In today's episode, I walk down memory lane and share my journey from being highly stressed to feeling the happiest I've ever been.
I share this to show my journey and how I've changed my relationship with interacting with stress and feeling overwhelmed.
I have worked in hospitals as a social worker for the state government, and I am a living embodiment of walking to talk when it comes to stress reduction and preaching about self-care.
Download your FREE GUIDE TO help change your relationship with stress reactions.
In today's episode, I walk down memory lane and share my journey from being highly stressed to feeling the happiest I've ever been.
I share this to show my journey and how I've changed my relationship with interacting with stress and feeling overwhelmed.
I have worked in hospitals as a social worker for the state government, and I am a living embodiment of walking to talk when it comes to stress reduction and preaching about self-care.
Download your FREE GUIDE TO help change your relationship with stress reactions.
Hello and welcome to another podcast episode of the Calm Compass and firstly I just want to thank you for being here and listening and wherever you are listening in the world. I am so grateful for you and I would love you to give us a five star review and share it on your socials and tag us at Real Vision Life Coaching, and that way we can really spread this message about supporting our well-being, supporting our stress, giving you the tools to enhance your well-being and so you can be a thriver. So I was reflecting on this and it's been over four and a half years since I left my hospital based job as a social worker for the government and now I am in a completely different mindset. I feel different. My lifestyle is very different. I feel different in myself. I must say.
Speaker 1:
I look back and I was deeply unhappy. I was. My mental health was really precarious. I was really experiencing emotional and physical exhaustion, which meant for me that I would often take myself. We had a meeting room. I would take myself to that meeting room and cry because of all what was expected, and it just felt like it was never, ever enough. I was never going to be good enough, and thinking about that breaks my heart to think that I thought like that that I wasn't enough, and look what I was doing and look what it made me do and how it affected my own mental health, when these people are the frontline workers supporting people in their well-being and mental health, and I just I was at that breaking point.
Speaker 1:
And often, when we're so in the thick of going down a particular path, we're maybe entrenched with fear. Fear had got me for so long and we are very. Sometimes we can become fearful of the unknown because we don't know. It feels almost safer to be where we are, because changing can feel quite scary and one of our human instincts is to feel safe, to feel have a sense of belonging. And if we are in, even if a job feels maybe quite crap or we're highly stressed or we're at burnout in our minds, we still feel safe because we don't know what the other is. And let me paint a picture that for me, I worked in a stroke ward and I actually had swapped roles, so I actually swapped, so I was working in the emergency and had I think I had five wards. So hear that again, I was working in the emergency department and had multiple wards that I was working across and even thinking about that.
Speaker 1:
That was unrealistic and it was probably a catalyst for me going enough is enough. I am so much. My mental health, my well-being is so much more important. So, working in a stroke unit, you would see people who had very stressful jobs and they would come in for having a stroke and they were relatively very young, and so there are so many extremes of what stress can actually do.
Speaker 1:
But we have almost been conditioned to be that self-sacrificing and to keep going and it's nothing. We're overreacting. All of these things are maybe swirling in our heads. Oh, you know, the financial thing, all of these things. And for me, I was at that point where I was so entrenched in my own fear and I was so no-transcript. It felt scary thinking that there could even be a possibility of something else. And sometimes decisions are already made when we're at that breaking point. And I realised when I made that decision I was like I am, my mental health and my well-being is so much more Because I knew in myself if I kept going, I don't know what would have happened in my mental health, my well-being and that journey in itself.
Speaker 1:
You know, sometimes we think journeys are linear, they're straightforward, they're a good experience and even though it was, I needed to go through that journey. It was still hard. It was the biggest journey that I've ever gone through in my life of self-discovery and also being a carer myself, having my own business, all of these challenges and we only uncover what we're ready to uncover. And as time sort of went on, it was such a self-discovery of myself and sometimes we just underestimate we're in this rush of life of go, go, go, we're in a hustle, everything's go, go, go and gratification. If we don't get those instant results, we feel like we're a failure and I realised that I needed to do things that were going to support my mental health, my well-being.
Speaker 1:
And there are so many different practices that people do and some of these practices that I do. They don't take a lot of time but they always make me feel better and I noticed that if I stop doing it I can feel my thoughts feel different. So I do breath work and I do meditation every single day, sometimes twice a day, and I can notice in myself when I'm in that feeling of anxiety, that feeling where it I feel quite constricted and I feel that my thoughts aren't very helpful and I'm going almost in a loop. It literally feels like I'm in a loop and almost like a time warp for me. This is my experience. I know, like my ego still, I still have to train my ego and say, let's just go for 10 minutes. So well, I'll go into my. I have a room in the house that I meditate in, do my yoga in and I'll put my big earphones on and listen to some music and at first it's just about slowing down my breath.
Speaker 1:
For me, when you're breathing in, you're activating the sympathetic nervous system, so you know you're getting ready that energizing breath. But when you're doing that longer exhale, you're actually activating the parasympathetic nervous system, so that hit that part of your body when you're sleeping, that rest and digest and healing properties. And that's what we need to focus on when we are really supporting our well-being and reducing that. Stress reduction is going into techniques that support the central nervous system and also looking at the body mind integrations, which I do through Ayurveda as well, and sometimes it can feel quite overwhelming. I focus usually on one thing and then I will add even if it's something small, I will add and add and you know I've obviously developed my own framework and supporting other clients who experience really in the thick of overwhelm and they've got lots of different stressors and how they navigate and having practical approaches. I'm very practical and sometimes we need that instead of you know, we need sometimes a range of different supports to help us, but having the tools to actually know to support ourselves so we can do it has just been instrumental to me and my clients. It's just been a game changer.
Speaker 1:
So even thinking about where I am now, how I feel about myself, I just feel more grounded. I feel more calm and full disclaimer. My life is not always like calm. At times it's really challenging. Having a child with additional needs and having another child with multiple learning disabilities as well. I thought can feel at times stretched and I know that in these times it's more important than ever for me to practice what I preach and that is doing my daily self care activities, reducing my stress reduction, supporting myself, what do I need and really being kind to myself.
Speaker 1:
And that's a journey, isn't it? Being learning the language of radical self-acceptance. I think we have this notion that everything is we've just got to accept ourselves right here, right now, and it's a journey. I'll just say that it's a journey of ourselves. So, yeah, I've just looked back and I think all of that has taught me so much.
Speaker 1:
And now helping women who many of these women are in these industries, interestingly enough, right. So we but we, we get in our own way and we want someone who, you know, gets it and understands and has that knowledge and uses a framework that can really support women. And that's what I really love about what I do and how I support and guide women so they can be their own coach and how to support themselves in each moment. So, yeah, I hope you've enjoyed my very my journey so far, how far I've come, and, yeah, I just I feel such a different person, so much happier within myself, and I celebrate those times where I feel good and celebrate that, because it's not always rainbows and butterflies, but I also celebrate what I can muster on each day. So I just want to thank you again for listening to the podcast and share your favorite podcast episode on at on Instagram. I'll put all of the ways you can get in contact with us here, but I just really grateful for you listening today. Thank you so much. Bye.