Category: Well-being

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LIST-Mindfulness Well-being

Eating Mindfulness

You can practice this exercise with one simple sultana or raisin, a piece of chocolate or a selection of fruit, biscuits on a plate. Before you choose one, come to a place of mindfulness: sense what your body needs – notice whether saliva production increases as you look at the platter. Take your time to choose one thing.

Focus with clear awareness on each movement and each moment of the experience as you move your arm and hand and fingers towards the object and pick it up – placing it on the palm of your hand or hold it between your fingers.

Imagine you have just come to Earth and awakened to this substance you have not encountered before.

  • Explore it with all your senses.
  • As if you have never seen it before.
  • Scan it, explore every part of it with your eyes as it sits on your palm or in your fingers.
  • Turn it around.
  • Notice the texture, the light on it, its shape.
  • Whether it is soft, hard, coarse, smooth.
  • Notice any thoughts that arise (like “why am I doing this?” ) and see if you can just notice the thoughts and let them be…bringing your awareness back to the object.
  • Take the object beneath your nose and carefully notice the smell of it. Bring the object to one ear and squeeze it, roll it, listen for any sound coming from it.
  • Begin to slowly take the object in your mouth, noticing that the arm knows exactly where to go and perhaps noticing your mouth watering.
  • Gently place the object in your mouth or take one bite if it is larger than one bite-size but do not chew yet … feel it on your tongue: its weight, temperature, size, texture …explore the sensations of it in your mouth.

When you are ready, intentionally bite into it …does it go automatically to one side of the mouth? Notice when the taste releases. Slowly, slowly chew, noticing the change in consistency, until you are conscious of the impulse to swallow.

Sense the food moving down to your throat and into your oesophagus on its way to your stomach. Sit with the experience noticing any vestiges remaining in your mouth, on your tongue, taste, feelings …satisfaction, pleasure, aversion.

Take a moment to congratulate yourself for taking the time to experience Mindful Eating.

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LIST-Mindfulness Well-being

Mindfulness of the External World

Background: We carry with us our 5 senses – touch, taste, smell, hearing and sight – but we often register those sensations unconsciously. Using these tools, we can become aware, accepting and mindful of the external world. We can only see, smell, touch, taste and hear in the present.

  1. 5,4,3,2,1 Exercises

These are exercises in noticing what is around us:

A.  Sight: Look around you and name as you look at 5 different objects (variation: 5 blue/black/green objects), then do the same for 4 of those 5 objects, 3 of those 5 objects, etc
B.  Sight & Touch: Look at, name and touch 5 different objects, noticing their texture, temperature, mass and weight as you do so. Then do the same for 4 of those objects, 3 of those objects, etc
C.  Sight, Touch and Smell/Taste: Look at (in a garden or a kitchen), name, taste and smell 5 different objects, noticing their colours, texture, taste and aroma. Then do the same for 4 of those objects, 3, 2, 1.
D.  Hearing: Close your eyes and listen for 5 different sounds. Then 4,3,2,1.

  1. Other Exercises On The External World

A.  Mindfulness on washing the dishes
B.  Mindfulness on walking
C.  Mindfulness on sitting in the garden
D.  Mindfulness on driving a car through traffic

Notice physical sensations through the body – sights, smells, sounds, tastes, touch/sensations

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LIST-Mindfulness Well-being

Introduction to Mindfulness

In this section you will find a variety of Mindfulness strategies that you might find useful in helping you to notice distress (worry, sadness, hurt, pain, anger, loneliness, etc) when it is happening rather than having to distract yourself from these feelings – because, of course, distraction can only last for so long and eventually the feelings come back – or the fear that they will overwhelm you.

Distress doesn’t just happen in your head – yes, there are difficult and painful thoughts, but these are always accompanied by emotions and bodily sensations. Mindfulness practice allows you to be able to identify, tolerate and even reduce some of these difficult, painful and even frightening thoughts, feelings and sensations – it gives you back some mastery over them.

Rather than feeling that you are being pushed around by your feelings and thoughts you learn to be able to have some agency over them.

So what is this thing called “Mindfulness”? Below are some definitions;

  • The awareness that emerges through paying attention on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally to the unfolding of experience moment to moment” (Kabat-Zinn, 2003).
  • “The non-judgmental observation of the ongoing stream of internal and external stimuli as they arise.” (Baer, 2003).
  • “Keeping one’s complete attention to the experience on a moment to moment basis” (Martlett & Kristeller, 1999).

