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Happy holidays: stress less with mindfulness this Christmas

Happy holidays: stress less with mindfulness this Christmas

Happy holidays: stress less with mindfulness this Christmas.

Christmas and the holidays are mostly feelgood times. At least the ideas behind them are positive, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t stressful.

Clinical Neuropsychologist Dr Michael Takagi, says there’s plenty of evidence to show stress comes from happy occasions too: “Planning a wedding is a joyful, positive occasion, but very stressful. For many people it is overwhelming.

“Christmas is on a smaller scale, but it can be a bit like that. So, can holidays.”

A big issue with positive life events is they usually come with expectations, that’s just human nature, right? It’s normal to expect Christmas to feel familiar, even similar to previous years. It’s also pretty normal to expect gifts from people we are close to.

So, what if they forget, or buy something we don’t want? It’s usual too, to expect our holiday will feel relaxing in a way that we want. But what if the holiday cabins you usually book aren’t available, and the alternate choice doesn’t measure up? The family probably complains, that’s what.

It’s important to note that Christmas isn’t positive for everyone. Research done by the Salvation Army in 2018 found that 7.6 million think Christmas is the most stressful time of the year. One in four Aussies experience anxiety at this time, while the same proportion spend more than they can afford.

Could mindfulness help? It’s never been a magic cure for the kinds of issues noted above, but there’s plenty of evidence that shows mindfulness has a positive impact on our mindset and behaviour.

So as long as our expectations are modest, a few basic mindfulness techniques can take the edge off Christmas and holiday stress.

It’s a good idea to do a little unpacking to make your mindfulness techniques effective this Christmas and holiday season, Dr Takagi says anticipating potentially stressful events can improve our chances of reducing stress. So, let’s dig a little deeper. Christmas and the holidays have the capacity to stress us out in several ways:

  1. Financially
  2. At work
  3. The celebration/s
  4. Relationships
  5. Post-holiday blues

Below we’ll look briefly at how mindfulness works and then unpack each of those trigger points.to see how mindfulness can help.

HOW MINDFULNESS WORKS

In a nutshell, by reducing the stress hormones that course through our minds and deactivating the parasympathetic nervous system that sparks the flight, fight or freeze responses.

Our muscles relax and loosen, our breathing slows down and becomes deeper. We feel less agitation and can think clearer and make better decisions.

But those effects are the end result not the instructions for getting there.

It’s a misconception that mindfulness is clearing the mind and calming down, though we might get those benefits when we approach mindfulness with a good understanding of what it is.

“A big part of mindfulness is learning to be present in the moment, Dr Takagi says. That is easier said than done, it is normal for your thoughts to wander and go off on a tangent or focus on stressful things in your life. With practice, you learn to bring your thoughts back and stay in the moment.

“What we are trying to do is be aware of how we are feeling, the emotions, the sensations, how the moment is impacting you and acknowledging your reactions are normal.

“Accept your thoughts and feelings without judgement, so for example, if you’re anxious, acknowledge it and reassure yourself that feeling anxious is neither good nor bad. We try not to expect that we should be feeling this way or another way.”

Just accepting your feelings and thoughts and concentrating on your breathing, or relaxing the muscles in your body one at a time, or a very simple visualisation, and letting thoughts go, this can reduce stress. “Feelings and thoughts tend to pass and move on if you let them,” Takagi says.

Why do we need to reduce stress at all? Because continually operating with feelings of stress can interfere with good decision-making. It’s a theme we’ll come back to several times.

FINANCIAL STRESS AND SHOPPING

Situations like rushing to buy presents at the last minute on Christmas Eve, or in a 30-minute lunch break, or having to weave through big crowds to find items in short supply, or trying to tick off a long list of gifts on a budget.

These trigger a stress response, even though in evolutionary terms this was obviously not what our stress response was designed to handle.

We are similarly ill-equipped to cope with financial stress, which happens when we experience chronic worry about money.

There’s no doubt stress is a useful immediate reaction for humans in some situations, like, being faced with a life-threatening situation: we can decide under pressure to run, jump, hide, or even fight.  But operating for prolonged periods in a stressed state can lead humans to make bad decisions.

Perhaps nowhere is this more evident with spending money as an attempt to quell stress. Research done by Financial Mindfulness in 2017 found financial stress had damaging effects on relationships and our mental health.

Things only got worse during COVID-19, with big increases in level of aggression, isolation and distress due to financial stress.

How often do we make spending decisions we regret later? Most people would probably identify with this when they reflect on purchases made without planning – especially with Christmas gifts and Christmas shopping.

Overall, we spend far more at Christmas than any other time of the year and it’s growing every year. Roy Morgan Research predicts Christmas period spending in Australia for the six weeks leading up to Christmas Eve will be $54.3 billion, up 2.8 per cent from last Christmas.

