Alastair Macartney's Blog, page 4

Real Romance for Real Busy Couples – 15-Minute Marriage Makeover

Real Romance for Real Busy Couples – 15-Minute Marriage Makeover

For week 2 of our one month 15 Minute Marriage Makeover challenge my husband and I focused on rekindling the romance in our lives.  Romance is one of the greatest joys of being in love, yet sadly, it is almost always the first thing to go when we get busy.  Sure, we are still in love, and say so daily.  Sure we still spend time together, and enjoy each other’s company.  But the sweet and silly romantic gestures and activities seem to get fewer and farther apart until they are just saved for special occasions; anniversaries, birthdays, and of course, Valentine’s Day.

If I close my eyes and recall when I fell in love with my husband, I promise you I still get butterflies in my stomach.  Yet, the truth is, with everyday that passes my husband means more to me than he did in the early days.  He is not only my love, the keeper of my heart, but now he is also my husband and the father of our son.  But how is it possible that over time how much I treasure this man and how often I show it have become inversely proportional?

At the start of all relationships we take such great pleasure in every little moment shared.  We go to such great efforts to make sure we make a big show of how much we care for the other one.  Complacency and time rob us of of both of these, and I for one revel in this weeks look at romance, and how to make sure we keep it alive in our relationship.

My Favorite Task this Week: Simple Romance – Pick Your Pleasure

For starters let’s all immerge ourselves back to the beginning.  The “good ole days”, when simple times together used to feel like stepping out onto a dreamy cloud of giddy happiness.

The task is simple; choose one of the following playful, romantic and possibly sexy activities to complete for your 15 minutes.  More likely than not they will transport you back in time, and will be things you and your partner have not done together in ages!

Go to the park and push each other on a swing
Look through old photo albums together
Make-out on the couch
Go for a walk and hold hands
Lay in the backyard and look at the stars
Listen to music you enjoyed while you were dating

There are plenty more suggestions included in Dustin’s Riechmann’s book the 15-Minute Marriage Makeover, but these are my favorite options.  My husband and I cheated slightly.  We listened to the album James Greatest hits, a favourite from our early months together, while looking at iPhoto albums on my computer of our favorite travel adventures.  We heard a James cover band at a beer festival in Winchester on our first weekend away together, and the tunes combined with chatting over the memories brought back from pictures of our Thailand and Switzerland excursions, created a wonderfully romantic moment.  Butterflies in abundance.

Stay tuned for Next Week: Intimacy!

Main photo by Porto Bay Hotels & Resorts.

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An Unconventional Way To Deepen Your Friendships

This month, we are focussing the Perfect Madness blog on Allies – one of the four pillars of Perfect Madness. Having allies and how you use them to your advantage makes a huge difference in our lives. Elyse is taking a strong focus this month on just one part of the allies pillar – love (here’s her first post on the subject). I’m going to cover the other areas – namely networking, family and friendships. This week it’s friendships.

An Unconventional Way To Deepen Your Friendships

Friendships are important. They’re pretty critical not just if we want to be successful in life, but to be happy in life. This post isn’t about creating friendships or finding new friends. It’s about deepening those bonds, bringing your friends in deeper, making the friends you have better friends and increasing the quality of those friends.

Over time, some of the friends that you do have will have become (perhaps they always were) haters. They’re not bad people, it’s just that, for whatever reason in life, experiences have caught up with them and the light of the dark side has shone down too heavily casting too much of a negative output. Of course, many of the self help gurus out there will tell you the answer with these people is to remove them from your life.

Removing the haters, the haters that are your friends, is one answer here. But, at some point in life you decided to make these people your friends. There was something about them that drew them to you and you to them. You shared a mutual bond in some way. Perhaps removing them from your life completely is exactly what friendship is not about. Friendship is about sharing the good times but, more importantly, it’s about being there during the bad times too.

This technique that I’m about to share is one that you can apply here, to the haters, to the friends you have fallen out of contact with, to the long distance friendships, to the close friends. To all of these groups, you can draw them in, draw them closer, rekindle those friendships and improve the quality.

Traditional Deepening

Friendships are often made, and then deepened, through experiences – normally through shared experiences. The deeper that shared experience, the more unique the setting, the harder you have to work during it, the more your friends depend on you, and you upon them, the deeper that friendship becomes. Of course, there’s risk in there too – if you screw it up, if you let your friends down, it can go the other way.

This is why boxers that train together at the same gym, soldiers in the same Platoon fighting on operations, paramedics fighting to save lives all start to bond together even if they weren’t friends when they started. They share a common bond, a common goal.

