Tag: stress

Who said we can’t have fun?

Posted on by philipdodson

Listening to Slim Shady while writing this today. I love writing with my headphones on, it allows me to shut the rest of the world out and really get into the zone of writing.

I was sat on the sofa this morning with YouTube on the TV and my daughter was going through various music videos with Mrs D asking her for various requests. Anyway the subject of twerking came up, not sure why to be honest, so Mrs D decided she’d have a crack.

So we searched for the appropriate song and off she went. Well probably good for her that my phone was upstairs so there is no video evidence. Mrs D is actually a very good dancer and has a great rhythm (steady, this post might end up in the public domain).

However, she hadn’t got the concept of twerking and we were all in fits of laughter. It was one of those moments where you obviously had to be there to appreciate.

laughter

The thing is that life can end up being too serious and it is important to have as many of those moments as you possibly can. Maybe some of them are best for the confines of your home and family.

I observe at work or travelling or at events or in what you read, that people are too serious in life. They sit on trains and their faces are misery, not surprising if they are reading the Metro….’ebola’…’terror’…’artic freeze’….and worse of all ‘Farage’.

Sorry have to break off here, what the f… is Farage on?? This isn’t a political thing, as if you know me, you will know that I am not aligned to any of that old school party politics nonsense. In fact the recent stuff in the news that I’ve looked at on Facebook, has just confirmed my thoughts about the whole crap political system that runs most of the world.

Anyway, back on track. Seriousness, which is often associated with the word ‘professional’ is all too often present in everyone’s working life.

Now I am not suggesting that people go to work off their faces on laughing gas, so that they are just falling about the place with laughter, unable to do anything.

However, this obsession with this other old school notion of ‘professional’, which is so subjective anyway, makes work a misery for most. Why do we have to be serious all the time? Who came up with that idea? Where is the rule book that say’s life can’t be fun, that includes work?

The fact is, there is only the ‘rules’ that we as humans have written or created in our heads, that when we are working, we have to be serious.

Naturally, if you are in court and discussing a serious crime, then again it may not be appropriate to sit there and have a good laugh about it.

However, apart from the obvious, there are lot’s of situations where taking a more light hearted and good humoured view would be better for all.

After all, we all enjoy life a good deal more when we laugh and have some fun. In a working environment, a great amount of stress and anxiety could be reduced or removed, by laughter.

There is now laughter meditation, Google it, and that along with mediation is often ridiculed and ironically laughed at by the ‘serious’ and ‘professional’ people.

Maybe some will see this as all to radical and unprofessional, but really I do think there should be a lot more time in the working environment to bring in not just meditation, but laughter meditation and much more time for light heartedness.

After all who says you can’t make fun. In fact, I would bet my shirt, that if we all were allowed or allowed ourselves to have more fun in the workplace, that productivity would massively increase, absenteeism would fall and stress/illness would reduce rapidly.

So when you get back to work on Monday, try being a little less serious, try having more of laugh, see how you can make your tasks and that of others more fun. I am sure our customers would be happier if they dealt with fun people and if you service in general was more fun.

I am already laughing about some of the most serious business situations that could be turned on their heads by introducing a bit of fun.

My mind gym

Posted on by philipdodson

This is my mind gym, 750Words.com, I love this 20-25 minutes each day, sometimes it’s good enough to release on the world via my blog and sometimes it is just private thoughts and ramblings, which would only make interesting reading to me or disturbed people.

So these 20 minutes that I write my 750 words each day is firstly a great discipline and more importantly, it is a place that I can exercise my brain.

This is an area that very few, me included until very recently, focus on. We all think about what we eat and what exercise we could be doing or are actually doing.

There is a lot of focus on physical exercise and that is very important to our health. However, the exercising of the mind is important to our mental and physical well being.

Our minds control everything that happens in our lives and it determines whether we are healthy or not physically.

Many illnesses, some of the most chronic, are result of stresses in our lives. These stresses are caused by a number of factors, however, it is our mind that determines how we deal with these stresses and determines what effect these stresses have on our physically health.

For me it is important to put down in writing a review of what happened during the day and to put down what my thoughts were. To write about my reactions to events that happened.

It’s important, as it allows me to think about the situations and learn where I could have dealt with situations to get a better outcome in the future.

Often, our lives just go by without us realising and certainly without pausing to take stock of things that have occurred.

So doing this writing everyday allows me to press the pause button in my head and to scan back over the day to take stock and think about things.

The other thing that this writing is good for, is to celebrate my successes for the day and to think about my goals and what I could do the next day to get closer to them.

Some people have no goals and certainly none that are ever put in writing. Others spend so much time planning and writing goals and targets, that they actually forget the doing part.

A review of my progress is important to me and it allows me to continue the focus. It is important to feel that you are moving forward to towards your goals. It is important to recognise progress and give yourself a pat on the back for your achievements.

I never use this to beat myself up, although I do use this sometimes to deal with things that are preying on my mind.

I pick a particular worry/concern and write down what it is. I then think of all the worst possible outcomes, then say ‘so if that happens…then what next?’. I repeat this for each outcome and keep going ‘so if x happens, then this will be next and then this’. Eventually the process leads to the fact that you can deal with every outcome, however bad you can imagine it to be.

Then you realise, having actually put them down in writing, when you read them back through, nearly all of the outcomes lead to nothing that you can’t handle and I often laugh at how silly 99% of them seem on reflection.

The other exercise I do at my mind gym, is to write down the things that I am grateful for and the positive thoughts that I have had that day.

So it is not all about exercising the gremlins, demons and worries. It is also about writing and reminding myself of the good things that are going on each day.

So this mind gym that I do each day has a number of exercises that I do and that enables me to keep my mind super fit and healthy. So if you don’t have a membership to a mind gym, I strongly recommend getting one.

I go for a family walk nearly every evening for 3 miles or so, which gives me a chance to spend family time combined with physical exercise. After that it’s off to the mind gym.

Since the 1st September, this has become the most important thing to me on a daily basis, it clears my head, recharges my brain, helps me to express my thoughts more precisely, helps me reduce worry, helps relieve stress and gives me a real confidence boost.