Time to Energise Ourselves

In this week's episode, we're diving into the topic of energizing ourselves to boost our overall well-being. As mums, we often neglect our own energy and with the focus on our children it can leave us feeling drained and overwhelmed. But it's time to prioritise ourselves and recharge in ways that resonate with us.

This episode delves into five different ways to help mums energise themselves. First, we look at the power of physical activity to wake up our energy, boost our mood, and lift our spirits. Whether it's dancing around in the kitchen with the kids or engaging in a spin class, I will be encouraging you to find movement that brings you joy.

Next, I explore how intellectual activities can be fulfilling and energising. Engaging in reading, solving puzzles, learning new skills, or joining a book club not only stimulates our minds but also adds a social aspect that fosters joy and connection.

The third technique is mindfulness and meditation. By being present in the moment, we can calm our nervous system, lower stress hormones, and improve emotional regulation. Talking about simple tips to incorporate mindfulness into our daily lives, and she explains how meditation can be a powerful tool for relaxation and improved mental clarity.

Breathing techniques take centre stage in the fourth segment of the episode. We will talk about the importance of deep intentional breaths to activate the parasympathetic nervous system, which counteracts stress and helps us relax. By breathing consciously, we increase oxygen flow in our bodies, leading to improved energy levels and mental alertness.

Lastly, I will let you know about the benefits of journaling as a tool to release stress and worries. Writing down our thoughts and feelings can help us identify and process emotions, leading to greater clarity and mental freedom. I encourage you to practice gratitude and set short and long-term goals through journaling, fostering a positive outlook and motivation.

Join me on this journey to energise yourself, your way, and discover how these simple yet powerful techniques can elevate your energy levels, improve your mood, and enhance your overall well-being.

Here are the highlights:

(1:33) Physical activity and movement
(6:24) Benefits of intellectual stimulation
(09:14) Focusing on the present moment
(14:50) Breathing exercise
(15:50) Journaling as a tool
(20:18) Setting intentions and goals

Aqua Jade Fitness 

Transcript

Welcome to the Being Mum Podcast. The podcast for Being a mum, your way. I am your host, Amanda Forsey. Thank you so much for joining me. It is so important as mums to find a balance between giving to our families and giving to ourselves. Living our lives in line with who we are and what we really want. Let's put the you and the why back into mummy. 

Hello. Welcome to this week's episode. Time to energize ourselves. 

This episode, we're going to be looking at some of the different ways that you can use your precious time to recharge and re energize our minds and our bodies. There is such a wide variety of things that we can do that it can be overwhelming, knowing where to start, knowing what to do, we've become so used to thinking of things for our children. We fill their days with all of these activities, and we don't even consider ourselves. and we don't feel that we have the energy to do anything anyway, even if we did. So I'm going to tell you about 5 different types of activities that you can do Some are short and can be squeezed in whenever you find a free 5 minutes, and others are going to need to be planned into the calendar. Hopefully, you'll find a few things that appeal to you you could start to add them into your life. Let's get started.

Right. So first up, I'm going to talk about physical activity. by adding some movement into our bodies that can help wake up our energy, move it around, and lift our mood and our spirits. Next, we're gonna discuss intellectual ways to energize our minds. By nurturing our curiosity and learning new things, we can boost our feelings of connection and excitement, and that can lift our energy and our mood. Third, I'm gonna tell you how you can slow time down for yourself and bring that calm energy in by using some mindfulness and meditation techniques, how to be present in the moment to go from feeling chaotic and rushed to calm and capable. Fouth, I'm gonna tell you how you can use the power of your own breath. It can bring you out of the high stress and chaotic energy of our busy minds and back into the calmer, more grounded energy of your body, which will make you feel more stable and balanced and in control.

And finally, I'm gonna touch on how you can get the thoughts you have swirling and dancing around in your head into a more healthy, considered, and useful context. so that you can then choose what serves you best, and let go of the thoughts you don't need that maybe bring in your energy and your mood down. We're gonna do this by journaling, so I'm gonna tell you about ways you can journal that might help you. 

