Hey there and welcome to day 21 of the 21 day Calm the Eff Down Challenge. Do do do doo!! We have been at this, exploring different ways to take our own edge off, for three weeks now. Popular wisdom says it takes 21 days to create a habit. I’m honestly not sure about the validity of that, but I do hope that in the last three weeks you’ve heard something and tried something that got you thinking and feeling a little differently. And hopefully even changed an outcome of a tense moment for you for the better.
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Let’s take a look back at this week. Which was all about calming down in your own mind. Mindset shifts are subtle. A little squishy, even. But they have so much power to shift you into a better state overall.
Here’s a re-cap of what we talked about this week. My hope is that it will help you integrate the stuff we covered and take it all out for a spin over the weekend.
the things we talked about were
On Monday, episode 180
In Eff the Eff Bomb We took at look at cursing. How it can be cathartic and fun, yes, but also, sometimes, overkill and upsetting. Your tiny assignment was to come up with three curseword alternatives that would help keep you from falling into a trap of immediately dropping an f bomb at every little thing. My favorite? Anus monster.
On Tuesday, episode 181
I talked about how the need for alone time is a real thing. Even during the quarantine, and especially when you’re shacked up with others. and I think extra especially when those others are your kids. Your tiny assignment was to spend some time visualizing yourself in your ideal setting, and just enjoying that experience virtually, because your nervous system doesn’t know the difference between real relaxation and imagined relaxation.
Wednesday, episode 182
I talked with Jill Miller, founder of Yoga Tune Up and author of The Roll Model, for her five techniques she teaches to help you feel safe in an unsafe world. Because really, you can’t calm down if you feel threatened. It’s physiologically very hard, so Jill shared 5 ways to send the all clear signal to your nervous system. The tiny assignment for Wednesday was to use her tip of choosing a comforting statement, like Everything is OK, or I am a safe place, or I allow myself to relax completely that youc an tell yourself in quiet moments to help you, as Jill says, turn on your off switch.
And yesterday, Thursday, episode 183
I talked about your secret weapon, which is acceptance. Acceptance can seem like giving up, but it’s more like giving over, just laying down your resistance which helps you find peace. And, paradoxically, when you accept something, you energy can change so much that the thing you were railing against starts to seem a whole lot smaller and more manageable. Not because you fixed it, but because you said, OK, so be it.
Weekend Assignment
To put these things into practice over the weekend, your assignment is super simple. Anytime you notice yourself thinking anything that’s unkind, or fearful, or stressful, just. Hold up a moment. Recognize that it’s happened again. Because it WILL happen. Thinking is what we do. It’s ok. Don’t beat yourself up. Just say, “thinking.” Bringing awareness to an unhelpful thought is just an insanely powerful way to remind yourself that you don’t have to go down the wormhole. You have a choice. You may have to tell yourself “thinking” 200 times in one day, and that’s ok. But it will help you start to have objectivity about what floats around in your brain and to begin to have the ability to release unhelpful thoughts when you notice you’re having them.
OK? Deal? OK.
I want to thank you for coming on the 21 day journey with me. I have to laugh a little bit because journey is so overused but, you know, we can’t travel at the moment, so dang it, let’s journey!
Re-emergence Week
I’ll be back next week with some episodes about Re-Emergence and what it means now that states and businesses are starting to open up; how to head back out in to the world (maybe) mindfully. We can feel this all out together.
Calm The Eff Down
I put together all the tips from the full 21 days of the Calm the Eff Challenge into a mini e-book that is available for free!!
