries don’t have access to water and 2.6 billion lack basic sanitation.

    And you complain about your ugly black iPhone?

    Stop. You’re hurting my brain.

    Look, I realise that at some level we can all be like these spoilt brats. It’s very easy to get caught up in the frenetic pace of modern life, lose perspective and forget how lucky we are.

    And research shows we pay a price for this. It has been found that people who lack an outlook of gratitude are worse off physically and psychologically than others. But before I launch into the research in this area, it makes sense to look at what ‘gratitude’ actually is.

    Prominent researcher Robert Emmons defines gratitude as –

    “a felt sense of wonder, thankfulness and appreciation for life”.

    It is a sense of thankfulness and joy in response to everyday events, personal attributes and the people we encounter. In other words, it’s about counting your blessings.

    In one experiment that examined the practice of gratitude, participants who wrote down 5 things they were grateful for each week engaged in exercise more regularly, reported fewer physical symptoms (i.e. less headaches, acne and coughing) and felt better about their lives than those who wrote down their hassles or neutral life events instead.

    Another similar experiment with young adults found that the participants who practiced being grateful showed higher levels of positive states of alertness, enthusiasm, determination, attentiveness and energy than those who wrote down their hassles or the ways in which they were better off than others.

    Further studies have also found that grateful people experience greater life satisfaction, vitality as well lower levels of depression and stress than others. These studies illustrate that if you want to feel amazingly good you may not need to buy lots of stuff, eat chocolate and take anti-depressants. Phew!

    It also turns out that expressing gratitude can save you money. If you’re grateful for what you have in your life you’ll be less likely to care about acquiring material possessions such as iPads or iPhones, less envious of wealthy people and more willing to share your stuff.

    So how does gratitude work? How does it make us happier and more balanced?

    There are several reasons and I’ll touch on a few of them. Sonja Lyubomirsky in her book ‘The How of Happiness’ states –

    “grateful thinking promotes the savouring of positive life experiences. By relishing and taking pleasure in some of the gifts of your life, you will be able to extract the maximum possible satisfaction and enjoyment from your current circumstances”

    In addition, expressing gratitude helps to increase an individuals self worth and self esteem, cope with stress, and strengthens your relationships with others.

    The research literature clearly demonstrates that if you want to boost your happiness levels then nurturing an attitude of gratitude may be the way to go.

    All that you need to do is take a few moments to reflect each day on aspects of your life that you’re grateful for. Here’s one way you can do it –

    1. Take a notebook and pen.

    2. Sit in a quiet place where you won’t be distracted and write down 3-5 things that you’re grateful for. This could be anything from the mundane everyday event (e.g. the floor is vacuumed) to something you saw that was beautiful (e.g. a full moon).

    If nothing immediately comes to mind, try answering the following questions –

    1. What are you good at?
    2. What do you like about where you live?
    3. What goals have you achieved this year?
    4. What opportunities do you have available to you?
    5. Who has contributed or touched your life in some way?

    You may also want to try using other gratitude exercises to avoid the practice of gratitude becoming a tiresome chore. Perhaps you may find that you get bored of writing a list of 5 things. If this is the case, you can just sit and think about the things you are grateful for. Alternatively, you may want to phone a friend or write them a letter to express your gratitude directly to them.

    Gratitude levels can also be enhanced by developing a good awareness of previous experiences of deprivation or difficult times. As Peterson and Seligman state in their book “Character Strengths and Virtues” –

    “one greatly appreciates a mild spring after a harsh winter, a gourmet meal following a fast…there is an old saying that blessings are not known until they are lost”.

    The most important thing is that you engage in the practice of expressing gratitude regularly. It doesn’t really matter when you do it, just as long as you do it. When it becomes a chore, that’s when you’ll know that it’s time to vary some of your practice (e.g. the activity, the time and/or place you do it).

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    Don’t have enough time? Try Time Hacking

    January 29th, 2012 by Jane

    Boxing in a ring, making grape juice with your feet and jumping into a cold pool of water in the middle of winter. These were just a few activities that Matt Danzico did as part of a quirky experiment (The Time Hack) to see if he could create the longest year of his life.

    Why did he do this?

    Well, scientific research suggests that when people engage in new activities time seems to slow down.