‘Mindless’ shopping – where we are not fully aware of our financial position or what it is what really want to buy – can become a vicious cycle whether we are doing it online or at a real ‘bricks and mortar’ store. Spending too much quickly results in financial stress, which creates uncomfortable feelings that we paradoxically deal with by buying more for the quick feelgood hit of dopamine.

“Trying to relieve short term emotional discomfort around money by compulsively purchasing things will compound a difficult financial situation and produce even more stress.

Doing a few minutes of mindfulness can stop that cycle and having a mindfulness practice can turn that behaviour around.” Dr Takagi says spending is a behaviour positively impacted by mindfulness and mindful practices.

WORKPLACE STRESS

Everyone knows it: that special kind of pre-Christmas madness in the office. We feel pressured to finish up all projects before going on leave.

If you consider the alternative – leaving projects and tasks half done – the Christmas work rush actually makes a lot of sense. Who really wants work hanging over them while they’re on holiday? It’s as reasonable expectation from our partners and families that we will not be doing work, or obsessed with work, while we are with them on Christmas Day and on holiday.

Dr Takagi says the rush to clear the decks is a big cause of tension and stress at Christmas but it can be difficult to avoid. “Sometimes wrapping everything up before Christmas isn’t reasonable but other times that’s just how it is. It depends on the company, the project and the commitments made.”

Dr Takagi admits being one of the many trying to find extra time to finish work before Christmas. “I’m trying to find an extra half a day each week to finish five different jobs.

Yesterday I was writing an email which reminded me to make a phone call and that resulted in sending a different email, I was a bit all over the place and overwhelmed.

Then if I’m not mindful a five-minute break turns into half hour and I’m really behind. It’s a really common behaviour to have a ‘quick-fix’ behaviour to deal with uncomfortable feelings that seems to work at the time but has negative consequences later.

“I take short breaks and concentrate on my breathing for a few minutes and that helps me to focus and stick to my priorities. Mindfulness is very good at helping me to make better decisions.”

Here are some questions to ask yourself that might help you get that Christmas rush into perspective:

  • Who wants the project wrapped up, you or your boss?
  • Will the project fail if it isn’t finished before the break?
  • Is this part of a bigger piece of work that will continue well into 2021?
  • Is completion prior to Christmas realistic?
  • Will you be likely to obsess over work, or even dip into it, on holiday if you don’t finish it?
  • Will you be more productive if you go for a week or two without doing any work? Why?

CHRISTMAS CELEBRATIONS

The traditional nature of Christmas plans – whether we gather to celebrate on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day or Boxing Day – are enough to stress out most hosts.

All indications are that Aussies are that planning to splurge on Christmas gifts and food too this year, to make up for the social distancing and belt-tightening that happened earlier this year due to COVID.

Roy Morgan Research has forecast a massive 10 per cent increase in spending on food, which means crowds, long waits and products selling out across Australia from fish markets and department stores down to local shopping centres.

Heavy spending and a desire to provide guests with ‘the perfect Christmas” without doubt creates pressure which can lead to minor or major conflicts and tension.

Mindfulness can help us in several ways around the actual Christmas celebrations:

  • Planning accurately so we don’t buy too much food and serve so much that we end up throwing food away;
  • Catering to the tastes of all invited guests, not just expecting everyone to eat the same as us;
  • Having clear, simple boundaries around how much we consume so we avoid over-eating and drinking too much;
  • Being clear about the food and drinks we want and need to avoid, i.e. allergens, emotional eating, alcohol if we need to drive home;
  • Taking mindful time-outs if family gatherings are triggering instead of numbing emotions with alcohol and/or drugs; and
  • Sticking to pre-considered time limits at a gathering if we are likely to be triggered by the people present.

RELATIONSHIPS DURING THE HOLIDAYS

Isn’t it sad that one of the best things about Christmas and the holidays – spending time with loved ones – can actually be the first casualty of festive stress?

We all value family harmony highly for good reason. But under high stress we can become difficult to be around, either because we feel angry or because of another behaviour we use to cope – such as drinking alcohol, gambling or taking drugs.

Even without damaging coping strategies, innocuous and unexpected pressures and expectations can arise that can cause tension. “It happens with my sister and I. I love her dearly, but we really know how to push each other’s buttons too, better than anyone else. It’s always great to see each other but we can also drive each other crazy!”

Once upon a time, in decades past, we would have poured an extra drink or taken multiple cigarette breaks to get away from family for a few minutes. But today we have more awareness and better options. Again, Dr Takagi, suggests taking a breather in sustained close proximity to family, perhaps to do a 5-minute progressive muscle relaxation exercise.

It may seem obvious, but given the stresses of any year – especially one with a global pandemic – and the fast-paced closure of the calendar year, we do actually need to relax and recharge before going back to work.

“Stress and relaxation are mutually exclusive,” Dr Takagi says. “You can’t really relax while you are stressed.”

POST-HOLIDAY BLUES

What goes up must come down and we all know that is true of the relaxed sense of wellbeing and calm we get from a great holiday. But we have to come back to earth and face the prospect of returning to work, school and our normal lives.

