Take a Mental Vacation to Avoid Stress

Last week I had the best vacation in Italy! I visited the cafes and museums, had a fabulous time at a few fashion shows and enjoyed the company of an old friend that I had not seen since high school. We decided to reconnect in Italy because we both have always wanted to go there. On our first night there we dined at Centrale, a beautiful, hip, chic restaurant/lounge in Venice. The food was amazing! I had a succulent parmesean farfalle pasta with chicken and mushrooms that was to die for…yummy! My friend had the spaghetti carbonara and a glass of white wine.  Afterward, we decided to return to our hotel in order to rest up for the festivities on the following day. Okay, people, I didn’t literally go to Italy last week, but I did take a mental vacation there, and it was almost as nice as the real thing.

Mental vacations are like retreating to that quiet, relaxing place that your yoga instructor tells you to go to when you are doing the final relaxation pose at the end of every class.  They are fun, free and can take you anywhere your imagination allows you to go. Mental vacations are a nice way for moms/stepmoms, working women and just about anyone to escape from the norm. I usually take my mental vacations during my “me” time in a relaxing bath with soft music playing. For those 3o minutes I am not mom, wife, business woman or counselor, and I don’t worry about the challenges of stepmamahood or motherhood. I allow myself to mentally escape to a place where I get to choose who goes along for the ride.

Next week, I think my business partner and very dear friend, Diane and I, will take a relaxing trip with our husbands to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. We could all use a couples only vacation right about now. If anyone else wants to join us, please let me know. The plane tickets, hotels, food, and activities are all FREE!

What about you, readers? Describe your ultimate mental vacation in the comments section below and win a brand new Sirius Sportster 5 XM Satellite Radio!

2010 Mind and Body Tune Up for Mom!

Leaving all of the stresses of 2009 in 2009 won’t be easy, but by committing yourself to a mind and body tune up in 2010, you will serve yourself well.

If you are like many, the stresses of everyday life can leave you feeling not only stressed but exhausted mentally and physically, all of which can leave not just you, but your modern family members feeling completely out of sync with you as well. As parents, whether bio or step, we often put our own health, well-being and self-care aside to take care of others. Women are especially guilty of putting themselves last on the list of being cared for.

Although I love to offer you readers my own helpful hints from time to time, the tips I read in the January 2010 issue of People Extra were some of the best I have seen. Each one of them gave me personally something to think about in my own life and I wanted to share the same with our readers:

10 Little Life Balancers:

1. Get into nature. Head for a hiking trail or a local park. Walk along a beach or along a river. Nature has healing powers.
   
2. Connect with a friend. We all need them for support, advice and laughs. Meet for coffee, catch a movie, or just call and catch up.
   
3. Connect with an animal. “Pet therapy” lifts the spirits and takes your mind off yourself for a while.
   
4. Center yourself. Anytime, anywhere: put your attention on your breath in one spot and leave it there. You’ll feel calmer and more grounded.
   
5. Sweat it out. When you’re tense, a vigorous workout is a great way to blow off steam (check with your doctor before starting an exercise regimen).
   
6. Say NO. It’s OK if you don’t do everything all of the time.
   
7. Say YES. If someone offers to help, let them.
   
8. Express yourself. Write in a journal or make art. Unleash the creative force within you.
   
9. Do something spontaneous. Shake up the routine. Take a drive in a new direction – or be a tourist in your own hometown.
   
10. Have a drink. And make it water! Water is an essential nutrient for the body.

A couple of little extra honorable mentions in the article discussed something a girlfriend and I just discussed today. Take a trip to a new place you’ve never been before. It doesn’t have to be exotic or expensive. Or, find a nook or cranny in your home that you can designate as “your space.” We all deserve a place that we can retreat to in private. Make it your own. One little extra tip I would like to share with you is a little gift my husband gives me once or twice a year. That is the gift of a nice hotel room all to myself for a night. I check in at noon and don’t check out until noon the next day. I take all my books, my hobby items and I curl up alone and watch television and have my own time to myself. As a mother. step-mom and career woman, at times, I spread myself very thin. This little treat is very special and helps me to reinvent, listen and re-center myself. I challenge you readers to try some of the above tips to reinvigorate and give yourself a mind and body tune-up for 2010 – I know I will be trying all of them!

Peace & Blessings,
Di

The People Pleaser: Part I

Can you not stand the thought of upsetting others? Or, maybe you are like me and you put everyone elses’ needs and wants before your own? If any of these statements describe you, you may be guilty of being a “people pleaser.” Granted, just being a busy parent and spouse, one can easily fall into the trap of as I have often been called the “be all, do all and go to person” for everything. Being a people pleaser has been something that I have personally struggled with in the past. I am the immediate “go to” person at work as well as at home. Recently, I came to the conclusion that I cannot and will not “be all and do all” to and for everyone in my life whether that be to my children, my husband, my boss or my friends. I have many friends that fall into this same category. I watch them bend over backwards, like me, to help everyone and get little to no time for themselves and when they do seem to find a little time, they feel guilty….just like me. My problem lies in the fact that I have a hard time saying the simple word “no” to anyone, any favor, any task asked of me. I felt like it was more important to please and impress that person or family member and endure the pressure and sometimes the stress that it brings along with it just to seek their approval. At times, I even found myself making excuses to myself for my people pleasing ways. Hence, my recent conclusion to “just say no to people pleasing!”

I have determined that the approval I may have thought I needed was really only my issue. I need not anyone’s approval. I have also determined that when my children are grown or when I am no longer here, how many miles I drove them to soccer practices or to games or how many times I stressed about buying them the latest and greatest clothes or toys or given them my last $5.00 until payday for little extras that they really could have gone without will not be remembered by them at all. What they will remember is the time I shared with each of them, my caretaking of them when they were sick, my unconditional love for them; not my people-pleasing because I didn’t want them to be upset with me and they definitely will not remember all of the times I gave into their excessive wants. My boss will appreciate me for my hard work and tenacity not for my accumulating 150 hours of paid time off because I never call in sick when I need to out of fear of displeasing anyone. You get the point? I do not have to be a martyr.

In my research on this subject I found out that people pleasers are really just fearful of rejection. Some feel that if they don’t put everyone else ahead of themselves or their needs, they will end up alone. They are afraid of setting boundaries out of the fear of disappointment. Something that I found out during my research really hit a note with me personally and that is people pleasers usually were raised in environments wherein their needs and feelings were pushed aside and not considered. Bingo! Boy there is so much truth to that statement. A lot of children of divorce end up being people pleasers in some aspect or another. They have been pulled in between their parents and often find themselves having to take sides. They didn’t have a choice in the decision of their parents to divorce, and after the divorce, their feelings often get pushed aside because their parents can’t find time to step off the battlefield long enough to see that their children need their attention.  In turn, they end up trying to please both parents all of the time and this behavior continues and carries over into their adult lives.

The following are some tips that I found very helpful:

1. Focus on your own best interest instead of avoiding conflict;

2. Do something for yourself;

3. Learn how to say no;

4. Learn when it is appropriate for you to take responsibility for an action and when it is someone elses’ issue. Do not bear burdens that aren’t yours to bear.

You are important. Your self-worth is not based on how much you do for other people. Learning to say no is not easy for a people pleaser, but having an assertive attitude without being aggressive is the key. Wanting to please everyone all of the time is stressful and even hurtful to our physical well-beings as well. Remember, there is nothing wrong with taking care of yourself first and then you will be more able to effectively and lovingly take care of the others in your life.

Peace and blessings,
Di