1. You are content with being on your own. When this happens, you feel great, never bored, and pleasantly occupied. You know how to entertain yourself, or simply relax and take it easy. 

2. You trust yourself.

3. You make decisions on your own, make selections; take responsibility for your actions. 

4. You are in touch with your own feelings and emotions. You recognize them, deal with them, control their intensity, and know how to express them.

5. You invest in yourself. Self-improvement, health, pleasure, and comfort.

6. Your self-criticism is up to par. You clearly see your strong sides and your weak sides. You recognize it when you have done something wrong. You admit to your misconduct and transgressions. Yet you do not berate yourself. Rather you deal with consequences and learn from your mistakes. 

7. You are able to support yourself. You know what’s good for you and you use it to your advantage. When needed you are not above asking others for help. You don’t consider this a weakness. 

8. You make yourself happy. There is enough in your life to gratify yourself. And you are responsible for all of that.

9. You know yourself.

10. You respect your own boundaries. You have a clear understanding of what is acceptable with respect to you and what is not. You know how to bring that information across to other people. If people somehow ignore you – you take a stand. 

11. You are successful in dealing with other people. You recognize the importance of relationships as such. You surround yourself with good people.

The post 11 signs of healthy relationship with… your own self! appeared first on Mindspa.

Summer is here! We would like this wonderful time of the year, which is just starting, to bring us as much joy as possible, heal the wounds brought by spring and winter, and fill us with energy and resources.

Does it depend on what surrounds us? To a certain extent, yes. But a lot depends on our attitudes too! What beliefs should you get rid of to prepare your brain for the goodness of summer?

○ Life is a continuous struggle.

Yes, this year so far, was difficult and painful. But no one canceled the good things either! Do not trap yourself in the state of mind of constant struggle. Get ready to notice the light that is around you.

○ Nothing good will happen. / It will never be like before.

This defeatist attitude locks you in the armor of despondency. Replace it with an optimistic point of view: “It will not be the same as before, but it will be different”, and “I have a lot of good things ahead!”. Positive thoughts will allow you to notice good things.

○ I can not cope with the difficulties that come my way.

Firstly, you will find a way to deal with them. Secondly, this thought blocks your strength and resources, preventing you from spreading your wings.

○ I didn’t have time to lose weight / get myself in shape / start a new life, etc. by the summer. Now it’s too late to start …

It’s never too late to start. You can do it tomorrow! No – today, right now! Whatever you want to do! Otherwise, there is a risk of being late for life. ?

○ I can’t influence anything, I’m just an ordinary person.

You influence your life – every day, every hour, every minute! In one day, you make dozens of small choices that make your life what it is. “Starting with yourself” is important!

○ Another person will make me happy.

Only you can make yourself happy! No other person should or can take on this role. If you need someone for this, then there is a serious error in the formula of your happiness.

○ If I complete my degree / get a new job / pass my exam / get married, then everything in my life will be great.

Do not make yourself dependent on any circumstances. Even if the event you want does not happen, this does not mean that “everything is lost”.

○ When I achieve my goal (having a slim body, meeting the right person, having a baby, paying off the mortgage, etc.) – that’s when my real life will start!

Delayed Life Syndrome is a big problem. Life does not pause at the time when you are waiting for something. It goes on right now, right at this moment, while you are reading this article. If it seems to you that you are just “preparing” for your real life, it will pass you by…

○ This is just not in the cards for me…

No matter what you are talking about, this phrase is fundamentally wrong. This is again a constraint that limits you and prevents you from setting goals and achieving them.

○ We must be content with the little that we have.

Why? Who said that? Do you really think you don’t deserve anything significant? Do not be afraid to dream big, do not forbid yourself to want things! Otherwise, you may be holding tightly the little bird you have in your hand, and miss the two big ones in the nearby bush…

The post Get your brain ready for the summer appeared first on Mindspa.

Today is your last day at the department of Friendship With Your Body. Before we move on, let’s create a long-term plan.

Allocate 15 minutes.

Think about what you would like to change in your relationship with your body.

How would you like to improve your contact with it?

What is important to improve or develop in your body?

Please create realistic goals – those which correspond to your physical abilities.

Why do you need to improve something? What will it provide you? How will you feel differently if this happens?

How will you start pursuing your goal?

Identify the first 3 steps.

Do the first step today.

For other steps, create a schedule.

