Always Logging It

 I have worn some type of fitness tracker for years: FitBit, Apple Watch, and now a Garmin Venu.  I love them, I love knowing how far the dogs and I have walked, how many steps I've gotten in, the elevation change on a hike, and how many calories I've burned.  I also went through a MyFitness Pal tracking stage where I logged my food.  I enjoy a planner and making To-Do lists and crossing them off.  You name it, I've probably logged it!

My goodness logging everything is exhausting!!

 My Type A personality thrives on logging things, making lists, and checking things off.  I like to know where I'm at with getting things done, movement, mileage, food, exercise, the whole kit and kaboodle.  But every once and a while, I do something completely drastic and STOP LOGGING EVERYTHING!

That's right, I go cold turkey and stop it all.  I take off the watch and power it down, I delete MyFitnessPal, and I use only one planner/notebook for making lists (this one is the hardest due to my schedule, school stuff, and my husband's ever-changing work schedule) and I stop using an exercise plan.

Do you know what that does?  To be honest, it gives me a crazy amount of anxiety for the first day or so; I know, not the reaction you were expecting.  But it's the truth, I am routine-oriented and thrive in my structure, and stopping some or all of the above things is very intense.  But, it does get better!  

Breaking the lines of dependency with my logging apps/devices allows me to have a bit more freedom: I exercise how I want and it depends on what feels good, I allow food to be something that's good versus something that always needs to be tracked and monitored, and I live more in the moment then what is next on the list for me to get accomplished.

Taking a break from logging all of our data is good once and a while, it allows us to reset and take a breath.  If logging all of your data starts to stress you out instead of making you feel good, it is time to put it on the shelf for a minute and breathe.  It isn't easy (hello anxiety moments), but I know it's better for me in the long run if I take a step back, and readjust.

What do you do to unplug and reset?

"F" is Not Failure

My favorite Peloton instructor, Robin Arzon, posted on her Instagram account about failing at a task she had been visualizing and training for and how she was striving to find the faith within the failure (see her IG post here).  

That really struck me because for as long as I can remember, an "F" always equated to failure: grades, losing a game, not measuring up, etc.  And sometimes, it really is that simple: the other team outscored you and you lost; you missed more questions on a test than you answered correctly.  These are very concrete examples of how sometimes, failing is failing.

But what struck me, is how sometimes failing is NOT failing.  You try something new and it doesn't go your way, did you fail?  Maybe in the simplistic meaning of the word, but didn't you also learn something?  Thomas Edison really hit the nail on the head when he said he didn't fail, he found thousands of ways to not make a lightbulb.  That is really powerful when you stop and think about it!

Sometimes we base our self-worth on how quickly we can master a new skill or achieve a goal, and if we don't measure up in the time allotted, we failed.  Instead of giving ourselves an "F" as in failure, maybe we give ourselves an "F' as in fortitude; we just continue to practice and learn.  

Give yourself the opportunity to redefine your "F" into Faith in yourself, Fortitude in your drive, and Fearlessness in pursuit of your dreams/hobbies.

How do you define your "F"?

Burnout: What is it?

Burnout, which is defined as an extreme form of stress, is characterized by “emotional fatigue, disengagement, irritability, and apathy related to the work environment” (Pendergast, et al., 2017).  Causes of burnout vary from person to person, but typically they can include pressure from an outside source (supervisors, friends, spouses/partners, children, etc.) as well as our own internal dialogue.   

 

Life is demanding, and many of us feel the need to meet all the demands always put on us.  We sacrifice ourselves for the greater good and demolish our own boundaries to achieve success in all areas of our lives.  The more we do this, the more our system begins to drain.  In my own personal experience, it was a trickle at first, so slight I barely noticed it and would just continue to push onward until suddenly it felt like running into a brick wall.  If you notice yourself more tired than normal after a usual day, patience running thin, and attitude shifts, you may be experiencing some of the warning signs of burnout.  

 

When these signs start becoming the new normal for you, it is good to stop and literally take a breath, breathe in and out.  Ask yourself what you must get done, what is good to get done, and what would be nice to get done; for example, getting dinner on the table is a must get done, and you must eat, however, going to a book club meeting is a nice to get done item. Once those categories are established, your to-do list becomes much more structured.  If you do not get all of the items on your “nice to get done” list, it is ok!  Give yourself permission to not be a superhero every single day.  Focus on what must get done and when you regain your balance, you can start adding those items from the “good to get done” and “nice to get done” lists slowly.

