Why Don't You Take Your Holidays?

I'm sure many of us will remember the culture of working long hours, always keen to be recognised as the first to arrive and the last one to leave each day. It didn't matter if the hours in-between were spent roaming offices clutching a file under one arm, looking busy. We were there!

These days, with so many of us hot-desking, working from home or on the road travelling from meeting to meeting there's no time to 'look busy' as we've often very little time to waste. In fact a recent TUC survey (2019) revealed that £32 billion of unpaid overtime was worked last year.

No wonder stress is such a 'biggie', costing UK businesses £40 billion in lost productivity, due to absenteeism, accidents and poor performance. Taking breaks and holidays is important in managing stress, self-care and wellbeing. Why is it then that 2 million workers, or one in fourteen, fail to use their full holiday entitlement?

Is there more pressure around? We all want to do a good job, protect our employment and see the business do well. With appraisals and performance reviews likely to affect our salaries and progression there can be additional concern to always be available and not open the door for someone else to cover our role, do a better job or maybe discover mistakes or inefficiencies.

When time away from work is so important why don't you take your holidays?

- Fear of missing out and perfectionism can mean that we feel stressed or apprehensive and uncomfortable at the mere thought of taking a break or holiday. We may really need time off but feel conflicted at the prospect of being unavailable for the duration.

- It's often the case that when we're constantly busy we focus our attention on dealing with the most pressing matters first. Why wouldn't we? But gradually the less demanding areas of our lives can fade into the background, with us trusting family and friends to take care of themselves. However, if we're frequently unavailable they can start to feel unimportant and learn to get along quite nicely without us.

- It's interesting that post-holiday is the second busiest time for divorce lawyers, with post-Christmas being the most busy. When we lose touch with our relationships we can find that spending a couple of weeks together highlights how estranged we've become. Taking regular breaks and holidays provides an opportunity to keep communications alive and improve those relationships, so avoiding becoming too distant.

- Be aware that stress manifests itself in different ways. There are a documented 360 physical symptoms of stress, potentially a new one for each day of the year! Learning to recognise your own warning signs gives you advance notice that it's time to intervene and take a holiday before things escalate and affect your health and wellbeing.

- One sign that you'd benefit from a holiday is when your creative thinking becomes less effective. You may find yourself going through the motions, working hard but not caring as much or concentrating as well, so losing the joy in what you're doing.

So, change your perspective on holidays;

- Decide how you'd like to spend a week or two, what you'd like to do whilst away. Whether single or partnered, with or without children it's important to include your wishes. Consider your needs as well as other peoples in any decision-making and stop being so preoccupied with what you'd be missing at work.

- Avoid using your holidays to catch up on chores. If you're not going away it can be tempting to decorate the house or sort out the garden. There may be some merit in allocating time for those things but equally find a location, hobby or interest that appeals; maybe a group holiday, one for special interests like walking, or even a retreat. Investigate what excites or inspires you.

- Use your holiday as time to really focus on yourself and/or family. Do things together that you enjoy and recommit to your relationships. Remind yourself that they're often the reason why you work so hard. Your intention was to make a good life and provide for them. Discuss ways to maintain fun and closeness post-holiday. Maybe sharing regular family meals, hobbies and interests could sustain 'us' time once the holiday is over.

- Appreciate that breaks and holidays should give space to switch off and distance ourselves from routine cares and stress. Often a break provides time to be quieter, distracted by other things, afterwards returning refreshed, with new insights and ways of doing things, perhaps even with a new perspective on a problem.

- Learn to switch off the adrenalin. We can become habituated to living permanently on red-alert, hyper-vigilant and programmed to constantly react and jump to attention at whatever is happening. Adopting a calmer, more relaxed approach helps you assess and choose to respond in a more pragmatic, effective way.

Switching off with breaks and holidays is an important way to invest in your ability to live life well. So make sure you take your holidays.

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Your Personal Wonderland

Most people have been fascinated by the work of Walt Disney who repeatedly turned the impossible into possible over the years. He not only developed Disneyland and Disneyworld which are clean playgrounds for families but also created many fictional characters in the movies that he produced.

One of my favourites is "Alice in Wonderland". It tells a story of bizarre happenings for a young girl who falls down a rabbit hole. Many of the characters probably resemble some real-life individuals you have met.