I’ve been on plenty of teams. I remember a period of several years when my skydiving team would battle it out, striving to win, or even medal, at the National Championships. While for many the end result, winning that medal, is the goal, for me in this circumstance, it really was the journey that counted. We’d go on numerous training camps mostly in Florida and North Carolina. We’d train hard. We’d have long 20-jump days. We’d have practice competitions with other teams. It was amazing.

I’m not going to pretend that we didn’t have our bad days. The odd tantrum would be thrown and we had to find ways to rekindle our friendships.

But, in all, our friendships deepened. If one of my team mates from those days phoned me up now with a problem, I’d drop everything to help. We shared so much. We travelled the globe to various competitions. We helped each other in all aspects of our professional and personal lives. We became family to each other. Working together and having shared so much with each other bought us close. We shared the same bonds and the same goals and fought alongside each other to achieve.

Unconventional Deepening

I can’t claim to have invented this unconventional technique. I first read about it on Medium towards the bottom of a post by Rajen Sanghvi. While on a 50 day meditation streak, Rajen was introduced to Lift. This app, which has now been rebranded as Coach.me, essentially helps people to achieve their goals. It’s free and it’s an App that I use almost every day.

Rajen noted that many organizations recognize the need to put on some form of team building events. These have significant benefits both in and out of the workplace – something that is widely recognized that I won’t go in to here. However, Rajen’s view was that only a few people would benefit from these events as they could seem forced and were ineffective at getting broader team participation.

In steps the Coach.me app. The beauty here is that everyone can work on their personal goals. The goals and dreams that matter to them. They can do this where and when they want and check in on the app. With friends or colleagues using the app they can see your progress and participation. They can give you ‘props’, in Coach.me terms, for having achieved.

You might have goals for dieting, meditation or running. A friend could be focussing on yoga or giving up smoking. Yet, despite both of your goals being different you can share the common bond of achieving your goals, discussing your progress, encouraging and supporting during harder times or missed achievements along the journey. The goal no longer needs to be the same in order to achieve that common bond within your friendship.

This slightly unconventional approach provides the bonding success that traditionally has been achieved by people, by friends, sharing common real-life experiences. Now, it is being achieved by a group of friends or colleagues sharing completely different goals yet still being united together in the pursuit of achievement.

The Pleasure In Your Friendship

Friendship is about enjoyment. It’s about being in the moment and supporting those around you. The deeper the friendship, the more value it adds. That’s why Coach.me is part of the free Perfect Madness Toolkit.

As James Altucher says in this post, friendship is about finding (or giving) pleasure from people that day. No matter where your friends are around the world, no matter what they’re doing, you can cultivate and deepen that friendship as you share your uncommon goals.

Main photo by Brett Davies.

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15-Minute Marriage Make-Over: Communication

15-Minute Marriage Make-Over: Communication

It’s February and the chubby cupids and bright red hearts adorning every window shop, as well as the “Book Now and Celebrate Your Love With Us” signs plastered in front of every restaurant, couldn’t let you forget; it’s Valentine’s Day.  Again.

I love my husband.  He is my best friend, and my soul mate, but I have to say I categorically hate Valentine’s Day.  This “holiday” is merely another excuse to sell themed stuff, and make you feel guilty if you haven’t planned a fancy meal out.  At its core there is only one message worth noting, buried deep under piles of stuffed teddy bears and expensive red lingerie.  If you are one of the incredibly fortunate people to have found another stranger living on this planet that you want to keep, celebrate that love.  Don’t do it one day a year, make February 14th every day.

It was this message that inspired me to ask my husband for one gift this Valentine’s day.  He looked at me shocked when I posed the question, as we have not really celebrated this holiday in all of our years together.  I asked if I could I have 15 minutes of his time to invest in our love every day this month.  It may not seem like a big request, but if we ask ourselves honestly, how many days in the last month did you spend 15 uninterrupted minutes with your partner?  How many of those minutes were used to discuss your love, your partnership?  More likely than not, days often pass by without any quality time together, and if you get it you often find yourself venting about work, or talking about what new feat the baby managed that day.

