Phone: 616-217-9489 | eMail: jude@midlifetoolsforliving.com
JD's Midlife Tools For Living Practices, LLC
Guess what? Today I found a primrose blooming in my yard! What a surprise it was finding it. I’m delighted to see the pretty pink flower too. It’s a sign that winter is edging its way towards spring.
The sun popped out after a gloomy morning and the sky is a beautiful blue. It brightened my day. The cats have been basking in the sun as it streams through the windows. My husband joined me this afternoon for a walk in the sunshine. We are all soaking it in.
I’m so grateful to have a glimpse of the sun and a hint that spring is on its way.
It’s the simple things that bring meaning and pleasure to life. They are available to us every day too. We just have to take notice and let them in.
What is a simple pleasure that you are enjoying today?
Photo by Ricky Gálvez: Pexels
If you doubt this reality just take a look at what the statistics show:
https://ourworldindata.org/slides/war-and-violence/#/title-slide
Start by taking in some deep breaths and let your mind focus on your inhales and exhales for a minute. Then start with your forehead and notice if you are holding any tension in those muscles and relax your forehead as you exhale. Next is your jaw tense? Relax your jaw as you exhale. Is your neck tense? Relax it as you exhale. Then your shoulders, upper back, lower back, chest, stomach, upper arms, lower arms, hands and fingers, buttocks, thighs, calves, feet and toes. Just work your way slowly down your body inhaling and noticing tension and exhaling and releasing it.
In a short time you can relax your body and your anxious mind can relax too!
Do you feel safe? What will you do to relax your anxious mind?
Do Contact Me together in Anxiety Therapy we can explore life coping tools for you to incorporate into your life’s journey!
Image by ASphotofamily on Freepik
We all have a wise mind inside us. It is that place where emotion and reason over lap. Neither one alone is enough to produce intuitive wisdom. We need them both to work together.
When I ignore that wise voice inside I generally have regretted it. Things don’t turn out so well.
I keep learning to pause and listen and respond as my wise mind suggests. Sometimes I have to quiet the noise of my emotional self with a few deep breaths before I can hear what my wise mind suggests. I can’t hear that intuitive wisdom if my emotions are too intense. They over take me. And I can end up reacting emotionally rather than wisely. So I have to calm that emotion part of my brain first.
My wise mind is there to guide me. I’ve come to trust her to steer me in a productive direction too. She helps me take the next right step I need to take! Yours can too!
How might you invite your wise mind to join you?
Do Contact Me together in therapy we can explore life coping tools for you to incorporate into your life’s journey!
By Mobilus In Mobili – Women’s March on Washington, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=55796823
The Women’s March offered some inspiration and hope with so many coming together for a common purpose. We cannot fall backwards and lose the progress the world has made. We just can’t. We just won’t. Will we?
That requires us each of us to get involved.
My husband reminded me about complacency that has been hovering over this country for some time. We are quick to be outraged and quick to forget and move on too. And that includes me.
Perhaps just perhaps the best outcome of this election is a reality that we just won’t be outraged over and quick to forget and move on. But rather a reality that motivates us to come together and stay together to make certain the progress humanity has made isn’t undermined.
We the people have a power far greater than just one no matter whom that one happens to be.
It’s often hard for me to see and accept that “everything is as it should be”. Could this be the reason for the election turning out as it has… a more involved and vocal people who command a voice to let freedom ring? I certainly hope so!
Today I’m asking myself how I can get more involved. Will you?
What will you do to make your voice heard?
Photo by Jess Bailey Designs: Pexels
West Michigan is up near the top of the areas in the country that have minimal sunshine in the winter months. Fortunately I have a light that I use in the morning while eating my breakfast that helps when it is gray outside to give me some of the elements of sun light. I feel less gray inside using it.
This time of year it is easy to find reasons not to go outside and get my daily exercise. It can be too cold or too slippery. I feel better when I deal with the elements and just do it.
