20 Sep Autumn 2022 Newsletter

Autumn newsletter

Greetings from Unravel!

Here we are …. but not again. Things are flowing and changing all the time and I hope that in the past few weeks since you got back into your work flow you have managed to feel that. As a reaction to all these changes and responsibilities, your wonderfully designed MindBody would have come up with the plan and resources for its execution. So far, all the above hopefully sounded empowering, however, as soon as I start expanding on it you might feel different.

When I mentioned “plan” and “resources”, I was referring to worries and stresses, as those immediate reactions of your system to equip you with all the things you might need to process and solve any arising problems. It would have been ideal if it was happening as it sounds, however, the sophistication of our MindBody comes with its own misfirings, delays and extremes. Mostly, we have our evolution to blame, the way that nothing gets rejected or disqualified along the way. Nature loves storing and recycling, and that is why any currently experienced stress gets coupled up and intensified by previously stored emotional residue, memories of your mind and body. A GOOD news is that you are not your experiences, you are not your memories or your MindBody altogether, you are much more than that. As much as you are at the mercy of all of those external and internal perceptions, you are also a designer of all of that. The power of feeling in charge of your life comes with some heaviness and intensity of recognising the feelings as well as being aware of your thoughts and behaviours you get by default. All that is RESOURCES and a gift if you like, rejecting and resisting it would cause conflict, but accepting and channelling it would produce some positive results and change. Therefore, it is not what you feel, think, and react like by default but what you do with all that that defines the quality of your life. Emotional awareness has a lot to do with it.

Emotional awareness means not only recognising what you are feeling but also making active choices about whether we need to take action or its best to leave things alone.

To expand your awareness of the present moment and your internal reactions to it so you can be clearer and more confident in making effective and wise decisions especially in difficult situations, I would like to share a Mindfulness practice with you below:

Emotional Awareness – RESET

Awareness of emotions starts with just that—intentionally paying attention to how we feel as often as you can. From there, slowly and over time, we can set new intentions for ourselves. For the next few days, aim to:

• Recognize emotions more often as they arise. Label briefly, if you like, whatever emotion you notice.
• Refrain, for a moment, from doing whatever you typically do with that emotion. Pause, take a few slow breaths, and let things alone before taking a next step.
• Relax if you can, letting go of any sense of constriction or tension the emotion causes you. We feel emotions with our bodies therefore the best way to let go of any physical tension needs to be physical to, whatever is appropriate in the context of a situation – star jumps, scrunching up your face or feet, wriggling up your nose or rolling back your shoulders. Pick and choose for whatever you need to relax. If you see something useful to be done about how you feel—go for it. If not, practice letting things be, instead of falling back on reactive, less productive habits.
• Resolve to keep working on emotional awareness and reactivity. Old habits change slowly, not all at once.

The Reset practice is the process I use most often to integrate mindfulness in my life. This practice can remind us to stop the momentum of our default thinking by creating a little space to align with our values and intentions and let go of what’s not serving us anymore — stored away residue of old stress, distractions, defences, and expectations.

Have a wonderfully mindful school year!