Tag Archives: meditation

Work-Life Balance: How to use Meditation and Mindfulness as the Bridge.

To make a mark at work, to have a buzzing social life, learn something new, spend quality time with friends and family and the list goes on- we want it all sometimes but can never quite master the perfect work-life balanceThe key to this is to slow down by practicing meditation and mindfulness.  

What do BeyoncéOprah Winfrey, Will Smith and Bill gates all have in common? Well, aside from success and wealth, they all swear by meditation and have come forward by explaining how meditating daily has done wonders for their mental well-being. Whether it is to manage stress or simply boost some energy, there is no denying that meditation has become the new go-to wellness ritual. 

Along with meditation, practicing mindfulness also helps with our overall mental as well as physical health. This is when your mind is paying attention to your present-moment flow of experience without commentary, analysis or judgement. Being mindful makes it easier to savor the simple pleasures in life and helps you become fully engaged in whatever you do.   

Here are few tips to help you maintain a healthy mental state of mind:  

  • One-minute meditation  

Meditation in work place

You do not require a certain time of your day to implement a mediation session, you can start by taking one-minute breaks between work by focusing on a calming picture or listening to relaxing music with your eyes closed for a minute while deeply breathing, this will help you reduce your stress levels and help you re-focus on your work.  

 

  • Set boundaries between work and leisure. 

Separating career, work, friends and time

Don’t forget to stop working. One of the hardest parts of work-life balance is defining the boundary between the two. The best way to do this especially when working frohome, is to start by creating a designated space for work. Giving a gap between starting and ending work will help you effectively transition from life to work. Adapting these rountines  in the long run will help your brain to be wired for presence in every context. 

 

  • Reduce multi-tasking: 

Believe it or not, one of the most difficult mind exercises to do is to focus on one thought at a time. Research shows only 2% of people who can effectively muti-task. Practice doing one thing at a time as often as you can throughout the day. When you are not working or studying, remain mentally present for other interactions and activities. Mindfulness saves time and helps you focus on what matters in the present. 

Too many list of tasks to do
Source: Unsplash, captured by Luis Villasmil

For instance, if you’ve decided to take an evening off for yourself, be sure to switch off and relax – don’t half-heartedly skim through a book while watching Netflix just to make yourself feel like you are reading. 

 

  • Schedule tech- free time  

Practicing a daily digital detox will allow you to disconnect from work and enhance your ability to pay attention. Have a go at the 30-Day Digital Detox Challenge by Forbes to help you begin! Be mindful of the time you spend on social media and maybe pick one activity or time every day when you can put your devices away for 15-75 minutes. 

Remember to immerse yourself in whatever you do whether it is taking your dog on a walk, playing with your kids, painting, or eating dinner with family or friends. Consider designating a room or zone in your house where electronics are not allowed to facilitate this daily digital detox. 

Social media
Source: Unsplash, captured by Nathan Dumlao

Its essential that you take time away from your screen each day. Try giving a break mid-way through the day and in the evening to shut down and transition from ‘work mode’ to ‘home mode’. Remember, if you were previously working from a workplace, you would have a bit of down time on the journey in and home and over lunch, so make sure you schedule that time for you if you are currently studying/ working from home. 

  • Take out time to reflect.
Journaling
Source: Unsplash, Captured by Cathyrn Lavery

Journaling can help get all your thoughts out and on paper. Bullet Journalling is a great way to stay organised. It’s worth taking some time to reflect on yourself. Especially since the past year has been so different for all of us, it’s good to pen down how you felt at the start of lockdown, how you’ve dealt with lockdown and how you feel about the next phase.  This will help to ground you, will help to remind you that you are in control of your thoughts and choices, that you can deal with a new and uncertain situation and that you are resilient. To do this, why not arrange a new comfortable place to sit by a window to soak up that sunlight? 

  • Start and end your day for you.  
Reading a book
Source: Unsplash, captured by Callum Shaw

Morning and evening routines are a great way to prioritise your health and wellbeing and give you a greater sense of work-life balance. Save some time for self-care- use the first 15-60 minutes of your day mindfully: exercise, drink water or tea, meditate, stretch, read a book, anything you enjoy doing but just remember to be fully present in the moment. British author, Jay Shetty has some really useful insights on his morning routine video, why incorporating meditation, mindfulness and gratitude is really beneficial.