The Book

My inspiration for my Valentine’s day gift is the phenomenal and highly recommended book “15-Minute Marriage Makeover” written by Dustin Riechmann who is a marriage counsellor and writes a positive relationship building blog at EngagedMarriage.com.  This short read, less than 100 pages, packs a punch, and we love it so much it is part of our Perfect Madness Toolkit.  This book takes you through 4 weeks, each with a focus on the 4 main aspects of a relationship; communication, romance, sex life, and finances.  Each day a simple task is provided within the theme of that week, and you are to use the 15 minutes you have set aside for you and your partner to work through it.  At the end of each week a one hour session is used to wrap-up what you have learned and bring it all together.

Celebrate for One Month Not One Day

So I welcome all our Perfect Madness readers to escape the confines of Valentine’s Day conformity and celebrate your love for a whole month not only one day.  Each week of the month of February I will share our favorite 15 minute exercise, and if you like what you read go out and get the book and join us!

Week 1: Communication

This first week we are taking a step back and focusing on building our communication skills.  Everyone knows communication is the foundation for any good relationship, romantic or otherwise.

My favorite exercise from the week; find your 15 minutes.  How simple of a request, and yet how difficult it can be to find.  We have built this life with our partner, they are central to it.  Yet within this life we also have a career, maybe some kids, friends, and hobbies.  Often  when time gets more and more occupied and we plan ourselves thinner and thinner, the first place we take from, is the place which always forgives and understands; the relationship with our partner.  I was astounded when we sat down to complete this first exercise and read through the task.  My first thought “Oh well, this will be easy.  Couple of minutes max  Just a warm-up really.”  How wrong I was.  You see my husband and I have fallen into a trap.  In our attempt to allow each other time for work, time with mates, time for exercise, and time for self-investment, we have started to tag-team parenting.  We both spend lots of time with our 4 month old son, Finn, and manage to have a relatively well-rounded life despite the young age of our munchkin.  But we don’t spend enough time together, and we absolutely do not spend enough time together alone.

I have to admit we failed our first task.  It took us nearly a half hour, double the allotted 15 minutes, looking at our schedules to try and discover an elusive 15 minute period during which we were both free and our little one was asleep.  In the end the answer was obvious.  Instead of sitting down in front of netflix every night with our dinner, we have decided to sit down at our dining room table and have a proper meal together.  Every night.  Now we have our 15 minutes to invest in our marriage, and in the simple exercise of finding it we have already identified an area in need of improvement, and more importantly how to action that improvement.

Well after we finish our one month challenge, we plan to keep this change in place.  It seems we have found the new face of date night with a baby; bottle of wine and a home-cooked meal replace a glass of the house red and restaurant cuisine.  But the most important element to a perfect date is still there, flowing conversation with my best friend.

Stay tuned for Next Week: Romance!

Main photo by Leland Francisco.

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Attaining Balance In Your Life: Quick Impact Resources

Attaining Balance In Your Life: Quick Impact Resources

Balance is a key part of living a happy, successful and contented life. The start of a year is when people need it most. The day purported to be the most depressing day of the year is in January – Blue Monday. Balance helps to bring this back in to line. As the name implies, it helps balance us. That’s why Balance is one of the 4 pillars of Perfect Madness.

As regular readers of our blog will know, we’ve dedicated the whole month of January to balance. This post is a reference guide to that to help steer you in the right direction and find that balance. Whether it’s something you feel you are in much need of, or you feel that you’re content in life, there’s always improvement to make. We can always be better, no matter how good we are already.

New Life Resolutions

At the end of December Elyse really kicked all this off with her post on Being Selfish to be Selfless – New Life Resolutions. It set the agenda for our month of balance and asked you to look differently at how you make your New Year Resolutions and, instead, consider New Life Resolutions.

The Themes

For the month of balance, Elyse’s posts have focussed heavily on exercising. It goes back to that old mantra of healthy body, healthy mind. She’s covered a few different types of exercises that will appeal to a broad range of people. She rates them as well as describing benefits and drawbacks. Pick a couple of these posts and check them out.

Adventures in Exercising

Family Yoga . Don’t avoid this post if you don’t plan to do this with your family – of course you can do yoga on your own too. But, sometimes involving those around you, no matter what their age is, can be a really great experience too.
Geocaching . Not tried this before? This gets you outdoors and adds a little bit of adventure. For those that hate the thought of dedicated and formal exercise, this might be the excuse and the compromise that you’re looking for.
Bodyweight Exercises . The great thing about this is you can do it anywhere and at any time. If you’re busy, you travel or just need a new way of exercising then this is definitely a great one to check out.
Shaun T’s Rockin’ Body Hard-Core Abs . This one took me be surprise. But being surprised and opening your eyes to new possibilities is a good thing. What I found even more surprising is that Elyse’s mother loves this workout yet I think it’s even more applicable to men as it is to women. It’s not for the faint hearted either. This guy makes you work hard.