Put simply, Mindfulness is as simple as becoming aware of your here and now experience, both internally and in the external world around you. It gives you a space in the present moment to be able to more safely deal with the distressing and painful memories of things that might have happened to you in the past and to also be able to look at and plan for the future, even when you might have fearful thoughts about things that haven’t yet happened, from a secure position of knowing that you are in the present moment. In fact, we are never NOT in the present moment – we just lose track of that fact quite often.

Sometimes it is easier to understand something in terms of what it is NOT. Here are some examples of MindLESSness:

  • Breaking things, spilling things, clumsiness, accidents because of carelessness, inattention or thinking about something else.
  • Failing to notice subtle or not-so-subtle feelings of physical discomfort, pain, tension etc.
  • Forgetting someone’s name as soon as you hear it.
  • Listening to someone with one ear while doing something else at the same time.
  • Getting so focussed on goals that I lose touch with what I am doing right now.
  • Getting lost in my thoughts and feelings.
  • Being preoccupied with the future or the past.
  • Eating without being aware of eating.
  • Having periods of time where you have difficulty remembering the details of what happened – running on autopilot.
  • Reacting emotionally in certain ways – feeling like an emotion just “came out of nowhere”.
  • Daydreaming or thinking of other things when doing chores.
  • Doing several things at once rather than focussing on one thing at a time.
  • Distracting yourself with things like eating, alcohol, pornography, drugs, work.

If you do some or even most of these things at times, then you are probably a normal member of the human race.

Recent research is indicating that with as little as 20 minutes of Mindfulness practice daily, the brain actually changes – the part of the brain that send messages of anxiety and distress slows down and the part that sends messages of calmness and comfort to the body gets more active. So this stuff is not just a sugar pill – it actually does make a difference. You don’t have to do it all the time, but once you practice some of the strategies we have made available on this website then you can adjust and modify them, or make up your own, and incorporate them into your daily routine. Like any new skill, they need to be practiced and it is best to practice them BEFORE you really need them so that they are familiar to you.

We have provided a number of downloadable Mindfulness exercises in this section. You can download them to a CD or straight to an iPod or MP3 player. Use the ones that seem most helpful to you – after using the recordings for a while you may find that it is easier to just practice mindfulness without them. You might find you are developing your own Mindfulness strategies that work well for you.

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LIST-Mindfulness Well-being

Mindfulness Overview

You might have heard the term ‘mindfulness’. This is related to Relaxation, but they are slightly different things.

Mindfulness is about paying attention to things about yourself and your environment that would normally go unnoticed. Mindfulness allows us to step away from distressing thoughts and feelings which often seem so compelling.

Practising mindfulness is useful in and of itself, not just when you are having difficulties. You can incorporate it into your everyday routines, such as practising mindful walking or mindfully drinking tea or coffee. By consciously using mindfulness in as much of your day as possible, you increase your awareness and enhance your sense of control and choice.

A ‘trap’ for men trying to use mindfulness is feeling pressure to ‘get it right’, or thinking that you ‘just don’t get it’. There will be times when you doubt your ability to practise mindfulness.

Expect that you will become distracted and doubt your ability to ‘do’ mindfulness. This is part of the practice. The idea is to notice such doubtful thoughts and the way that they can take hold, as you practice mindfulness awareness exercises.

Mindfulness exercises can be a struggles at first for men, as it goes against the idea that men are ‘do-ers’, who have been trained to be problem solvers. Learning to notice things without trying to assess them or change can therefore feel difficult. The idea that you should do something will almost certainly occur; the challenge is to simply notice a thought and then to come back to your breath anchor.

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LIST-Living Your Values Well-being

Making change happen

Change rarely happens in a neatly staged or organised way. Making changes to address unhelpful habits or to develop more useful patterns of behaviour requires focus, effort and repetition. Below is a basic map to help ‘track change’.

I don’t know or want to know. You don’t see a problem or need to change. Others efforts to convince you of a need for change are generally ineffective.

I’m thinking about it. You see that there’s a problem you want to get some control over, you’re evaluating the pros and cons. Others hear you talking about problem/s and options.