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The vital part is staying disconnected from work and screens so you not only get a great night’s sleep but you will also wake up feeling restored. The next time you feel yourself stressing out whilst studying or at work, try a few of these mindfulness techniques to keep your mental wellbeing on check. Get the most important tasks done first, focus with greater clarity, and ultimately, become more productive at work. Striking a positive work-life balance is possible, you just need to take the first step.  

 

 

Yoga and Meditation

As people pay more and more attention to their health, yoga movement began to appear on our side, yoga with its movement soothing, remarkable effect by people’s welcome. So what are the benefits of long-term yoga practice?

DO YOU REALLY NEED A YOGA MAT?

Young woman performing simple yoga move in front of laptop following an online class

Photo by Kari Shea on Unsplash

When the weather turns cool our appetite is big, inadvertently will consume large amounts of fat, in fact, in the winter the energy needed to power a body and summer is not much different, but the weather’s cool movement is relatively small, yoga through the various curved back, turn around before extrusion, stimulate our glands, adjusting endocrine, make the person produces heat capacity increased, to help us better control appetite, prevent the body fat. During the practice of yoga, people often sweat, and at this time the sweat will expel toxins from the body. Also can through the body twisting pull god, massage and other methods to stimulate the body has the effect of detoxification organs, so regular practice yoga, help to discharge toxins in the body. The quality of our breath often directly affects our mind and body. When we learn how to control and moderate our breath, we can find that we can control our body and mind more effectively. Yoga can help us learn to master our states of mind and eliminate the stresses that we face in our daily lives.

Can yoga help you lose weight?

Some people can have such perplexity, be oneself after practicing yoga, feel oneself slim many, but seem weight did not go down, however, is this why? In fact, speaking of weight loss, mainly to consume calories, and want to consume calories, mainly by reasonable exercise and reasonable diet, but yoga is just a kind of exercise muscle, so it is not so much to achieve the purpose of weight loss, accurate speaking, should be thin.
Another kind of circumstance, is when people in a state such as state of mind is not very good, she’ll want to find a vent, want to go to eat to solve, but if this time to practice yoga, you can transform the outlet, so as to change your state, let you get a better state of mind.
Is yoga have more feelings than any other sport, is running or fitness Kubla khah dripping wet, yoga is one of the most natural fitness ways, through yoga training system can not only change the human body, still can massage visceral organs, improve a person’s status, and so on, the whole people will look brand-new, insist on yoga after a period of time, the figure will be more beautiful, size is also beautiful. So yoga is through which several aspects to change a person, shape your beautiful figure?
1. Burn calories
In doing yoga, although do not need strenuous exercise, but each time the consumption is very big, if a week to adhere to 2-3 times of yoga training, each time in more than 40 minutes, so the effect of weight loss and weight loss is very obvious, calories are consumed, so the fat can not accumulate naturally.

2. Eat a balanced diet

After practicing yoga, yoga can also lead people to the dietary balance, in after a period of time, you will find that the diet habit can be, you will no longer like high-fat high-calorie foods, thus to fruits and vegetables and protein, so your intake of rich nutrition, weight loss is also more obvious, and most importantly, don’t worry about to rebound.

Yoga meditation methods

  1. Learning yoga, from the pranayama of the body to the cleansing of the mind, is a chain reaction. Your thoughts and emotions exist in your body. By exercising and relaxing your body, your body continues to practice yoga, focusing your mind on stretching and strengthening parts. When you relax and focus on stretching, your body produces a feel-good “endorphin” that stabilizes your mood. This releases negative emotions and leads to positive thoughts, leading to a state of “peace of mind” and “unity of body and mind”. Through yoga meditation can also eliminate our eye fatigue, and can promote the blood circulation of the eye, because yoga meditation, often need to close your eyes for a long time, can let our eyes get rest for a long period of time, which makes power be enhanced, and it also can improve our ability to focus of the eyes, at the same time can eliminate we fear in the heart of the world. It is also possible to enter visualization at home at any time. Just find a visual object, such as a crystal, a fishbowl, a potted plant, a picture, etc. These objects help us to focus our attention, gradually eliminate external distractions, and slowly turn inward to experience peace and serenity! Imagine yourself lying on a piece of green grass, soft, continuous, bursts of fragrance blowing. There is not a cloud in the blue sky. The babbling brook, flowing slowly from the side, called not famous wildflowers, competing to open. In the distance, a cow was walking with her calf, and children were frolicking beside her. A cricket was bouncing around in the ground, and the birds in the tree were singing.
  2. Things to note before yoga meditation:
    1. Choose a place where you feel like you can get your mind off the fray, which will help you get into a meditative state.
    2. Choose a regular time of day — early morning and late afternoon are ideal.
    3. Use the same time and place to relax and calm your mind more quickly.
    4. Sit with your back, neck and head on the same level, facing east or north.
    5. During meditation, keep your body warm (wrap a blanket around your body when it’s cool) and guide your mind to remain calm.
    6. Get your breathing on a regular basis — breathe deeply for five minutes, then calm down.
    7. Create a rhythmic breathing pattern — inhale for three seconds, then exhale for three seconds.
    8.When you haven’t completely calmed down, don’t force yourself too much. It doesn’t matter.
    9.After quiet down, let the consciousness stay on a fixed target, which can be in the middle of the brow or heart position.
    10. Get into a meditative state with your chosen meditation technique.
    11.Before the arrival of a very pure state of meditation, don’t force, let the free state continue to exist naturally.
    12.After a period of practice, the free state of mind will slowly disappear and eventually, enter the pure.

