Life – Pagina 18 – Crisbie Coach

Sharing The Little Good Things

The publication on Facebook or other Social Media provokes a contagious phenomenon. Both positive or negative news generate a reaction from the followers.

I rarely publish negative things on Facebook, with the exception of some situations that happen in big cities, like a poor waste collection. I definitely prefer to publish positive news because I think that generally speaking the media report mainly about bad news. I am convinced that both positive and negative things happen in the world. Honestly, I think that more good things happen and that they are worth to share. By sharing good things, you will help the world being a better place as positive energy will spread all over around you. Bad news attract the attention of the public because of their morbidity but they only contribute to the creation of a spiral of negativity.

It is true that our society has been in crisis for many years now and that politics does not offer adequate solutions to problems that are increasingly complex. There are too many homeless people, salaries are low and life is expensive. But despite this I am sure that life reserves us moments of joy that we should not hide, rather we should celebrate!

I am happy about my life overall. Of course, the environment that surrounds me is not ideal; sometimes things do not go as they should; I see injustices, I have my intolerance and suffering, but I don’t let myself be involved by this negative spiral. If I think at the life that our grandparents used to live, then there is nothing else to do than rejoice. We have food every day, running water, electricity and heating in our homes. In Maslow’s hierarchy of needs we surely passed the first two levels. What if you were a woman born in Afghanistan and had to wear the burka? Or if you were born in a country at war? Or if you were forced to pay a fortune to heal yourself?

Therefore, do not hesitate to share your moments of joy, your successes, small or big, because this will spread and create positivity all around you. Of course, not every day will be spring, but I’m sure you can always find a small good thing to share.

This does not mean that you should not try to improve yourself, but it does mean that your personal development would be easier if you looked at the glass half full instead of the glass half empty.

So, are you ready for positivity? Let me know!

A Somali Tale

A woman begged a shaman for a potion that would “make her husband love her again”. She explained that her husband fought in the war, he was warm, loving, and laughed easily. But since his return he was angry, and distant. The more she tried to hug him, and draw him back to her, the worse it became. The shaman was her last hope.

The shaman listened patiently to the woman’s story. When she was finished he said, “I think I can help you. I will make you a love potion, but you must go find one of the ingredients.”. She said she would. He told her that the love potion must contain a whisker from a live tiger. This was the only way he could help make her husband love her again. She was distraught. “How can I possibly get a whisker from a beast as fierce and powerful as a tiger?” The shaman shrugged and left her to tears.

The next day she went to a place where she had once seen a tiger. On that day she saw nothing more that monkeys fighting in the trees and birds flying in the air. On the second day, she stayed a little longer and found a comfortable place to sit. But she did not see the tiger.

Weeks passed. One morning she sensed his presence before she saw him. She didn’t move but the tiger saw her anyway and ran away. It was a week before she saw him again. Curios, the tiger stopped running away.

Finally, after months of bringing the tiger good things to eat and ever so slowly reaching out to pet him, he finally was so comfortable with the woman that he fell asleep under her stroking hand. Once he was asleep she took a very sharp knife and gently cut one single whisker from the tiger’s muzzle.

The next day she brought the whisker to the shaman, and asked for the potion that would make her husband love her again. The shaman said “You do not need any potion. Throw away the whisker, keep the knowledge you have gained, and your husband will learn to love you once more.”

What have your learned from this story? Share it with me!

Ikigai: The Search for Meaning

The search for meaning is inherent in the human being. In Japan there is even a specific word to define the importance of having a purpose in life: Ikigai. The Ikigai refers to the individual motivation, the one that makes us get out of bed every morning and that gives us the joy of living.

There is no direct English translation. Ikigai does not need not be conducive to fame and fortune. It is simply the priority around which everything else (often unconsciously) revolves.

For some, especially artists or high professionals, this sense of dedication is related to their vocation. There are few things as fulfilling as doing meaningful work, but even those who do not have a career-related Ikigai find purpose in the daily routine.

Ken Mogi, in his book The Little Book of Ikigai: The secret Japanese way to live a happy and long life, tells us that Ikigai is made by five pillars:

Starting small
Releasing yourself
Harmony and sustainability
The joy of little things
Being in the here and now

A basic idea of Ikigai is to be in the flow. Do you remember when you were a child, you were playing and your mom was calling you for lunch? You did not want to go because you did not want to stop playing , you liked playing so much and it was always too early for you. Time flew away so fast and you did not even realise it.

Being in the flow is like that. It means being in harmony with the elements within ourselves and those in the outside world. It means also paying attention to the chances that life offers us.

Ikigai‘s greatest secret is to accept ourselves as we are, with the unique traits we received when we were born.

“I love and accept myself as I am” is a positive statement that I have been repeating for years. You are a unique and unrepeatable individual who must find your own way among the obstacles of life.

Try to answer these questions:

Which are the small things that make you feel good?

Which are the small things that help you to face your day?

Let me know!

