Hello out there, all you lovely people. How are you today? Please, do not just say fine. Because it is ok not to be fine. That’s how life rolls. Sometimes we are fine sometimes we aren’t. So please come in, have a cuppa of your favourite hot or cold beverage and let’s chat about how we feel.

Today is World Mental Health Day and I think it’s a good time to chat about ourselves and where we are in our lives. I was lucky this week. Without me realising, I have made some huge steps forward recently. On Thursday I needed to do some training for work and yesterday I drove to Norwich to the hospital. Both occasions used to cause me a lot of anxieties. My mind was continuously milling around wondering what could go wrong, what people might think about me and most of all what I might have done wrong that might have caused someone to feel hurt. It was awful! 

I have trouble to figure out what caused this change but maybe it is a result of my long mindful work. I allow myself for a couple of minutes in the evening just to sit and concentrate on my breathing. It’s so hard to do so and not let the mind take over. Mine is a very active one and it usually goes into all that can go wrong. Or more all that what I do wrong. It doesn’t matter that I do this for years now. My mind just grins at me and goes on and on. The only thing I now do is bring my attention back to my breathing. No judgment. At least I try not to judge. I listen to recordings of OM chanting which always helps. At one point in the last couple of years I have at last learned that I can’t achieve a “goal” when being mindful. It’s the daily practice and keeping at it that makes it work. I do no need to do anything. I just need to sit and breathe and be. That’s all. Well, if you haven’t tried it out I encourage you to do so and find out for yourself how incredibly creative our minds are when it comes to stop us from shutting them down LOL.

Today I feel much better than in recent days. I got a couple of nights proper sleep in and we are off work next week which is brilliant. I am rather out of it when I do not get enough sleep. Then I feel like a machine doing stuff but am not present at all in what’s going on. I do not like this feeling. Then I feel like life is going by and I miss the important things. However, when things get tough I am now reminding myself that things constantly change . “This Too Shall Pass!” is a good mantra to get through sh… Not that it makes the sh.. feel better. But it gives hope and it seems to me that hope is usually all you need to get through the hard stuff. 

Well, that is where I am at. Today, I encourage you to take a minute and check in with yourself. It’s ok not share it publicly. It’s ok to feel tired, exhausted, anxious, afraid, hopeless and all that. That is part of our experience. It shows us that something’s wrong somewhere in our lives and we need to start changing. It’s also ok not to want to change. Change is scary. Change is exhausting. My experience is though that only if we accept that all that stuff is hard can we kick through and start finding our way of doing things and start to feel better. Sometimes we need help with that and it is ok to ask for it. Well, not that I am that good with asking for help but hey: “It is ok to ask for help!” 🙂 Sometimes we can muddle through by ourselves. All I want to tell you today is: “You can do it! & You are perfect exactly as you are!” And I want to send you lots of positive, healing and encouraging vibes.

I wrote about how our outlook can change our situation in December 2015. Maybe that is when my change started 🙂

December 2015

Life is a path that winds around many corners. Sometimes you spot a beautiful valley with flowers and a stream behind it and at other times you are surprised by a tornado throwing you backwards at a rock.

Everybody chooses to see life and their struggle in a certain way. You might choose a Christian outlook thinking this plane of being is meant to cause suffering and everything will be better in the afterlife or you choose to believe there is no god and you just have to get on with it.

I have chosen to believe that we are all connected, that there are beings who have lived on this plane before and that we are here for a reason. That our souls chose to learn a lesson or two in these fragile bodies. When life’s tornados hit me I feel the pain and confusion very deeply and I forget to ask: What could I learn from this?

But when they are over and things have calmed down a little I remember the question. Right now I am learning to set and respect my boundaries. I am learning that not everything that happens is my fault and sometimes I just can’t do anything. And even though this is so scary and causes pain it is OK. It is OK to feel scared and angry and confused. I am a human after all.

That is a huge step I believe. A huge step of acceptance that will lead me forward somehow.

Happy Sunday despite everything. Please stay safe, stay kind and remember: It’s ok not to be ok! But ask for help if you need it!

You can find phone numbers of helplines here on my Pinterest board: