If you are ready to learn the art of calm, start by noticing your patterns.
What situations tend to repeat themselves?
What themes tend to show up again and again?
You can learn a lot from your creature habits.
One of the habits I often see is constant busyness (it's an easy one to spot from personal experience).
Often, people tell me they have always been this way…it’s who they are… packing every waking moment with work, errands, over-extending themselves, always on their phone, watch, or in the company of the tv... because they can’t stand the quiet of being by themselves.
Busy isn’t a character trait. Babies aren’t born busy.
Busy is taught. It’s a creature habit. And it’s a telltale sign of anxiety.
You aren’t alone if you’ve been ignoring or downplaying the negative effects of constant busyness. When we can’t “fix it” –I’m sure you’ve tried--we dismiss it.
Until we can no longer overlook it. It takes too big of a toll. On our relationships. On our health. On our happiness.
Anxiety can't be fixed at the level of thought because the roots of anxiety run deeper. But there are ways we can free ourselves and heal from it.
Worry is the thinking side of anxiety. We can learn how to separate a thought from worrying, and bravely use mindfulness to look at thoughts.
My mind was blown the day I learned that our outer worlds are always a reflection of our inner worlds. They are different parts of the whole, mirroring each other. Always.
Most of us (myself included) fear looking inward, which is why we like to stay in motion in the outer world. It's the brain's natural tendency. We don't think “I’m scared to feel this emotion” or “I don’t like the company of my inner voice”.
Instead, we say things like “I don’t know how to be mindful” or “I think I’m doing it wrong.” (Hint: you are doing it exactly right, but if you aren’t sure, I’m happy to chat with you about it 😊)
Yet, mindfulness and self-awareness is the key to cultivating calm and ease.
One of the hardest assignments for my new clients is sitting still. (I work with a lot of busy people!) When we sit with ourselves, we can’t help but hear from our inner world. And, at least at first, it can be really shocking and even unsettling to hear internal chatter.
The good news is that our thoughts and feelings are never as scary as they initially seem. We don’t need to stay busy to avoid them. In fact, it’s vital not to avoid them. To a brain, your avoidance habit teaches it to be afraid of what you are unwilling to relate to, and that makes anxiety feel more dangerous.
Anxiety can’t hurt us. It just feels bad. Busyness becomes the security blanket.
The art of calm begins with being willing to see what that busyness is all about.
What is your busyness filling a need for? For one client, her busyness was filling the need to feel appreciated.
Without busyness, your intuition shows up. You ARE everything you need and seek... appreciation, acceptance, and gratitude, as natural as breath itself.
If you are constantly busy, you’ve probably also been trying to find your way out of unrest, anxiety, insomnia, injury, illness.
Calm isn’t a lost cause.
The art of calm on the other side of anxiety, if you are willing to befriend it. Once you learn how to heal your whole body, you have these tools forever.
You cannot unlearn this wisdom. You free yourself from worry, anxiety, insomnia, chronic conditions. And you liberate your inner energizer bunny.
Curious? Click here to get on my calendar and talk about joining the next round of Aligned, my group coaching program where we use Pilates, nutrition, and integrated mind-body tools to calm your anxious mind, tap into your innate wisdom, and become strong, flexible, and healthy whole beings, in mind and body.
It’s a whole-self healing journey that you don’t want to miss.
Let’s get calmer, stronger, and more creative together.