Brain Gym
Is Your Tank Full?
Did you ever have a teacher in High School make the class do the exercise “if so and so were and animal, flower or car what would they be?” I remember my classmates and I doing this once in 10th grade psychology class. My friend decided that I was a Mercedes convertible (I forgot which one exactly) classy, sporty and fun. It fit me. I loved convertibles especially in sunny southern
California. Of course my convertible was a sporty FIAT spider, which eventually broke down beyond repair. In part because it was a FIAT (fix it again Tony) and in part because I wasn’t the greatest with routine maintenance. Not horrible, mind you, my dad taught me the basics and I cajoled my male friends into changing my oil and other basic tasks. But I definitely pushed the limits, arriving to work on empty and such things. This is a common phenomenon among high school and college students. They call me to say they are running a “little late” for our appointment because they “just realized” they need to get gas. I smile every time remembering my own adventures running on fumes, putting the car in neutral down the winding hills, so I would make it to the station! Sometimes I think that angels must have pushed me along because I always “just” made it!
It’s not just teenagers that push the limits and run on fumes. Often we carry these adrenaline driven habits into adulthood just transferring the specific details. We might not ever run out of gas again in the car, but how many times do we run out of patience? Or energy? Kindness? Respect? When our reserves are low – our levels of back up emergency “funds” – it is very easy to lose out in living our ideal self, living out the person God made us to be. Maybe your basic physical needs are met. You have plenty of food, clothing and shelter, but your emotional account is empty from constant giving out and never refilling. I know that when I want to give someone “the bird” for cutting me off in traffic, that my emotional reserves are low! (Someone with “road rage” or anger management issues wouldn’t benefit from the above example.)
How do you keep your tanks full enough so that you can choose to respond to a situation, instead of simply reacting out of habit or desperation? What do we need in our lives so that we are free to choose?
One important element is making sure our needs are met and that our reserve tanks are full. One reason I hardly ever ran out of gas in the car I bought when I was 19 was because I knew I had a 2.2 gallon reserve tank. I drove and drove until the light flashed on. When that light flashed on I knew I had entered the “I better watch it” zone. Many times I used up me reserve tank within that .2 of the gallon, but I was intent on really pushing the limits counting on the accuracy of my readings of the mileage.
Not only do you need that reserve, you need an awareness of it, where you are within it, and the perspective to read it accurately. If you are used to reading the odometer in kilometers but are driving a car with mileage reading only, you will misjudge the distance. How many times have you said “I thought I had more “ (time, money, patience, whatever). We misjudge the reality of a situation when our perspective is out of whack.
What can throw our perspective out?
-
Fatigue
-
Hunger (low blood sugar)
-
Unrealistic expectations
-
Illness
-
What we are ingesting mentally (movies, TV, books, radio and newspapers)
-
Relationships
-
Stress
The list continues. The important fact is to know what your triggers are, so that you prepare a “perspective intervention” for yourself! This isn’t as radical as it sounds. Actually a shift in perspective can happen in a moment.
Some things to experiment with:
· Call your “pick me up” person. This could be anyone that can talk you out of your craziness; your friend, mentor, coach.· Ask your friends how they shift their perspective and borrow or brainstorm techniques.· Go outside and walk around in nature; take time to notice the colors and sounds around you; get out of your head!· Off to the gym with you. Stop whining and get moving!
· Do some Brain Gym (www.braingym.org)
What do you do? LMK
MLH
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )Coaching Corner: Waking Up
“Sara” doesn’t think she has anything to offer the world. She’s unable to identify her strengths and gifts. She’s asleep to her 17 year old self in so many ways. Waking up to who you are—who God made you to be—at your core it isn’t easy. We can’t just snap our fingers after saying “1, 2, 3 awake!” This isn’t a fairy tale we live in. But I wonder if we make it harder than we need to? Maybe sometimes, we could be like children in a fairy tale—open to wonder. Could this make it easier for us to wake up if we pretended we are children again to lock into that freshness of vision? Could we shed our skins of apathy, of nihilism, or despair? Can we even wake up without hope? Do we wake up to hope?
To wake up 1st we need to NOTICE we are asleep!
We walk around like zombies most of the time. Even if we are intellectually awake, we are not noticing what is going on in our bodies. We have blocked out the intelligence of our bodies. In the end, all this does is hurts us. Body centered movement such as yoga, tai-chi, pilates, and brain gym can help us wake up, but only if we want them to. As my sister summarized it, “using the body is like accessing the sub-conscious mind.” This powerful intervention, using the body to access subconscious and physiological dimensions in tandem with the conscious mind, is much faster than processes that only access part of the system. I have personally experienced this.
Of course, we can even be mindless and asleep during body-centered activities, not noticing what is happening. Since, we are thinking creatures it is important to connect the body intuition with the mind (an interesting site on physical/emotional intelligence, although I haven’t experienced their work first hand.) That’s one of the beauties of working with a program like Educational Kinesiology; it is an integrating process that wakes up the brain and body. I didn’t notice how much I wasn’t noticing until I took a Brain Gym 101 class (you can go to braingym.org for info on classes in your area). And waking up is really about learning—learning to notice and be aware.
We know how powerful movement is for learning. How do kids learn the first five years of their lives? Through movement, play and exploration. Obviously, this should not suddenly change with the entrance into kindergarten, but unfortunately with the recent push for “academic” kindergartens, children’s natural and most effective learning routine is stalled. Developmental psychologists and most educators understand the importance of movement to learning. It is developmentally appropriate as the saying goes. But movement shouldn’t stop with our childhood. Adults need to move to learn also.