Finding a way of exercising that suits you. One you can stick to, is key. If you’re new to all this then start small. Don’t go at it too hard. Instead, finish your exercise feeling good and wanting more rather than pushing it past that line and making it unpleasant. Feel good from it and you’re more likely to create a habit.

The Mental Game

While Elyse has focussed on the physical side (which, of course, has mental gains associated with it), I’ve been posting about the mental side of things. We’re certainly not limited, mentally, to where we currently are in life. We can improve. It doesn’t matter if we’re down in a rut right now or if we’re feeling the best that we’ve ever been and totally on top of our game. What if we could improve even further?

Mentally agility can improve. But you need to choose to work on it. You need to challenge your thinking. You need to push yourself mentally. You need to open yourself up to what’s possible, not focus on what can’t be done, on what’s impossible. And there are those proven ways with more and more scientific data out there showing the plasticity of the human brain and the possibilities that neuroplasticity has for evolving our thinking – mindfulness and meditation are fundamental in this process.

If it’s your mental game that you’re planning to focus on then take a look at these posts:

Beating the Roller Coaster Ride of Life . So many of us find that life really is a roller coaster ride. This post doesn’t promise to avoid that but, perhaps, it can help you deal with the lows and really ride the highs.
How to Achieve Your Goals in 6 Easy Steps . This applies if you’ve set New Years Resolutions (and hopefully you’ve made them New Life Resolutions). But it also applies to whatever other goals and dreams you have. If you’re not yet perfect at achieving your goals, like most of us, then give this post a read.
How Meditation Has Been Proven to Create Balance in Your Life . It’s really true. Every year there’s more and more scientific data backing the benefits of mindfulness and meditation. I’ve written about it before and we include more in our free Perfect Madness Toolkit (there are also free resources at the bottom of this post). This time I look at some of the science behind it – don’t worry, it’s not cumbersome but useful. The posts looks at how meditation really can change your brain, proof that the theory actually works and how you can start.
The Power of the Smile . I’m biased, but I really like this one. Smiling really is powerful. This post is actually an extract from my latest book. Make sure you’re using your smile to your advantage – this post tells you how.

Taking Action

Now it’s time to take action. If you’ve read this far without clicking on one of the links then I encourage you to go back up. Pick one post from each section – the mental and physical, the mind and the body. Our mental and physical are entwined so it’s important to work on both areas. They will compliment each other. So pick a post from each section and dive in.

Lots of people read our posts but the reality is that taking action is going to a whole new level. Be one of the people that stands up and improves their life – follow through with the lessons and techniques from the posts above.

If you want more, then come back in February. We’re having a month focussing on another of the four Perfect Madness pillars – Allies. It’s about love, networking, family and friends. Actively engaging with our loved ones, and expanding our network whenever possible, for it is with the helping hand that we can achieve anything. We’ve got a ton of great content planned and Elyse has her first post scheduled and ready to go on February 3rd. Stop back then to find out more.

Before you go we’d love it if you signed up to our email list. You’ll get free access to our Perfect Madness Toolkit as well as exclusive content. Just click the button below:

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Main photo by winnifredxoxo.

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Adventures in Exercising: Shaun T’s Rockin’ Body Hard-Core Abs

Adventures in Exercising: Shaun T’s Rockin’ Body Hard-Core Abs

For our Perfect Madness Balance month of January I have decided to focus on exercise.  I don’t want to engage in the resolutions of old, but instead I want to change my entire approach to physical fitness.  I want to discard the days of body punishing and box ticking.  I want to indulge in exercise.  I want it to be a gift I give myself.  In order for this mind shift to occur, I need to first find exercises I take pleasure in doing, so each week I will try a new form of exercise and report back my experiences, including a rating from 1-5, with 5 being the best experience possible.

This Week: Shaun T’s Rockin’ Body Hard-Core Abs
What is it:

In three words; FUN ENTHUSIASTIC FITNESS!  Forget laying on your back passively counting sit-ups, this is an innovative approach to building core strength, and believe it or not, you never even lay down!  This is not your mother’s ab workout.  Well except that my Mother, the woman who exercises more than any person I know, did actually recommend the exercise to me after I had little Finn three months ago.  She hoped it would help with my goal of coaxing my Mommy tummy to take a hike, and more importantly to repair the damage pregnancy imposed on my abdominal muscles.

