So today, as I continue an intentional week of online mindfulness events, I was teaching a group of unpaid carers mindfulness skills. During lockdown I have been a complete convert to online teaching via Zoom. Of course it’s not the same as being together in a room but actually these virtual communities are the next best thing. And as a teacher who is used to arriving at dusty unloved community halls with little in the way of IT support or functioning projectors, what I have noticed is that screen share on Zoom is 100% more likely to allow participants to see my lovingly crafted powerpoint presentation than the previously mentioned dusty community halls.

And we have breakout room technology to allow participants to mix and mingle and by the end of a short online course and especially an eight week online course, there is a sense of community, a sense that we have shared a meaningful journey together – we have practiced, we have connected and shared and we have had a bit of nosey into where we chose to sit for each class. Perhaps this glimpse of our homes and lives is more authentic than the self we often show in a community hall or at work, perhaps that’s why these groups feel meaningful and reduce the sense of social isolation that we can all feel during lockdown.

Online teaching is not the same as face to face classes but it’s an important resource and support to those who are feeling isolated and disconnected as the lockdown and social distancing continues into the future. For this reason I am now offering more online content in the coming months. Follow this link for details of the Mindfulness-Based Sleep Hygiene Course, an affordable and practical course rooted in the latest research around sleep hygiene supported by journalling and daily mindfulness practice thismindfullife.net

And for this reason I am proud to be working in partnership with and supportive of unpaid carers in Hertfordshire during the uncertainty of lockdown.

It’s been quite a year, for me as a teacher and trainee therapist. I’ve been busy, my clinical placement and diploma started this autumn and time has whizzed past ever since. But before all that kicked in, over the summer, me and the children watched Marie Kondo on Netflix and decided we would do our own declutter.

This tied in well with wanting to live more simply, with being intentional in when and how I shop. I started this year with one main resolution – to buy less, consume less and I have stuck to this – I didn’t buy any clothes for myself for the best part of a year.

And so thanks to the declutter my drawers and wardrobe are emptier than the start of this year. You don’t need to read one of Marie Kondo’s best selling books to get the essence of her declutter method – you basically pile all your clothes in one (shamingly big) pile.

For a woman of my age and income, I don’t think my pile of clothes was too bad to start with but there was still stuff I could cull. Then once you’ve decided what you throw and what you keep, you move onto step two which is repack the clothes you will keep into your drawers in a more aesthetically pleasing way that means you can always find the jumper or top you are looking for.

Amazingly the kids were on board too and did their own versions of this. Three months later my drawers still look this way and I haven’t brought anything new to add further clutter. My first Extinction Rebellion meeting helped add conviction that this is the right way to live right now – less stuff means more time actually, more time to be with and connect to people, more time to do things I am passionate about.

I hope to continue living a simple life: college, work and family keep me busy enough so to give up needless consumption, whether shopping locally or mindless online purchases, feels a no-brainer right now and I’m more on board than ever to buy less, fly less and drive less in 2020.

Thanks for following my sporadic blogs in 2019,

Wishing you a peaceful Winterval and a mindful 2020!

Last year I quit caffeine and reassessed my relationship with alcohol. So I guess it was only a matter of time that sugar would be the next in line to be culled. To me the three together are quite symbolic: sugar, caffeine and alcohol fuel our lives in the West – they are all acceptable and highly addictive. Two are classified as drugs, sugar gets less attention. But all three affect our lives and health and are, within society, the topic of much debate.

I believe capitalism cannot really function without them. We drink at night to unwind from the busyness of our lives then when we get up at 7am and feel tired we fuel ourselves with sugar and caffeine to get us through the day and then guess what? At the end of the day we need a little help to unwind again. It’s a cycle: wash, rinse, repeat.

The last year has been a playful adventuring into this theory that I have long held, that this holy trinity of substances fuels capitalism and also fuels a lot of suffering. ‘To know and not act, is to not yet know’, as Mishima wrote. I cannot really know this is the case until I have rid myself of cravings for all three.

So here I go – 2018 and a sugar free, caffeine free, alcohol free life. Sounds fun, right? The bizarre thing is I couldn’t be more excited. I decided as alcohol and caffeine have already been dealt with my ‘dry January’ this year would focus on sugar.