Follow this schedule as if it was your project at work.

To comprehensively work on your relationship with your body and your nutritional habits you can join our course “Psycho-Eaters”. Join it today <enter info here>.

The post Plan appeared first on Mindspa.

Rituals bring stability to our lives.

They are very important for forming a stable relationship with your body.

Yesterday, we learned what your body enjoys.

Today, let’s think about what rituals for taking care of your body you already know.

Taking care of your body does not mean only cosmetic procedures. Here you can include physical exercise, any actions for improving your health, and, of course, everything you do for enjoyment.

Create a list of the rituals you do every day for your body.

Pat yourself on the back – you are already doing a lot!

Think about what is missing. Perhaps, you could add some rituals to improve your health? Or bump-up physical activities?

Add two more little rituals.

Do not add something major. If you do not do sports at all and decide to start going to the gym daily, most likely you will not succeed. But doing 10 sit-ups or a 15-minute walk is quite realistic.

Perform your new rituals for at least one week.

If you want to comprehensively work on your body and your eating habits, you can take our course “Psycho-Eaters”. Join it right now for just <enter info here>.

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To love yourself means to please yourself.

Today, we announce the day of bringing joy to your body.

Why is this important?

It is simple: the more you bring joy to your body the more it brings joy to you.

Allocate 15 minutes.

Analyze: what does your body enjoy?

You can use the technique called “Separation”. Imagine that your body is another person and ask it. What does it like? What makes it happy?

Write down all the answers.

Today, do something nice out of this list.

Try to introduce in your weekly to-do list an item “pleasure for my body”. Doing it once a week is already a good start.

Share your observations in posts or stories. Do not forget to mention our account (Instagram @mindspa.me). We read all the posts and feel very proud of you!

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Come on in, sit comfortably. Today you will spend a day in a wonderful place: the hall of gratitude to your body.

Every day, minute, or second your body does a huge amount of work. It supports your life, fights for your health and wellbeing, and defends yourself (sometimes from yourself).

Many processes take place in your body while you are reading this text.

Your body deserves gratitude for everything that it does for you.

Allocate a few minutes. Relax. Close your eyes and say “thank you” to your body for all the work that it does every day.

Stay in this state of gratitude for a while. Notice how your body responds to it.

If you do this practice every day, you will be surprised how different you will feel and how your relationship with your body will change.

Do you want to work on your body in more depth? Join our course “Psycho-Eaters”. You can buy it right now for <enter info here>.

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Today, you have an interesting task. You will observe your body. Imagine that there is a monitor attached to it that captures absolutely everything.

Pay attention to all the signals and record them.

When does your body feel good?

And when not so good?

When there is tension in your body?

What brings your body pleasure?

And what causes discomfort?

In the evening, analyze your records. If you feel like it – continue your observations for a few more days.

Just by being more attentive, you can learn to better understand your bodily signals. And therefore, you will acquire a magic remote control that will allow you to manage your body and its states.

Post your observations from time to time or publish them in stories. Do not forget to mention our account (Instagram @mindspa.me). We watch all your stories and feel very proud of you!

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In our day and age, when the internet in general and Instagram in particular, are so popular, we are bombarded with a huge number of unrealistic and potentially harmful images of perfect bodies.

Actresses and singers whom we know to be older than middle age, don’t have a hint of wrinkles on their faces. Young women on Instagram have smooth skin, ideal faces, perfect teeth, no cellulite, flawless eyebrows and eyelashes, slim bodies… Aaah, stop it! So, how on earth can you love yourself when what you see in the mirror is quite different?

In these conditions, a treacherous thought appears as if on its own: if I don’t look like a model from a fashion magazine, that means I am not beautiful, and my body is not very fit, and my face is not ideal, and surely nobody will ever love me since I myself do not accept and love my body.

In our time of plastic surgeries, big and small, women often get trapped thinking: if only I fix my lips (breasts, nose, ears, eyelids) then my life will change and I will love and accept myself. No, friends. This is not how it works. As a rule, after the first operation, there is a second one, then a third one, etc., till infinity. But love for yourself still doesn’t come. 

What can you do?

First, we must emphasize that if you strongly dislike yourself or your body it makes sense to see a psychologist to figure out the causes of this phenomenon and to stop treating yourself as an evil stepmother.

But what can you start with if for now, you don’t have an opportunity to see a specialist?

1) Acknowledge your feelings.

