"Words to Thrive By" by Mary Anne Dorward

I finally took a full day off, the first in several months. I highly recommend it! Instead of trying to catch up with work and clients, I took the time to catch up on myself! Highly enlightening.

My space at home needed cleaning and clearing so, before I vacuumed, the first thing I did was I smudged the entire space. “Smudging” for those of you who are unfamiliar with it, is a Native American practice of using sage** in any kind of ceremony. Sage is lit on fire to create smoke. This smoke is considered holy, like frankincense and myrrh are in a Catholic or Episcopalian church. You simply use your breath, your hand or a feather to wave it around yourself, the room, into corners and across thresholds.

Smudging is used for anywhere you feel is bogged down energetically or in a room that just plain doesn’t feel right in your gut. You can use sage smudging to clear your home or office, and especially around yourself. When you have had an especially stressful week, just smudging around yourself can help clear your mind, your body and your spirit.

While I am moving the sage smoke around the room, I also usually say something like, “Anything in here that is not for my Highest and Greatest Good please feel free to leave out that open window or door!”

Once I “cleared my space” it felt a lot better to me. And the rest of my Full Day Off was heavenly. I rested, took a nap, read all the books I felt like reading, went out to see a really good movie, ate nourishing food and got to bed early. And today I feel refreshed and ready for the workweek ahead.

So, for all you “Over Achievers” try taking a full day off and try clearing your space, inside and around you. It can work wonders! Let me know how it goes for you!

**Important note on Ceremonial Sage: Sage can make a LOT of smoke, so you might set off your smoke alarms. This is why open doors and windows help move the sage smoke out before the alarms go off! Also, for some people, sage smells a little like marijuana. So if you are in an apartment or condo complex, you might want to tell your neighbors what you are doing if you are worried about that kind of thing. You can find sage or smudge sticks at Whole Foods or PCC grocery stores or any “New Age” bookstore near you.

NEXT IN THIS WORDS TO THRIVE BY BLOG SERIES: WHOLENESS: The Key To Aliveness

“To me, wholeness is the key to aliveness. It is more than just physical vitality, it is radiance, coming from being at one with yourself and your experience. Life then flows through you and radiates from you.” - Richard Moss, How Shall I Live

We all know that horrible moment of panic or terror, especially before speaking in public. It feels like our brain shuts down completely, the words we need to remember feel like they will never come and we will never make it through the oncoming train wreck of just saying what we have to say, no matter how big or small our audience is.

There is a solution and it is as close as your breath. In fact, it is your breath!

In both my professional speaking coaching and inspirational new book, Words to Thrive By: Powerful Stories of Courage and Hope, I give lots of examples about how to improve your health and overall well being through meditation, visualization, belief in yourself, taking risks of courage, reframing your experience so it moves from tragedy to triumph.

So here’s another breathing exercise tip that will help you not only in your life but also in your work, whether it is a momentary anxiety or when your anxiety looms over you when have that huge presentation, “Do or Die,” “Winner take all,” “Everything on the line” kind of moment.

So how do we learn how to relax and use our breathing in order to accomplish that?  The good news is everyone can do it and it’s not as hard as it may feel to you right at this particular moment.

On the one hand, according to Biing-Jiun Shen, Ph.D., a clinical/health psychology professor at Ohio University in Athens, “Almost every person experiences anxiety periodically and this can be beneficial. An occasional burst of anxiety can help you respond effectively to life’s challenges.” This is what I would consider a healthy moment of anxiety, meant to get you through a short period of time.

On the other hand, we also now know that prolonged anxiety can seriously undermine your health and contribute to all kinds of diseases from cancer to complete physical and mental breakdown.

Julie L. Pike, Ph.D. who is a psychologist at the Anxiety Disorders Treatment Center in Durham N.C. says, “We know that what happens in the mind affects the body, but carefully controlled studies are being published now that show a harmful connection between anxiety and physical health…In other words, this is an intuitive belief that is now shown by (published) research.”

So here’s another breathing exercise tip that will help you not only in your life but also in your work, whether it is a momentary anxiety or when your anxiety looms over you when have that huge presentation, “Do or Die,” “Winner take all,” “Everything on the line” kind of moment.

FOUR SQUARE BREATHING- 

“When you’re anxious it takes a little while for the brain to get the message that it’s safe to calm down.”

First of all I want to extend my thanks to thanks to Julie L Pike, Ph.D. for sharing this breathing technique in the American Heart Association magazine, “Heart Insight.” We all know it’s a viscious cycle: During bouts of anxiety, your breathing can get faster and shallower, leading to feelings of even greater panic as your body struggles to get enough air. But if you slow down your breathing, you’re halfway to feeling calm. Pike advocates so-called four-square breathing as an effective self-calming technique: I have practiced and tested it and it really works for me.

Four Square Breathing:  

1. Breathe in through your nose for four seconds.

2. Hold that breath for four seconds.

3. Exhale for four seconds.

4. Pause for four seconds before starting the next breaths.

Pike suggests doing a set of at least 10 breaths.

Pike also says from experience, “When you’re anxious it takes a little while for the brain to get the message that it’s safe to calm down.”

So give it a try and let me know how it goes for you. I hope it helps being a little peace and calm into your life.