BE PREGNANT. BE HAPPY. STAY CONNECTED.

“Carrying a baby is the most rewarding experience a woman can enjoy.” – Jayne Mansfield

WE ALL HAVE OUR OWN WAYS

Being happy during pregnancy is not only very possible but also important for mother’s and baby’s health. Each women will have her own ways of keeping herself in emotionally and mentally good shape. There are many tools for you to use, such as:

However, we wanted to highlight such underestimated thing as connecting with other expectant mums. Before revealing more of this, we have to understand WHY it is important.

YOUR EMOTIONS AND FEELINGS MATTER

Have your heard about anxiety, depression and similar non-positive experiences pregnant women can face during and after their pregnancy? We don’t want to scare you, however we want to make sure that you know importance of respecting your emotions and feelings early in the pregnancy (and even before!) to avoid experiencing such things.

This is called Perinatal Mental Health. And it matters.

Just be aware. Read up on this and listen to other expectant mums to gain an insight into this topic just simply to avoid it from happening with you. And if it does, don’t worry! There is a great support and help available for expectant and new mums.

The last thing you want to be feeling is loneliness. Sometimes just by having a chat with other pregnant women can help massively. This has a power to reduce likelihood of ending up with some type of mental health problems.

CONNECTING WITH OTHER EXPECTANT MUMS

Keep it simple. You don’t need to find a girlfriend which will become your best friend forever. You just need to surround yourself with women who are pregnant, the same as you.

You can either find some local mums-to-be groups or connect online! Nowadays distance is non-existent. Especially now, during the Covid-19 pandemic, this might be the best and safest option for yourself. Online meet-up groups via Zoom is a great way to connect and build a support network around yourself.

Connecting with other mums over a cuppa and having a friendly chat sometimes is everything you need! Whatever it takes for you to avoid social isolation and feeling lonely. It’s great to share worries and stories, ideas and expectations. And sometimes just to discuss what’s new on Netflix.

SOME IDEAS

In UK many expectant mums are looking to connect with others and there are different groups and websites for women like yourself. As example, net-mums website is a great source to find ante-natal courses and local groups and there are many charities offering support to pregnant women across the country.

And, if you live in Yorkshire, there are many activities in Hull and East Yorkshire for young parents, including the Us Mums programme which offers free online exercise sessions, mediation and meet-up groups for pregnant women and new mums.

Has this blog post encouraged you to look out for other mums to be? Let us know in comments section below!

We are very confident that you can find suitable and positive way how to connect with other expectant mums. Now it’s over to you… Go, find it & just give it a go!

 

Yoga, powerful tool to boost self love and confidence.

As this year continue being the most challenging to all of us, stress and neglecting one self is bound to happen, negative thoughts could creep in to best of us.

With the starting of this beautiful month, my journey towards self love and positivity deepened with introducing yoga practice in my daily schedule. I watched myself evolved to truly loving myself for whom I am and finishing each day with bucket full of optimism.

I begun practicing yoga to discover a direction to higher path, however I found the confidence and love within myself. Through yoga, I have learn control of breath, adaptability, focus and above all acceptance for my body.

When I begin to question myself and my mind leads me to negativity, I now hold myself and pause. Let myself breath and release all the negative and stressful thoughts from head.