 

What do you do when you recognize the signs of burnout?

 

 

Ryan, S. V., von der Embse, N.P., Pendergast, L.L., Saeki, E., Segool, N., & Schwing, S. (2017).  Leaving the teaching profession: The role of teacher stress and educational accountability in policies on turnover intent.  Teaching and Teacher Education, 66, 1-11.

It's All Contagious

One thing as a teacher (and those of you with children probably understand this too) I learned is that my attitude propelled what kind of mood my class was in.  If I was upset or edgy, they would take on some of that and the undercurrent of the class would be edgy.  If I was happy, they would get happy, if I was calm, they would calm down.  Even if they didn’t come into my class that way, my mood would usually encourage a similar one from them.

 

Moods are contagious, what we feel can be caught by the people we are around and likewise, we can catch the mood they are in as well.  In stressful situations, the first thing someone of authority usually says is “please remain calm” which always intrigued me.  I can just picture the captain of the Titanic making an announcement “Good evening everyone, we have just encountered an iceberg and I need you to calmly make your way to the lifeboats, there is no need for panic, please remain calm”.   Yeah right sir, we are all sinking and going to drown!

 

But if you think about it, when something stressful is happening, what do you tell your students? Kids? Coworkers? You tell them to calm down, it will all be fine.  That is because chaos is contagious, and it spreads like wildfire.  When we are in a chaotic state, our logical thinking process becomes overrun by emotion and the fight or flight instinct.

 

However, calmness is contagious too.  If we stay calm, our logical thinking has a chance to work, our emotional response becomes under control, and we are less motivated to act by instinct.  This is not easy, and I would never proclaim that it is, but in moments of stress, stop and think about what you want to be contagious: calm or chaos?

 

What do you do to encourage the calm versus the chaos?

 

Communication is Key

I like to think of myself as a Master Planner: I have a pretty good understanding of my husbands’ schedule (as ever-changing as it is), my schedule, our dogs’ needs, vacation schedules, etc.  When I make an action plan, I usually take everything into consideration, I try and look at it from all possible sides and like a box of 500 puzzle pieces, dump it out and try and make it work.  This was the case earlier this week.  I have a couple of opportunities for conferences abroad this year (one in the summer and one in the fall) as well as vacation goals as a family.  So, in true fashion, I dumped all the pieces out and went about sifting through them until I could find a way that we could experience all the events this summer/fall season and not have to sacrifice or miss much.

 

My husband is in and out of the field, so when he called that night, at 10pm, I couldn’t wait to tell him my brilliant plan that I was super proud of and have him remind me of what a great wife and human I am.  Well, that isn’t really what happened….at all.

 

Throughout our relationship, we have always communicated well (we learned to), and my husband relies on my ability to handle things when he is unavailable.  It works!  However, the thing I usually forget, is that sometimes my husband likes to be involved in the planning of things.  So, whereas I took his schedule into consideration when I made the Master Plan for our summer/fall, he likes to ask questions, give his input, and be involved.  

 

Not going to lie, I was a bit annoyed that he didn’t just hail my brilliance, and he was a bit annoyed that I was a bit annoyed with his questions.  Instead of continuing to grind our way through it, we tabled this talk: it was after 10pm and I am not at my best that late, and he would be home in a day or two and we could hash it out then.  Perfect.

 

When he got home, we did talk it out: we talked about how he is frustrated that I have these great conference opportunities and he isn’t sure he will be able to attend both and support me like he wants, we talked about how we want to do vacations and places we want to go, we talked about how I wanted him to be impressed with my plan, we talked about it all. 

 

So, what is the point of my story?  

 

Sometimes you need to know when to hit pause on a conversation if it will only end up in an argument and talk about it when you can be face-to-face and not be so emotionally attached to the subject of the discussion (for me it was my plan, for him it was his ever-changing schedule).  It is easy to argue, and sometimes it’s good to get it all out, but it can also be more beneficial to prevent the argument and revisit the topic when you can communicate effectively without the added emotion.

 

What are some ways you have learned to communicate with your spouse/partner?

 

MUSTER 013

 My husband and I listen to audiobooks on leadership together and then like to have discussions about them: how we can implement strategies, what our biggest weaknesses are, what might be difficult about the strategy we are listening to, etc.  One of the leadership books we listened to was Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin who are both former Navy Seals.  Well, those two incredible gentlemen took what they learned from the military and their book and started their own leadership consulting business called Echelon Front.

Last week I had the opportunity to attend their MUSTER conference in Dallas, Texas.  It is a two-and-a-half-day leadership conference where you are immersed in extreme ownership and get to meet other leaders from various industries around the country.  In my honest opinion, this was the best leadership seminar/conference I have ever been to.  Their principles of extreme ownership are impactful and one of the parts that really made me think was "tactical victory, but strategic loss".

When we are thinking strategically, we are thinking big picture: the purpose, goal, or mission that you have in your work or home.  When we are thinking tactically, we are thinking about the little things that pop up and cause chaos in our lives, and they are not necessarily key in advancing the overall mission/purpose.  They even gave an example of this happening in your personal life: when you bring work home and focus on it so much, that it is at your family's expense: hard work pays for a good and solid lifestyle, but if you are doing that at the expense of missing out on your kids' life, is it a strategic or tactical win?

For some reason, that just hit home for me and it made me analyze what I do and work on that help propel me to the goal (graduate with my doctorate and take over the world...kidding on that last part) and what are things that are white noise and distractions.  

Overall it was so empowering and I made not only great connections but great friends!  Below are a few photos from the event; I normally do not post photos, but when you take pictures with former Navy Seals, it is worth sharing.

Me with Jocko Willink

Me with Leif Babin

*They look super intimidating but were some of the nicest people I have ever met*

Time Management

I have always been under the assumption that multi-tasking was the way to be; I can focus on and complete multiple things at once and get twice as much accomplished in half the time.  Even if I am not performing multiple tasks at once, I am usually thinking about more than one task at a time.  I attended the Women's Assembly Zoom from Echelon Front this month and this was actually one of the things they recommended steering away from...color me shocked!  But why?  Why focus on one thing when I can focus on two?

One hostess of the Zoom talked about how she would have 15 things on her list to get done and only manage to get 3 of them accomplished; she couldn't believe it!  So she did an audit on her time and found that she spent the majority of her day wasting time versus actually getting after her to-do list.  She said that one of the reasons she wasted her time was that she wasn't prioritizing tasks, she was multi-tasking and trying to get everything accomplished at the same time.

This made sense to me and made me reflect on my own To-Do list that I have; and in thinking about priority, I re-wrote it to have the higher priority items towards the top and then rank the rest of the list.  Normally, I don't even list them numerically, I just put a dash and write and item and do that for the entire list.  Basically, all levels of priorities are a jumble and there wasn't any formal organization-everything was listed in the order it came into my brain.  

For this upcoming week, I am going to try and be more intentional with my To-Do list: I am going to break it down by day of the week and prioritize my items by importance and day.  This way I am not overwhelmed by completing all necessary and high ticket items on one day and fluffing the rest; my goal I to have more order and structure to my lists and therefore, less wasted time.  

We shall see how it goes! Does anyone else find that they get scattered when they try and multi-task?  Any other good planning tips?

For more information on the Women's Assembly, please check out their website here

Change of Scenery

 One of the prominent tips I have come across is utilizing movement in mindfulness practice.  Now that can look super regimented by a scheduled fitness class you attend weekly, a dog walk, weight lifting, etc.  However, I have found that we need movement in our work schedules as well as our off schedules, but how do we fit that in while at work?

Incorporating movement into your life sounds a little intense, and kind of like a job or chore that must be done.  Instead, I like to think of it as changing my scenery.  On your lunch and weather permitting, go outside and breathe in the fresh air and the sunshine, take a ten-minute break to walk a lap around the building, get a stand-up desk, even walk to the bathroom.  These are little ways that break up your day and give you a chance to get the blood flowing and change your scenery, even for a few minutes.  

Changing your scenery gives you the chance to mentally (and physically) step away from what you're working on and gain perspective.  When I have a problem that I am working through, I like to step away from it and think about it without it staring me in the face.  Even if that is just walking a lap or two around the kitchen table; it gives me the space to regroup and start again.  Doing this when you don't have a problem is just as effective; we all need to step away for a minute and give ourselves the chance to regroup, breathe in different air, and have a new perspective.

