A Wellbeing Invitation for November & December
A simple Occupational Therapy inspired monthly prescription of activities intended to support wellbeing that you are invited to spend as little, or as often as you like on.
Create a sensory kit
This is all about self soothing on the go. Chose a few objects that you can carry around with you, based mourned the five sense of touch, taste, smell, sight and sound. The idea being that in moments of challenge you can access your sensory kit and play with the objects with mindful awareness, exploring the sensations, dropping into your direct and felt experience. An emotional prop. Within my own kit I carry, amongst other things, a lip balm, nail file, perfume, rescue remedy sweets, a handkerchief. Keep it simple, small and easily available.
For more ideas have a look at this wonderful blog by art therapist and psychotherapist Carolyn Mehlomakalu.
2. Take 3 Soothing Activity Breaks
Much like a breakfast, lunch and dinner, we are going to nourish ourselves by taking three activity based soothing breaks within out day. In doing so we build new habits, creating new neural pathways that support us to activate our parasympathetic nervous systems. Not only are these preventative measures but tasks we can then fall upon to support ourselves in experience of situations where we may feel overwhelmed.
Create a list of soothing, nourishing activities that you enjoy. Using this as a guide carve out three pauses within your day to carry out a soothing break. Here is a Soothing Activity Examples document I have used previously with clients you may find helpful. As an addition you can write a few lines in a note book to describe how you feel after the activity, it could be just a word.
3. Sensory Based Meditation
Over the next 5 Friday's I will be releasing a new 10 minute sensory based meditation which you are invited to use. Each week we will have a different sensory focal point that you'll be encouraged to explore over the coming week. This supports the development of neural pathways, dropping into the experiences of our bodies and how they experience the mental events, intended to sooth and refresh our nervous systems supporting our health and wellbeing. The practice of the week will be uploaded to my soundcloud album here or you can access them below.
To explore this in more depth you are welcome to join access the live recordings and resources of the Friday morning group. Details can be found here.
