Saturday, January 30, 2010

Fighting Exhaustion (and I want to win)


we'll deal with it later, originally uploaded by emdot.

So I've been tired. I'm tired when I get up in the morning; I'm tired when I get to work. I'm tired during the day; I'm tired when I get home. I seem a little disinterested in everything. Life is tasting a bit like a bowl of plain oatmeal and that is no way to live. Sure, it's enough to live on -- but it's not making a smile spread across my face.

So, I'm going to do an experiment for the month of February and will see if this helps.

For the month of February I am going to

  • Go to the gym before work, 5x/week
  • Eat a healthy breakfast (I already do this)
  • Focus on some happy thoughts (see below)
  • Walk for 10 minutes at lunch time
  • and Drink 2L of water every day


About the thinking the happy thoughts... I wish I had a better word for this. Martha Beck calls it treasuring and this is what it consists of:
Think of something your heart really years for. Now imagine that you have that thing, whatever it is. Spend 10 solid minutes imagining this with all senses -- what does it sound like, look like, feel like, taste like, smell like. 10 solid minutes.

That's it.
And that's what I'm going to do for February and I really really hope it brings me some more oomph. Some more get up and go (cuz my get up go seems to have got up and went. <-- I wish I made that up. Clever.).

I'll let you know how it goes.

3 comments:

Blondi Blathers said...

Good luck with the February resolutions. Do you get shorted on sunshine down there, too, in winter? Ever considered one of those SAD lamps? Everyone I talk to at this time of year could use one, it seems.

stone_feather said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
stone_feather said...

Hi Mar. I feel your pain. I go through times like this, especially during the winters. I agree with the SAD lamp thing that Katie mentions above (keep one on my desk). Some other things I do to cultivate joy and have more energy are:
- cutting caffeine (I am really sensitive, so for me this means no coffee or just decaf). I allow myself 1-2 cups black tea in the morning. When I was having 1-2 cups coffee per day, life was a lot different.
-(some aspects of )Ayurvedic daily routine: neti pot, tongue scraping, nasya oil, drinking warm water instead of cold, trying to avoid eating between 7 and 7 (supposed to be 6 and 6, I find even 7 and 7 is hard), trying to sleep from 10 to 6, lunch bigger than dinner.
-attempting to eat for my dosha (for me, enough protein, avoid going completely empty, high quality oils)
-sing (impossible to be sad and sing at the same time)
-(only a new thing I am just now starting) turning negative thoughts around so that they become affirmations. I.e. "I should eat more healthy" --> "I am so grateful that I eat healthy"
(reading The Secret right now, kind of cheesy, but some useful stuff in there)
-movement. If I am having trouble motivating, music always seems to help. I also have to consider where I am in my moon cycle. For me, I am often down for more strenuous activities (i.e. hike up a mountain and ski down or weight lifting) in the 1st half of my cycle, and less strenous (gentle yoga or walking the dogs). I got this idea from the book Consciously Female (Tracy Gaudet, MD). Another great one in this same vein is Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom (Christianne Northrup, MD).
-really hot baths with epsom salts (like a pound per bath).
-light timer on my bed side table. Lamp turns on 1/2 hour before alarm goes off, so I get the dawn response at the same time each day(from Northrup).