A good holiday often brings introspection too: we can reflect on how to the good, the bad and the unhelpful behaviours and habits that might have stressed us throughout 2020. For many of us those included:

  • Unhealthy eating, drinking or substance use
  • Compulsive spending, overspending, gambling or shopping
  • Avoidance of our true financial position
  • Overworking or avoidance of work
  • Unresolved relationship issues
  • Thankfully, January always brings the opportunity to start the New Year in a positive way, which means a clear-headed assessment of what might have been holding us back in 2020.

Beginning a mindfulness practice can help us to see and accept reality, perhaps helping us to make form some new plans and take a few small steps towards the kind of 2021 we really want to live.

After all, we could probably all do with a better year after 2020!

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Stressed about your finances or your mortgage

yahoo finance logo

Stressed about your finances or your mortgage.

Financial Mindfulness was covered in Yahoo Finance

Yahoo
Yahoo

If you’re experiencing financial stress, you’re dealing with two distinct issues: the money problems, and then the stress itself.

While Headspace has rolled out meditations specifically to help tackle financial stress, a new app has gone one step further to try and tackle both issues at once.

Developed with neuropsychologists, mindfulness and financial experts, the Financial Mindfulness app comes off the back of two years of research and aims to help people reduce financial, credit card and mortgage stress by addressing the way the stress itself is handled.

“The way we deal with particular stressors impacts everything that comes after,” said Financial Mindfulness founder and CEO Andrew Fleming.

Worrying obsessively with money can lead some to start seeing life as just keeping ahead of their financial problems. “Inevitably, that exhausts us.”

“When financial stress is reduced, we get some peace of mind, our relationships improve, and we are more engaged in our jobs.”

But can the Financial Mindfulness actually help me with my finances?

Just because the app is primarily aimed at tackling the ‘stress’ of financial stress doesn’t mean that app is light on financial guidance.

To improve users’ ease of mind and change habits, it uses a mix of financial literacy, goal-setting, and positive reinforcement to help develop new behaviours for better money management.

“Financial Mindfulness also has the ability to measure users levels of financial stress and then measure changes in those levels,” Fleming told Yahoo Finance.

“There has never been a solution available like this to ease the heavy burden of consumers’ financial stress.”

The app is available in the App Store and Google Play in both Australia and the US and offers two free learning modules: ‘Paying Bills’ and ‘Stress Management’.

You can access the rest of the modules, such as ‘Managing Credit Cards’, Managing Mortgages’ and ‘Unexpected Expenses’ for a one-off payment of $1.49 per module.

More than 20 modules are in the pipeline – expect to see ‘Managing Money in Relationships’, ‘Loss of Employment’, ‘Divorce & Separation’ and ‘Under-Earning’ before long.

Though the app only went to app stores this month, Fleming said user testing found financial stress was lowered after just one use of the app.

“Most users said their mood about personal finances also improved,” Fleming added.

“The users were intrigued because they’d never heard of a tool that addresses financial stress in this way.”

Published in Yahoo Finance on 6 September 2019. Credit: Chris Jessica Yun

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Power of Mindfulness over bad financial decision making

Using mindfulness

Power of Mindfulness over bad financial decision making.

If you’ve ever persisted with a dead-end job or loveless relationship or a university degree you regret starting in the hope it will somehow improve, or ‘chased your losses’ by doubling down, you might want to pay attention.

Maybe you’ve endured reading a novel you hated from the first 3 chapters or stayed through a movie just because you bought tickets – despite the fact you would rather be anywhere else.

Have you ever done something similar with money? Plunged money into a stock, a small business or tried your hand at Foreign Currency trading, something you didn’t understand? Hung onto that car for too long when it’s cost you a fortune already?

All these actions, and anything else where we ‘throw good money after bad’, are examples of a famous economic principle called the ‘sunk-cost fallacy’ which can be applied to life in general.

It’s the tendency to continue with an irrational and often risky course of action not based on the likely outcome, but because we don’t want to ‘waste’ what are unrecoverable costs and time – aka the ‘sunk-costs’.

It’s a very human response to the loss to try even harder to win, sometimes to avoid feelings of guilt or inadequacy, or even just fear of ‘looking bad’.

But at worst ego, politics and emotional decision-making can cause people to double or triple their financial losses, causing huge financial and emotional stress for individuals and their families.

In the cold light of day, it’s not rational, but who hasn’t done something like this? More importantly, how do we stop this apparent madness?

Researchers Andrew Hafenbrack, Zoe Kinias, and Sigal Barsade published their work, ‘Debiasing the Mind Through Meditation’, Mindfulness and the Sunk-Cost Bias in the Journal of Psychological Science in 2013.

In the research, the results suggest that increased mindfulness reduces the tendency to allow unrecoverable prior costs to influence current decisions.

“Meditation reduced how much people focused on the past and future, and this psychological shift led to less negative emotion,” Kinias wrote in the journal. “The reduced negative emotion [then] facilitated their ability to let go of sunk costs.” Mindfulness does have some power over bad financial decision making!

