How to feel calmer during the coronavirus pandemic

Guest Blog

I’m welcoming Gemma Sandwell, Chief Happiness Officer and Mindfulness Teacher at The Happiness Branch to my blog to share tips on how to feel calmer during uncertainty.

At the moment lots of people are feeling fear and anxiety, whether it is due to the challenges of lockdown or the worries around catching Coronavirus

I want to be able to give you something to help you over the next few weeks and with this current situation. These tools can help you moving forwards even over the coming months. I have been using them for a few years and have changed my life.

I’ve been on my own journey with stress and anxiety. I started my journey on a quest to help others, seeing those around me stressed and anxious and then learning and finding techniques and tools to help others. I’ve completed 13 years of study in Psychology, Positive Psychology and Mindfulness. I have been able to use these techniques to apply to my own life, in particular with anxiety.

I have been able to overcome anxiety to the point that I did a TEDx talk last year. That being said I have been feeling a bit anxious at the moment but I’m able to manage it, use the techniques on myself and get myself to a place of calm so I can help others.

So to bring these techniques to you today, firstly I want to mention Mindfulness.

Mindfulness is helping me a lot at the moment, noticing the anxiety, being able to identified how I’m feeling and why and then get techniques to help. My daily meditation has been a life saver, even finding a few minutes a day to practice. At the moment with less travel this is actually easier. See if you can take some time to even just take a few mindful breaths.

Step away from the news. Its great to be informed and there are reliable sources out there, if you must watch the news limit it to once a day. The news creates a fear response which triggers our fight and flight mode.

 We can use Mindfulness to notice the fear and switch it to a place of calm, love and kindness. Mindfulness can help us notice it at early stages, where in the body we are feeling it and act accordingly. For me its noticing the early stages of a tight chest and this helps me to realise I am feeling anxious and then think about ways to be kind to myself, to slow down, to think about what I would say to a friend if they were feeling this way.

Mindfulness is not just about being mindful and noticing but about the action step, what we need to do with what we have noticed? 

I wanted to share with you the APPLE model from Anxiety UK which is basically Mindfulness and is a helpful way of stepping back from what is going on at the moment:

Acknowledge - Notice and acknowledge the uncertainty, see it for how it is non judgementally.

Pause- Just pause, and breathe.

Pull Back – Step back and realise this thought or feeling is only a thought or feeling.  Don't believe everything you think!  Thoughts are not facts, what are the facts?

Let go - Let go of the thought or feeling. It will pass.  You don't have to respond to them.  You might imagine them floating away in a bubble or cloud.

Explore - Explore the present moment, because right now, in this moment, all is well.  Notice your breathing, and the sensations of breathing.  Notice the ground beneath you.  Look around and notice what you see, what you hear, what you can touch, what you can smell right now.

Then, move your attention to something else - on what you need to do, on what you were doing before you noticed the worry, or do something else - mindfully, with your full attention.

This is similar to the waterfall approach which Jon Kabat Zinn (the Grandfather of Mindfulness) talks about which we use in my online 8 Weeks of Mindfulness course.

 If we can imagine that our thoughts are like a waterfall, flowing and passing in front of us and we take a step back. We go behind the waterfall and in this place we can consider that our thoughts are just our thoughts, they are not facts and we can watch them pass. By considering the facts in a situation, this can really help as a lot of the time as a lot of the time they are just our thoughts.

With letting them go you can focus on leaves floating down a stream or clouds in the sky or thoughts moving away as bubbles.Bring your families into these practices, connect with others through these practices even if this is online.

A great activity you can do with children is make calm jars, a great way to help children with anxiety and with emotions at the moment plus its fun and they look pretty.

https://www.thehappinessbranch.com/calm-jars

I have a free tree meditation available from my website at the moment, if the analogy of the tree from my TEDx resonated then you are welcome to get your free copy here www.thehappinessbranch.com/subscribe.

If you would like to build a mindfulness habit for life and join my popular 8 Weeks of Mindfulness course you can do so here www.thehappinessbranch.com/mindfulness (please note the VIP option I may be able to open up some more spots sooner given the current circumstances so please let me know if this interests you).

Take Care of yourselves, sending Mindful Love

Gemma Sandwell – TEDx speaker and Mindfulness Teacher