I want to, I’m getting ready. You are ready to change and make things happen. Others help through encouragement and strengthening your motivation.

I’m doing it. You’re taking active steps to modify your behaviour and/or environment: in your own unique way. Others can help by noticing positive changes.

I’m staying on track. Change has been made and maintained for a few months. Although, there are occasional ‘bumps’ in the road, you refuse to be derailed and know what it takes to stay on track.

When seeking to make change, remember that SAFETY is a foundation stone of building a solid base for yourself and the well-being of those close to you.

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LIST-Living Your Values Well-being

Expectations and making changes

For some people, downloading this app might be a sign that you are ready for big changes in your life. You might have a sense that this isn’t going to be easy and might be a struggle sometimes.

At the same time, it might feel like things are a struggle already and it’s time for things to change as soon as possible. There can be a real sense of ‘c’mon, I’m ready, let’s get on with it!’

It’s important to try and stay realistic about how much can change and how quickly. You can make changes for the better in your life one step at a time.

Trying to work it all out can become overwhelming and frustrating. It can feel like everything in your life is beyond your control.

At times like this it can be helpful to try and focus on something you can control – it might be your breathing or what food you are going to eat tonight. These might seem like small decisions but they are important.

Making change happen requires focus, effort and repetition.

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LIST-Living Your Values Well-being

Knowing your values

Dealing with distressing experiences like memories of sexual abuse, anxiety, and depression takes a lot of our energy, and at times it might feel like it takes all you’ve got just to stay afloat. In order to get ourselves in a better place to deal with these difficulties and life’s problems in general, it is worth putting some time and energy into identifying what you stand for as a person: what you value.

Our values act as a kind of reference guide or compass for who we are, how we act in particular situations and where we want to go in life. If we possess a clear sense of purpose and direction, and act according to our values, then we are less likely to feel overwhelmed or be knocked off course when we experience challenging situations.

Our values might be based on how we were brought up, on religious or spiritual tradition, or a particular ethics or approach to life that we have adopted. We might value being calm, honest, considerate, ‘giving people a fair go’, being creative, thoughtful, reliable, ‘doing our best’.

Whatever the history of our values, they are essentially our sense of the right way for us to live. When we act in accordance with our values, we generally see our life as purposeful and meaningful.

Tips for identifying your values:

We usually hold our values implicitly; in other words, we don’t often consciously think about and name our values in a structured way. By identifying our values, we establish a basic guide for us in our life.

Take some time to think about the following areas of life, and try to identify a word or sentence or two about what is important to you; what kind of person do you want to be and how would you like to act in these areas of life?

We have included some possible suggestions.

  • Family relationships – caring, supportive, respectful
  • Parenting – loving, caring listener
  • Friendships – honest, mateship, ‘being there when needed’
  • Work – integrity, efficient, reliable
  • Education – open minded, informed, ‘doing my best’
  • Recreation, leisure – fun, relaxing, life experiences
  • Spirituality – consideration, tolerance, compassionate
  • Community involvement – commitment, giving back, connecting with people
  • Health and well-being – quiet time, variety, generosity to others

Keeping a record of what you value and how you want to live your life can be useful. Once you have created a record for you, the next step is to start to take some small steps that make these valued part of how you live and act in your life.

This approach to life does not mean we are never confronted by difficult situations, unwelcome thoughts and uncomfortable feelings. It is just our focus is on calming and centring ourselves and acting in accordance with what we have established as our preferred, valued way of living life.

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LIST-Learning-thinking Well-being

How music can support our well-being

Music can play a big part in our lives.

Research suggests that music can stimulate the body’s natural feel good chemicals (Eg. endorphins, oxytocin), it can help energize our mood and even help us work through problems and provide an outlet for us to take control of our feelings.

For example music can help us to:

• Promote Wellness

• Manage Stress

• Express Feelings

• Enhance Memory

• Improve Communication

• Promote Physical Rehabilitation

• Alleviate Pain – Did you know that focussing on music reduces your brain’s perception of pain?

Listening to music is a popular way to cope with difficult times, for example music can sometimes express how we are feeling or vent difficult thoughts and emotions for us. You may be able to relate to the music and find comfort from the words in a song.