In another study, from Elsevier’s journal Personality and Individual Differences in 2007, found “mindfulness is associated with less severe gambling outcomes”.

Chad Lakey, Keith Campbell, Adam Goodie (University of Georgia) and Kirk Warren Brown (Virginia Commonwealth University) concluded their findings.

They wrote, “are hopeful in suggesting that the greater attention to and awareness of ongoing internal and external stimuli that characterizes mindfulness may represent an effective means of mitigating the impulsive and addictive responses and intemperate risk-attitudes of individuals with problem gambling.”

They concluded: “In this light, mindfulness may help to lessen the grip of automatic thoughts, affective reactions, and behaviour patterns.”

Research into the specific benefits of mindfulness is ongoing but it seems clear that a regular mindfulness practice can have powerful positive effects on dysfunctional decision-making around money and reduce financial stress.

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Financial stress is widespread for Australians

The Sydnety Morning Herald

Financial stress is widespread for Australians.

Financial Mindfulness released its latest Financial Stress Survey and the results showed just how much damage financial stress is causing. The Sydney Morning Herald covered the story.

Nearly one in three Australians is feeling financially stressed, with damaging effects on mental and physical health and social relationships.

The CoreData/Financial Mindfulness Financial Stress Survey of 1000 people found 30 per cent of people reported financial stress, and the problem affects all socio-economic groups.

Marian Russell, from North Narrabeen on Sydney’s northern beaches, knows the feeling well.

Her husband, Zac, 28, works long hours as a carpenter while Ms Russell, 24, looks after the couple’s two children, Allegra, 2, and Bodie, 1.

Marian Russell with her two children, Allegra, 2, and Bodie, 1, at Warriewood beach. Credit: Daniel Munoz

The family lives pay cheque to pay cheque and struggles to pay off a debt they acquired when they bought a vehicle for Zac’s work.

“This week we literally had $30 after all the bills were paid. It’s sad but we’ve got to be thankful we’ve got food in the cupboard,” Ms Russell said.

“It’s taking its toll, not just on our relationship but emotionally, on myself. I have anxiety and depression and it doesn’t help not having my husband around because he has to work six days a week to keep food on the table. It’s a lot of pressure for a young mum.”

Ms Russell said her husband found it hard to switch off from work and the couple rarely get to go out together. Her husband’s family live nearby but are away until the end of the year, so free babysitting is off the cards for now. They got married in the registry office because money was too tight for a wedding and Ms Russell has shelved her plans for study.

Marian Russell had to take her children, Allegra, 2, and Bodie, 1, out of swimming lessons because of money worries.

Marian Russell had to take her children, Allegra, 2, and Bodie, 1, out of swimming lessons because of money worries. Credit: Daniel Munoz

Her biggest fear is not providing for her children. She cancelled their swimming lessons because it cost too much, a decision that weighs heavily given the family live so close to the beach.

Ms Russell said she would like to contribute financially but if she went back to her former work in retail, the cost of childcare would leave the family only $10 a day better off. “I would love to work but it’s not worth it,” she said.

Instead she sells her art online, under the name LunaTribeDesign on Instagram and Facebook, providing some “pocket money” and a much-needed emotional boost.

Ms Russell said they were lucky to live in a good rental property but she doubts they will be able to get ahead while living in Sydney.

The financial stress survey found money worries were widespread across all socio-economic groups. Clinical psychologist Dr Nicola Gates, who was involved in the study, said people on high incomes reported financial stress as well.

“It can be over-commitment but also things can change profoundly for people,” Dr Gates said.

“A client in my practice had a recreational sport accident … he came off his jet ski and hadn’t set himself up well with insurance, so the family lost the major breadwinner just like that. So where do the school fees come from? How does the mortgage get paid? People’s financial position can be more precarious than they realise.”

Dr Gates was aware financial stress was a problem for her clients but was surprised the survey suggested it was so high in the general population.

Potential reasons include the high cost of housing, lack of wages growth, perceptions of job insecurity and the fact financial literacy has not kept up with the complexity of the financial system.

“Financial stress is very prevalent and there’s a lot of shame and embarrassment around financial stress and as a result people don’t really talk about it,” Dr Gates said. “Shame is a particularly acute risk for mental illness.”

The psychological burden of stress has a physical effect on the body, with lack of sleep and lowered immunity. And people often cope with financial stress in ways that can damage their health and relationships.

Thirty-five per cent of financially stressed respondents have used drugs or alcohol to manage negative feelings stemming from their money worries, while 38 per cent have been hurtful towards themselves or others.

Almost nine in 10 financially stressed respondents regularly miss social events because of money worries, compared with only one in five of those not financially stressed.

More than seven out of 10 people who are financially stressed regularly lose sleep because of money issues, compared with less than one in 10 of those who are not financially stressed.

And more than half of financially stressed respondents report considerable difficulty concentrating due to money worries, compared with only 3 per cent of those who are not financially stressed.

