Tag Archives: inspiration

Five Tips to Feel Better this Winter (or at Any Time)

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2/11/2022

I’ve done right well this winter, but my motivation started finally freezing this month. And it’s usually too cold for the salt to work. When I was growing up, my mom always told me, “If you’re feeling it, someone else probably is too.” So today I thought I would give us all (me included) a little winter pep talk.

Life and health is mostly a series of many, many small decisions made every day. Here are some good February decisions.

Play feel-good music from a feel-good time in your life.

“The past which is not recoverable in any other way is embedded, as if in amber, in the music, and people can regain a sense of identity. . . ” — Oliver Sacks, Neurologist

Musical memory is powerful. Several years ago I watched a video on Facebook about the power of long-remembered, beloved music on our brains.  A woman named Gladys has severe Alzheimer’s dementia and does not communicate much. She is able to tap along to familiar hymns as a clinician, Naomi Feil, sings. However, when a particular song is sung, Gladys starts singing with Naomi, a real communication breakthrough. (Video)

I suggest listening to music from a happy time to help when life is tough, you need a boost, or just to feel good daily. Research shows that listening to long-known music activates memories about oneself and emotional responses related to those memories. Specifically in one research study, “Exposure to long-known music preferentially activated brain regions including the medial prefrontal cortex, precuneus, anterior insula, basal ganglia, hippocampus, amygdala, and cerebellum relative to recently-heard music. These areas are involved in autobiographical memory and associated emotional responses.” (Thaut et al, 2020)

February is a hard winter month! Play music. Play it strategically! Think of eras you were happy, hopeful, and/or carefree and start dosing yourself up from songs from that time. Add movement and dance to it for even more potential benefits.

I use music apps because when I pick a song, they’re great at picking other songs from the same era. And I keep a little wireless speaker in the kitchen to connect to. Sometimes, I feel too “blah” to pick “happy” music, but I have found that if I can just get the music on, and then start moving it up the “feel-good” ladder, I can work myself up from the melancholy stuff to bright songs which rejuvenate my feeling of hopefulness and joy or even rebellious songs which offer a feeling of empowerment (which one needs for sure in February winter).

Force yourself to seek out comedy which makes you laugh.

Pick up an old Reader’s Digest and find the funny story section. Search your phone for the best stand-up comedy or hilarious bloopers. Think back on your life about scenes which always make you laugh and giggle again!

In order to genuinely laugh, different neurotransmitters HAVE to be made! It’s like a natural anti-depressant! Why not use it? Why not seek it out? You’re probably already paying your cable bill, your phone bill, and your wireless internet bill, so why not take advantage of the comedy you can find on them which can change the chemical imbalance in your brain naturally?

What makes you sincerely laugh? Go find it! I like the site called Dry Bar Comedy to find cleaner language comedy. Here’s some stuff that made me laugh too: 13 Clean, Christian Comedians Who Will Make You Laugh Right Now.

Move. Move. Move.

It’s sub-zero and you don’t even want to leave the house. Do you have stairs? Walk up and down them a set number of times. Do you have a TV or phone? Find the work out stations. Playing music? Dance! Do you have arms? Throw in a push-up today, and try two tomorrow! By the end of the month shoot for five push-ups in a row.

Force yourself to move in an intentional way for strength and cardiovascular reasons. Make it intentional. Why? Because when you start accomplishing your intentions, it feels good, and February blues start leaving!

Give yourself permission to not feel your best, be your best, or do your best.

I’m no good at taking breaks. My idea of taking a break is to unload the dishwasher. Lately, I’ve been going through the motions, not really doing anything well.

I’ve told myself, “It’s winter. Take a break.” So I might sit and read, but I feel guilty about it. So my sitting is never really therapeutic.

In order for a break to be truly effective, one must give oneself permission to really and truly set aside the expectation of themselves that anything else must be done. When I sit, I must stop looking at the kitchen, the toys on the floor, and the kids I’m letting be on technology for me to have a quiet moment.

It’s winter, and that means that physiological changes are taking place in my body which really do not want me to be active. I can’t stop being active, but I can make it permissible to really, truly, honestly rest without guilt.

Look above the horizon.

I try to look at everything in life spiritually. I know from a medical and scientific standpoint, winter is long and hard on both the body and brain. Physical ailments are hard and burdensome on a body and brain. Life’s changes and fights are hard.