So let's get physical. When we're feeling tired, moving our bodies might feel like the last thing we want to do. I hear you. We'd much rather put our feet up, sit on the sofa, lie down, but getting our bodies moving actually has the effect of energising and wakes us up.

It gets things going. It boosts our mood. There are so many types of physical movement out there to try. I know there's got to be something for you. What did you use to enjoy before you were pregnant and had kids? You know, things like, going to the gym, did you use to dance, maybe it was even just walking the dog. What types of things did you enjoy before? Did you use to, like fast paced movements, high energy activities that get your heart rate up and break sweat, things like running, cycling, aerobics. I mean, those things are no for me. Running is a definite no for me.

I personally don't even run for a bus. I'm getting red and sweaty just thinking about it. Running isn't something that I've ever enjoyed, but I do love cycling in particular spin classes. I used to love going to the gym to do spin classes before I had kids. Now, I have a bike at home. I was one of those crazy people that got a Peloton bike before lockdown and before COVID. 

For me, it's the music. The music makes it. It totally energizes me. I get motivated by it. I like a catchy tune, something cheesey, something I can sing along to. And also, I like having someone telling me what to do. If I go to the gym, I just have a blank. I don't know what to do on the machines. I just kind of go on there and I don't really know what I'm doing and it's boring. Whereas when I'm in a class and someone's telling me what to do, I love it. I can just get on with it, and I feel like I'm doing it properly, and I definitely push myself more as well. 

So the other way that you can move physically is just dancing around in your kitchen, you know, just put the radio on or put some music on. The kids can get involved with this too. We have little dance parties in the kitchen, and some of the shapes that they throw and the moves that they make, honestly, they'll get you smiling and laughing, And that is a sure fire way to energise you and lift your spirits. How can that not? The other good thing about kitchen dance parties and doing things at home is that they can be done when it's raining. And if you're at the gym, or you're doing classes online, you know, it doesn't matter what the weather is. you can still get your physical movement in.

YouTube has a crazy amount of free content. So there's got to be something for you on there as well. You can do dance or yoga, even some simple stretching can work. There's a really fab lady called Aquajade fitness, and she has YouTube videos, and she dresses up. and really gets into the different themes of the music. So it can be rock music or cheesy Abba, all kinds of stuffs on there and honestly, I giggled my way through doing the the YouTube videos. It really makes me smile and really boosts my energy. So she's worth checking out and I'll pop a link for her classes in the in the notes. 

For us mums, even doing simple stretching, first thing in the morning and last thing before bed, it can be a super simple thing to add into your day, and it can actually have really huge benefits as well. It's just waking up your body and energising you, and, and it can just help set that tone as well for the day. look, body wake up, we are moving, and it can just ease any tension or stress that you've been holding throughout the day before you go to sleep and help you sleep a little bit better. So if you do nothing else, if you can even add in just a little bit of simple stretching, that would be hugely beneficial to you. And I would highly recommend it. it's something that I do, and it doesn't take long at all.
It's very quick and easy. 

Right. So now I'm going to touch on the benefits of using our intellectual abilities. I know you probably feel like your brain isn't working like it used to. I heard somewhere that you lose 20% brain capacity per child. So if that's true, I'm down to my last 20%. I don't believe it is, but sometimes I do feel lost in brain fog, and I can't think as quickly or clearly as I used to, I believe it's the lack of sleep. I definitely think it's lack of sleep, but I'm still figuring out how to find more sleep. So for this episode, we'll keep the focus on finding more energy. Activities that stimulate our mind are a great way to energise us. Things like reading, listening to podcasts, solving puzzles, or learning a new skill, doing something that you know, gives you mental stimulation. It can be really fulfilling, and it just gives us a break from the day to day routine. You know, we're taking ourself out of all that mundane stuff that we do on automatic repeat, and we're engaging our brain. So it's a lovely break for ourselves. 