The exercise is only 10 minutes long!  Who doesn’t have ten minutes a day to devote to themselves?  The soundtrack is full of pump-you-up vibes, and a cast that make you feel as though you are out for a night of dancing with your friends rather than doing a work-out.  But hands down the best part of Shaun T’s Rockin’ Body Hardcore Abs workout?  Shaun T!  This man brings an excitement to fitness that is infectious.

Benefits:  

Can be done at home when works in your schedule
Only one off cost of the DVD series
No equipment needed
Easy to learn
Fast workout
Cardio and core workout in one
Great for when traveling
Easy to change-up and keep fresh as Shaun T offers many different exercise DVDs
FUN!

Drawbacks:

Takes a few times going through each workout before you learn the moves properly
Not going to lie, it’s hard work, but because of the enthusiasm of the video you hardly notice how tough you are actually working
Very sore the next morning
Constant attention to the task at hand required, which prevents socialising with work-out partners, or time to lose yourself in your thoughts

Rating:

5/5. If I can manage it, I will do this video everyday!  It’s a great supplement to any fitness regime, or a change from the usual, and particularly beneficial for moms trying to focus on rebuilding core strength after pregnancy has stretched and weakened the abdominal muscles.  I also love the motto of the BeachBody company who creates the Shaun T workout series; Decide.  Commit.  Succeed.  It’s as simple as making the choice to improve your fitness and in doing so improve your life!  Also, my favourite quote is Shaun’s motivating “This is your show!”  which simultaneously remind me that my performance in that moment matters, so I should be an active and eager participant, and also that I chose to take part in this activity so I should have fun with it!

Main photo by Terry George.

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The Power Of The Smile

The Power Of The Smile

This January we’ve been working on Balance as our theme for the month. Many of us are bringing our lives back in check. We’ve made New Years Resolutions, or even New Life Resolutions. Yet sometimes, as part of this, as we become serious about where we want this year to go, we can forget some of the basics, some of the fundamentals. I can’t help but share this extract from my latest book that talks about the power of the smile. I hope you enjoy it…

Smile. Go on. Do it. Now.

How did it feel?

I tried it once. Obviously, I’ve smiled more than once, but I remember when I tried it as a strategy for the first time. I wasn’t in the mood to smile but I forced myself to use my 43 facial muscles to smile. It was fantastic. My mood lifted. I felt better.

Despite my time on this planet I hadn’t discovered this. Sure, I smiled a lot and was a positive person. But I hadn’t realized that I could choose to smile when I didn’t feel like smiling. The act of smiling would then lift my mood and even help me smile more. I could choose to be sad or I could choose to smile and be happier.

I’m not trying to share some amazing life-changing experience. I didn’t develop some psychedelic high or anything crazy like that. But my mood ever so slightly improved. For the cost of just beaming a small smile the benefit of an uplift in mood is extremely worthwhile.

There are pages across the internet that will also tell you that it takes more of your facial muscles to frown than to smile. The truth is we’re not all the same, we smile in different ways. There are different types of smiles and frowns and some of us even recruit a different number of facial muscles than others to form our unique smile. What’s important is that smiling improves your mood. When you’re down, angry, depressed, grumpy, obnoxious or irritable it will help lift you up.

Smiling isn’t a miracle cure nor is it a prevention, but it can help. And the best part – it’s free. You can smile any time you choose to.

Never go a day without smiling. No matter how hard it is, when life’s really got you down, chose to smile.

 

If you liked this extract then please check out the book on Amazon.

Main photo by Daniel Go.

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Adventures in Exercising: Bodyweight Exercises

Adventures in Exercising: Bodyweight Exercises

For our Perfect Madness Balance month of January I have decided to focus on exercise.  I don’t want to engage in the resolutions of old, but instead I want to change my entire approach to physical fitness.  I want to discard the days of body punishing and box ticking.  I want to indulge in exercise.  I want it to be a gift I give myself.  In order for this mind shift to occur, I need to first find exercises I take pleasure in doing, so each week I will try a new form of exercise and report back my experiences, including a rating from 1-5, with 5 being the best experience possible.

This Week: Bodyweight Exercises
What is it:

Bodyweight exercises are very popular right now, and are clearly the Zumba of 2013, and the CrossFit of 2014.  They are strength exercises that do not require a gym, weight machines, or free weights.  Your own body provides the resistance and weight needed.  When done in quick repetition a cardio training aspect can also be included.