A Guide to Budget-Friendly Self-Care Purchases for 2019

Self-care has become one of the most popular New Year’s resolutions, promising a year full of health, well-being, and self-love. However, the problem with self-care as a concept is that it is extremely vague. What does promising to take care of yourself actually entail? Is it possible to invest in self-care without spending a fortune on exclusive treatments and high-tech gadgets?

Eating Better

According to INC (1), the most popular New Year’s resolution for 2019 is to eat better or diet. Now, with increasing evidence showing that dieting is both ineffective and bad for your overall health, your focus should definitely be on simply improving your diet rather than drastically restricting it.

There are a few items that can help you do that. A slow cooker is a great way to eat healthier and save money, and some models cost under $50. A juice blender is great for people who want a way to have a healthy breakfast on the go, with cheaper models costing as little as $20.

Mental Health

Self-care for mental health can mean different things for different people. If you need to reduce stress, meditation is an excellent tool with loads of free options — try an app such as Insight Timer to help get you started. Journaling is another great budget-friendly, stress-busting habit, which can give you a sense of order and control.

It is also crucial that you take care of any unresolved or undiagnosed mental health disorders you may be suffering from, so go see a medical professional if you suspect you may have depression, anxiety, seasonal affective disorder, or any other issue.

Physical Health

Don’t forget that your mental health is strongly connected to your physical well-being, so regular check-ups are in order. One area people tend to neglect is dental care. Poor dental hygiene can be both a result of and a contributing factor to depression, not to mention affecting your physical wellbeing. This guide to affordable health insurance can help you keep these costs under check.

Exercising

Exercise doesn’t have to cost you anything. For example, jogging, walking, and hiking are all great forms of exercise that can be done for free, and there are some excellent free YouTube channels for workouts from yoga to Pilates.

If you do want to invest in your fitness, go for some new exercise gear that gets you excited for your workouts. Health.com has a great guide to buying budget-friendly workout clothes without sacrificing quality. Alternatively, you could spring for that gym membership — just make sure you make it worth your money by going regularly.

Sleep

Sleep is often neglected as a health habit, especially compared to diet and exercise, but it is just as important as everything else. One of your main resolutions for the year should be to sleep better, and there are a few simple ways to achieve this.

Firstly, create a consistent sleep routine and stick to it. This means going to sleep at the same time every night to wake up energized and refreshed in the morning. This is free, and it’s possibly the most important part. However, you can enhance your sleep with small, affordable luxuries such as high-quality bedding or a soothing pillow mist spray.

Self-care is often used as an advertising tool to sell luxury and expensive wellness items. However, the truth is that true self-care is available to everyone and can actually cost very little (even nothing at all). The items you purchase for self-care should be tools to support lifestyle improvements, not the improvements themselves. The most important thing is your attitude and commitment to taking better care of your mind and body — the stuff is just there to help.

(1) editor’s note: Inc. is an American weekly magazine which publishes about small businesses and startups (Wikipedia)

5 Tips to Avoid Stress During the Festive Period if You Are an Expat

I like very much Christmas holidays. They remind me my childhood when I used to wait for Midnight opening the presents with my family. Now, that I am an expat, I like going back home at Christmas time, because I like to share this peaceful time with my dearest.

However, I can understand that it can turn out in a stressful period. Buying presents at the last minute, preparing dinner for the Christmas’ Eve or lunch (or both, as we do in my family, not to miss anything…). Wishing Merry Christmas to all your relatives and friends, hoping not to forget anyone.

Here are 5 tips to keep a positive mind-set and enjoy yourself. Follow these tips for coping with some of the stress that the holidays can cause.

Reach out to loved ones

Family and friends back home may want to spend time with you during the holidays, and expect a visit. You can try your best to keep in touch – a phone conversation or spending a few minutes chatting with a loved one can make a big difference, and lift both your and their spirit. And you will not feel guilty 🙂

2. Make the most of it

Adjusting to new traditions can bring up mixed feelings and emotional struggle. Try not to put yourself under too much pressure. Embracing the new, while maintaining a sense of tradition to your new surroundings, can help you feel better.

3. Don’t let the publicity affect you

You may feel surrounded by images and ideas of what the perfect holidays should look like – but the truth is that holidays can be stressful emotionally and financially. Don’t let the media get into you and avoid comparing yourself to unrealistic depictions.

4. Seek support

People who are going through difficult situations, such as grieving, the loss of a loved one or dealing with the break of a relationship, can be particularly vulnerable and experience further emotional stress with the holiday season. It’s important not to ignore your feelings. Reaching out for support from specialists or counselling sessions can help you analyse your feelings and cope with overwhelming emotional struggle.

5. Find your balance

Take time to reflect and think about what works best for you. Whether you can or want to visit relatives abroad or spend the festive season in your host country must be in tune with your personal priorities and needs. Finding the balance that is right for you is essential for your mental health.

Happy Holidays!

I am going on holidays too. Look for next post in 2019!

Learning To Be Unhappy

I know, usually you would say “learning to be happy”. But, after having read a lot about happiness, I found out that you also would need to learn how to manage your being unhappy.

Is it really necessary to be happy all the time to be successful in life? What is the real meaning of being happy?