You know, intellectual activities are positive distractions.  I want you to find activities that you actually enjoy. You're not doing this just for the sake of it. It has to be stuff that you enjoy. Then they're going to be relaxing. It's going to refresh you. It's going to allow you to recharge. Mentally. We're recharging our minds here.

Alright, of the intellectual activities that you can do, things like joining a book club or maybe a creative art class, they have added benefit of adding a social interaction connection to them, which is just wonderful for boosting your joy and mood. It raises your energy levels right up there because you're connected with people that share the same interests and passions as you, and so the joy is multiplied because you're sharing it. And, you know, the connection is higher because you're really feeling connected to people on the same level and same wavelength as you. So it just raises both your vibrations.

I don't want you to stress yourself out thinking. You have to add in all these different things. You really don't. The idea is to choose an activity that aligns with your interests and your life, and you try to make it a regular part of your week. It is really part of your self care. You know, it's important for boosting your mental energy and so your overall well-being. Have a think about what intellectual activities that you maybe would enjoy that you could add in to your week. it's a really good way of increasing your energy. 

So next up, I'd love to touch on mindfulness and meditation. They are very powerful ways for us mums to energise ourselves. How do they do that? Well, they're very effective at calming our nervous system and lowering our stress hormones. Mindfulness is simply bringing our attention to the present moment. It's nothing more complicated than that. It's not some fancy thing that you have to go and learn from a buddhist monk somewhere in a monastery. It literally is just paying attention to the moment. That's all mindfulnes is. I don't want you to over complicate it.

By focusing on the present moment, we are detaching ourselves from thoughts of the past, which cause worry, and thoughts of the future, which cause anxiety. We are being in the present. By practicing mindfulness, we can work on improving our focus, our ability to pay attention, and also it helps with improving our memory. super important because we have to remember everything, don't we? This helps us so much with our mental ability to function day to day. We can be clear on what we want and what we need to be doing. So by being mindful and aware of our emotions in the present moment, we can develop better emotional regulation We can respond better in situations as they come up. And in that moment, we are able to notice ourselves starting to become overwhelmed or upset, we can decide to pause, take a breath, or step out of the situation if we need to rather than trying to hold and suppress those emotions inside. 

The very act alone of doing that helps us to give ourselves compassion. understanding. And ultimately, it is an active self care.  You're gonna notice, that you're going to get more patient with your kids, you're going to put away distractions like your phone. You're going to be present with them, fully engaging with them. You're going to have more meaningful and fulfilling interactions, and that's gonna bring you a lot more joy and love and connection.  All of those things raise our energy and they lift our mood. 

So being mindful is super, super important. So how, how can we give it a try? How can we be mindful? Like I said, it's basically paying attention to the present moment We don't need to make it complicated. If you're going to do things like the dishes, I want you to notice the warmth of the water. How does it feel? Notice the smell when you're doing the laundry, the freshly folded laundry. You can smell that powder. You can smell it. It's lovely, isn't it? You know, it's just looking and smiling at photos when you're dusting the shelves, taking a moment to remember those happy memories.

It's about being present in your life and noticing the moment you're in, and that is how you slow down time and how you own your days. If you want to gain more benefits than just being mindful, then you can take it up a notch and you can meditate. This isn't something that might come easy at first.  It's a skill. You can learn it. It does take practice and it does take being consistent.

That's the key to getting better at it is to do it regularly. Okay. Start with short meditation sessions just a few minutes a day, find somewhere quiet where you won't be disturbed, sit comfortably, close your eyes, and focus on breath. Or if you find that difficult, you can focus on a specific focus point. So if you don't like the idea of closing your eyes, you can use something like a candle flame, or you can look at a flower. It can be a picture or an image. It doesn't have to be real.

 You can just look at a picture, and you simply relax and you focus on your breath or your chosen focus object. When a thought arises, you just let it pass. It's not about trying to think of nothing. You're not trying to clear your mind of all things. Your thoughts are going to pop in there. You just notice and you let them pass. You notice the thought and you let it go. A good analogy, that I like to think of and it helps me is looking at a busy road. You see the cars going by up and down the road. You don't run out into the road and try to stop each car and have a a chat with it. It's the same with your thoughts. Alright. They will come into your mind, but you won't follow them.