By Caitlin Fitzsimmons

Updated September 4, 2017 — 11.29am first published at 12.15am in the Sydney Morning Hearld

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Mindfulness practice reduces time off work for anxiety sufferers

Retirement Orange

Mindfulness practice reduces time off work for anxiety sufferers.

Working with someone who is extremely anxious isn’t always fun, but it’s worth remembering stress hits everyone, including us. Anxiety disorders are by some measures the most common mental health issues in the western world, even more common than depression.

Previously research has shown sufferers of anxiety – which could be defined as continuous feelings of stress or worry – typically take more sick days at work and use more mental health services than average workers.

But mental health problems are so common they are basically unavoidable in the workplace, affecting at least 45 percent of all Australians in their lifetimes and possibly more, according to charity Sane Australia. Undetected mental health issues can also be triggered by major life events and financial stress events.

Hence the move to expand corporate wellness programs beyond physical health, and embed mental health programs and tools in them. Mindfulness is one such promising tool.

Mindfulness has been shown in many studies to positively affect symptoms of depression, insomnia and anxiety but now there is proof of improvements that could directly benefit employers: rates of absenteeism in anxiety sufferers fell after establishing a meditation practice.

A team of seven researchers, led by Dr. Elizabeth Hoge, associate professor of psychiatry at Georgetown University Medical Center, split a 57 subjects diagnosed with Generalised Anxiety Disorder into two groups, with half doing eight weeks of “attention control” training while the others did MBSR (mindfulness-based stress reduction) training.

Those that did the mindfulness cut their time absent from work by nearly two-thirds, while the control group actually increased the amount of time they took off work.

The measurement scrutinised in Hoges’ latest research paper – called Effects of mindfulness meditation on occupational functioning and health care utilization in individuals with anxiety – was “partial days missed” and not full days. Why?

“This may be the most sensitive measure of how anxiety disorders impact work performance, as employees … may come late to work, or leave early depending on their mental state,” her report said.

For those who continued practicing mindfulness in their own time, the reduction in absenteeism continued and there was a similar decrease in visits to mental health professionals.

The report concluded: “Mindfulness meditation training may improve occupational functioning and decrease healthcare utilization in adults with GAD.”

Hoge recently published research from a similar experiment which found a group which had undergone mindfulness training “felt” less stressed and had lower levels of the stress hormone ACTH in their blood than people who did stress management training.

If you need to speak to someone about your anxiety call Beyond Blue 1300 22 4636 or Sane 1800 18 7263.

Beyond Blue
Beyond Blue
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Mindfulness could complement CBT interventions for depression

Retirement Orange

Mindfulness could complement CBT interventions for depression.

Anyone who has been truly depressed understands how vast the difference is between knowing it’s helpful to talk to people and regularly being able to connect with others.

Depression, and its nagging stablemate, anxiety, often render a person so exhausted and full of self-doubt that it feels impossible to escape the prison cell of their own thoughts.

Anhedonia is a common symptom of depression, which is the loss of the ability to experience pleasure – emotional flatlining. A mindfulness practice could hold a key of sorts to that prison and even help sufferers to begin experiencing more fulfilling relationships in their lives.

But such a healthy change might not come about by doing a mindfulness alone, although multiple studies confirm its effectiveness in alleviating the symptoms of depression. The idea here is that mindfulness could complement and even enhance the effectiveness of specific Cognitive Behavioural Therapy interventions for depression.

The positive effect of ‘daily uplifts’

New research done in New York, by Lisa Starr, of the University of Rochester and Rachel Hershenberg, of Stony Brook University and published in the Journal of Clinical Psychology found that positive events in real-life conditions had a greater positive impact on sufferers of depression than in laboratory conditions.

They wrote: “experiencing or even just anticipating uplifting events in daily life was related to feeling less depressed that same day”. The researchers called these “interpersonal uplifts”, such as participating in fun activities with friends or family.

“It’s the social activities—positive, everyday experiences that involve other people—that may be most likely to brighten the mood of those struggling with depression,” Starr wrote on the University’s of Rochester’s website. “The same is true for the expectation of good things to come,” although Starr noted people with depression are actually less likely to anticipate positive experiences. The study included 157 young adults, a third of whom had depression ranging from mild to severe. Sandra Knispel, writing on the University website concluded: “In other words: If you’re feeling seriously blue—make a concerted effort to do something fun with friends.”

Overcome negative thinking with mindfulness

Of course the advice ‘just do something fun with friends’ is easy to say but might feel impossible to do if you are bound by negative thinking, especially about yourself.

This is where mindfulness could help enormously, says Marc Richardson, psychologist for Financial Mindfulness who also works private practice in Sydney.

“Self-recrimination does lead to greater levels of worthlessness which compounds our unwillingness to engage in those interpersonal events which have really clear effects on brightening the mood. It’s hard to access those events when the overwhelming sense is ‘I’m worthless’.