Some reaserchers state that happiness means designing your own quality of life and also finding ways to strive for continuous improvement. They say that we all have a social purpose to live for, that is our mission. If you keep a journal, for instance, you would be able to evaluate the activities that make you happy and compare them with those that make you unhappy. In this way you may have a choice. You can also compare yourself with others’ activities to find out what makes them happy and get inspired. It doesn’t mean that you have to compare yourself with the others: you are unique, and in some cases you don’t even know those people very well.

Moreover, there is not a single recipe to be happy. Not everyone will be happy by practising meditation or sports, for instance. There are, however, factors that will influence your happiness: valuable relationships, a meaningful job, work-life balance, a great partner and good health. In any case, you may find someone who is not happy in spite of the fact that they have a good job and they get along well with their partner.

However, there are also researchers saying that it not important to target happiness as such, but you would need to to learn how to be unhappy, that you would need to accept moments of unhappiness without judgement.

Some scientists see with a critical eye today’s trend on being always positive. Avoiding facing distress, sorrow, misery is not a solution. You can’t ignore being unhappy, you have to accept it for what it is. You can also share your negative feelings or emotions with others, it will help you creating and strengthening relationships. When you are worried and you know that someone will listen to you, you may feel a bit better after having shared your distress and discomfort.

Isn’t living together one of the objectives of life ? Actually, those pretending always being happy end up in being alone, isolated and of course unhappy. This sounds like a paradox but if you try to accept your unhappiness as a moment in your life that will fade away sooner or later, you will be more content.

The most important thing is to be happy with the life we live, acknowledging and accepting ups and downs that are part of our life: c’est la vie.

Unplug your mind, find yourself

When e-mails, text messages, conference calls, Webex, Whatspp, FB, Instagram, Tweeter, Google and anything else from your partner to your boss invade our lives, it becomes necessary for our survival to stop for a while and be silent.

Our always connected minds take us away from the best of ourselves and our creative potential.

Referring constantly to what one or the other has said, we forget to connect to our essential being, which is unique and precious.

We have become individuals driven by technological change that moved away from ourselves, from our awareness of being human, from the first component of Emotional Intelligence (EI). EI is recognized today as a condition of success in a Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous (VUCA) world, as it is the one we live today.

Refocusing, looking inside, listening to silence and our inner voice. In the depths of ourselves we find an enormous amount of resources and our most authentic creativity: it is our treasure, a unique, rich and colorful, magical place where everything is open and possible.

In this space, we can find synchronicity, messages and insights that will enable us to make the right decisions for our lives.

In this space real relationships can arise, authentic relationships between sincere people who are now masked by the ego that continues to rule us.

What to do then?

Give yourself moments of silence! Be for a while without your mobile phone. Go out for a walk without it, walk with no direction in the nature and feel, look, listen, use all your senses to the maximum.

Be present in this unique moment and let yourself be pervaded by the harmony that surrounds you.

Practice your favorite hobby, and if you do not have it, think about finding one. Quietly cooking at home, knitting, painting, drawing, gardening and all the other activities that you may be passionate about.

Stop for a moment and stop moving from one activity to another, from one piece of information to another. Your brain can not take it anymore, it also needs a rest. Give yourself time to deepen the reasons of your choices and discover the reason of your being, your purpose.

So many people today cannot make a decision, if it has not been recommended by someone, a friend, a colleague, or a family member.

People feel lost. Most probably they are really lost: they have disconnected from themselves to live in connection with the social networks.

It is not my intention to condemn social networks and sources of information, I also use them. The problem is their overuse: a lot of people nowadays lives constantly with an external reference and far away from their real life.

I can accompany you on a journey where you will learn to clear some space for your inner needs. I will show you techniques to manage your stress that will help you to go back to your daily occupations in a more balanced way. And live your life fully. You deserve it!

New Year’s Resolutions

New year’s resolutions are very common at the beginning of each year.

The most difficult thing is to achieve them. We get bored, we start thinking we could never accomplish them, we have too many things to do and why bothering to take those for serious? But you don’t need to set unrealistic resolutions, you can set something like the following, that are not that difficult too achieve, if you really want to.

Here they are:

Spend more time with friends, or your beloved ones doing anything you really like. It’s the best way to feel connected, even if you are an introvert type. You can create a routine out of it, like joining a club that gathers each first Monday of the month, for instance
Everyday, find a way to thank someone. This is great happiness booster. You can start with being thankful for all what you have, the place you live, the job you have, the gym club you go, all that is part of the abundance that surrounds you. Day after day you’ll become an expert and you will be thankful for a blossoming flower, the rising sun, a baby smiling at you
Get more sleep and exercise. If you sleep less than 7-8 hours each night, you can start by increasing your sleeping time 10 minutes a night for a week, then another 10 the next week, and so on until you reach your optimal sleeping time.
After the winter holidays, we all feel a bit overweight. Starting with a physical activity will help you not only in loosing some weight but also in feeling in a better mood. Physical activity in the long run gives you more endorphins, the hormones that inhibit the transmission of pain signals and may also produce a feeling of euphoria.

Good luck and may you achieve your goals in 2019!