How do you utilize changing your scenery?

*Next week we will have a guest on the blog!  My friend Steve will be joining us and talking about what mindfulness means to him!  Make sure you stop by and check it out! 

Here is a little about him:

Steve is an assistant professor of education at Wesleyan College in Macon, Georgia. His scholarship involves embedding meditation and mindfulness practices into teacher education and higher education. His current research focuses on introducing brief meditation with college students prior to instruction as a way to prepare the mind for learning, de-stress, and build community. Personally, Steve has been a meditator for 26 years.

When You Need to Detach

     One of the things my husband and I like to do together is listen to a book on Audible, either together or separately, and have discussions about it.  The types of books he is drawn to are leadership books, books on strategy, and books by military leaders.  To be honest, I'm not super interested in battle strategies or recounts of success by military leaders (some, but not all) and he is not going to have any interest in my Outlander adventure; but, leadership is something that is critical in his line of work and something I hope to also have an impact in.  Leadership books it is!  

    We started with Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin and that was so good we moved right into Leadership Strategies and Tactics by Jocko.  His books were encouraging, motivating, eye-opening, and very pleasant to listen to (anyone who listens to audiobooks understands how important that is).   I was fascinated by his notion of "detaching" from the situation and immediately recognized it as something I do not do very well.

    I am an emotionally based person, I feel with my whole self, am very empathetic, and anyone who is around me can usually tell how I'm feeling by looking at me.  I wouldn't say emotions drive my decisions, but they are a factor.  Even with communicating with my husband, he detaches and focuses on the issue, and I don't quite operate that way.  After listening to Jocko's two books, I decided that this is something I wanted to work on; how to take a step back from the situation, and analyze it more critically versus emotionally.  

    I would be misleading if I said this is something that has been a snap, in fact, quite the opposite.  It is something that I actively have to incorporate into my life when situations don't go as I want them to or unexpected chaos pops up that I have to handle.  But, I do find that when I detach successfully, I find the mental energy spent on the angst of emotions actually goes into handling the situation itself.  In my goal of finding mindfulness and being resilient, this notion of detaching is something I am going to continue to work into my regime.

Do you detach?  Does it help you analyze situations more clearly?

*I have also enrolled in the Women's Assembly from Echelon Front (the organization Jocko and Leif have built) and they give a free one-hour seminar on different tactics once a month.  If you are interested, you can find their website here for more information*

Toxic Intake

A prominent part of every new mindfulness technique, self-care guide, and mental health awareness talks about toxicity and culling it from your life.  In the research I have read, it usually discusses the importance of boundaries with the negative influences in your life, be it that drama-filled friend, intense in-laws, or the clothes in your closet that you have yet to purge.  All of this is great advice and should be considered when you are reflecting on the traces of toxicity in your life.

 

However, there are other forms of toxic intake that are not as prominently discussed, and these traces get absorbed into your life by sight and sound: what you read, what you watch, and what you scroll.  I am a person that when in certain moods, I go all in, and this is the same personality trait that had me watching Criminal Minds for a ridiculous number of weekends while my husband was deployed the second time.  All of a sudden I started to become a little more negative, which was very unusual for my normally upbeat personality.  I was nervous to walk the dog alone, I would obsessively check my door locks...it was getting a little out of hand.  I remember talking to my mom on the phone and she gave me such a brilliant nugget of advice: “Stop watching that, put on something happy like Scooby-Doo (a personal favorite), and read something fun”.  I did exactly what she told me, and I became a whole new person; better yet, I became myself once more.

 

We absorb an incredible amount of information every day, and sometimes we need to re-evaluate what that information is doing to our mood and our inner voice.  If watching/reading the news is stressing you out, take a break.  If you scroll through social media and find yourself comparing your life to everyone you follow, take a break.  These kinds of toxic intake slowly erode your well-being and we tend not to notice until we are experiencing dramatic mood changes and it gets pointed out to us.  

 

Cutting the toxic out of your life might certainly mean that dramatic friend, but it also may mean limiting your exposure to negativity on a screen to a lower number until you regain your sense of self.  People say ignorance is bliss, and while I don’t want to be completely ignorant, I am a fan of having gaps in my information absorption.

 

How many of you have ever given up a form of social media?  How long did it last?  How did you feel?

New Year New You?