Name them using specific words, call out your feelings and emotions.

2) Stop comparing yourself to others.

There are no ideal bodies! But there is makeup, photoshop, and photo-filters. What you see on your tablet screen, on TV, or in fashion magazines – is not real. Therefore, taking it as a basis for comparison is not fair towards yourself, to say the least. Comparing yourself to real people also doesn’t make sense since the criteria are too vague. You compare your legs with Naomi’s and get upset that the outcome is not favorable for you. But Naomi may be dreaming about the shape of your breasts or your beautiful hair. Everyone has their pluses and minuses!

3) Start taking care of your body.

Yes, the way it is now – not ideal, with wrinkles, freckles, and toes that are too big. What does your body need? Sauna? Massage? Regular moisturizing? Expensive and fragrant shower gel? Yoga? Swimming pool? Give your body the gift of love and care, even though for now you don’t notice any response.

4) Look at yourself with loving eyes.

How do you look at someone you love? What do you feel at that moment? Do you really evaluate separately the quality of their skin, height, and weight? How do you feel about their shortcomings? Do you feel irritation, or rather tenderness and understanding?

Try to look at yourself from this point of view. 

How would you look at yourself if you loved yourself? How would you speak about yourself? 

How would you dress, feed, and take care of yourself?

Start with something small! Acknowledge that you and your body have a right not to be ideal. It is important. And then it will be much easier to accept and love your body, which is an important part of you.

The post How to accept your body? appeared first on Mindspa.

Panic attack is an “emergency” mode which is turned on by the person’s psyche. It is a reaction to danger – real or (most often) imaginary. And you need to learn how to get out of this regime, preferably with minimal losses.

Of course, what we describe here will not address the root cause: for now, we are treating symptoms rather than the disease. But the “disease” itself needs to be treated with the help of a psychotherapist. It will take some time, and this process begins with a search for the reasons for the “strike” declared by the autonomic nervous system. But you are not going to suffer from a runny nose until the allergy ends: you need to take urgent measures and make your life easier. Even more so in the case of a panic attack – it is much more painful than a cold…

Now we know the very essence of the process of formation of a panic reaction, and this gives us an important understanding: in order for PA to stop, we need to reduce the existing tension (in the thoughts, in the body, in the emotions) and switch off the reaction that has already begun. This is what all the coping strategies are aimed at. If panic attacks still happen to you then you probably already know some ways that help you when you get overwhelmed.  And you can also probably list of certain techniques that do not work for you, so it’s time to expand your arsenal.

The general rules of self-help during a PA are the following:

– get grounded. Literally, feel the ground under your feet, every square inch of your feet touching the floor. Note your sensations, focus on them. 

– try to bring yourself to reality: who am I, where am I, what’s the time, where am I standing or sitting, what is going on around me, what do I see and hear, what are the sensations on my skin.

– get warm: if you can, wrap yourself in a blanket or in a large sweater. Get a heating pad. This will help you get your blood moving through your limbs and around the whole body. 

– manage your breathing, focus on it. Breathe in the corners of an imaginary square: inhale on the count of four while looking at one corner, look at the next corner and hold your breath, exhale in the next corner on the count of eight, hold your breath and move your eyes to the next corner. Breathe into a paper bag. 

– choose any object. Look at it very attentively, mentally (or aloud) note all the little details of it. 

– try convincing yourself that this is just a panic attack, you are not going crazy, you will not get sick nor die. It is unpleasant, but not dangerous. It will be over soon. 

Now, let’s consider these methods in more detail.

Let us start from the key aspect. What is always affected during a PA? Breathing, of course. Recall any instance when you experienced nervousness or anxiety. Your breathing becomes shallow and fast. Just noticing this change makes you even more nervous. Any changes to our psychological or emotional state affect our breathing.

The good news is that we can influence our breathing, especially if we practice a little bit.

• Shall we learn how to do it?

If you need to lessen the symptoms of stress that were caused by anxiety or fear, you need to do certain breathing exercises. They will help you get back to reality.

The general principles of managing breathing are simple and can be easily memorized: 1) slow down the breathing rate, 2) make longer exhales as compared to inhales, 3) distraction. 