    Danzico wanted to know if this was actually the case. So he set himself a challenge: each day for a year he would try something new and unusual.

    So what did he find?

    Time in fact slowed down.

    After the year long experiment, he concluded –

    “For generations, mothers have told their children not sit around and let life pass them by. The Time Hack was an effort to confront the time-honoured adage and demonstrate the science-backed benefits of making the most out of life. In short: Do more and your perception of life will change for the better. Get out the house and experience the world first-hand, put yourself in unusual and uncomfortable situations.”

    And before you start thinking, “But hang on a minute, there are only 24 hours in a day, 60 minutes in an hour…you can’t change time!” let me make a distinction between two types of time: physical time and psychological time.

    Physical time is the actual amount of time we have in our lives (i.e. 24 hours in a day) and this will never change.

    Whereas psychological time is your perception of how long something takes. Several studies show that you can extend your perception of time in a number of ways such as engaging in new experiences like Danzico did.

    It’s easy to understand the psychology of how your perception of time can be slowed down by thinking back to a time when you hurt yourself or experienced excruciating pain. Perhaps you broke your leg, slammed your finger in a car door or had a splitting migraine. Did it feel like time stood still or dragged? Most likely.

    When you’re in pain you perceive time to be longer than it actually is. The reason for this is that you focus in on the pain and have greater attentional focus on what’s happening in the here and now. In other words, you’re more mindful. That’s why everything seems to slow down.

    The good news is that slamming your fingers in the car door isn’t the only way to expand your sense of psychological time. I’ve outlined a few other healthier and less painful ways below.

    Do new things

    There’s really no reason why you can’t try something new and different each day. If you look at the different activities Danzico did as part of The Time Hack experiment you’ll quickly see that the only thing stopping you is your imagination.

    Ask yourself this–

    “What can I do differently today?”

    There is an infinite number of possibilities: make something different for dinner, take a different route to school or work, have a conversation with someone you usually wouldn’t, etc. You don’t even need much money (if any) to do most of these things. A lot of the activities Danzico engaged in (e.g. creating and tossing a message in a bottle, having dinner with an Iraqi refugee and learning to moonwalk) cost next to nothing.

    Be in the moment

    Do you often find yourself thinking about the future or the past? Or perhaps you find that you frequently break or spill things because you weren’t paying full attention or were thinking about something else? Do you tend to forget a persons name as soon as you’ve been told it?

    If you answered yes to any of these questions, consider that most of the time you’re not in the present moment. You may be living life on automatic pilot, which means you experience life in a mindless, rushed and frenzied way.

    If you’re sick of experiencing life like this, you may want to take up mindfulness training. Mindfulness is defined as being aware of what is going on around you (internally and externally) in the present moment in a non judgmental way.

    As the authors of the journal article “If money doesn’t make you happy, consider time” state –

    “One possible benefit of being present-focused is that thinking about the present moment vs the future slows down the passage of time, allowing people to feel less rushed and hurried”

    Breathe Deeply

    It’s firmly established that breathing deeply can help us to de-stress, but recently it’s also been shown that it can help us to expand our time.

    In an experiment by Rudd and Aaker, one group of participants were told to take long and slow breaths, whilst another group took short and quick breaths for 5 minutes. The participants who breathed more deeply felt that they had more time to get things done and felt that their days were longer too.

    So next time you find yourself feeling stressed out and rushed, remember that you have a choice in the matter. You can extend your perception of time through using a range of simple strategies: trying new experiences, breathing deeply and by being in the here and now.

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    Are you being Screen Sucked?

    January 7th, 2012 by Jane

    Do you find it hard to get away from the computer?

    Have you ever found yourself in a trance like state wasting hours browsing meaningless websites?

    If so, you experienced being “screen sucked”.

    The term “screensucking” was created by medical doctor and author of the book “CrazyBusy”, Edward Hallowell. He defines screensucking as –

    “Wasting time engaging with any screen – for instance, computer, video game, television and BlackBerry”

    He goes onto state -

    “Held by a mysterious force, a person can sit long after the work has been done or the show he wanted to watch is over, absently glommed on to the screen, not especially enjoying what he is doing but not able to disconnect and turn off the machine.”

