Natural Wellbeing

I’m reading an article in the most recent Psychologies Magazine about how regular time in nature contributes to wellbeing of mind, body and soul, and it suggests that even spending 5 or 10 minutes outdoors with nature can be beneficial in reducing anxiety and can make us feel happier.

I know that I don’t get to spend nearly enough time outside. I do try to go for a walk at lunchtime, but quite often, due to location, that around a housing estate or hospital grounds. We are fortunate that there are open fields behind the hospital and I get a move on I might just have time to go that way. I guess even in a housing estate, nature has its place in well-manicured (or even overgrown) gardens and hedgerow. You just need to look hard enough.

When we were kids we used to holiday most years in the wilds or North Wales. A beautiful spot with mountains to climb, trails to walk and forests to play in. In adult years, when we’ve been away, we’ve always had what we’ve called “long walk day”. A day put aside (hopefully with good weather) to go on a 5-10 mile trek. No distractions but the views around us. Taking in the sights and sounds of nature doing its thing.

Having to work most days means that going out for long walks or further afield is not easily achievable. However we are lucky that we have some nice park spaces quite nearby.

According to the 10 question quiz that always accompanies these articles the thing that I should find most benefit from time outdoors is grounding.

“If you crave calm or wish you feel more grounded and connect to what matters, upgrading the quality of the time you spend in nature ma provide the shift you need. It’s easy to spend time outdoors on autopilot, or use it as a way to being with others – but you’ll benefit most from spending at least some time in nature on your own, so you can tune into the stillness and connect with your inner calm. If your tendency is to live in your head, time in nature can be a much-needed way of paying attention to your physical self. Finding the ground beneath your feet may even be the first step to finding a new direction in life.

You’ll get the most benefit by focussing on the here and now as you walk. Don’t give yourself a hard time if you can’ leave your emotional baggage behind but, when you become aware that you’re caught up in thinking, direct your focus outwards by noticing the colours, textures, sounds, smells and sensations. We can all benefit from a daily grounding ritual but, for chronic over thinkers, it can be life-changing”

Like most people, I haven’t had a proper holiday for nearly a year and a half now (since summer 2019), so when we are able to, I will relish the chance to get out and have some time to wander around new places and spaces to take in the sensations.

The Instant Gratification Monkey

I was reading an online article from Tim Urban, who studied why procrastinators procrastinate. He possets that they can’t help it. In their brain the procrastinator has the Rational Decision Maker who steadily guides the mind in to doing what needs to be done, and then there’s the Instant Gratification Monkey who sideswipes things and sends the mind off wandering for some instant satisfaction for information or other, that takes us away from our steady path.

The Instant Gratification Monkey takes us off to play in what Urban calls the Dark Playground, that space where all the fun, new, shiny things hang out that distract us from what we should be doing. In the back of our minds though is this constant feeling of anxiety or regret for that looming deadline or that thing that we’ve been working towards for ages. When that deadline approaches though, it’s time for a visit from the Panic Monster who scares us away from the Dark Playground back in to a sense of productivity to get things done.

Urban offers three steps to turn procrastination into motivation:

recognise that you are procrastinating. Being aware of something is usually the first step in resolving it.
Understand the reason for the procrastination. Is it the task itself, or is it you? Is it that you aren’t enjoying it, not qualified for it, or feeling overwhelmed by it?
Set objectives, tactics and rewards. Depending on the reason for the procrastination in the first place it might be as simple as having a to do list if you’re feeling overwhelmed, or someone that holds you to account, or if you promise yourself a treat if you get that thing done.

There are times that I procrastinate. It’s not usually because I don’t want to do something, more that I don’t want to do that particular thing right now. I will send that email out but after I’ve watched this episode of that tv programme I like. I will write that report just as soon as I’ve finished making lunch. I will learn how to ring handbells properly, just as soon as I’ve written that report and sent that email. Sometimes it can become a vicious cycle.

Other days, I can blast through even the most boring, or painful task without so much as a second thought. It’s about the frame of mind that I’m in. Sometimes, I find being in a particular place, or with particular people helps galvanise me into action. Sometimes I just wake up and tell myself that today I’m going to power on through all that stuff and clear my to do list.

Today has definitely been one of the latter type of days. I’ve finished the first draft of a strategy document. I’ve documented a framework that I invented that supports that strategy. I’ve been for a power walk. I’ve read the next section on learning to ring handbells and had a few goes at it. My Rational Decision Maker was in charge today.

I wonder if that means tomorrow I’ll be all out of juice and my Instant Gratification Monkey will be running the show.

Budding growth

As Public Relations Officer for both my local #bellringing Association and for the Central Council of Church Bell Ringers I’m always on the lookout for ways to get our messages out there and increase awareness of what we do.