 Self care and self love aren’t around fulfilling yourself, its around investing time with yourself and cherishing each miniature of it, so truly practicing yoga is the self care and self love you are showering upon yourself.

LOVE 🧘‍♀️ POSTURES

I am positive 😊  extended side pose

I am graceful 😃  dancer pose

I am proud 🥲 pigeon pose 

I appreciate myself ✌️  bridge pose

 

So how exactly yoga can help you increase self love and boast your confidence?

  • Practicing yoga decrease feelings of stress and negative thoughts. Plenty of yoga postures turn on parasympathetic nervous system and foster overall goodness.
  • Yoga is one art that boast the self image and self worth of the practitioner. It helps you building an inner connection more aligned with the body and feelings which makes a person feel good about themselves and comfortable in their own skin.
  • It improves concentration levels, yoga postures motivate people to focus, also uplifting their confidence.
  • It helps in a better body mind relationship hence promote well being.
  • It helps you grow, enhances your self esteem and definitely reduce stress levels.

Practicing self love could be exceptionally alleviating that requires yield and peace. It’s an engaging act that gives us quality and mettle. Yoga postures for self cherish, consider calming yoga postures combined with control postures.

Some  easy yoga postures for self love –

Child

Dig into self acknowledgment and self adore through the yield of Child posture. As you hold this posture for up to a miniature or longer, rehash the taking after mantra to yourself; “I am enough.” To do this posture, start on your hands and knees. Sink your hips back towards your heels and reach your arms forward. Unwind your paunch onto your thighs and rest your head towards the tangle. Keep length in your spine and unwind your neck. Hold and breathe, feeling yourself sink more profound towards the soil with each breathe out

Goddess

Get in touch together with your internal Goddess or God with Goddess Posture. This control posture makes a difference to evokes a feeling of quality and certainty. As you hold this posture utilising your breath, rehash the taking after mantra’ “I am solid and worthy”. To come into Goddess, from Mountain posture, step your feet wide manyfeet separated, turning the toes out somewhat towards the external edges of the tangle to about 45 degrees. Twist your knees and come into a wide squat, working to urge the your thighs parallel to the tangle. Keep your knees pointed within the same course as your toes. Hold for a few breaths.

Warrior 2

Find quality and internal peace with Warrior 2. As you hold this posture, rehash the taking after mantra to yourself; “I am commendable of all the adore and delight within the world”. To come into Warrior 2 from Mountain posture, step your feet separated 3 and a half to 5 feet separated. Point your front toes 90-degrees toward the front brief edge of your tangle and your back foot somewhat in almost 45-degrees. Lift your arms up bringing them parallel to your tangle and twist your front knee stacking it over your lower leg or marginally behind it. Hold for a few breaths and switch sides.

Pigeon

Pigeon posture may be a profound hip opener that makes a profound sense of yield within the body. It moreover makes a difference calm the intellect and alleviate the soul. As you hold this posture for up to a miniature or longer on each side, say to yourself with each breathe out, “I acknowledge myself completely as I am”. To do Pigeon posture, from a tabletop position, bring your right foot in and put it down on your tangle behind your right wrist. Alter you’re shin so that it’s comfortable for you. Expand your cleared out leg back on the tangle. Come up onto your fingertips and walk your middle marginally up with the chest lifting and broadening. Stay here or to develop the posture, start to overlap towards the tangle keeping your spine stretched. You’ll select to come onto your lower arms or rest your head on top of a piece. To assist develop, you’ll be able bring your temple down towards the tangle and amplify your arms out before you – together with your palms confronting down.

Savasana

Savasana is the extreme unwinding posture in yoga. Utilise this time to develop self care and adore for yourself; remaining here for up to 20 minutes or longer. You’ll upgrade your Savasana hone by diminishing the lights, lighting candles, and playing soft encompassing music. You’ll indeed utilise fragrance based treatment to encourage initiate internal peace; Rose, Jasmine, Bergamot, and Sandalwood are extraordinary fundamental oils to utilise for self adore care. To do Savasana, come down onto your back and unwind your arms and legs out comfortably. Permit your palms to tenderly open up towards the sky. Near your eyes and unwind the muscles in your confront. Let your breath be delicate and characteristic as you fair permit yourself to discharge and appreciate the minute. Remind yourself that by giving yourself this time to reset, you’ll be able to provide more of yourself to others. Remain here for as long as you’d like.

check out this website for yoga equipment – https://www.exercise.co.uk/product-range/yoga