“Mindfulness is about lifting our level of awareness and that improved awareness would give us the ability to notice the negative thoughts which are such a big part of depressive symptomology.

“Mindfulness has the capacity to act as a circuit breaker to rumination on negative thoughts, allowing us to catch those negative generalisations and challenge them, and make us more willing to engage in those activities we know are beneficial.

Richardson explained how that process could also help anxiety sufferers too.
“Depression is closely aligned with anxiety and in both people tend towards living in a future-oriented state rather than a present state. They will typically worry a lot about what might happen next, almost with an impending sense of doom.

“Mindfulness brings us back to the present moment and allows us to connect with the here and now rather than identify with our negative projections.”
Richardson believes a mindfulness practice could allow us to make decisions to follow through with, or perhaps even plan, those ‘daily uplifts’, such as meeting with family and friends for healthy fun activities.

“The more people engage in mindfulness, the more self aware they will be. That greater capacity to be present will surely improve our capacity to be in relationships.”

What ‘fun’ activities?

If you are depressed or anxious you might well ask ‘what sort of activities?’ In the end that will come down to you: who do you feel happy around, what do you like doing that lifts your mood naturally? You are best advised to talk to a therapist or loved one, or journal, to work this out. But here are some suggestions:

  • Arranging and having a coffee/tea and a chat with a trusted friend once a week
  • Phoning a family member you have a good relationship with once a week
  • Volunteering somewhere in your local community for 4 hours a week where the work involves helping someone who is likely to be grateful for the company / help
  • Taking the opportunity to chat in a friendly way to someone on public transport, if that opportunity presents itself)
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Send yourself a valuable gift: get mindful

financialmindfulness blue Background color

Send yourself a valuable gift: get mindful.

Why do we spend money to feel good now, even if it’s clearly going to have negative consequences later? And why do we seem to make better decisions if they are planned and not impulsive?

The answers are complex, but just so you really get the idea, first imagine yourself under a lot of stress. Maybe you are working and studying, so you’re always flat-out busy, and there’s no end in sight. Or perhaps one of your parents is gravely ill and it’s hard to communicate about this with siblings you don’t get on with.

So you should feel really stressed.

Then without thinking, say which of these following suggestions sounds like a great idea a/ now, or b / in five years time: buying two pairs of the same fancy shoes you like because they are on sale, or selling your car today for $500 less than you could probably get because a buyer is ready with the cash and you want a weekend away.

You probably favour option a/ in most cases, meaning you want the ‘reward’ now.

Why? Because, according to behavioural scientists, “present rewards are weighted more heavily than future ones. Once rewards are very distant in time, they cease to be valuable,” so says behaivoraleconomics.com.

This was the finding of landmark research done in 2002 by Shane Frederick, George Loewenstein and Ted O’Donohue, and published in the Journal of Economic Literature.

Interestingly, when the reward is delayed, we are more prepared to wait to receive a greater reward. Research shows if given the choice between $100 in a year or $120 in 13 months, we will probably wait.

All this suggests if we plan for the future we are likely to make better decisions about money.  But it depends what that future event is, and how far off it is.
If it’s a skiing holiday in the Canadian Rockies, we will probably swing into action. If it’s retirement at age 70 (as the Australian Federal Government proposes from 2035), that feels somewhat less urgent, even though few would argue it’s more important.

In a 2014 report on savings, the Reserve Bank of Australia showed “younger households place more weight on saving for large purchases and emergencies to smooth near-term consumption rather than saving for longer-term (retirement) consumption.”

“Keys to managing decisions like these are to make those far-off outcomes feel closer,” Peter Sokol-Hessner, assistant professor in the department of psychology at University of Denver, told The Huffington Post.

He suggested “to imagine how you’ll feel when you can use those retirement funds, how grateful you’ll be that your younger self sent this gift into the future.”

If that sounds like a fairy story, there is research to back up the idea that we are more careful as ‘our future selves’. A study run by UCLA Anderson School of Management in 2011 found when people visualised themselves as 70 and were asked to imagine what they’d do with a $1000 windfall, they put more than twice as much money towards their retirement as those who were asked to visualise themselves now. They were more likely to choose short-term options like planning an extravagant outing or buying someone a gift.
So where does mindfulness come in?

Let’s be clear: a mindfulness practice, even one focused on money, isn’t going to directly impact your Canadian Rockies ski fund, let alone your retirement savings.

But if undertaken consistently, a mindfulness practice could help change the decisions you currently unconsciously make about spending.
For instance, you may decide to do extra research before selling your car or home, looking more carefully at trends and brainstorming other ways to find ready cash.

It does that by increasing time between your thoughts: that well-worn but accurate metaphor of busy thoughts as clouds against a blue sky that represents an untroubled mind.

“Thoughts are like clouds,” says Financial Mindfulness’s Chief Mindfulness Officer Tomas Jajesnica.

“When you can see more sky and less clouds you start to move out of an immediate, involuntary response state and towards the type of thought where you could think about your ‘future self’.”