You're just gonna come back to your breath. or your focus point. There are some wonderful apps, and online resources if this appeals to you and you want to explore it more. It really is a wonderful way of reducing stress, relaxing, and giving us a sense of inner calm that we can carry with us through our days if we meditate in the morning, or if we choose to do it before bed, it can help improve the quality of our sleep. So it's a good one to have on your toolkit. 

So breathing techniques, how can these help us? Why do we breathe? It's to get oxygen into our lungs, into our bodies, into our cells, it's in our cells that this oxygen is part of the magic process of energy production. Oxygen is essential for our bodies to make energy and so our breathing is pretty important.

As women, we tend to hold our tummies in, and we hold tension in our jaws. Can you feel it now? Is your tongue pressed against the roof of your mouth? Are your lips closed tight? Are you only filling the top part of your lungs and upper chest when you are doing these shallow breathing, or are you breathing down into your tummy? You might not even realise it, but when we're stressed and especially when we're busy and we're doing all of this without even realising it. Our body holds that stress as tension in our bodies. We're actually in fight or flight mode. So by taking deep intentional breaths, we can activate our parasympathetic nervous them. And this counteracts stress response. It helps us relax. It helps our bodies realize we're not in fight or flight, and we can calm down. 

So the other benefit of deep breathing is that we boost the levels of oxygen in our blood. Deep breathing increases blood flow. It increases the circulation. And this means our cells are getting a better supply of oxygen and nutrients, and so we're producing more energy. we're gonna feel more awake, and we're gonna feel more alert, and we're gonna feel more alive. So how do we do it? How do we do these breathing techniques? 

Well, as moms, we find ourselves in quite demanding and stressful moments all the time. When we feel stressed and overwhelmed, I want you to take a moment. Focus on your breath. Imagine and visualize that your breath is filling your lungs. It's in around your heart. And then as you breathe out, it flows down through your body, to your feet, and into the floor.  And it's gonna take that stress and overwhelm with it. So you're going to imagine the breath, coming in and filling your lungs and in and around your heart. So take a big breath in. And then as you breathe out, Feel it and imagine it going all the way down your body, down to your feet, down to the floor, taking that stress, and that overwhelm with it. Do a few deep breaths like this, and it can really calm you.  And it can really help you deal with any drama ever is happening. You're gonna take that stress and overwhelm, and you're gonna breathe it out and down and into the floor. And that's just one simple away that it can work. I hope you can give it a try. I'd love to know. Let me know if it works for you. 

So journaling is the final point I wanna touch on today. So some of you might have kept a diary or journal before. It may be something that you're open to already or you're already doing, and to others, it may not appeal to you as it seems time consuming, and lack of time is definitely an issue for us moms. So, I want you to try to be a little bit open to it. as another tool that you can have in your toolbox to use. Generally, it can be a powerful tool to help us energize ourselves. It provides an out it for stress and worries. It's a way to explore our feelings, our emotions, and a way for us to be creative and to relax. Let me explain.

Have you ever heard the phrase where your attention goes, your energy flows? Well, your attention is your thoughts. It's what you're thinking. If you have an endless to do list in your head, there's lots of things you're worrying about or you're feeling anxious about, it can all add up to feeling very stressed out in a panic in fearful mode or even dreading the upcoming day or week ahead, recognizing that your nervous system is activated and you're in this protective energy is really important and journaling is a way for you to do that. It's a way of acknowledging, identifying, and labeling how we're feeling. And by doing that, we own it, and then we can calm ourselves. 