• Breathing on the count of 6: 1-2 inhale, 3 hold, 4-5-6 long exhale, emptying your lungs.
• “Breathing into a square”. Find any rectangular shape. Look in the upper-left corner and inhale, slowly counting to 4. Then look at the upper-right corner and hold your breath, slowly counting to 4. Move your eyes to the lower-right corner and exhale, slowly counting to 4. Look at the lower left corner and try to smile. Do this exercise for 2-3 minutes.
• The “4-7-8” method can be used to lower the stress level. Sit straight, put the tip of your tongue to the back side of your upper teeth and keep it there during the whole exercise. Inhale through your nose on the count of 4. Hold your breath on the count of 7. Exhale making audible sound through your mouth on the count of 8. This is one full breath. Repeat this cycle three more times – making four breaths total.
• Rhythmic breathing: inhale through the nose – one nostril at a time, exhale through the mouth in three bursts. Inhale through one nostril on the count of one, exhale with both nostrils while counting 2-3-4 in three bursts. One inhale through the right nostril, exhale through both, next inhale through the left nostril. Try it several times, gradually increasing the number of cycles. 

As soon as you notice that panic is reaching out to you with its tentacles, start controlling your breath, consciously slowing it down and making is deeper. Select one of the techniques above, the one that you like the most – and do it!

When our brain notices fast breathing it reacts by sending SOS signals to the body. “Fast breathing – means something is wrong, something is happening, you need to release the stress hormones!” And here they are – raising the adrenaline level in your whole body. It works in the other direction too: the stress hormones make you breathe faster. But if you breathe slowly and evenly, the same mechanism will help you move in the opposite direction: “Oh, slow breathing, therefore it is not dangerous, false alarm, at ease guys!”

Do not forget about the grounding techniques. When everything around you is trembling (a PA can make you believe that something terrible is going on), it is very important to feel support under your feet. You can use the grounding methods to help you return to reality. 

• Find a small object in your pocket that will be “grounding” for you. It may be a little stone, a piece of sea glass, a small statue, or even a coin. Focus on it and mentally describe every little detail of this object while touching it and noticing your sensations through your fingers. 
• Wrap yourself in a blanket. Tightly hug yourself or ask someone to hug you. You can rub your arms from your shoulders to your wrists, and legs from your feet to your thighs. Focus on your bodily sensations. 
• Stand firmly and “attach” your feet to the floor. It is better to take off your shoes, if possible. Feel your feet on the ground or on the floor, as if your feet are the foundation of a sturdy house or the roots of a big tree that is securely attached to the ground. Feel the floor under your feet, feel the force of gravity. You can do this exercise while sitting or while laying down too.  
• Lay down on the floor. Scan your body from top to bottom, noticing where your body touches the floor, what parts of your body feel it. Focus on this sensation of pressure, texture, and temperature. 
  
   

In the next article, we will continue studying quick methods of coming back to reality. We would want you to create a small toolbox of coping strategies in the case of PA.

The post Panic attack: how to help your body appeared first on Mindspa.

We already mentioned that PAs are not caused by a real psychological or somatic pathology. They come from the “rioting” autonomous nervous system. When you don’t feel balanced, any emotional experience (seeing a bus door, if your first attack happened on a bus, or troubling news, or just recalling the previous PA) – can cause a powerful adrenaline rush. And here it is, your autonomous nervous reaction – asking “Here I am, did you call me? I sense danger!”. 

This combination of autonomous nervous symptoms is associated with a grave physical or psychological disorder since it strikes like a powerful force. To begin with, let’s consider – what is the autonomous nervous system? 

People have not one but two nervous systems. One is central (it deals with the brain) and peripheral (it deals with the body). The peripheral system consists of two parts: one manages the muscles – it transmits the signals from the brain to the muscles. It controls the movements of the body, the balance, etc. And the second one is autonomous – it is responsible for the workings of the internal organs. Like a director at a large corporation, it delegates various important tasks to different organs: the heartbeat, the blood pressure, the production of urine, saliva, and sweat, the frequency and depth of respiration, peristalsis of the gastrointestinal tract, the production of hormones, and much more. For a PA to occur, the central nervous system must evaluate the environment as dangerous, and the peripheral one needs to pull together all the hidden resources of the body to deal with this danger. 

The autonomous nervous system has two parts: sympathetic and parasympathetic. The first one intensifies the functioning of internal organs, while the second one lessens it. As a result, the sympathetic system creates the necessary strain when the organism needs to fight or flee from danger. The muscle tone increases, metabolic processes intensify, breathing becomes frequent and shallow, heart rate rises, blood pressure rises, etc. And the parasympathetic system is responsible for relaxation, digestion, and rest. It takes over when the organism realizes that “everything is fine, I can chill out”. 

