Mindfully aware

Mindfulness is something that can seem really challenging to achieve when under pressure or dealing with a great deal of emotion.

From my own experience, and from others I have worked with, mindfulness becomes a big part in helping to navigate busy times and calming overworked emotional responses.

Some benefits found when using mindful approaches and meditation are calming a busy mind whilst getting into the 'now'. Focusing and gently directing your mind on what you are doing and away from latching onto negative thinking too.

There's not one way that is best for someone to experience mindfulness and there are many different ways to be mindful too.


Yoga is a mindful activity and one that I enjoy doing for the mental focus that is required (as well as the challenge of the physical movement!).

Our yoga teacher told us about a very mature lady who she saw whilst on a retreat. This lady was in her 70's, was extremely supple and lithe for her age. She chose to rise much earlier (at 6am) at least an hour and a half ahead of the rest of the group. This lady was mindfully directing her body (and mind) to a morning routine that strengthened her physically and got her joints and muscles ready for the morning yoga session. It was proof that focus and awareness had given this lady a choice of how she wanted to be, how she wanted to feel, and then directing herself fully to that activity.

If only we were all on a retreat? It seems easier to imagine when you have not got the daily pressures of life. However, mindfulness can be used at any time. Why not go for a walk and just pay attention to the feeling of your feet on the ground? What about noticing the sounds you are making with your feet? The feeling of a breeze on your face? Making a cup of tea with absolute focus on that task, letting any thoughts 'not about tea making' to drop away until you have finished your cuppa?

Enjoy being a little more mindful today. Notice what happens when you do.

Angie :)

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About the Author: Angie works as a hypnotherapist, counsellor and coach at the Norfolk Clinic Complementary Healthcare Clinic, 38-40 Magdalen Road, Norwich, NR3 4AG. 

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Fight or Flight?

Stress can lead us to have an undesired fast-track reaction to individuals or situations.  Where we would normally be rational and calm in our minds, the smallest thing can send a stressed individual 'off the scale'.  I've dealt with it and have felt it in the past. 


Have you ever been in stressed situations in the past where all your nerve endings are fired up and ready to 'fight or flight'?  It's quite a normal response to want to do either of those things in extreme emergencies, it's more negative when it's a loved one who happens to say the wrong thing at the wrong time.  


It's really about what is known as coping mechanisms. For some examples, if shown as a child (whether by parents or carers) that the way to deal with a stressful situation is to shout or get angry or walk away, then likely that behaviour will continue into adulthood. If the response is to get angry or to withdraw, both of these behaviours can be damaging to personal relationships. Especially if they are repeated many times, it really can wear through all the layers of good stuff that are built up.  


It takes a brave person to ask a question of someone who we feel is doing us an injustice or to find out if the 'truth' in our current stressed state is actually what we are thinking it is... perhaps realising that someone else has actually a totally different take on the situation. Patience is required before 'blowing your top'.   


What would stop us from asking a question to establish what a loved one really means? 'Why do you say that?' for example. I will be remembering this as a lesson for this week and hope it helps anyone reading this too. 

Filtering negative thoughts

Registering thoughts and emotions is something we all connect with, at times before we realise that a thought has made us feel bad. That negative thought might be about how someone else see's us, or even a likeness we see in somebody that creates an internal conflict, or some other past experience or hurt.

Whenever a thought appears to make us feel we should act a certain way, we can start by working on seeing it for what it is. It is just a thought. Not necessarily a fully weighed-up thought in the here and now on the current truth. It's mostly based on past experience. It takes time to find the truths and myths of our experience as that time expands.  


Give a little time to developing your 'thought radar', switch it to manual every now and then.  I recommend it for checking and filtering negative thoughts. The happier you may be.