A big benefit of a regular practice is a buffer against the power of marketing, he says. Think about the hype involved around the release of the next stage of a sought-after apartment development: it’s in the interests of a real estate agent to get you into a feeding frenzy state with other potential buyers, so the stage sells put, the project can go up and the next stage goes into marketing overdrive.

“But it’s not just effective in dealing with real estate,” Jajesnica says.
“A lot of marketing works on the idea of scarcity and urgency; some saying ‘quick, there’s only 100 in stock’ , or ‘hurry, it’s a brand new order’, or whatever. Marketing works on you by getting you to make a decision right now.

“A mindfulness process will help you to buy things rather than just be sold to.
“It’ll allow you to come from your own space, consider the consequences of your actions and respond by making decisions, rather than be manipulated by marketing.”

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Why isn’t mindfulness working for me

Retirement Orange

Why isn’t mindfulness working for me.

Mindfulness, in theory, sounds great. The deal seems to be roughly this: if I sit still and listen to my breathing for 10 minutes each day I will be calmer, certainly cooler, possibly richer and definitely an all-round better person.

So how come it’s not working, you might ask, because you probably feel like none of those things after a few days doing mindfulness meditations.

However, that starting point of using mindfulness meditation to find self-improvement is, apparently, backwards.

“Meditation practice isn’t about trying to throw ourselves away and become something better, it’s about befriending who we are,” the world famous American meditation teacher and author Pema Chodron said.

Chodron was a stressed-out schoolteacher called Deirdre Blomfield-Brown until she was crippled by depression following the end of her second marriage in the 1970s. So how does she, one of the world’s foremost experts do it?

“You just sit down with yourself,” Chodron told Oprah in a 2008 interview.
“It’s a way of being completely open to whatever is happening in your mind, and you realize your mind is wild and crazy and all over the place. The instruction is so simple: Just keep coming back to your breath. Then you say,

“This is almost impossible!”

“It isn’t, but I know how hard it is.”

Initially it will be hard, so like anything, practice makes perfect.
In general terms, if we feel like quitting after a few days we are expecting too much too soon.

“You might call it beginner’s uncomfortability,” says Marc Richardson, psychologist with Financial Mindfulness.

“I tried to learn the guitar literally every time I picked it up I would sweat because I was so uncomfortable. Trying anything new is uncomfortable and to experience full benefits one would need to engage for quite a while.”

Are there strategies, though, for dealing with the specific problems if they persist? Some of the most common include: I’m thinking too much, I can’t do this, I can’t sit still, I don’t have time, it hurts.

Here’s what British mindfulness expert Shamash Alidina wrote about some of these problems in Meditation for Dummies.

I can’t do this:

“When people say this, they normally mean they can’t focus … mindfulness meditation is one of the best ways to develop that focus! It’s completely normal for your mind to wander off when you’re meditating.

However, as soon as you’ve noticed, bring your focus back to the object of attention specified in the meditation (often your breath).

Each time you’re training your mind to be more focused in the future. Remember, you can’t fail at meditation. As long as you try, you’ve succeeded.”

I can’t sit still:

“Some meditations require you to be … still for half an hour, but many don’t require this. You [can do a] body scan meditation lying down. And mindful yoga, walking or tai chi is meditation in movement. [A] three-minute mindfulness exercise is a great practice to do daily.”

I don’t have the time:

“If some of the busiest people in the world can find time to stop and meditate, even if it’s only five minutes, you probably can too. You can do mindfulness meditation at any time. You can wash the dishes mindfully, you can walk your dog mindfully or you can even have a mindful shower.

So that takes no time at all out of your busy day.”

What about ‘It hurts’?

Tara Healey and Jonathan Roberts, writing for mindful.org are clear on this:

“Being in a lot of pain is not a mark of doing it right. It can take some work, though, to find a position (or a few positions) that don’t lead to intense pain … try out different postures and supports … a hugely important lesson of meditation is that even comfort is, well, bound to eventually become uncomfortable.

“For this reason, once you find a suitable posture and support, it’s a good idea to avoid making too many adjustments.”

Getting fully into the meditation itself can help: “People have found that as they relax that inner tension, it often results in less bodily tension.”

As for I’m thinking too much, well that one is addressed by realising practice makes perfect. You accept the thoughts you have without judgement, and gently set them aside. Thoughts are normal and they will come and go, hence the widely-used analogy of allowing thoughts to pass like clouds against a blue sky.

The more you meditate, Chodron told Oprah, “the more you have a lightness about what’s occurring in your life … it’s not about becoming indifferent to life’s experiences; it actually allows you to be much more present with whatever arises.

“You’re fully engaged, but you see it from a different perspective.”
In other words, you will be able to cope much better with what life throws at you.

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How mindfulness helped a bunch of chronically anxious worriers

Australian employees want mental health at work taken seriously

How mindfulness helped a bunch of chronically anxious worriers.