By listening to music we may feel our mood or energy improve, but sometimes we may actually feel worse. So how can we work to ensure the way we use music has a positive effect on us?

What does your music do for you?

To find out how music affects you, try and become aware of the effect certain songs, styles, artists have on you.

What does the music do for you?

Some music may allow you to sit with a mood, explore it, understand it, but not feel worse from doing so.

Other music might help you change a mood, or set a new mood. This can be a helpful if it helps you bring your mood/emotions to a healthier space.

To discover the effect music has on you consider:

• Does the music allow you to sit with a mood, change a mood or set a new mood?

• Does it make you feel better or worse?

• Is it helpful to feel worse? When does it stop being helpful? For example rather than music having a calming effect on you, listening to it might make you feel more angry or anxious.

• When is it not helpful?

• Is it a certain style of music that is helpful or unhelpful or is it a certain artist or words in a song?

Managing our music

Once we are aware of how music affects us we can then start to intentionally select our music.

Many people say that having their music on shuffle is not the best thing when they are having a tough time, instead being aware of their music choice and selecting songs or playlists that they know can help them cope in a positive way is more helpful.

By considering the questions listed above can help us work out which music would be on these playlists.

Why not have a go at creating a few playlists for different emotions i.e.

• Music to wake me up

• Music to energize me

• My happy music

• Music which vents frustration for me etc

Listening to music, doesn’t have to be the only way music can be helpful you may find singing or dancing along is the actual factor that has the positive effect, so try putting on some great songs to belt along to, or you may like listening to live music, or actually writing and playing your own music. The key is to become aware of how different music and use of music affects you.

By actively and intentionally selecting and using your music it can be a really helpful way to feel more in control of your feelings.

Link to music

Acknowledgements

This information was prepared by Cheong-Clinch, Hense and Goulding 2012. We are grateful to Tune in Not Out (www.tuneinnotout.com) for allowing us to include this information on our website.

Tune In Not Out (TINO) provides 24hr TV for life’s challenges from mental to sexual health. Tune In Not Out brings videos, factsheets, real stories and blogs from across Australia into one central point for young people to explore. Check it out www.tuneinnotout.com

References

Grape, C., Sandgren, M., Hansson, L.O., Ericson, M., & Theorell, T. (2003). Does singing promote well-being? An empirical study of professional and amateur singers during a singing lesson. Journal of Integrative Physiological Behavioural Science, 38, 1, pp. 65-74.

http://www.musictherapy.org/

Categories
LIST-Learning-thinking Well-being

Unhelpful Patterns of thinking

Our brain generates thousands of thoughts each day. Some thoughts are really useful, absolute gold, while others are unhelpful and best left to one side. If you can see these thoughts for what they are – thoughts – then it can allow you to get some distance from troubling thoughts and to spend more time with thoughts that are most useful and supportive of your life.

Every now and again we can all get into unhelpful patterns of thinking. When someone has experienced significant trauma, or had a series of setbacks, unhelpful patterns of thinking can become ‘locked in’, almost as an automatic response in unfamiliar or challenging situations.

Listed below are some unhelpful patterns thinking to watch out for, plus ways to disengage and get you back on track. By naming these thought patterns for what they are, you can step back from them and make a decision whether to put more energy into them—or not.

Stewing or ruminating,

Stewing or ruminating is where you find yourself running things repetitively over and over in your mind, like a tape loop, without any fresh input or action being taken. Typically, stewing or ruminating leads to problems growing in size and appearing even more difficult to deal with.

Catastrophising and over generalising

Catastrophising and over-generalising is where you take a single event or limited piece of information, and see it as a global pattern (usually a negative one). If you hear yourself using words like ‘always’ or ‘never’, these are hints that you might be catastrophising or over generalising (e.g. ‘I’m always stuffing things up’, ‘I never get a fair go’).

All or nothing thinking

All or nothing thinking, or black or white thinking, is where things are either all good OR all bad. It’s either one extreme or the other; there are no grey areas.

Shoulding or musting

Shoulding and musting is where you focus on how you perceive things ‘should’ or ‘must’ be, rather than how it is. Shoulding and musting can pressure you to do things one particular way or the ‘right way’. These might be pressures regarding yourself, or other people in your life.

