“We cannot solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.”
-Albert Einstein
Each one of us has different levels of resiliency when it comes to dealing with our life situations. Do you need to learn some ways of becoming more resilient? Take this brief Stress Quiz and find out!
1. Do you worry constantly and cycle with negative self-talk?
2. Do you have difficulty concentrating?
3. Do you get mad and react easily?
4. Do you have recurring neck or headaches?
5. Do you grind your teeth?
6. Do you frequently feel overwhelmed, anxious or depressed?
7. Do you feed your stress with unhealthy habits-eating or drinking excessively, smoking, arguing, or avoiding yourself and life in other ways?
The most important first step in dealing with your stress is to accept and acknowledge that it is your emotional reaction to a situation or event in your life that causes your stress, not the situation itself. We cannot often do anything about the situation, but we can work with our reaction to the situation-this is where our power is!
I created the Snap Out Of It NOW! Method to help myself, and now you, to become more resilient and more creative. In other words, to learn how to interrupt and SNAP Out of the destructive cycle of emotional reactions that are engaged when faced with a difficult life situation.
Breathing Awareness Exercise:
The breath is your key to self-resiliency. The breath is your entry into your body-bringing light to the darkness, warmth to the coldness, and boundless possibilities for breaking free from your everyday reality.
The following exercise takes less than a minute and you can do it anywhere-at the grocery store, in your car during traffic, even in the middle of a fight or disagreement with another person. Sometimes just one single minute can be your best friend!
Launch Yourself to Places You Have Never Gone Before!
1. STOP, LOOK, and LISTEN-acknowledge you are stuck in a negative think-feeling pattern-you are stuck in a destructive cycle of reactions within your own body.
2. Become aware of your BREATH by listening to your breath going in and out your nose. Enter your body with your breath.
3. BREATHE to the negative feeling sensation in your body that is present wherever it may be, and as you exhale you are releasing the disharmony within your body. You are NOW free to deal with the situation in a creative new way!
You are shifting the state of your body and mind away from disharmony (frustration, anger, fear) back to its natural state of harmony (appreciation, love, joy)! Within this state of harmony you are more flexible, resilient, and creative. Is it not wonderful to have a tool that will launch you into possibilities you never saw before!