I was reading an article online the other day about growing followership and there were two amazingly simple tips that could make a world of difference.

Include a sign-up link in your email signature. So, my emails signatures for both now carry not only a link to our website, but also to our social media pages, and for the Central Council a link to our mailing list sign up page. That was easy. My signature is now quite large, but I hope it will draw people I correspond with to find out more about us.
Include a “forward to a friend” link on each page/article on the website. As it happened, we had a local Association Comms team meeting last night and I mentioned it. I have no idea how complicated it is to set up or not, but before the evening was out, our Webmaster had added a link in the footer of our website and emailed me to test it. I clicked on the link, up popped a blank email with a link to the relevant page ready for me to forward to anyone I might think would be interested. I’ve also sent a request for a similar link on the Central Council website. Hopefully, it will be just as easy.

Two simple tips that have potential to increase awareness, get more engagement with our social media and spread the word.

It was also quite good fun having a look at some of the analytics from our website for quarter 1, again appealing to my inner nerd. There needs to be a bit more work on extracting relevant ones and interpreting them into meaningful data, but given that we only set it running recently, it will be great to track hits to the website during promotional campaigns. I can get the analytics from our social media sites and its all encouraging.

Top tips

I’m on LinkedIn, the professional network on the internet that allows you to connect and strengthen professional relationships and learn new skills. You can follow organisations and groups in much the same was a Facebook and Twitter and other social media sites.

One of the groups that I follow for interest and to support #bellringing activities, rather than work related, is about Public Relations and in particular this group focuses on internal communications. In fact its called The Institute of Internal Communication. Each week a contributor called Carole Searwert, a copywriter and newsletter writer posts an article called Top Tips Tuesday which gives you some pointers that you might find useful. Admittedly, most of it relates to the business world rather than the small, social charity, activity type world, but occasionally there’s something that make sense.

This week’s top tips were all about How to Grow Your Newsletter List. In the #bellringing community, we tend to use newsletters quite a lot to keep in touch with our ringers, let them know what’s going on and what’s been coming up. We have them at all levels. Some districts do their own. Most association’s probably have one. The Central Council of Church Bellringers (CCCBR) and the Association of Ringing Teachers (ART) are currently issuing a joint one on survival and recovery strategies. ART have two of their own, Tower Talk and ART Works for slightly different audiences.

Most newsletters are usually quite well done. Lots of uplifting news and case studies, information that may help, updates on what’s been going on and useful contacts or diary information. Hopefully they come with lots of bright shiny photos too. Invariably these days they come in digital format, but some are still produced in paper, and some are both.

I contribute to many a newsletter and have at some time or other been featured in all of the above. But how do we know whether what we produce gets read? How can we increase our readership?

The article offers 10 suggestions, some of which are business orientated, but the things that I picked up that might be useful in a #bellringing newsletter context were:

Offering an interesting “lead magnet” as a sign up incentive. Now, this relates particularly to getting new business sign ups, however, the suggestions offered actually could form part of your regular newsletter offering e.g. “how to tips”, a cheat-sheet (in our case maybe an article that explains a particular method like the way I learned Double Norwich Court Bob Major as first, treble bob, last, near, full, far) accompanied by some diagrams.
Include a sign up link in your email signature. This I thought was interesting mainly from a Central Council perspective and I shall be offering it up to see if it works.
Add a “forward to a friend” button (obviously for digital newsletters). Again, I’m thinking Central Council and local Association websites News Page at the bottom of every article so that if someone likes it and thinks that a friend ought to read it, they can easily forward the link.
Promote your newsletter on your social media to raise awareness. Sounds a bit obvious but do we actually do it? Probably not consistently.

A two minute read at lunch time has now just turned into an evening’s work to see if it’s feasible.

50 Ways to Enjoy Turning Fifty

My sister bought me this book for my birthday last week. I thought I’d better take more than a cursory look at it. It claims to have 50 ways to make this the best year EVER. The book is set out in chapters based on making the most of turning 50, planning the best year EVER, implementing the plan, treating yourself well, having fun, looking back, looking within, expressing gratitude, putting things in order, eliminating what you don’t need, giving and looking forward.

Each chapter has key questions to help you analyse yourself and figure how to make the most of turning 50, thought experiences to delve a little deeper and activities to do. It does say that you can dip in and out of the book, fast forward to the bits that most interest you and so on but being a pedant, I started at the beginning.

Way #1 Accept your age.

Thought experiment 1 asks you to make a list of people you admire who are over fifty and who are living terrific lives and make a note of what you admire about how this person is living their life. OK, so first thing is to think of people over 50 who I admire.