Think back to college and all those essays you had to write. What worked when you had writer’s block for a big paper? What woke up your creativity? Movement! Professors recommended going for walk, jog or something to get the ideas flowing. And guess what? It actually worked. Now we know why! How dare we expect kids to sit through 6 hours of lecture a day with no time for movement and integration of the ideas being thrown at them? But, I digress…waking up is also a process of unfolding.
I think that after I started working with yoga and educational kinesiology, it awoke me to other areas of my life that were asleep. A friend, who is a spiritual director, turned me on to the enneagram as a tool for spiritual growth. I have always been into personality “types” and theories—not in the boxing you in way, but to understand people better and thus, relate to people more completely. These theories have something to teach all of us—even if it is just a tidbit. But, none of them were transforming for me—until the enneagram. Dealing with my unconscious motivators and what my “number” type is usually blind to has been most helpful. In fact, it has been a very hopeful waking up experience. At times, it was depressing looking at my blind spots, waking up to my weaknesses. But, for an optimistic “7” dealing with the nitty gritty is important to do. I would rather avoid the ugly parts. Waking up works though. Now that I am awake to certain things, I notice them and can work on changing. I have woken up to hope by way of the despair.
If you have ways that work for waking you up into the fullness and truth of life, email me (my first name AT TheLearningGround.com—this is for the autobots scrolling for emails…) or comment in this blog. I would love to hear and share your wisdom with others. MH
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 2 so far )emotional integration methods
Reframing your thinking in a positive light is not just for the affirmation spouting “feel good” types. Research is finally catching up with what many have suspected all along: positive emotions can change your life. Specifically, they can “broaden people’s habitual modes of thinking and build their physical, intellectual and social resources” according to BL Fredrickson. When you engage positive thoughts and emotions, not only are you leaving no room for negative emotions, you are also creating new neural pathways in your brain. This means your brain changes, and thus, you change! You can become a healthier person on all levels, especially in relation to your emotional consistency and resilience—something all entrepreneurs need to be successful in their businesses.
Doc Childre reminds us in his work (heartmath.com) that “attitude directs how you manage your energy.” How we manage our energy really is how we run our lives and businesses, don’t you think? If your energy is scattered or fragmented, you may feel like you are working an awful lot while not achieving the results you want. IF your energy is being directed by fear or anxiety—emotions often felt when taking huge leaps of faith—your intuition could become stifled along with your creativity resulting in stagnant performance. Learning how to focus one’s emotions, neutralizing the negative ones, can directly affect productivity, profit and performance. We know from current research on the brain and heart that these changes are not only psychological in nature; your physiology changes along with your emotions. It’s not all in your head! We’ve all experienced clammy hands when we are nervous, for example. Obviously, we can’t control primitive reflex reactions—like when we are startled—but we can learn to minimize the body reactions by neutralizing our negative thoughts and emotions.
In addition to neutralizing in real time the charge of the emotion, we can then release it for greater freedom and peace. The method is as simple as the previous techniques and equally profound in effect. Many people have come up with variations on releasing these emotional “stores” in our bodies. You can use techniques from Brain Gym, The Sedona Method, Heartmath or others. It is helpful to be led through the process with a coach or practitioner the first time, but not necessary. The main component in all these methods is in noticing what is going on in your body, being with it and STAYING with it until it dissipates. Usually, when we get uncomfortable with these negative feelings we want to escape them as soon as possible. But, instead we need to remain in the presence of these emotions. This is counter-intuitive to how we live, but it works.
I’ve used The Sedona Method while on the pre-core machine at the gym with great success. I had a client that was really stressing me out with her habit of negativity and over-reaction. I liked this client but was feeling avoidance at the thought of her name. I had just picked up a book on The Sedona Method and was eager to try this cerebral approach. I visualized this person in my mind, felt the aversion, pedaled harder and began the internal questioning process:
1. Name it. What are you feeling now? (aversion)
2. Could you welcome this feeling? (No!)
3. Could your release this feeling? (Yes!)
4. Will you release it? (Yes, please!)
5. When? (Now?)
I went through the cycle about three or four times, naming each different feeling as it arose. And finally, when I felt complete I could picture this client and I actually smiled. The Sedona Method doesn’t instruct that you need to be moving physically, but with my training with educational kinesiology I knew it could only be beneficial; and it was. You’ll notice by my answers in the parentheses that it doesn’t matter if you answer “no” to any question. Just keep breathing and going through the questions until you feel the emotion has released. There is much great work that can be done with this simple method. (For more info go to www.sedonapress.com).
These methods can be combined with body centered tools that engage the heart/mind and body simultaneously. This is probably why doing repetitive cardio helped my Sedona process. All these techniques are useful for use on your own, although some take a bit of instruction or facilitation. Brain Gym is one brain/body integration method that listens to your body to unblock whatever is internally holding you back. Again, this is a simple method involving 26 physical movements to achieve profound change in learning ability and overall emotional health. This system of integrating activities is taught in person either one on one or in a group by a licensed professional.
Many schools are using the techniques with their students to enhance learning ability and readiness. Once you have worked in person with an instructor you can use all you have learned on your own at home. Some changes are instantaneous and others unfold over time. (For more info go to www.braingym.org). A benefit of this program is that it is appropriate for even the smallest child (you don’t need to be able to talk, unlike other methods that are more cerebral), whereas other methods profiled in this article are more fitted to school-aged children that have passed a certain developmental stage.
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 1 so far )
Interplay 