For my first bodyweight exercise (BWE) experience I used a video from buzzfeed sharing the 12 exercises that will change your life.  Though a simple google search will provide an endless supply of BWE for you to choose from.  I did 20 repetitions of each, or held poses for 20 seconds, and repeated for 3 rounds in total, with a short break in between to catch my breath.  The whole work-out only took me 20 minutes.

Benefits:

Can be done anywhere at anytime
Free
No equipment needed
Easy to learn
Fast
Great for when traveling or for parents of young children who want to exercise in random locals like play parks
Easy to change-up and keep fresh with so many routines available online
Used new and many muscle groups
Made my baby laugh at me, especially the jumping squats

Drawbacks:

Felt more like work than fun part way into the second round, so slightly more akin to the body punishing exercise I would like to avoid
Very sore the next morning
Constant attention to the task at hand required, which prevents socialising with work-out partners, or time to lose yourself in your thoughts

Rating:

4/5. It is clear to see why bodyweight exercise is trending as the top fitness activity for 2015.  I have been an avid fan of “stop-drop-and-yoga” for years, so the ability to perform bodyweight exercises anywhere without any equipment appeals to me.  The fast paced movement got the heart racing, and the muscles burning almost immediately.  Though I loved the intensity of the workout, and will continue to incorporate into my fitness routine, I think less rounds and more frequent is the way forward, to ensure the activity is still fun.

See the other Adventures in Exercising here:

Geocaching
Family Yoga

Main photo by Nick Kenrick.

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How Meditation Has Been Proven To Create Balance In Your Life

How Meditation Has Been Proven To Create Balance In Your Life

What possible use can meditation have? Why would I want to wear a robe, sit cross legged on the floor, eyes shut, clenching a thumb and forefinger and chanting some hippy-type mantra? Clearly it’s just a waste of time, a cult full of weirdos.

Is Meditation Just A Form Of Art?

It turns out I wasn’t just a little bit wrong. I was totally and utterly wrong. I had shut my mind and was going against lots of the principles that I preach, failing to keep my mind open. I guess we can’t all be perfect!

As we continue to focus on January as a month of balance, I want to look at meditation and how you can use it to create more balance in your life. I’ve been meditating for about 5 months now, practicing mindfulness for a little over a year. I went in to it as a sceptic and come out a convert.

Last year I wrote this post about how mediation can change your life. I’m now going to elaborate and tell you some of the science behind it. I thought this meditation and mindfulness stuff was all a bit arty, with no real science behind it. How wrong I was.

Firstly, so that I’m clear and as I mentioned in last years meditation post, there is no need to be sat on the floor cross legged in a pose that many people consider is a requirement (I thought that). Instead I’ve meditated on trains, buses, cars, a public bench. This is something that you can do where ever you are (within reason).

The Science Of Meditation

I am not a scientist with any level of qualification regarding the brain, neuroplasticity or meditation. I am just a convert to the benefits of mediation and someone that needs to understand some of the science behind it. This science is what I’ve found and should be enough for most people to realize that there is more than just a bit of art behind what these meditator-type people do – there is a whole bunch of science that proves that mediation really is good for you.

Meditation affects the brain. If you are to do a brain scan and look at what’s going on in the brain if you don’t meditate you’re likely to find some interesting connections (of course, everyone is different so this will be a bit of a generalisation). The medial prefrontal cortex will, within itself, have strong neural connections. It will also have strong neural connections between itself and the insula and the amygdala.

Translating The Science

OK, so what does this mean? The medial prefrontal cortex is a part of the brain that references you. It’s based on how you perceive things and formed through your experiences. The insula works on your sensations and is the part that gives you that gut feeling and decides how strongly you respond to a particular sensation or experience. The amygdala is responsible for the fight or flight mechanism.

With this in mind, what these strong neural connections are doing is heightening the response to an experience or sensation and making it more likely that you will decide that this input to your brain is a problem of some sort.

Neuroplasticity Of Meditation

Meditation can actually change the physical structure of the brain. This is neuroplasticity – changes in the brain’s neural pathways and synapses.

If we scan the brain of someone that regularly practices meditation daily there are some interesting changes. The connection between the medial prefrontal cortex and both the insula and amygdala are weakened. This means those sensations of panic, anxiety or fear that fleetingly pass through us when we really wish they wouldn’t are reduced. Resultantly we have less anxiety and are able to respond to it in a strengthened and more controlled way to these situations that otherwise may have been difficult to deal with.