I’m not going to list them all here because some of them might read this and either be embarrassed or disagree. I’ve written each of them in the book. Suffice to say that it includes C, my parents and siblings, a few former work colleagues, and some ringers I know. In some cases, I admire what they have achieved over adversity. In others I admire what they’re currently doing with their lives, and if I’m honest, I’m probably a bit jealous of. Some I admire because I wish I were more like them.

The key questions were what are some benefits of turning 50? and What are you looking forward to this year?

I guess benefits might include being that little bit wiser sometimes. Having more opportunities to reflect on what I want out of life and trying to achieve a better work/life balance. Nearer to retirement age (although still some considerable way to go). Looking forward to getting to see R again. This year has been an exception and we haven’t been able to spend time together, so as soon as we can we’ll do that. Can plan for the trip that we should have had for my 50^th birthday.

Thought experiment 2: what concerns do you have about turning fifty? What challenges are you experiencing or expecting? Which of those can’t you change? What constructive actions can you take regarding that item?

I’m not really bothered about turning 50. It’s just a number. I guess ill health, or my level of unfitness is probably going to be an issue at some point. I’m feeling less tolerant of other people, which I need to reign in a bit sometimes and there are other things that I’d rather be doing with my time but have to work instead. I can’t change that for a few more years yet unless something amazing comes up, like winning the lottery.

Every day’s a school day

It seems like it at the moment anyway. Between doing my online mindfulness course, which has really challenged some thoughts and feelings, and learning methods for virtual #bellringing in Ringing Room sessions, of which I had 4 this week.

The first #bellringing session was a district practice which I didn’t need to learn anything new for but the session that I run on Thursdays we’re consolidating methods that we’ve been learning for February. Some of those methods are repeated at a Friday morning session but sometimes something different. Then every other Friday there’s another session that changes methods every time. This week I needed to learn Newcastle and Alnwick Surprise Minor. And in 2 weeks’ time, we’re aiming for London and Wells Surprise Minor, and I set new methods for our Thursday session at the beginning of the month.

Some of these methods I’ve never even looked at, always thinking they are beyond my capability but with the advent of Ringing Room, have been able to ring things that I wouldn’t normally get to ring in any of the towers that I would normally frequent.

Learning to ring takes time, even just the basics of handling a bell on your own, then you need to join in with others and make a meaningful sound. Then you can move on to the more complicated stuff, but that tends to depend on others a bit more, as you can only ring to the standard of the most novice ringer in the band. However, learning skills that require longer term commitment can be rewarding and stimulating for the brain.

A quick internet search shows that there are a multitude of sites that promote learning something new, from new skills, to new languages, to cooking and baking, knitting and creating videos. I’ve always found learning something new to be rewarding. It doesn’t necessarily make me an expert in it but it gives me better understanding, better skills, better adjustment and a wider range of things to do.

Having just completed the 6 week mindfulness course, I’m now looking around the site to find the next thing to dive into.

Analysis Paralysis

I’m doing an online course in mindfulness and wellbeing at the moment and have been fortunate to spend all of the day going through the next module, which has been discussing, amongst other things, the merits of whether mindfulness teachers need to be qualified or regulated in some way, and whether attending an 8 week intensive mindfulness course is sufficient for someone to set themselves up as a mindfulness teacher. Don’t panic, I’m not going to be opening up a clinic any time soon.

Being scientifically objective about mindfulness is difficult in that it is difficult to measure one person’s experiences against another’s. We all come pre-programmed with inbuilt prejudices and life experiences that cause us to be open or judgemental about ideas. We all have unconscious biases that impact our opinion as to whether a therapy has been helpful or not.

Connection to a teacher is important. Without a rapport and mutual understanding student and teacher may not settle into a place of trust. People attend mindfulness based stress relief (MBSR) or mindfulness cognitive behavioural therapy (MCBT) for a multitude of reasons, but it is important to recognise that many of them do so because they have been referred as part of a treatment therapy for depression or stress/anxiety, trauma or PTSD. However, even those of us who are seemingly quite resilient and able to cope with most things could end up being triggered by regressing into something that we had long ago put away, dealt with, coped with or moved on from, as part of mindfulness practice.

Is someone who has been on an 8 week course sufficiently qualified and experienced enough to handle that?

If I were in the situation of needing support to such a level, I would be wanting to find out more about the person delivering the sessions. In a business environment we are taught to use the PESTLE analysis tool to investigate the political, economic, social, technological, legal and environmental aspect of a business before investing or setting up a new business. If I were looking for a teacher who was going to be helping me explore the deeper parts of my brain, and help me find ways to cope and recover I would want to know that the teacher had done those same sorts of analysis on the subject of mindfulness and not just got a certificate of attendance.