1. Alice is a rather naïve but polite young person who is curious and eager to chase a furry white rabbit in her quest for adventure. She is, of course, immature and has an imagination that doesn't match reality. Know anyone like this?
2. The white rabbit is famous for his large pocket watch and frantic singing of the tune that begins "I'm late. I'm late. For a very important date". Many people in society are always claiming that they are late and seem to think that they are so busy and important that this is excusable. The rabbit, however, is fraught with high anxiety because of his tardiness and just can't seem to get it together.
3. The Mad Hatter is mad - not angry but thought disordered. He talks and acts in unusual ways that would not be expected. He celebrates the three hundred sixty-four days that are "unbirthdays", fixes a watch by pouring food on it and removing the springs while through it all he sings and dances in what might be termed a manic high.
4. The Cheshire cat is a bit of a philosopher who also does the unexpected by distorting his body. He can remove his head to stand on it, turn his teeth into piano keys and disappear stripe by strip. His sage advice to Alice is that if you don't know where you are going, then it doesn't matter what direction you choose. A bit of a trickster, I think.
5. The Caterpillar is a drug user who blows smoke rings in the shapes of alphabet letters from his hookah. He doesn't seem to have a care in the world as he sings about vowels and answers questions in a chillaxed fashion.
6. The individual cards from the deck are blamers. They point to each other rather than accepting responsibility and then laugh when others are in trouble.
7. The King of Hearts is an affable little man who seems to always be in the shadow of his wife.
8. The Queen of Hearts is an absolute bully who demonstrates traits of narcissism. She has extremely high expectations for others and is totally unforgiving of the slightest deviation from her instructions. When she isn't pleased, she yells "Off with their heads". Who do you know who, like this Queen, throws temper tantrums and uses aggression to get what they want?

One of the reasons that we can watch and enjoy this Disney's movie is that we recognize character traits of people around us even though they are portrayed in exaggerated form.

If you were asked which of the Alice in Wonderland characters that you most resemble how would you respond?

Are you the naïve and fantasy-chasing Alice, the rabbit who is known for always being late, the mad hatter or drug-using caterpillar? Perhaps you are a trickster like the Cheshire cat or a card who blames others and then laughs at their misfortune. Are you the likable king who takes a backstage role or the abusive Queen?

Who is in your wonderland?

Just wondering...

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Transitioning From a Slump to a Good Place (By Danielle R. Gault)

Two weeks ago, we went for my husband, Bill's, cancer assessment to get the results of his CT scan which was done the day before the assessment meeting. After two years of wondering what would happen to Bill regarding his bladder cancer and whether or not he could keep his bladder or his life, when we learned that his tumors were 'resolved, we went emotionally blank.

Our news from the CT scan could not be better. The scan showed no sign of cancer. The tumors disappeared and the lymph nodes were back to normal size.

WHY AM I NOT REJOICING?

So why am I not rejoicing? The doctor was astonished -- he said he has rarely seen anything like this and the nurse cried when she shared this great news with us. We don't think the news has hit us yet but will probably only make it real when we don't have to keep going back to the cancer hospital so often for treatments and can pick up on other things in our life.

The funny thing is that I went into a slump the very next day after the good news. My blood pressure went up and I felt gloomy. Why? My rational mind has come up with the following reasons:

A. It is a great relief and I can now exhale and let go of the immediate caretaker concern that has been a big part of 'who I am' in this part of our life and now the life we were starting to get use to we are released from.

B. It is just before Christmas and the holidays make me feel a bit sad around family stuff and how things have changed over the years.

C. I have to accept that getting older is part of life and let go of expectations and ideas that are outlived.

CHANGING MY PERSPECTIVE

I looked for ways to deal with the internal processes of adjusting to this change. Here is my philosophy that has helped pulled me from the slump to a good place as I move through life's journey with all its ups and downs:

1. Just carry on. Like walking the Camino, you will have to go uphill and downhill in the rain, the cold, the heat, and the warm and sunny days - one step at a time.

2. Face the day as best you can by keeping as positive an attitude as possible. When you wake up in the morning, ask yourself "what can I do to contribute to life today?"

3. Face your struggles and strive to confront and deal with them in constructive ways. Never pretend something away - look for solutions EVERYWHERE. There is no one key that works for anyone and there may not be one key that works for you - explore a problem from many perspectives, continue to explore, be curious and keep an open mind. Answers can come from the strangest places if we're open to SEE.

4. Learn from each struggle you face and let it teach you something that will make you stronger. Life is a great teacher so be open to learning from it - you never know what you'll learn about yourself along the way. Isn't life dynamic and so very interesting?

5. Look for the sunshine in the day. No matter what the day brings, be grateful for something - a little flower popping up out of a crack in the concrete driveway, a child smiling at his grandpa, a beautiful piece of fruit to eat. Life is rich and generous even if it doesn't feel that way at this moment - look for the gifts and be as grateful as you can that you are alive and can witness a lovely image or experience.

6. Events in life happen but the processing of their effect on us takes time. Be patient with yourself and give yourself a break from the tyranny of pursuit in life. You really don't have to 'do' anything today. Give yourself some 'gaps' in life. Take a breather and let that be OK.

BOTTOM LINE

Change what you can and if you can't change something, be sure to change the way you're looking at it so that you maintain a healthy frame of mind and a good flow of hormonal chemicals throughout your body.

Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. ~Philip K. Dick

Stay awake, alert, and aware - be aware of what may trip you up, how others may affect you, and what you need in order to stay strong - that is how we grow; YOU are the most important person in your life. The rest of the story is our teacher.

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Meditation For Vision - Daily Guided Meditation by Deepak Chopra

How To Be As Confident As A Genius

The Oxford Dictionaries describes "genius" as being:

- Exceptional intellectual or creative power or other natural ability.

And

- Very clever or ingenious.

For this article I'll be focusing on the "creative" or "ingenious" element of being a genius.

I'll show you how you can think up "creative" or "ingenious" ways of looking at confidence. Each new way of looking at your self-esteem you come up with, will take you one step closer to being:

- Even more confident, and

- Being a confidence genius.

I must warn you in advance that until you get used to this technique it can make your head hurt as it makes your brain really work.

The technique is simple. All you do is compare anything with confidence, and ask yourself how are they similar. That's it! A simple but very powerful technique.

Let me give you an example.

As I sit here typing, some of the things I can see are:

1 - A garden fence,

2 - A bird box,

3 - A six plug extension lead,

4 - A beard (on the TV), and

5 - Rain.

That's the easy part. Now for the hard part. How are these objects like confidence? Asking this question will give me new insights into confidence. Here goes. I'll just work with the first one.

1 - A Garden Fence. Firstly I'll write down the characteristics of the fence. It holds back stuff. It provides privacy. It provides security. It's bio degradable. It's been painted to blend into the surroundings rather than stand out. It's strong. It marks the boundary of what is mine and what belongs to other people. It cuts down on noise pollution coming into my garden. The birds use it as a place to watch out for my cats. I can hang things off it. The plants can grow up it.

Now I'll write down at least one insight for each characteristic.

A - It holds back stuff. Insight = I'll be able to say no to things I want to say no to.

B - It provides privacy. Insight = No one can see inside my mind and heart, so they can't see how confident or insecure I am feeling. It's only what they see on my outside and how I act that determines how confident they think I am.

C - It provides security. Insight = If I have self-esteem, it'll protect me form those who want to hurt me.

D - It's bio degradable. Insight = My confidence is not damaging, in fact it benefits the world I live in.

E - It's been painted to blend into the surroundings rather than stand out. Insight = People won't see the effort I put into developing my self-esteem, they'll just see the increased results and success I have.

F - It's strong. Insight = Once I have become more confident, no one can take that away from me unless I let them.

G - It marks the boundary of what is mine and what belongs to other people. Insight = I can either build a stronger fence to shut people out more, or a smaller fence to welcome people in. If I can increase my self-esteem, I'll be more comfortable letting more people in, and this is a good thing.

H - It cuts down on noise pollution coming into my garden. Insight = Confidence makes my life more pleasant.

I - The birds use it as a place to watch out for my cats. Insight = If I have more self-esteem I'll be better able to look out for dangers coming my way. More importantly I'll also be able to look out for opportunities.

J - I can hang things off it. Insight = Confidence is useful. The stronger it is the more things I'll be able to do.

K - The plants can grow up it. Insight = If I have more self-esteem, even more will come to me naturally.

L - If cared for it will be around for many years. Insight = If I do regular, daily, maintenance to my confidence, it will look after me for a lifetime.

Wow. Now my head is hurting. As you can see I've quite a few insights there. Some insights will just be reminders of what you know already. Some will be more useful than others. You need to work through your insights and decide which ones you will use and how you will use them.

Now all the above thinking is going to be wasted unless it changes your behaviour.

The next stage is for you to figure out what you'll do differently moving forward to give you more confidence. Without a change in behaviour the thinking will be wasted. The thinking alone is not enough to increase your self-esteem.

You need to start by just taking one insight, for instance the one that came from the fence being bio-degradable.

You need to figure out how that insight is going to make you behave differently. You need to come up with actions as a result of your insight.

Action = I will get excited about increasing my self-esteem, and using it to leave a legacy for the world. To start this off I'll have a five minute brainstorm, and list as many ways my increased confidence can leave the world a better place when I am gone.

What I'll do now is spend five minutes furiously tapping away at my computer (with my kitchen timer counting down the five minutes) listing as many ways which increasing my self-esteem from right now, throughout my life, until I die - will enrich the world i.e. leave a legacy. Once I have the list I'll work out some of the things I'll need to do to make it happen, and start doing some actions towards that today.

What this confidence-genius exercise has done for me is to give me a much greater reason for wanting to improve my self-esteem. It's not just about me having a better life anymore. It's about using my life to leave the world a much better place for future generations. Who'd have thought that would come from looking at a garden fence!

This technique is not quick, but is well worth your investment in time and energy. Once you've learnt it, you can also use it to tackle any problem you have.