To be completely honest, I’m not one for New Year’s Resolutions; I used to be though.  I would make a list that would have 3-5 items I wanted to change or accomplish in the new year ahead.  For a while it was fine, it was working, but the problem I have (and probably many others) is that the year is long, life is chaotic, and my ambitious self in January with 5 resolutions becomes a bit bogged down.  Then somewhere around August, I realized I haven’t been putting forth as much of an effort, and then the guilt sets in.  Does this loop sound familiar at all?

 

I decided about two years ago that it was time to break this loop of New Year’s resolutions and the “new year new me” mindset that seems to be ever-growing in popularity.  I decided to shorten my list to one item: a word.  That’s right, I would choose a word that I wanted to incorporate into my life more or bring more awareness to.  Last year I chose the word “guilt” because I tend to hold myself to crazy standards and feel guilty if I let someone down, take a rest day, read instead of walking my dogs, sleep in, eat a piece of cake, not being able to volunteer at an event, etc.…you name it, I feel guilt over it.  By choosing this word, it brought more awareness to my thoughts and feelings surrounding that emotion.  

 

Realistically I could choose “guilt” as my word every year (I am a work in progress myself!), but I don’t because that doesn’t send a very nice message to your inner self, does it?  This year my word is “embrace”.  I choose to embrace the challenges, the good things, the work, the stress and own it.  It is easy to get annoyed, angry, bummed, and frustrated when there is another hoop to jump through, another task to complete, yet one more edit to make; but my goal is to not stay mired in those emotions, and instead embrace those challenges and own them.  Personally, I tend to exert a lot of energy and effort in frustration when things don’t go the way I want them the first time, but this year, I want to put some of that energy into embracing whatever challenge/obstacle it may be.  

 

So, this year, I choose to embrace life: the good, the bad, the ugly, the funny, the stressful, and the sweet and see where it takes me. 

 

Happy New Year my friends!

 

Does anyone else choose a word for the year?

Communicating Effectively

Talking is easy, we do it on the phone, via text, in person, on Zoom, on social media platforms…you name it, we chat about it in one form or another.  But talking, texting, emailing, and posting is not necessarily the same as communicating. Yes, they are all forms of communication, but are they always effective uses of communication?

 

My husband and I have been together over nine years and in that timeframe, we have spent over 3.5 years apart due to his Army service.  When he deployed the first time, it was a whole new experience for both of us: he was 9 hours ahead of me in time, he was in a combat zone, we had no idea what deploying really meant, and we were just green.  We had the ability to talk on the phone only a handful of times on that deployment, the way we communicated the most was through Facebook Messenger (thank goodness for modern technology!).  However, how easy is it to misinterpret tone on a text or email?  For me, it was super easy!  I attributed so many emotions to his messages it wasn’t even funny, and usually not the ones he was actually feeling.  It was a learning experience for both of us in so many ways.  I learned how to ask him questions such as “I am interpreting you sounding like this, is this how you meant it?” or “Can you clarify what you mean by that?”.

 

Communicating effectively seems so easy but can be a bit tricky when it comes to interpreting or misinterpreting emotions.  Even when he is home, sometimes I double check to see if what I am hearing is actually how he means it and vice versa.  When you are feeling like you’re not communicating effectively with someone, you get annoyed, stressed, and upset.  Taking the time to check in and double check meanings can take some of that away and allow you to focus your energy on something else.

 

 

Does anyone have other ideas to help communicate effectively?

Let Me Introduce Myself

 Hi!

Welcome to my blog!  I wanted to take this time and introduce myself: my name is Brittany and I am a Year 2 doctoral student at the University of Tennessee.  I have my Bachelors Degree in General and Special Education grades 1-6 and my Masters Degree in Special Education grades 7-12, both from Niagara University, NY. 

My husband is in the Army, and this caused us to move around quite a bit.  I have had the pleasure of teaching high school Special Education in Colorado and middle school Special Education in Oklahoma. 

My dissertation and area of study focuses on Resiliency through the practice of Mindfulness.  This blog is dedicated to my findings and techniques used to become more proficient on the resiliency scale.  While my purpose of study is to ultimately assist my fellow educators, the best thing about mindfulness techniques is that they translate in all careers, hobbies, dreams, and passions.  The techniques discussed here will help in all aspects of your life that require resiliency. 

So glad you stopped by!