KITCHEN SHIFT 8 PILLARS OF HEALTH - PILLAR 3
At Kitchen Shift my clients follow the guidance of 8 Pillars of Health. To dive in and explore these Pillars is an invitation to explore you! We are each uniquely designed and these Pillars go deep and can uncover places you have been “stuck” that a diet never will!
In the coming weeks- I want to give you a peek into some of the education I offer clients around these Pillars.
PILLAR 3- Mindfullness, Mediatation and Breath Work
See these two bags I am holding? The strap on both these bags broke around the same time. I remember being super frustrated as both these bags were expensive (LV and Cuyana are the brands) and they were my “go to” work bags.
If we are being honest- the blame was on me. Not the quality of the bag.
I have a tendency to carry EVERYTHING with me like a boy scout and the load was too much. A laptop, two planners, a makeup bag, chargers for every device, 3 notebooks… you get the picture.
Those bags actually sat in my garage for 19 months. Yes. Almost 2 years they sat in a corner. I would occasionally wipe off a spider web or remove a ball of dog hair that somehow settled on them- but for the most part I got comfortable seeing them just sit. Why couldn’t I get them to a leather repair shop? Because I AM BUSY and I WILL GET TO IT ONE DAY. That has been my answer to a lot of things. I am busy. I will get to It eventually.
Spoiler Alert. I got to them this past August.
Yes- both bags were repaired and I am happy to report I am back to using the light blue leather Cuyana bag daily.
SO, what in the hell does this have to do with anything? And what does this have to do with mindfulness?
It actually has EVERYTHING to do with it.
And if you have a minute to hear my story, I want to walk you through this because I believe with my whole heart that many of you can relate to this situation. To the broken strapped bag collecting dust in your garage. Or anything else in your life you are procrastinating or putting off because you are JUST TOO BUSY.
I won’t take the deep dive into how I came to this awareness, but at the end of July I started to take a very honest look at my phone use. I don’t know if you have ever gone into the screen time section of settings in your iPhone but you can see how much time you spend on your phone, broken down by app. You can even see how many times you open your phone (screen) in a day.
You all. I was APPAULED at this number. I felt like a hypocrite. I am on my kids RELENTLESSLY to put their phones up, I coach clients on putting their phones away at night to help sleep and here I am picking up my phone and opening it 100 times a day.
WTF.
As a health coach, I am very pro “coach”. I think it’s hard to do a lot of things on our own. I couldn’t just say “I am going to use my phone less” and it would happen. It just doesn’t work that way for me. So, I had to find a resource that could coach me to a better place with it.
I did a little research and came across a book titled, “How to Break Up with your Phone” by Catherine Price. I don’t want to get too deep into this book in case you choose to download it on audible or kindle- but the bottom line is this.
Mindfulness will pull you out of some deep holes.
Like most people, I love dopamine. I LOVE to feel good. And my phone had become a constant source of dopamine for me. Whether it was:
Receiving a comment or like on an Instagram post (dopamine CITY!)
Watching a golden retriever reel and then sending it to my 5 friends and waiting or their reaction (dopamine)
Reading a crazy debate on Twitter (the conflict makes me so uncomfortable yet sort of gave me an odd charge! dopamine!)
Linking to the latest fashion bloggers recommendation to then land on Amazon to purchase that thingy we all “need”- zing! Dopamine.
ALL of these things were dosing the dopamine like a little IV drip.
Then there is the time. Do you know how quickly 5 minutes passes when you open Instagram? Or a game? Or email? Or a group text where there are 19 comments and you need to catch up? This takes a lot of TIME.
The combination of the time SUCK and the dopamine drain left me exhausted. I had NO idea how tired I felt until I started to pull away from my phone.
Although I am featuring my 3rd pillar (mindfulness) in this blog, I did indeed have to pull from some of the other pillars to make my phone detox happen. Nothing is clear cut with health and wellness.
But mindfulness IS the way. It is REALLY hard to overconsume food, alcohol, social media, Netflix or online shopping- when you take pause.
Mindfulness is defined as the quality or state of being conscious or aware of something. Notice there is nothing in that definition that implies judgment.
When I started my phone detox, I had to really work to not berate myself. I would catch myself in a mindless scroll- and then tell myself “I suck”. Yuck. Not very motivating.
As I got past the judgment- I learned how to ask myself questions. Curiosity took hold.
What’s stressing me out right now that I am escaping to my phone?
What painful thing am I avoiding?
Why do I need to feel good right now?
What would be a better way to manage this discomfort?
This is deep work. I had to stop drinking a glass of wine each night to do it. I had to protect my space a bit with what projects and things I was saying yes to. I had to get consistent sleep. I had to take my supplements.
This work is draining. But I am walking into the month of September feeling (literally) the BEST I HAVE FELT IN YEARS. My body feels good, my brain feels good, my business is killing it and my personal credit cards are the LOWEST they have been in YEARS. Oh- the best of all- I GOT THE DAMN STRAPS ON MY FAVORITE BAGS REPAIRED!!!!
You all- I exchanged mindless tech time for THIS!?
I will make this trade 1000 times out of 1000!!
And I want the same for you.
This month in my membership mastermind called MemberSHIFT we are tackling Time and Tech.
We will have 4 calls this month with a 5 day challenge following each to help you detox from your phone. This work will bleed into other areas of your life. TRUST ME. Mindfulness makes everything more meaningful.
I am so excited to see what results we get from this month and I am excited to continue on my journey with it all!
To learn more about this program, click below!