We can become masters at avoiding our emotions I know we're all so good at this. I am really good at this. we can use stress  eating, or drinking. I I'm guilty of this. I use sweet treats in the day and maybe a few glasses of wine at night, you know, keeping busy with life, or our to do lists, the housework, scrolling on social media, all our focusing on other people and all the things around us. It's all a very effective way to ignore our own feelings. But the problem is that our emotions are our body's way of giving us messages, and they have to be felt. and expressed. And if they're not, if we don't deal with them, then they can come out in other ways, ways that maybe aren't so healthy, things like anger, resentment, passive aggressive behavior. And usually, we aim those at those closest to us, you know, those that we love get the full brunt of our frustration because we're not really handling and dealing with our emotions the way we should be. I want you to think of Journaling as a way to unload your stresses and your worries.

You can pick a time of day that works for you, and you can pick a type of journal that suits you as well. I prefer to do it before bed. It means I don't forget about it, and I don't forget to do it. and I can go to bed with a calmer mind. You don't have to spend a long time doing this. It's just writing down some of the worries you have or stressful things that have happened or things you're worried about coming up, putting them on paper, put them in perspective. 

Alright? Be honest with yourself, There is no judgment here. This is just for you.No one else has to see it. All of your feelings are totally valid and they're important to acknowledge, so be honest with yourself. writing down our thoughts and our feelings and our emotions can release that pent up stress.  It helps us see more clearly. It allows our minds to free up space for creating potential solutions or ways that we can handle and cope with the stress that we're feeling. 

It's also nice to add in things that we're grateful for.  By focusing on gratitude, we can shift our mindset into a positive one, and we can be optimistic and change that outlook for ourselves. So it can give us feelings of joy and contentment, Something I like to do with the kids is I ask them to do the rose, thorn, and bud exercise with me. you can do this at the dinner table, or before bed. It's just a really nice way to connect with them about what's going on in their lives right now. So a rose, you think of something good that's happened. Okay. Can you tell me a rose about your day? A thorn, something not so good. something that happened you didn't Iike, or didn't work or it made you feel sad and a bud, something that they're looking forward to.  Something that's coming up. Maybe they're excited about. 

It's really, really simple. It's just those three things. And, yeah, It just helps you connect with them, and it's a really, really nice way for them to start to have this practice as well for themselves, to think about something good that's happened in their day to, to make them realise things aren't always good, but that you can talk about it and share it, and it makes it feel better. so it's just a nice habit to get into, and also it'll help you find out about what's going on in their life, which, you know, my kids don't always tell me unless I do this. So it's really, really nice for that. 

We can also write down our goals and things that we want to accomplish. This is a great way to set intentions and motivate us when we can really energise ourselves with that because will find a new focus and a way to achieve them. Just making sure that you have both very short term and the long term goals. Okay? You don't want to be just thinking about long term ones. You want short ones, and you want them to be for yourself personally, not just ones around being a mum like tidy in the house or sorting out some clutter or clothes, personal ones for you that you want to achieve. So break them down so they're really manageable and they're easy to work towards and that you can make progress. 

 So, for instance, saying, I want to lose the baby weight. Well, that's a nice idea. But, I mean, that's such a big concept. How hard do you even start it? I mean, how on earth would you even go about achieving that? Whereas if you say, I'm going to make time this week to do 3 x 15 minute workouts. It's a doable and achievable thing, and you can work towards your goal. and you can fit that in. And you can also measure it and go, did I complete that? No. I only did 2. So maybe I need to rethink this, and I need to reset my goals. maybe I'll do 3 x10 minute sessions instead of 3 x15. And then once you build that up, you can really assess where it's going, and you can make your goals come true.

So this week, we touched on some of the things that you can try to energize yourself. I really hope that something I've talked about resonated with you, and you could try to add into your life to give you an energy boost when you need it and maybe help you raise your energy and maintain a calmer state of being over the week rather than being on a reactive roller coaster. Please join me next time, and I'll be talking about different ways that we can make ourselves feel good. 

Thank you for joining me for this episode of the Being Mom Podcast. Please stay tuned and subscribe for future episodes. You can also follow me on instagram @beingmumyourway or join my Facebook group, The Being Mum Tribe. I'd love to hear from you and if you have questions or want advice, please do get in touch and join the online Facebook community.