Not only are these connections weakened but the connection between the lateral prefrontal cortex and both the insula and amygdala are strengthened. When something potentially anxiety provoking or dangerous presents itself these stronger connections allow us to act more calmly and rationally.

Additionally, the connection between the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (part of the medial prefrontal cortex) and the insula are strengthened. This promotes our ability to be empathetic and understand others that are different to us. It allows us to be more compassionate, open our mind to further possibilities and perhaps even (and this part is my own personal theory) be more creative.

Meditation is neuroplasticity in action.

Does The Theory Actually Work?

I meditate about 5 times a week for 20 minutes. I should be meditating twice a day every day and I’m striving towards that. Life, combined with a 3 month old son, make it slightly harder for me to fit this in but I’m working on it.

When I meditate I notice that I am calmer, I’m more empathetic, I’m open to possibilities, I’m less anxious and I’m more creative. I also suffer from nerve pain and, while I don’t have any tangible evidence, I think that meditation has also reduced the affect of this pain.

I started meditating as a sceptic so this isn’t some placebo effect – it’s the opposite. Meditation has had affects on my brain. It has rewired it and continues to do so. As I increase my practice and get better at it I fully expect to see more results. While I can’t personally attest to claims of meditation improving things like your immune system, I can believe that it’s true.

How You Can Apply This To Your Life

It’s widely acknowledged that exercising is healthy. That’s the physical part. What about exercising your brain? Just like with your body, you need to do this regularly. You should be doing a daily or twice daily practice to get maximum results.

I learned with Will Williams Medication in London. He teaches Vedic meditation – essentially this is what’s commonly known as Transcendental meditation but that term has been copyrighted and trademarked  heavily. It involves 2 sessions of 20 minutes each per day. You can pretty much do it anywhere and say a mantra inside your head.

Many of you will think that you won’t be able to get your mind still enough to reap the benefits – I certainly did. But, I learned, it’s OK to have thoughts enter your mind – this is part of life. You just acknowledge them, raise the ‘volume’ of your mantra inside your head and, soon, you’re back to focussing on your mantra – it really works.

To get the full benefit of Vedic meditation I highly recommend going on a course. However, there are lots of other forms of mediation and we’re all different. There are links to free guided meditations at the end of last years meditation post and there is help in our free Perfect Madness Toolkit too.

Why You Should Start Meditating

I’m not going to insult your intelligence and, once again, talk about the benefits of reduce anxiety, improved immune system, etc, etc. Instead, I’m going to put it another way. Perhaps, you already feel strong and in perfect health – you don’t have any of these ‘issues’ which need ‘fixing’. But then imagine how good you could be. Imagine how you could take on even more challenges if you were even stronger, if your brain functioned even better. If you want to help others, achieve more, make the impossible possible, then I truly believe that meditating regularly will help take you to that next level.

Not convinced and don’t want to dedicate 2 sessions of 20 minutes a day to this? Start small. Try 2 minutes or 5 minutes just once a day. Do that for a month and see the benefits yourself.

The Challenge

This is where I challenge you. I’ve personally seen the results. Now it’s your turn. Give it a go. Try it. I’d love to hear how you get on – let me know.

Main photo by Moyan Brenn.

The post How Meditation Has Been Proven To Create Balance In Your Life appeared first on Perfect Madness.

Adventures in Exercising: Geocaching

Adventures in Exercising: Geocaching

For our Perfect Madness Balance month of January I have decided to focus on exercise.  I don’t want to engage in the resolutions of old, but instead I want to change my entire approach to physical fitness.  I want to discard the days of body punishing and box ticking.  I want to indulge in exercise.  I want it to be a gift I give myself.  In order for this mind shift to occur, I need to first find exercises I take pleasure in doing, so each week I will try a new form of exercise and report back my experiences, including a rating from 1-5, with 5 being the best experience possible. Read last weeks post about family yoga.

This Week: Geocaching
What is it:

“An anytime, anywhere, real world adventure.” Using the geocaching app and associated website geocaching.com, you use your GPS location to set-off in search of local hidden treasures.  The GPS in the app tracks your location in relation to the hidden caches, and provides clues to where they are, but after that assistance, you must root around and hunt for the cache yourself.  Inside is often a log book that other fellow adventurers have signed as well as little knick-nacs which can be traded.

My husband I went on a geocaching adventure in a local nature reserve we frequently walk in, The Rickmansworth Aquadrome, and the walk was given new life!  The geocaching took us off our normal route and we discovered paths we had never before explored.