On those really nasty days I have a treadmill that is agony for me to use because it seems to take so long but it does get me a walk.
I do feel better when I get some exercise—that is the prize for enduring.
Today the sun is out and is that a treat! It was easy to go for my walk and soak it in. It’s been wonderful to have the sun streaming though the windows today too.
Seeing the sun sure makes a difference! It just warms me up all over inside and out!
What helps you with the January blahs?
It’s old movie time. When it’s snowy and cold outside it is perfect for snuggling up to an old movie. I’ve seen many movies multiple times and don’t tire of seeing them again and again.
For me the really old black and white movies from the 30’s and 40’s capture my interest and warm my heart. Theses movies seem to connect me to my grandparents and parents generations. I remember watching old movies on TV after school when I was a kid. Movies connect me to my past.
A bit of nostalgia goes along with old movies. In an odd way I feel at home again watching them.
I’m transcended to a time that I can only imagine what life was like. It’s a great escape from the technology driven world I live in.
For a couple of hours the world slows down and the color fades to shades of black, white and gray. People who are long gone come alive again frozen in time.
For a time I am lost in another world where it’s not so cold and snowy and I am warm and cozy inside.
What keeps warms you up on cold winter days?
It is time once again to usher in a brand new year. Time travels more swiftly with each passing year it seems too. Weren’t we just here wondering what 2016 would bring?
As I watch the minutes of my life tick away I increasingly see just how important it is to make mindfulness an intentional practice. I really can’t afford to miss any of those precious minutes I have left to live!
It is so easy to get all caught up in my head and as a result miss so much of what is really going on around me. Living in the past revisiting what has happened or into a future that we create keeps us from fully being alive and present in this very moment.
We all do this too. It is just what human beings do with this wonderful brain we’ve been given.
It takes practice, intentional practice to keep from parking up in our heads thinking away the minutes and hours of our lives!
To practice a mindful focus I use my senses to notice what I am seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, touching and completely take it all in. It is the basics of life that I become aware of and experience. I don’t separate myself from life by my thinking and judgments.
I simply experience life as life unfolds.
When I am more fully present in this very moment no matter what it is bringing to me, I am more apt to find a peace with what is and for this I can be grateful.
Mindfulness and gratitude…May you take these gifts into this New Year with you!
Happy New Year to you!
What do you see, hear, taste, smell, and touch right this very moment?
My Dear Gentle Reader-
I wish for you some quiet moments this holiday season.
In the stillness deep within may you find peace and joy in your heart to lighten the load of your life’s journey.
In your memories may you find gratitude for the many gifts you’ve been given as you reflect on your past as we do this time of year.
In the presence of this moment as you mindfully follow your breath may you find a calm to rest your mind and body.
In the gift of right here right now may you find a simple pleasure to delight and bring you a smile.
Quiet moments, simple pleasures, the peace and joy that stillness brings, gratitude and calm are yours for the taking….will you ever so kindly give these gifts to yourself this holiday season and beyond it too?
A very Happy Holiday to you!
Jude
Whatever the day brings we do have the ability to approach it with a spirit of peace inside even in the most challenging situations.
At times this however is hard for me to do. All too often I become blown by the winds around me and out of sync within myself.
It is when I quiet my mind and tune into the harmony of my inner self that I find peace.
I can intentionally stop and take a few deep breaths and calm my mind and body. When I practice gently focusing on inhaling and exhaling, my body and mind instinctively relax. My pulse slows and steadies.
By noticing my breath, I relax into a state of peace and feel a sense of harmony, belonging and comfort. The chaos dissipates and the winds of my mind grow calm again.
I exist only in this present moment and peace prevails once more.
How might you make breath focus practice a part of your day?
We are getting our first blast of winter in the form of a snow storm that at the moment has dumped six inches in our driveway and it “ain’t” over yet.
This is supposed to be a joyful time of year. In this season however so full of hectic times, obligations, and even blowing snow it is not so easy at moments to remember to feel joy.