Now out of the three, sugar is the one I was most reluctant to tackle. I have never eaten that much sugar, it seems a fairly natural, plant based, food. Where’s the harm in it? So I started this experiment fully expecting to find it pointless, not for me and revert back to my biscuit eating ways come the end of January.

But to my surprise I have enjoyed this mostly sugar free month. I’m not like super strict about it, I still have ketchup and have eaten some tomato soup in that time (both heavily laden with sugar) but I have stopped putting honey on my muesli and now buy sugar free muesli at that. I have quit, after so many years, my daily biscuit at around 3pm. It’s been replaced with dried mango and I have survived! I got lots of chocolate for Christmas which has been hidden away but I am sure it will get eaten at some point. Yesterday there was cake at work and I said no. Not because I felt I mustn’t but because I genuinely didn’t want it.

The comedown from sugar is just as bad as when you give up caffeine: headaches, cravings, flu like symptoms. If something makes you feel that bad when you quit I figure it can’t be that good. I have tried some adventures in sugar free baking and the kids are keen to try a sugar reduced life.

We never know how something will feel until we try it, all I know is that 3pm dip which I had everyday has now vanished. I feel more energetic in my mid-40s than I possibly ever have or at least post-children. I know there will be days when I say yes to cake but just to crack the daily biscuit habit alone seems a great achievement.

Today’s total practice time: 10 minutes movement 10 minutes seated

If I were to make any new year’s resolutions, which I’m not sure are even that useful (see a previous musing on this here thismindfullife.net/2016/01 ) they would be drawn from the learning that happened during the retreat late last year thismindfullife.net/…7/12/21/retreating-3 along with less sugar and more creative writing.

Part of this drive to unleash more creativity will involve The 52 Lists Project which I hope to work through as the year unfolds.

This book appealed to me as it was weekly rather than daily, which felt a more realistic aim. And it’s a book rather than staring at a screen which pledging to do a blog post everyday for a year or whatever would entail.

I guess that means a new year’s resolution might also include, if I decided to make them,  less screen time, less busy-ness in general.

One day I hope to find that elusive work-life balance and so for the most part more than anything else less busy-ness resonates most with me if I were to pledge to do anything differently in 2018.

Belated happy new year – in the spirit of less busy-ness it has taken me a week to write a new year’s blog post!

Today’s total practice time: 30 minutes movement and seated practice

I’ve lost count of the articles I’ve read about the pervasive and damaging nature of technology. Participants on the eight week courses I teach often comment on how difficult it is to switch off from work, citing the fact they can all too easily read their emails 24/7 as one more stressor in their life.

Being by nature quite low-fi I thought I had managed to dodge all of that. I didn’t get a smartphone for years and like many middle-classed parents, I don’t use much technology in front of the kids. Their screen time is usually limited to watching the occasional CBBC programme on the computer and the odd educational maths or English online primary game we’ve discovered.

So recently when I facilitated a full day mindfulness practice session I was surprised by how much yearning I experienced to check in with my phone as the day unfolded.

Perhaps it was because running the session, though fulfilling and relaxing as it was, felt like work. And at work, away from the kids, I often lose track of how often I surreptitiously check my phone for missed calls, aware small children can fall sick at any point during the school day, I check in with my phone to seek reassurance. A blank screen tells me all is, thus far, well.

So I was working but needed to model the behavior I had set out for the group – a day to switch off your phones and just be with yourself, practising non-doing, practising noticing what happens when the distractions are out of our reach for six hours.

As facilitating meet up groups comes under the broad umbrella of work, I wasn’t expecting to get much out of it for my own personal practice. But the day unfolded as one of great calm. It allowed me to tap into the calm I had experienced whilst on a longer retreat. I was aware I didn’t want the day to end and part of that was connected with having a digital detox for the day. It allowed me to return to work the next day fully recharged, ready to face the Christmas chaos of work do’s and busyness that lay ahead.

For more details on local practice sessions and our regular meet up group follow the retreat tab https://thismindfullife.net/retreats/ or the meet up group tab https://thismindfullife.net/bishops-stortford-meet-up-group/

Today’s total practice time: 20 minutes mindful movement, 30 minutes seated practice.