Totalising or Labelling

Totalising thinking takes a single mistake, problem or shortcoming, and gets you to see yourself – your identity—entirely through that lens. (e.g. ‘I spilled my drink, I’m such a loser’). Common labels include ‘loser’, ‘idiot’, etc. Sometimes this pattern of thinking has you labelling others.

Mind reading

This is when you ‘know’ what someone else is thinking, even though you have no idea what they are thinking. It often takes the form of an assumption that another person is making a negative judgement about you.

Discounting the positive

You reject positive experiences by insisting that they “don’t count”. For example, if you have a positive interaction with someone, you write it off as a one-off, or attribute it solely to the other person’s actions and not seeing your own part. Discounting the positives takes the joy out of life and makes you feel inadequate and unrewarded.

Forecasting

When you predict that something will turn out badly, or you will stuff things up, without there being any evidence. Forecasting can get in the way of taking action to make things better.

Funnelling

Funnelling is when you interpret every difficulty as a result of the abuse you experienced. For example, if you feel stressed about something at work, funnelling puts this down to some personal failure resulting from the abuse, rather than identifying that there might actually be things that would cause most people to feel stressed.

Emotional Reasoning

You assume that your negative emotions necessarily reflect the way things really are. “I feel guilty. I must be a rotten person.” Or, “I feel angry. This proves that I’m being treated unfairly.” Or, “I feel so inferior. This means I’m a second rate person.” Or, “I feel hopeless. Things must really be hopeless.”

Mis-attribution of blame and responsibility

Over-attribution of responsibility is when you hold yourself personally responsible for an event that isn’t entirely under your control. Personalization leads to guilt, shame and feelings of inadequacy. Men who have been sexually abused often struggle with feeling responsible for things they are not.

Some people do the opposite. They blame other people or their circumstances for their problems, and they overlook ways they might be contributing to the problem. Blaming others often goes hand in hand with feeling powerless.

Apply some problem solving skills.

Call it for what it is.

If you find yourself getting caught up in these patterns of thinking, try to name the pattern. It might be one in the list above, or you may discover some other unhelpful patterns (which you can come up with your own name for).

Ask yourself: “Is this getting me anywhere?” If not, that’s a strong indication that it’s time to try a different approach.

Get out of your head. Take a walk, call a friend, or engage in some other activity to distract yourself, refocus, shake off and loosen the hold of unhelpful thoughts.

Breathe deeply.

Worrying doesn’t only occupy the brain, it also impacts on the body: Our heart rate speeds up, and muscles tighten. Engage in deep breathing or a few yoga poses to eliminate that physical stress.

Step away from the thoughts

You could try a mindfulness exercise, or another strategy where you visualise yourself watching the unhelpful thoughts go past without getting caught up in them.

Define, don’t dwell.

Much of our worry is based soundly in how we feel: We’re upset, we’re angry, we’re hurting. Instead of focusing on these feelings, try to describe and define the actual problem, and then accept it for what it is. From there, you can either solve it, or vow to move beyond it.

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LIST-Learning-thinking Well-being

Problem solving

Basic problem solving six points.

We all face difficult decisions and problems in our daily lives. Some problems are quite small and easy to resolve, whilst others can require some significant effort and time to work through and sort out. Whether the problem is small, medium or large, it is helpful to have a basic plan for working things out and deciding on a course of action.

The below six steps focus on identifying the particular problem, to consider and evaluate options in order to reach a decision to be acted upon and learnt from. These steps provide a framework for problem solving that can be used by individuals, couples or groups.

The next time you have a problem that you want to work upon, get a piece of paper or create a document and then work your way through the headings, making a record of the different options and steps.

  1. Identify; What is the problem? What is it that you want to change or sort out?
  2. What are the options or solutions as you see it? Consult with others in relation to the identified problem and what possible solutions.
  3. What are benefits or consequences of each option?
  4. Choose an option? This is not about this being right or wrong, it is about choosing the best available option for this particular problem and giving it a try.
  5. Put it into action? This is where the rubber hits the road, where you can make it happen
  6. Review It is always worth taking time to review results, what is the learning, what if a similar problem presented itself, would you do the same thing or are there other alternatives.

Note: Keeping a log of how you handled particular problems and the learning in relation to what worked and what you might do differently next time, will enhance your options, choices and sense of control over your life.