Within me is the possibility for joy when I allow for it to be present in my life.
There are different forms of joy for us to experience:
There is a quiet joy that keeps us calm and centered. It is source of peace and goodwill that spreads out to touch those around us.
There is an exuberant joy that is hard to contain and burst for the in laughter, song and dance. It is pure energy.
There is a perennial joy that surfaces in time of difficulty and reminds us that no mater what we have hope and reason to go on.
Today, I will allow the beauty of the snow draped branches and the quiet peace that this gentle snowfall is bringing to connect me to the quiet joy I hold inside my heart.
What form of joy will you invite into your heart today?
A friend of mine sent me this great lesson on stress that is circulating around the web. It’s a tale about a young woman leading a seminar who is holding a glass of water while her audience is assuming she will ask that is it half empty or half full question but rather to the surprise of her audience asks “How heavy is this glass of water?” People call out various actual weight measures.
But instead she states, “The absolute weight doesn’t matter. It depends on how long I hold it. If I hold it for a minute, that’s not a problem. If I hold it for an hour, I’ll have an ache in my right arm. If I hold it for a day, you’ll have to call an ambulance. In each case it’s the same weight, but the longer I hold it, the heavier it becomes.”
Then she continued, “And, that’s the way it is with stress. If we carry our burdens all the time, sooner or later, as the burden becomes increasingly heavy, we won’t be able to carry on.”
“As with the glass of water, you have to put it down for a while and rest before holding it again. When we’re refreshed, we can carry on with the burden – holding stress longer and better each time practiced.”
How true it that! It is so hard to keep holding something we are troubled by! Our burdens weigh us down so and get heavier and heavier.
The presenter suggested that as early in the day as you can, you should put all your burdens down and not carry them through the evening and into the night. And if you want to you can pick them up again tomorrow if you must.
It’s hard to rest when our mind is full and our heart is heavy.
In my experience emotional pain seems way more difficult to contend with in the middle of the night. It is a lonely time when the house is quiet and the world around me is asleep to be wide awake and deeply troubled by something I can’t let go of.
So just how can we let go and let ourselves rest?
Setting an intention to let burdens go and be solidly in the moment of life you are in is a choice and important decision to make. It is a practice and it takes practice and practice and practice and even more practice to do.
Sometimes writing down what is troubling me helps me let it go. I’ve written in a journal for many years. I pick it up when I need to clear my mind and my heart.
There is a breathing practice that can help get us to our body’s relaxation state: breathe in through your nose to a count of 4 and exhale through your mouth to a count of 6. This has helped me countless times since I learned it.
That lesson on stress sent to me also included the following important things to remember:
We have to remember when all else fails that both chocolate and laughter are the best medicine after all!
What do you do to put your burdens rest?
Contact Me together in therapy we can explore life coping tools for you to incorporate into your life’s journey!
Dear Midlife Tools For Living visitor,
I want to thank you for taking time to visit my website as you do.
It has warmed my heart to see the number of people who poke their nose in on this site grow each month.
I am honored by this and humbled too.
And I thank you!
From me to you this holiday I wish for you:
A peaceful heart that forgives yourself and others
Recognition that you’ve done your best at any particular moment in your life
Openness to opportunities to learn each day
Strength to reach for help when you need it
Knowledge that you are not alone in life’s challenges
Courage to take risks and make changes
Flexibility in your response to the world around you
To notice good in the world and in the people who live in it
Tools to manage your emotions and cope well in the face of adversity
Simple pleasures that warm your heart
Kindness and compassionate not only for others but for yourself too
Awareness of your talents in addition to your short comings
Gentle laughter with yourself
To cultivate meaning in your life
Playfulness and frivolity
Quiet moments for simple reflection
To know you are loved
To love others and be able to tell them so
Gratitude for all you’ve been given
Happy Holidays and hugs to you!
Jude