Time magazine recently ran an article with the headline ‘how mindfulness helps you handle stress better’. So what you ask? Sounds like every second story spruiking mindfulness as a wonder cure these days, right?

Except that the article is about research done by someone who wanted to cut the crap and find out if mindfulness really does work. Or not.

At a personal level this article is it spoke to me – the writer of the story you are reading – deeply because it looked at the effects of mindfulness on a mental health problem I have suffered all my life, which at times overwhelmed me.

First, to Dr. Elizabeth Hoge, associate professor of psychiatry at Georgetown University Medical Center. “There’s been some real skepticism in the medical community about meditation and mindfulness meditation,” she said.

According to Time, Hoges he and her team wanted to deduce if people just felt better after meditating, or if doing meditating caused measurable changes in the body’s markers of stress.

So they ran people through a stress test that would give anyone rubber legs: “eight minutes of public speaking, followed by a round of videotaped mental math in front of an audience of people in white lab coats with clipboards.”

Then they made them do the stress test again, just to be sure. But first they split the group into two.

Half underwent mindfulness training (including breath awareness, body scan meditations and gentle yoga) and the other half did a stress management education course (including lectures on diet, exercise, sleep and time management).

Both groups did eight weeks training with the same amount of class time and homework.

The group that did the mindfulness training reported feeling less stressed, but blood tests showed they had lower levels of stress hormone ACTH.

The meditation group also may have been strengthening their immune systems via lower “pro-inflammatory cytokines”, alien-sounding molecules linked to depression and other neurological conditions.

On the second run of the stress test the meditation group outperformed the stress-management group by even greater margins.

“We have objective measures in the blood that they did better in a provoked situation,” says Hoge. “It really is strong evidence that mindfulness meditation not only makes them feel better, but helps them be more resilient to stress.”
Now back to me – the writer of this article – if you don’t mind.

After the death of my mother and redundancy from a 20 year career as a journalist I spent time receiving treatment for depression. To my confusion I left with a diagnosis of generalised anxiety disorder.

I felt dismayed and worried. How I felt was: ‘what on earth am I supposed to do with this?’

Generalised anxiety disorder, according to Way Ahead – Mental Health Association NSW, is “intense anxiety and worry about a variety of events and issues (for example, work, health, family), and the worry is out of proportion to the situation… [sufferers get] restless, easily tired, difficulty concentrating, easily annoyed, muscle tension, and/or difficulty sleeping.

While many people worry about things from time to time, people with Generalised Anxiety Disorder experience worry a large proportion of the time and it interrupts their lives. ”

Tick, tick, tick. It’s hard to admit, but this is me.

My beautiful late mother, Rosemary, may she rest in peace, worried incessantly. She worried so much it annoyed everyone around her – and mortified her teenage sons.

She worried every day until she knew she was going to die (from brain cancer) and then, quietly, she stopped worrying.

She also had trouble with anger, supressing it until she would rage. It’s even harder to admit, but this is also me. Taxi drivers who take me ‘the long way home’ have copped some fearful sprays from me over the years.

So I guess I ended up a bit like my mother, but I’d rather avoid the sad cure she found.

In the treatment centre I attended, South Pacific Private, I did a simple mindfulness meditation exercise most days – 10 minutes sitting still and concentrating on my breathing. I have done it around 70 times since leaving the centre in January, increasing the duration to 15 minutes a day. I also try to do micro sessions several times a day.

I haven’t had a blood test to show, so I don’t know how my stress hormones are or what my cytokines are up to, but I feel better. How? I worry less.
I still worry, but you have no idea how good the feeling behind that simple statement feels: I worry less.

There’s a lot more too. I am growing the ability to see my thoughts and feelings as separate from me – almost as passing storms across a blue sky – instead of experiencing them as a sort of nasty conjoined twin hissing at me.

I don’t see my thoughts as instructions, but just as thoughts.

I don’t have to let them define what I do next. If my thoughts tell me: ‘I feel down, I wonder if there’s any cheesecake left’, I can phone someone, listen to music or go for a bike ride instead. If my head sees someone smoking and wants one too, I can stop and say ‘no, that thought is not helpful’, and I do. I quit smoking in December and haven’t had a cigarette since.

I sleep better and have little muscle tension. Though am still restless, I have a level of awareness of this – and, interestingly, of how my behaviour affects others – way beyond anything I’ve ever experienced.

I still get easily annoyed – although much less so. I am more patient. If I need to stay on hold for 45 minutes to the phone company I am more inclined to express healthy anger when I get through, then detach without flogging the poor person who answers the phone.

If I do get too angry, I can cool off much quicker and apologise expecting nothing in return.

I now get on with cab drivers, even if doing so costs me $5 more.
I’m sure if I was assessed again for generalised anxiety disorder I would still fit the bill. So I am not cured. But life for me, and those very close to me, is a lot easier.

Mindfulness meditation is not a cure and there have been questions about its real effectiveness. But I know it works, and I don’t need to ask my cytokines to prove it.