Benefits:

Exercise for the whole family
Fun for the whole family
Fresh air, and enjoyment of the great outdoors
Time to connect with your family while also investing in your own fitness
Helping promote a positive attitude toward fitness in your family
The gentle pace, and time spent walking in between cache points allows for conversation
Same health benefits as walking in countryside or around a track for a couple of hours
Mild, Moderate or Strenuous exercise levels available depending on how long you want to walk, and where you want to walk
Social connection with other community members

Drawbacks:

Requires use of a smartphone throughout the exercise
Hunting for the caches interrupts normal flow of conversation in comparison to other long hikes or walks
Requires forethought and planning
Smartphone is not as accurate as an actual GPS device, so serious geocachers would probably want to invest in one

Rating:

5/5. Incredible form of exercise for families and couples.  All the amazing health benefits of walking/hiking, but with added fun of going on a treasure hunt!  My husband and I took our 3 month old son, and we felt like kids again searching all around for the caches!  We made it slightly competitive when we got close to see who could spot it first, and who could spot the most in one afternoon.  Though planning is involved prior to setting off this is a very delightful form of exercise, that I would engage in as often as possible, before I knew it we had walked for over 2 hours!

Main image by heipei.

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How To Achieve Your Goals In 6 Easy Steps

How To Achieve Your Goals In 6 Easy Steps

As we adjust to the new year, many of you will have made New Years Resolutions. Or, perhaps, New Life Resolutions. Many of you will be working hard on them now. However, lots of you will already have quit, given up, decided they weren’t important anyway.

The fitness industry thrives on you quitting, throwing in the towel. In January they sell you a 12 month membership knowing that very few of you will actually last 2 months and they’ve got an extra 10 months payment from you – that’s why the deals look so good. They know that most of you will drop out.

Now it’s time to take the bull by the horns, invest in yourself and make your goals happen. I’m not talking about SMART goals – there are tons of great books on that on Amazon, like this one from S.J. Scott. I’m talking about working out what you really want and making sure you follow through.

Achieve Your Goals

To achieve balance in our life we need to set goals and make changes. That means self-investment and finding a system that works for us to achieve our goals. Follow this 6 step program to achieve your goals.

1. Define

What is it that you really want? What’s the goal that you want to achieve? It needs to be something that you’re committed to, not something that someone else wants or that you don’t really care about. If you’re going to invest in yourself then you need to invest in a goal that you, yourself want to achieve.

2. Commit

Agree your goal and commit to it. Make a pledge to yourself. Now write it down. Most people don’t write their goals down. But those that write their goals down are 95% more likely yo achieve them. Take the time to write them down. Commit to yourself.

3. Be Accountable

Now that you’ve committed and you’ve written your goals down, make yourself accountable. Get an accountability partner – someone that you can share your progress with. If you know you have to report back to someone at the end of each day on how you’re doing, you’re more likely to do it. Try sharing it on social media or blog about it too.

4. Start Small

Don’t jump in at the deep end. This is a marathon not a sprint. You want to achieve your goal and then carry it on as you improve your life. If you want to lose weight, you want to make sure the weight stays off at the end, not starve yourself for a few weeks and in a couple of months time put the weight back on again. (Note: I’m using simple examples of goals as an illustration but you should really consider making new life resolutions).

You need to make a habit. These habits are best formed by doing something small and often. If you’re eliminating something then put something in its place to help form this habit. If you’re trying to cut down from 10 coffees a day to 5 then start with getting rid of one. But, when you cut out that 10th coffee, go and drink a glass of water instead. Form a small habit and get your mind and body used to it.

5. Build

Slowly, very slowly build up on that habit. Don’t rush it. Remember, it’s still a marathon. It’s easy to trip. Often you won’t know you’ve pushed it too hard until it happens. Build on your habit slowly. Compound it. Get your mind and body used to it.

6. Ingrain

Once you’ve been going at it for a month you will have started to ingrain that habit. You can still trip but you’re more invested. Most things in life take some sort of investment and, normally, work. If losing weight was the goal then stopping what you’ve been doing and binge eating probably isn’t the answer. You’ve worked hard to build this habit so do that little bit extra to ingrain it. Sure, take a day off and reward yourself but stick with it.

Self-Investment

Don’t be part of that 95% that fails to achieve. This month, start the year as you mean to go on. Be part of the top 5%. This needs to be about self-investment. Pick goals that you want to achieve, commit to them and become accountable. This is a marathon so start small, build on your successes and then ingrain those habits. Make 2015 the year that you achieve your goals.

Main photo by AG Gilmore.

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