Do you often feel exhausted? Knackered? Maybe it's time to H.E.A.L.
Hello ….how are you today?
Have you noticed how we tend to go through life without looking at each other, being lost in thought and absorbed in our problems? We’re overwhelmed by our long to do lists, feeling tired and deflated.
This isn’t the case all of the time, of course not, but the truth is that when we experience something positive and good, we just let it go far too quickly.
As neuroscientist, Rick Hanson says: we are like Teflon for good experiences and like Velcro for bad ones. Our brain isn’t that concerned about our happiness and joy, its function is to keep us alive, we are genetically programmed to want the things associated with evolutionary success.
You can listen to the podcast with this player, or if you prefer reading you have a written version below. Enjoy it!
Imagine this: you gave a presentation and felt safe and satisfied. The public was delighted and they let you know. Then you received a call from your son's school because his teacher was waiting for you for a meeting that you agreed to a month before. You’d forgotten so, you apologized and said you’d be there in a few minutes. You had to buy some things for your house but you decided to postpone everything to get to the meeting asap. You took a taxi but the traffic was so heavy that if you’d walked, you’d have arrived faster. When you finally got to your son’s school, you were covered in sweat, it took you much more than a few minutes and your son's teacher was trying to hide her anger without success. To make matters worse, when you were finally home, you got into the shower only to realize that you didn’t have any soap because you put off going to the supermarket earlier.
How do you think you would feel on a day like this? Answer honestly please. Would you go through life feeling grateful for your presentation and with renewed strength for everything that life is throwing at you? Or would you forget your morning satisfaction due to the stress caused by the school call and the string of things associated to it? And guess what? If you are nodding because overwhelm has won over joy, it’s normal, don’t beat yourself up. Our brain’s always watching because it hates risks and at the slightest hint of real or imagined danger, it releases stress hormones, such as adrenaline and cortisol, which don’t help you to see the picture clearly and to make sensible decisions.
The truth is that the path to real well-being and happiness is a process that requires awareness and the acquisition of new habits to live life on our own terms. It isn’t something that we do now and then, it’s an exercise that we do one day at a time. What relieves stress and lightens up our experience is physical exercise, meditation, contemplation, taking breaks, good nutrition, wholesome social bonds and the wish to contribute to something greater than oneself. In addition to the above, today I want to share with you a simple and super effective Neuroscience practice, which leads to the creation of new synapses in the brain and which rewires it gradually so that it’s more permeable to the good experiences we have every day. The practice was invented by my teacher Rick Hanson PhD and it’s called H.E.A.L. It’s an acronym and I’m going to break it down for you in my own way, with my words, in a very home-made style and always, of course, respecting this teaching’s spirit.
Do the exercise with me, you’ll love it:
H- Have
Have a positive experience that makes you smile and lifts your spirits. If you’re walking, for example, stop to look at the trees, the sky, the sea, the colors of your city, and so on. If you can’t have a special experience right now (because you’re at home or in the office, for example) bring a memory to your heart, one which makes you vibrate high, it will work just as well
E- Enrich
Once you pause to savor your moment, enrich it. As I told you before, our brain isn’t very good at installing positive and rich experiences, so stay with yours for 10 to 15 seconds. Enjoy what you feel, where you feel it, what you see, hear, smell, taste, and see how it feels to inhabit your body in this beautiful moment
A- Absorb
Absorb all the positive qualities of your moment or memory on a physical, mental and spiritual level. Inhale deeply and exhale even longer. Let your experience get into you through all your pores. Feel as though a warm light was illuminating you and making your soul glow. Be aware of how good it feels to be feeling what you feel and let that feeling sink in.
L- Link
Rick Hanson says this step is optional. I invite you to try it and then decide whether to do it or not. Now bring to your memory something that has been challenging for you, nothing too dramatic or difficult emotionally. Now leave that experience in the background and bring to the foreground the experience of harmony, joy and beauty that you’ve just experienced. Let the positive be more powerful than the negative and gradually let the positive wrap up and / or absorb the negative.
The H.E.A.L practice works, that's what I love it. I’ve already told you that I had a period in my life where I lived to the fullest. I was too self-demanding, always running from one place to the other and ticking the boxes of my to do list. Of course, I had no idea that I could pause, I didn’t know the practices that I’m sharing with you, in fact, I didn’t want to think about the good things in my life because I feared that if I did, they would end. How could the universe take away from me what I loved so much! I can’t believe I went through so much unnecessary suffering! I’m grateful to have come out of that trance and I’m so joyful to offer you all of this in the weekly blogs and podcasts.
I’d like to round off with a few words from Dr. Rick Hanson "...Through repeatedly internalizing wholesome positive experiences, repeatedly registering the sense of no deficit, and no disturbance, we can gradually weave into the fabric of our being an unconditional sense of needs met...we gradually cultivate such a profound sense of alrightness and fullness and love and lovingness..."
Go ahead, pause, create or recreate good times, enjoy them, install them and make this a continuous practice. You’ll see how little by little you raise your eyes to appreciate the sky, how you smile more often, how you rejoice with the gifts of the here and now and how you are more prepared to face everyday challenges with a strengthened spirit.
If you have a friend who’s having a hard time and feels burned out, do forward them this blog or podcast. And remember I’m here to read you.
A big hug ❤