When a person experiences big emotional upheavals or prolonged tension, the hypothalamus (the area of the brain that produces alarm impulses) starts signaling to the hypophysis about the state of stress (like top-management is sending a directive). The hypophysis, in turn, “communicates” it to the adrenal glands. They, like “shop-floor workers” get to work and inject into the bloodstream such amount of adrenaline that is appropriate in emergency situations, such as fire, ambush, financial crisis, or death of a loved one. At these levels of adrenalin, we will observe the state of panic. Since the decision about having a panic attack is taken by the body as a whole but it is implemented by the “shop-floor workers”, PAs can produce different symptoms for different people. 

When a person experiences a PA for the first time, they get very scared and become very afraid of another occurrence of such an event. Nobody wants to experience these “wonderful” strange feelings again. 

What happens to the brain at these moments? 

Since the emotional charge is so strong, the person gets fixated on their unpleasant physical sensations. They very quickly form a link (neural connections): “Oh, last time it was bad in the subway, next time I will experience the same”. Or, “when my heart is beating like this, I will have problems with breathing and will get overwhelmed by fear”. 

When Kate was taking a bus, she experienced a stomach problem (simply put – a bout of diarrhea). She endured 20 terrible minutes before she could run out of the bus and find the nearest restroom. This was a horrifying ordeal for her, and she experienced real panic. Even though she knew that the culprit was the spicy taco she bought from a street vendor, when next time she had to board a bus, she experienced strong fear. Immediately, her stomach started aching… 

When a person undergoes a panic attack, they may develop a fear that the attack will repeat itself. Therefore, they may start avoiding certain places and situations that are in their mind connected with the attack. Next thing you know, they are not able to stay alone at home, or to be in crowded places, or to be far away from a restroom, or they avoid elevators, escalators, or subway. However, all these desperate attempts only “feed” their neural network because avoiding only strengthens and solidifies the panic disfunction. The person does everything to evade the same nightmare, but their fixation on “anything but this” is what’s feeding their panic attacks, like blood vessels are feeding a tumor. 

All of this entails significant, ever-expanding limitations in the life of a person with panic disorder and reinforces the presence of panic attacks. The person’s conviction that a panic attack is life-threatening and should be avoided at all costs only grows. 

Since PA has already happened once, new players are entering the field – triggers. Even if it seems to a person that an attack occurs literally “from scratch”, there are always events, sensations, or thoughts that provoke the onset of a panic attack. And later, everything that is associated with PA can also become a trigger for the onset of an attack. Therefore, with each new attack, the list of triggers can be replenished with those that are now connected with the PAs by association. Previously, PAs were only happening in public transport, then just on the way to work – now the whole road seems to be one continuous trigger. 

Such stimuli cause somato-vegetative changes in the human body, which it interprets as an impending threat to his physical (fear of death from a heart attack, from suffocation) or mental health (fear of going crazy or losing control of the situation). 

External triggers for panic attacks include: caffeine, alcoholic beverages, nicotine, drugs, stuffy rooms, strong odors, flashing lights, cold or, conversely, hot weather. 

The internal triggers for a panic attack are extremely varied. They can be: 

• lack of sleep, 
• chronic exhaustion, 
• intense stresses, 
• low blood sugar, 
• concomitant somatic diseases (hormonal disorders, high blood pressure), 
• negative emotions (intense anger, resentment, fear, shame, jealousy), 
• a place reminiscent of the past PA, 
• closed or open spaces, 
• fear of another attack. 
  
  What else does a person who is afraid of panic attacks do? Spoiler alert – it doesn’t work either. 
  
• Use certain methods of controlling their anxiety as “to prevent the trouble”. For example, they take the subway only when accompanied by friends, limit the range of places that can be visited, constantly carry “magic pills” (sedatives). 
• Try very hard to avoid strong emotions. 
• Use protective behavior. Kate from the example above looks through the route map in advance, noting toilets, and preemptively swallows Imodium. 
  You can guess that their life becomes increasingly restricted. It turns into an unending struggle to prevent a possible PA. The person sort of lives, but the quality of their life dramatically goes down. They are not able to feel happy and to enjoy simple things. 

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