Positive Practices for your Mental Health and Wellbeing - Part 2

June 1, 2020

Last week, we learned about Marianne’s background and how the amazing Posify group came to be.

She had just started sharing her four very practical tips for promoting mental health but I felt we needed to break up the episode to be sure we didn't miss a single bit of this enthusiastic conversation. I didn't want to edit this down and so we're going to keep going through each technique - step by step so you get the full value out of this episode.

If you haven't heard the last episode yet, be sure to go back and listen to that one first so that you've got the background for this series.

Marianne is a fountain of knowledge and SO passionate about her content - you'll hear that when you listen today.

Be sure to get your copy of the Wellbeing Posters - a self-awareness resource that you can stick up at home, in your workplace, or wherever you are going to stumble across it and take some simple steps to optimise your mental health and wellbeing available throughout this 2-part episode.

Let’s continue...

Get the Self-Awareness Posters

Here's the highlights:

[2:30] Tools to Use: MIND TOOLS for 0-5 levels of Overwhelm, BODY TOOLS for levels 5-10.
[4:00] BODY TOOLS: Turning on our Parasympathetic Nervous System to calm our system down. The way to do that is MINDFULNESS-- tapping on our senses. Try Five for Five exercise to practice mindfulness.
[6:04] Exercise is a powerful tool. The way we perceive is what stresses us, not the event itself. Try Heat training, tai chi or yoga or anything to keep your body moving.
[7:27] Power of Touch. Oxytocin, a chemical released in this process, gives a sense of safety, reconnects us to our creativity and compassion muscles, sets off positive emotions, boosts the immune system.
[9:45] MIND TOOLS: Focus on what’s in our control and influence. Learn to accept what’s out of our control to lessen stress and anxiety. Optimism is not necessarily ignoring the places we want to improve, but we need to have a compassionate conversation within ourselves.
[12:42] Notice your thinking. Recognize the emotions. Catch the thoughts in the process.
[14:04] Snowball thinking leads to “worst-case scenario” thinking. Activate challenging thinking and challenge it with the best-case scenario. Look at things with a sense of humor to activate positive emotions to help in creativity and solution focus.
[15:58] Compare best-case and worst-case scenarios to activate critical thinking, switch back to using the prefrontal cortex, and see the most likely scenario.
[16:55] What-if vs What-is Thinking. Bring everything back into the circle of your control and re-orchestrate cognitive thinking.
[21:40] Now is the time to try out what works for you. Whichever way you choose, it’s going to be a beautiful journey.