If you are a parent you could probably do with some stress relief and I am sure you can relate to what I am about to say.
By the end of the day, I’m often really scraping the bottom of the barrel. My patience, my energy, my acceptance, tolerance, and love all seem to be vapors and bedtime is stressful. When the last of …” I need a drink, I need the toilet, I’m not tired, I’m hungry, It’s too dark, it’s too bright, they won’t be quiet, I can’t sleep, my sports uniform is dirty and I need it for tomorrow” is done, just the thought, of another child at the top of the stairs, is enough to send my blood to boil!
Because you know the thought is enough. We think ourselves into more and more stress.
Our amazing brains can create the same emotional intensity with just the thought, the memory. You get the same chemical cocktail in your brain as though it is really happening. So we don’t even need the real event. We can just think about it and it’s real in our minds and bodies.
So the more we think about anything we find stress inducing the more our body thinks it is happening for real- again at that moment.
So I land in a heap on the couch and release a sigh. I take a moment for myself to just be at peace. I glance over and there are my daughter’s sneakers and dirty socks on the end of the couch. I say to my husband, Her stuff is just everywhere! When I ask her to put it away she says ‘sure’, only to move it from that spot and put it down in another.
The frustration starts to mount in my mind because those shoes represent something. And the thoughts start to spiral.
We give meaning to everything, nothing has inherent meaning, we choose what it means for us.
It’s how we make sense of our world.
So unconsciously those shoes mean: I’m not a good mother because I can’t get my kid to put her stuff away. I have a lazy child. I have a distracted child. She’s never going to remember. How is she ever going to look after herself when she’s older. She’s going to lose everything when she’s on her own. I’ve made so many mistakes raising these kids. I don’t put my stuff away and she’s learned it from me, Or my husband is lazy and doesn’t put his stuff away, it’s all his fault…..we assign meaning. And left unchecked on and on it goes.
We create fears for the future, blame from the past, and in our body, those feelings are like it is really happening. It is stress in the body.
If we dwell on it, how do we feel? If we feel that way how do we think, if we think that way how do we feel, and so the loop goes on. All this often happens under the surface, unconsciously, and in seconds we have created a feeling that can loop for as long as we allow it. It becomes a mood, then an attitude and if held, repeated, and practiced long enough our personality. We just FEEL stressed all the time. We’ve just forgotten the thoughts that are creating it.
My husband bless him just looked at me and said: “Those shoes won’t be there forever”. Nothing has any meaning except the meaning we give it and we can re-frame that in a second. When can choose new meanings. Become more conscious and aware of what thoughts are creating our emotions. And instead of being dragged into an old thought pattern that creates the same old feelings and experience, we can change our thoughts so our experience can be what we want it to be.
Those shoes have sat there all night and all day and when I look at them now they mean I am blessed to have this beautiful child and I feel love and gratitude. Now that is something worth dwelling on x
For more tips on conscious awareness and how to practice stress relief with less stressful thought patterns check out Ester Hicks “Ask and it is given”
If you are struggling with stress in the mind and body book your free coaching call today.