But I also know that God has asked me to stop seeing with the eyes given to me in this world and to stop feeling with the physical receptors that have been given to me in this world. I’m to see with spiritual eyes and spiritual receptors, and that means that no matter what happens, God’s peace, love, and acceptance is here. I must somehow search that out even in the cold, even in the physical ailments, even in the angry world. It is natural and human that I am distracted by these worldly negative experiences, but when I can see through them and feel true peace, then I have entered God’s realm for me. It’s the free will of thought that I have been given and that for which I humbly, and falteringly, seek.

Closing

Have a great weekend! Keep making the right choices.

Terri F

The Holiday is Over

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christmas_decorations_in_a_store_bow_8-1Well, the holiday is over. How did you do? Did you eat too much? Eat the wrong things? Know you’re going to pay for it this week?

What? You still have dinners to go to today and tomorrow? Leftovers staring you in the face?

Come on. You have 38 days left. Thirty-eight days. Thirty-eight days left of holiday food torment. Did your first day set the tone you wanted for the next 38 days? Mmmm? Or maybe not.

Listen to me. And listen to me good. You have a choice. Each day. Each moment.

That one hard thing

Think hard. Hasn’t there ever been anything hard you’ve done that required effort? Required diligence? Have you run a 5K? Have you painted a bedroom? Have you played in front of a crowd? What have you done that required work?

Because you could have stopped doing it. You could have walked to your car instead of to the 5K finish line where a banana and water was waiting for you. Some fashionable curtains could have tied together a two-tone bedroom. Nobody dragged you kicking and screaming to the stage with your clarinet.

You. Your choices did all these things in your life.  YOU.

So, I want you to think hard again. You’ve paved the connections in your brain between neurons for persistence by doing these hard things before in your life. Great job! Now is the moment to capitalize on your earlier successes. When it feels like you can’t say “No” to that food or that latte, remember that one hard thing you did. Feel the shoes on your feet, the concrete under your feet. And say, “I choose me, not food.” And run on.

Feel the paint brush in your hand, see the accidental paint spatters on the carpet, and say, “Sometimes I drop some paint, but I keep painting.” And paint on.

See the audience’s eyes on you, while you play your zombie-stiff clarinet song with racing heart. And say, “I choose to do this in front of the glares and stares of the world.” And play on.

You see, it is your choice. I promise you, nobody is going to grab that roll or those mashed potatoes and stuff them in your mouth. (Visualizing that, are you?)

But YOU might grab that roll and those mashed potatoes or that brownie this holiday season. YOU.

I can quit

Once, when I was having a hard time at pharmacy school personally, my volleyball coach looked at me and said, “Terri, you can go home. [Home and dear family support was six hours away.] Take a break.” I tried to argue with her. I couldn’t go home! I’d lose a whole semester of grades! A whole semester of money! No matter what I said, she told me it didn’t matter. I could go home. Finally, I realized, I could go home. I could quit whenever I wanted. And suddenly, I knew I had the fight in me. I knew I could pull myself up by my bootstraps, get my head wrapped on straight, and I could do this hard thing.

When I had to change the way I ate 4 years and five months  ago (I remember the date I dove in to 100% change), I did the same thing. I recognized my choice. MY CHOICE. I thought of all the hard things I’d done in my life, and I knew I could do this one.

I haven’t fought every food and nutrition battle you’ll have to fight. But I’ve fought a lot the last four years. Battles from myself. My tongue. My mom. My kids. My world. The TV. Gluten. Dairy. Eggs.

But I’ve run 5Ks, painted rooms, and I’ve played in piano recitals. I remember those things. When I am faced with food choices I know don’t benefit me, I recall those successes. I feel them. I smile at them. And most of the times, I move on just fine.

Move past the dribbles and play your song

Sometimes I don’t move on just fine. That’s probably most like painting. I never get the drop cloth spread out the way I should. I often think I don’t need the drop cloth. I’m just going to paint this one little touch-up. I won’t dribble. And I always do. Always do dribble. But seriously, who stops painting a whole room because they dribbled?

Today, while you’re shopping, looking at leftovers, visiting family. Next week, when the baked goods and cheap candy start rolling in (Gosh, wasn’t it just Halloween?). Thirty-eight days from now, remember it was YOUR choice.

Did you run? Did you dribble, yet keep painting? Did you play your song?

Eating right isn’t about now. It’s about hiking with your kids when they’re old enough to hike. It’s about that trip to Europe you’ve always dreamed after you retire. It’s about getting down on the floor to change your grandbaby’s diaper. It’s about writing that book with great mental clarity that comes from real food.

