The 9 Elements to Happiness & Feeling Fantastic - Part Two

Today marks the second day of learning how to be content and feel fantastic everyday... So shall we continue where we left off? (With 4 more elements to discuss)

3 Momentum Elements...

Having a dream and living it - So this is about setting goals, whether they be short term, medium term or long-term and completing them. An example would be 'Tomorrow I want to wake at 5am, see the sun rise, go to an exhibition, cook a new meal and spend an hour working towards my long-term dream' - so this is an example of a short - term goal something that is very much achievable with some effort and time management. Having the sense of completion with your short term goals sets the path and direction for you to know how you can achieve your medium and long-term knowing they are possible. John says Imagine everyday taking one step towards your dream, just one step - imagine in 30 days how much closer you will be? Living your dreams purely because it gives you a spark - you will begin to go into 'flow', your environment changes and in short - becomes amazing. 

Learn - Learning from your stress, how to work with it to push yourself into doing something. Doing nothing creates nothing and so we must know that our stress can be positive. Allowing our stress to move us to do something creates results. Our stress is then not a challenge, but an opportunity.

Social Connection - You should try your best to make positive social connections, whether it be attending networking meetings, going to a dance class or whatever else you enjoy, helping someone in the general public, on a daily basis you should try to make some form of positive connection.

The last - extremely important element..... The Art of Being Present

In Johns words: 'If you're in a car and the drive is phenomenal, smooth, music just right, lovely surrounding, but your mind is down the road and around the corner - you've missed the moment.' What does this mean? It means you need to learn to live in the present, now is the only place you can live. So how can I do this? You can do this by focusing on your five senses all the time - 

What are you hearing around you (conversations without you drifting off thinking of what to cook for dinner) 

What are you seeing around you? (Taking in everything, seeing your lovely house you live in and appreciate it, or the journey you take everyday and enjoying it) 

What you taste (chew your food and think of how good nutritious food tastes, don't just gulp it down really think about how great it really is and how it's nourishing every cell in your body)

What you touch (being aware of the nature and material of everything that crosses your path in the day - for example I am really enjoying these soft buttoned keys that I am typing on. Sound silly? Nope, it's a pleasure I appreciate.)

What you smell (there is so much around you to enjoy a few examples in your own house - your clean laundry, a clean work surface, your cooked food, or outside - the fresh air, flowers or grass)

John Whiteman's Book - '9 Days To Feel Fantastic' is out on the 4th April ... To have this information to hand at all times, I recommend this book. "Become inspired to do all the things in life you have always wanted to do" Visit his website for further information http://www.johnwhiteman.com/

Enjoy Day Sunshine Lassies

LA xoxo

The 9 Elements to Happiness & Feeling Fantastic

Last Friday I had the pleasure of learning some very valuable information in a workshop from the Author himself - John Whiteman. This information is like a manual for contention and feeling fantastic, it's like a check list that you see at a glance everyday and if you are feeling dishevelled, low or depressed in some way - it is very very likely that it is because one of the 9 elements have not been fulfilled for the day. 

Let's have a look at it and break them down:

5 of the elements create Balance:

• Excercise!!! You are energy, we are made up of energy and your energy needs to move. Moving with intention to move your energy and breathe and get your heart racing is extremely good for you not only physically - but superb for your mentality. Imagine a river, if it had to stay still without movement - what would happen? It would become stagnant. That's what happens with us also, it either affects our body and fitness or it affects us mentally - depression, frustration and anger can be built up very easily inside without any way of dispersing that negative energy. Exercise is fabulous for this and 20 minutes of exercising a day working up a sweat is the key.
• Personal Space 5 minutes a day, just to Be. Take the feeling of having a massage, how relaxed you feel, we can induce this feeling ourselves everyday, and it is optimal in the morning before you start your day. You do this by taking 5 minutes to yourself to breathe deeply down to an inch below your navel (put your finger there) and direct your breath there by concentrating. Fill your body with air right down to below your navel because breathing only to your chest can increase anxiety and there are amazing benefits to breathing much deeper. This exercise takes us slightly away from our mind chatter and since the aim is to balance mind, body and spirit for a state of flow (where every thing is in equilibrium and feeling fantastic) this brings us closer to the center - where flow is. We spend way to much time in our brains (Our left brain hemisphere of having to be logical and reason everything, causing lots of mind arguments) and the way to create flow is to think less and not more, to give yourself time away from your running mind. To concentrate more on your right side (by breathing and time out) which is our creative side, where you become inspired which in turn creates 'flow'... where goals and ambitions are fulfilled, where life is a steady road of easily changing what can be changed and accepting with ease something that cannot.
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEulyxBCA6c (Give this one 10 secs to get into it, but it's beautifully relaxing)
• Nutrition John used this illustration to explain quite an important point: Would you feed a Petrol car Diesel - so why do we feed ourselves food that is not nutritious? Of course sweets, chocolate, coke, processed foods may all taste nice but they give us no nutrition and sometimes we are easily addicted to them and wonder why we feel so bad and so sluggish. He recommends making good nutritional choices, so Organic rather than non-organic and free-range rather than farm eggs ( I'm sure a lot of us follow this one) Everyday we should be feeding our bodies nutritiously.
• Environment - The energy changes in all the different environments you are in, from work to home for example is a different energy. Your environment should always be as positive as you can make it and you can drastically affect that by making sure your energy is as positive as possible. You can take 5 minutes each time before you are moving from one environment to the next and repeat the 'personal space' breathing above and walk into your new environment refreshed and revived. (You may now be thinking oh this sounds to koo koo for me, but I urge you to try, what's there to lose? Even better for the morning exercise have some relaxing music to hand - your day will follow in the same calm manner and even if it doesn't it will feel like it is to you because you will have an inner calm that you've given yourself.
• Sleep we all know we need to sleep but some of us simply can't. Try some lavender on your pillow, some natural tea, no caffeine after midday and maybe exercise in the evening so that your body is tired. Sleep is very important and can affect our body and mood for up to a couple of days if we haven't slept the right amount. 

Tune in tomorrow for the last 4 elements John Whiteman teaches for balancing our life into feeling great... a check list that can be looked at on a daily basis - "I don't feel so happy today - OK I didn't eat to well today and neither did I take 5 minutes to myself" - That's the idea.

LA xoxo