Give it a try right now. Invest at least a few minutes now, working through this technique, And remember once you've done this you can call yourself a confidence genius.

https://ezinearticles.com/?How-To-Be-As-Confident-As-A-Genius&id=9742776

Self-Esteem and Your Relationship

Have you ever been in a relationship where everything seems so perfect, but then you just can't reach into agreement about certain things? You love each other, but entertaining and maintaining the relationship is a burden to both of you. Often times, you would think that these conflicts result from you misunderstanding and miscommunication, but what you don't realize that these conflicts stem from both of you-your own personal issues, your self-esteem.

Self-esteem plays an important role in the romantic bond that you have with another person. Most of the time, you will attract those that are similar to you.

In the same sense, if you have low self-esteem, you will attract those who also have low self-esteem. It can be very detrimental to your relationship. It brings about negative feelings and emotions to the relationship. It nurtures the feelings of insecurity, mistrust, misunderstandings, and lowers down your self-worth. These feelings can significantly affect your relationship which may also lead to break ups and separations. Usually, if you have low self-esteem, you will most likely engage in self-sabotaging behaviour that will cause you to feel worse about yourself and the situation that you are in.

However, people with high self-esteem will most likely attract those people with the same level of self-esteem. When relationship problems hit hard, if you have high level of self-esteem, you will look at it as a challenge and take in a different approach in solving it. You talk and try to understand each other; you will not force your beliefs into each other's throats. But you will listen to each other and try to reach a compromise; where in each of you has part of the bargain. You don't throw blames at each other, but instead have a sit-down, heart-to-heart talk and try to reach to the root cause of the problem.

Sometimes, a "mismatch of self-esteems" happens. This means that you and your partner have different level of self-esteem; you may have high self-esteem and your partner has low, or vice versa. This kind of relationship also has significant effects to your relationships ranging from negative to positive. The person with low self-esteem will most likely engage in self-sabotaging behaviours and increased self-doubt when his/her partner talks about his achievements, adventures of the day or the number of opposite sex friends he/she has. These can nurture jealousy to the partner and might lead to break up.

Although these differences post risks in the relationship, this type of mismatch, above anything else, also have a "harmonizing effect" to the relationship. You and your partner will complement each other. You and your partner will be filling up what the other is missing. You are actually helping each other to become whole and realize the cliché "you complete me". Often times, the person with low self-esteem would adapt the behaviour of the one with high self-esteem thereby increasing his/her self-esteem as well. This then leads to a better and happier relationship.

At the end of the day, you have to be self-aware of where you and your partner are in the self-esteem spectrum as knowing where you stand can help you improve yourselves and your relationship-be in a more peaceful and happy one.

https://ezinearticles.com/?Self-Esteem-and-Your-Relationship&id=9611346

Procrastinating? Try This Simple Formula

Do you have those days when you just aren't motivated or inspired to follow through on your good intentions? You're lethargic, stuck in procrastination, and just can't seem to get started. On days when I don't feel like meditating, exercising, writing, cooking healthy food, or doing anything I really need/want to do, I've found a simple formula to get me going: low expectations and an easy warm-up.

I start with low expectations by telling myself, "If I do a little, that's good for today." I usually define "a little" as half or less of what I might normally do. For example, with exercise, it might be 10 minutes of cardio, instead of 30, and one set of 5 strength exercises, instead of two sets of ten exercises. With writing, I tell myself I'll just write a paragraph or two. Because I've done more in the past, I know this lesser amount will be easy.

With my low expectations in place, I start with an even easier warm-up, something that feels like nothing at all. For exercise, I just start moving. This could be a walk or riding a stationary bike with little resistance. If I'm writing, I start with one sentence of any quality. I just get something written down.

Once I've gotten myself moving in this small, easy way, I often find the internal juices start to flow. With exercise, I begin to breathe a little deeper, feel a little looser, and my energy increases. With writing, ideas come to mind, associations click in, and I often find myself in the flow.

Invariably, I exceed my low expectations and end up feeling good about my efforts. I remember why I wanted to do what I'm doing. It feels good. It's taking me somewhere I want to go. It helps me feel productive, purposeful, and alive! At this moment of feeling good, make sure you record this experience in your memory. Then, you can recall this positive feeling of "being in the flow" to support you to get going the next time.

Now, if I do a little exercise and a little writing every day, it's easier to stay in the flow. It's easier to be consistent with a small doable action. That's the power of having an intentional daily practice to grow something that's important to you-be it your health, relationships, business, art, or spiritual growth. Small consistent actions are the building blocks of big accomplishments. They're the key to deeper meaning, purpose, and productivity.

And, if I just don't feel like taking action--if I find myself procrastinating--I go back to my low expectations and easy warmup to get me going. If getting started is the hard part, make getting started as easy as possible.

Are you ready to be free from procrastination and self-judgment?

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