It’s about YOU.

And doing the hard thing. Each step of the way.

YOU CAN DO THIS. STARTING NOW.

Run. Paint. Play your song. You’ve done it before, and you can do it in this area too!

Happy Friday!

Terri

Photo attribution: By Tomwsulcer (Own work) [CC0], via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Self-Doubt and Jealousy

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I have a fear. I have a fear that it’s all in my head. What would that be? What’s in my head? Many things.

That food really matters. That I don’t feel good after I eat sugar, bread, and milk. That I can influence how my children develop. That I deserve time to myself as a mom. That I’m any different than anyone else. That I can write. That I know anything that I am talking about.

It is self-doubt. I’m not good enough. I haven’t done enough. Everyone else is smarter. They know what they’re talking about and I don’t. I’m flighty.

All my life I’ve fought it in any way that I could. I’ve fought the quiet little girl from podunkville whose parents (the best parents for me, I would never trade them ever) live exactly where they were born and never wanted more than what they had. Heck, they’re probably related for all I know.

(I remember these two doctors for my med school interview. I had to list on the application where my parents were from and even went to high school. Oh, man. They noticed that right off. “So, your parents went are from the same county? Went to the same high school?” I think I replied, “Yeah! They were first cousins.” No, I didn’t, but I felt the implied insult.)

Each day has been spent in not failing. If I do this well, maybe then I’ll believe in myself. But no matter what the measuring stick, whether you raise it to ten feet tall or drop it to 4 feet 6, my self-doubt persists.

I try to pass it off in nice terms: humility and goodness. I’m supposed to strive to be humble and good, yes? Right? It’s my religion. (Shame on me. I’m sorry. Wrong religion.)

Beginning yesterday, finally, after all these years, I see my self-doubt for what it is.

Pride.

I am too proud to allow room for failure. I am too proud to risk room for being wrong, not doing it right.

The real changers aren’t too proud. They change the world. They change ideas. Their pride doesn’t interfere with what they think they know and want to share, what they’re called to share. The good ones, the humble ones–they just re-work their theories and thoughts as people expand or rebut their ideas.

The best ones DO without attaching the results to WHO they are.

Oh, don’t confuse my self-doubt with lack of self-confidence or low self-esteem. Honestly, I don’t want to be anyone other than who I am. Hand me lots of things, and I have confidence in my abilities to pull them off. (But someone else can always do it better…)

Lately, I’ve noticed sometimes that I have these strange pangs of envy and jealousy. They are not common themes in my life, and I haven’t understood them. I’m not normally that type. Because normally I’m living up to my full potential in each area of my life. Probably living up to my full potential in areas of life I shouldn’t be.

(What do I mean? Well, I’m not naturally neat, but I keep my house neat. I’m not naturally the science type, but I’ve culled myself that way for 26 years.)

I really couldn’t give a drop more in most places. And guess what–I’m not jealous in those places.

But there are a few places—places that make me characteristically me—that I’m not putting myself out there because of self-doubt, and as I stepped back to look, I saw jealousy telling me exactly that.

My self-doubt has taken me from a place of caution, which is probably good, to a place of fear and holding back, to a place of developing jealously. I see it now.

So today I say thank-you to my self-doubt and jealousy, both “BAD” feelings, for teaching me. For telling me to live up to my potential and to stop making excuses.

(“I don’t have enough time… My kids will feel neglected if… I couldn’t do that… I’m not good enough… It has already been said… I’ll look stupid… People will think I’m a fruitcake… I can’t post that blog post without a picture… I don’t run a clinic, so what I have to say isn’t important… Another real expert has a blog on this, so what is one more… Homeschooling, inspiration, and nutrition science on one blog is weird… I’ve spent 42 years of my life learning to keep my mouth shut—a very hard task for me— to look smarter, so I can’t possibly open it… My grammar isn’t good enough… Sometimes I don’t eat the way I should… Of course they can do it, they have more time. They understand computers better.”)

My self-doubt has been keeping my childish pride safe, the part that wants to prove I can do it, the part that says bicycle falls hurt. The jealousy is my inner parent telling me I’m not living up to my own potential in areas that I am called to.

Are you feeling self-doubt? (No worries! So am I–for writing this post!) Are you feeling jealousy? Despite feeling content in life? Then, my friend, you have some work to do.

Get on it. YOU have a difference to make.

Terri