    The thing about screensucking is that we are largely unaware of the amount of time we spend doing it. We sit at our desks in front of our computers and have a tendency to collapse our mindless browsing with actually doing productive work. By “productive work” I mean the stuff that will actually bring you closer towards achieving the things you want in life.

    It wasn’t until I actually tracked my time that I realised that I was wasting hours of my day getting screensucked.

    Here’s the thing – your time is finite. It’s your most precious resource and it’s non renewable, meaning once it’s gone, it’s gone for good. You’re never going to get it back.

    Once you realise that you’ve been spending a significant chunk of your life doing things that aren’t that important to you (i.e. screensucking), you can’t help but feel a little pathetic and want to change things.

    The beauty about the concept of “screensucking” is that once you’re aware that every time you turn on the TV or computer you can be screensucked you have some control at that point. As Edward Hallowell states –

    “It’s similar to drinking alcohol: Once you start, you need to be careful how much you consume. Insight can lead to moderation”

    Sure, insight and awareness can make a huge difference but often we need other structures and strategies in place to help us change our behaviour.

    Below I have outlined some strategies you can use to avoid being screensucked.

    1. Set limits and stick to them

    Before you turn on your television or computer, decide on a period of time that you are willing to spend engaged in this activity. Grab an electronic timer and set the timer for this amount of time. Then tell yourself that when the alarm goes off, that’s it, time out. At this point, you need to step away from the computer.

    2. What else could you be doing?

    Often when we are bored and restless we tend to do one of two things –

    1. Shop
    2. Go on the computer or turn on the TV

    These activities give us a sense of purpose and are easy ways to avoid the discomfort of feeling bored and pass the time. But the reality is, both of these activities are not likely to get you to the places you want to go in life.

    Most people go through life on automatic pilot and never really ask themselves the questions –

  • What do I want to do with my life?
  • What would bring me joy and fulfilment?
  • Am I actually doing the things that bring me joy and fulfilment?

    • Spend some time, even if it’s just 5 minutes, reflecting on these questions. Getting clear on the things we value in life can help us to see inconsistencies in our lives and bridge the gap between what we say is important and what we actually do.

    The last thing you want to do is end up joining the socks and sandal brigade full of regrets (“I wish I had spent less time on Facebook in my younger years!”). Make sure you use your time to do the things that matter most to you.

    3. Work with a pen and paper

    Work in an environment that doesn’t allow you to be screensucked. Leave your mobile and laptop at home and head to a café or quiet library with a pad of paper and pen for a writing or planning session.

    Note: I actually wrote this blog post with a pen and paper far away from my computer screen. It took me about 25 minutes to write. It probably would have taken me twice as long to write if I had been at the computer and plagued by screensuckers ugly relative – Uncle Multitask.

    4. Have a technology (screen) free day in your week

    Think of the last time you couldn’t find your mobile phone, what was your reaction? Slightly panicked? What about when you couldn’t connect to the internet? Did you feel a bit lost? Found yourself pacing around the house?

    Many of us have become a little addicted to technology. Going online, checking our email and turning on the TV are ingrained habits like brushing our teeth.

    But it can be liberating when you cut back on your screen time by taking a technology detox one day a week.

    Don’t get me wrong, initially you may feel jittery and uncomfortable doing this. You may experience withdrawal symptoms. But everytime you feel like turning on a screen, take in a deep breath and tell yourself that this moment will pass.

    5. How do you want to be remembered?

    How do you want to look back on your life? As someone who spent a lot of their time updating their Facebook status? Superficially engaged in the virtual space? Or connecting with people face to face?

    Spend a moment thinking about what you would like people to say about you when you die. Sounds a little morbid right? Not really. The point is for you to get clear on what you want your life to be about. Once you get clear on this, you can start to take action to live in line with what you truly value.

    I know that I want to look back on my life and be able to say that I made the most of the short time I had on this planet. I think the following words of George Bernard Shaw sum up how we could all live if we didn’t spend so much time getting screensucked–

    “I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work, the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no ‘brief candle’ to me. It is sort of a splendid torch which I have a hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it over to future generations”.

    Now is the time to put these strategies to the test. Close down this webpage and turn off your computer. Make the most of this beautiful day.

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    Posted by Jane Tags: , , ,
    Posted in Lifestyle, Technology | 3 Comments »


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