Shout, shout let it all out…
I’ve been there myself. F**k, have I been there! I know it feels rubbish, when you’re not feeling how perhaps deep down you know you should. I also know that you absolutely do not need to exist in a perpetual state of ‘making-do’. You are one powerful human being and you have everything you need within you to change your state of mind.
It’s Mental Health Awareness week so I’m dropping some down regulation practices in here that I mention in my book ‘Be More Human’ that have helped me in times of utter despair and hopelessness.
DOWN-regulation: parasympathetic nervous system – rest and digest
This is the ultimate skill to develop to influence our state of mind and slow our heart rate, lower our blood pressure, calm our nerves and ease those pangs of anxiety.
Nature immersion
Simply by spending 20 mins with nature is enough to transform us from our stressed out mindset to a more down-regulated calm, clear headed human. Natural environments drop us into parasympathetic state, - resulting in lower concentrations of cortisol, lower pulse rate and lower blood pressure.
As little as 20 minutes of nature immersion for those us who have our heads rubbernecked into our phones, dodging traffic and racing between our grey linear boxes is enough for us to reach nature nirvana.
Open your eyes
Rewild your hyper-visual screen time eyes by reconnecting with your panoramic visual field to fully scope your environment - look as far and as wide as you possibly can. Enjoy the sky. Create a wider visual field to fully scope your environment. Our hyper-visual screen time eyes stimulate an alert, sympathetic response, whereas our wide scope, panoramic visual field, stimulates a parasympathetic one – rest and digest.
Listen
Disconnect from the hustle to reconnect to the sounds of nature. Immerse your ancestral ears in nature’s sounds; you may be surprised by just how much you can hear in your surrounding area, once you get out of your head and tune in.
Breathe
By combining nature immersion with breathwork, we can radically transform our stress-induced anxious frequency in a much shorter time frame. I recommend alternate nostril breathing. This is a great practice to bring our attention to being in nature and disconnecting from the ego to reconnect to the eco.
My advice with this practice is to think of inhaling nature as becoming the frequency of nature.
Our left nostril stimulates the right (feminine) hemisphere of the brain and the right nostril stimulates the left (masculine) hemisphere.
• Allow your breath to settle by taking a long exhale, then place your thumb or forefinger on your right nostril and breathe into your left nostril. Pause, cover the left, and breathe out through the right. Then breathe in through the right, cover, breathe out through the left. You can change each round, or work in sets.
• Complete 10 cycles starting with the right nostril, 10 cycles with the left nostril and repeat until you hit 100 cycles of breath. Don’t get wrapped up in how long you inhale or exhale for; it’s far better to maintain a cycle that’s comfort- able, keeping relaxed in the pelvic basin, lower abdomen, shoulders and jaw. If you feel tension or your shoulders popping up at the end of the inhale, lower the intensity.
Breathing for the everyday urbanite malaise
Breathing and reboot on the hour. If we can remind ourselves to breathe and reboot our being on the hour. We can flip our mind from being full to being mindful. Through rebooting breath practices we can alter our perception of the environment we inhabit and find calm.
• Every hour, reboot the breath for 1 minute.
• Start by relaxing the space around your pelvic floor and lower abdomen (we’re all so tense down there, learn to let it go). Then, inhale gently up through your nose for 4 seconds and exhale gently out the nose for 6 seconds. Repeat this for 6 rounds - that’s 1 minute dedicated to 4:6 breathing for every waking hour.
Shout, shout, let it all out
Sometimes deep conversations aren’t profound enough, nor is deep breathwork or meditation. To avoid emotional stagnation manifesting into something destructive, it is important to release our tensions, frustrations, worries, fears and feelings of overwhelm out into the world. The practice of a good primal roar or a scream into the pillow of love has been profound for my own sanity. I feel it’s equally important for us to shout, roar and let all that vulnerability out, but in a place where we are not terrifying others. This is one powerful release that will enhance those other inner practices, getting right into the belly of the beast.
• Take an exhale to create the space for a deep belly breath in, then let the beast out of the cage. Roar, shout, scream – whatever needs to get out, let it go, let it out, be that into the woods or in the pillow or in the car.
• This is your permission to lose your shit into the pillow; every part of your life will benefit from this emotional explosion. Five rounds should do you.
Expose yourself to cold therapy
This will alter your perception of the cold and your innate abilities. We are not designed to constantly maintain room temperature. There are numerous potential benefits here from; improving your circulation, to weight, to ramping up your immune system, but there is real gold to be found in on cold. Our ability to build resilience requires that our mind is free from crippling and compromising fear.
If we are operating in upregulated position of worry, fear. overwhelm, we are chronically stimulating our fight & flight response & in doing so sabotaging our wellbeing. But if our individual consciousness shifts then our reality changes.- this is the gold of the cold. I see the cold water as a micro hit of adversity that helps us see beyond our limitations.
By playing with the idea that the cold is a stressor and how through the breath we can learn to find states of calm we can reboot our perception even in the most uncomfortable of situations. I find the overlap into the modern day malaise really quite extraordinary.
Prepare to step into cold water
Cold-water immersion doesn’t have to be in a lake or an ice tub, you can do it in a bath or shower. If you’re feeling anxious about getting into the cold (or feeling anxious in any situation), use breathing to prepare you for the stress.
This breathing practice is a way of down-regulating your nervous system to induce calmness.
• Take a deep inhale, then exhale fully as you enter the cold water/exam/classroom/email/phone-call/meeting the in-laws
• Extend your exhale so that it’s longer than your in-breath, repeating this breathwork practice as long as you remain in the cold water (perceived threat).
• Inhale, then lengthen the exhalation, as you down-regulate to move through the perceived threat.
Remember……If we can remind ourselves to breathe and reboot our being. We can flip our mind from being full to being mindful. Through rebooting breath practices we can alter our perception of the environment we inhabit and find calm.
Human Connection
Lonely people are 30% more likely to die prematurely than non-lonely people.
Human contact and connection are widely considered a fundamental physical, social and spiritual human needs, crucial for our survival and emotional well-being.
Goldsmiths University has just embarked on a global study into whether modern society suffers from “touch hunger”.
Virginia Satir, a respected family therapist, states “We need 4 hugs a day for survival. We need 8 hugs a day for maintenance. We need 12 hugs a day for growth.” Current research supports Satir's wisdom.
Hug Challenge
Today’s challenge is to go forth and gather, those 12 growth promoting hugs - be it your partner, your kids, your mum, your dad, your aunts, your uncles, your grandpa, your gran, your friend, your cat, your dog. But always ask permission before going in for a hug!
Remember, there are some pretty lonely people out there, most of whom are feeling anxious, insecure and will be suffering from a lack of human connection. Show some love and compassion towards your fellow humans. A simple nod of appreciation, a smile and a “hello how are you today” will go along way.
Community
We are innately wild connected and empowered beings. It’s in our DNA, it’s the narrative of our evolution to be a physical, social, spiritual, emotional well-being.
It is important to immerse ourselves in communities that recognise our potential & help support our health & well-being, rather than compromise it.
In common-unity we can create the collective shift, that eureka moment and the Aha! moment to the fact that we are all awe inspiring humans, who already know what we need. Through a supportive community we can find the help of others to remember that we have everything inside of ourselves to make the changes we so desperately seek.
But I don’t have a support group?
I hear you, It can be lonely out there!
Here’s what’s been created -Over the past few years I have been busy creating events, circles and an online community to help others immerse in community and practices to navigate their path when life gets tough. Because life can get tough right?
The NatLifeTribe
The NatLifeTribe is an online community, which offers weekly movement and breath work classes. There are four mobility and movement sessions per week because as we now know, being able to move well and freely directly impacts our level of wellbeing and happiness. Sometimes, we can stuck on the idea that all we have to do is think the right thoughts. But it’s not enough to think happy’. When your body is starved of movement, your joints aren't working well, your inner systems are stagnant and your muscles are tense or in pain - where’s the space to breathe and find balance here? Think of your body as a fleshy vessel for your mind: the more good quality, organic, naturally fluid movement and mobility you feed it, the easier it is to access those feel good relaxing vibes.
The NatLifeTribe morning mobility and movement classes and down regulating evening breath work and slow flow yoga classes, are here to help keep you more grounded, strong, mobile, connected and conscious. - And the additional support from live chats and the incredible WhatsApp group helps with accountability and deeper connection.
ManMen
I committed to creating MANMEN because the stats don’t lie.
Suicide remains the most common cause of death among men under the age of 50 in the UK - so it’s really quite evident that it can be quite lonely out here being a man.
I’ve been there, I know it feels rubbish and I also know that we absolutely do not need to exist in a perpetual state of ‘making-do’.
So Why MANMEN?
Because it’s nice to know there are more Men in the circle.
At MANMEN we challenge the scars of our domestication and help each other find the courage to have a good honest look at our behaviour. Together we will learn how to show up; to bravely transform our perspective of our masculine self; to ReWild our sense of strength, honour and accountability and reclaim our purpose. Yes it might be terrifying to take a good honest look at how you arrived here, but it’s essential if we’re to navigate this path of authenticity to finding ultimately who we are as conscious Men.
Details about monthly meet ups and experience can be found here
WomanHood
Throughout time Women have gathered in circles of ceremony and celebration to connect with each other and the natural world.
There is a respect that is built between women.. a strength from trust in sister hood... a divine chemistry of honouring our hearts, hurts and our power and pain. The bond between woman who sit in ceremony expands out beyond the circle and the ripples are felt in our wider community.
The womanhood is about honouring and healing both the healthy feminine and the healthy masculine within... being open yet having boundaries and the strength inside to endure... to trust our super powers of heart-centeredness and intuition, but also assert our intuition to be heart led.
We are leaning into a great time of healing. Through Womanhood we will shed some light upon the healthy and unhealthy sides of masculine and feminine energies, what they are and why we should learn to love and accept both.
Night and day. Hot and cold. Winter and summer. Sun and moon. Inhale and exhale.. All of these represent dualities that keep our Earth functioning as it is.
Details about monthly meet ups and experience can be found here
The 100 Human Experience
The 100 Human Experience is your route to ‘rewilding’ yourself back to your natural, healthy, consciously connected state. We provide you with potent practices for you to bring positive changes towards your health and wellbeing. Through breathwork, movement, play, voice awakening, ecstatic dance, ice baths, fire and drumming ceremonies and high vibrational healing cacao ceremonies. - We show you how to connect with your innate, wild nature, to build resilience and the strength of mind to welcome in the wild, connected and empowered version of you.
You are Loved
You are Enough
You are Appreciated
Love & Hugs
T