The stress of mornings

From the moment of my waking up to arriving at my desk: this seems to be the most stressful part of my day. There is so much to fit in, and two little people who just don't seem to get the concept of time or being late.

It has got me thinking about my mornings and how I can make them less stressful. And the answer is simple. Work from home or a cafe those mornings that I also have to get the kids to school. Do not even attempt to get into the office at the same time everybody else is trying to get to the office. Do the opposite of what everybody else is doing.

The answer to my stressful mornings maybe as simple as not trying to meet an arbitrary arrival deadline. I will experiment with this over the next two weeks.

The moment before

People usually fail when they are on the verge of success. So give as much care to the end as to the beginning. Then there will be no failure. 

 -- Tao Te Ching - Lao Tzu

I have learnt that those moments when I feel the most stress, the most desire to give up, the most confused, and the most dispondent, these are the feelings that always come just before a big breakthrough.  

The irony is that they are also the moments when it is easiest to stop and give up, to declare failure.  

Noticing the feelings; calling bullshit on my rationalisations that tells me I have gone backwards; allowing myself to thrash in any way I see fit; and being curious about what is emerging: These are my personal best tools in enabling me to cling on in those moments. 

And then, in a moment, something changes. I meet somebody. I understand something. Something clicks. And the thing I was so worried about moments before now seems mundane. And I have come to a deeper understanding of myself and my existence.  

When struggling to sleep

Those nights when I am trying to sleep but can't, when my mind is racing and all I want to do is check my phone, these are a few things I do to try and help myself get to sleep:

• I get up out of bed and have a short walk around the house, going to the toilet, having something to drink. This helps get my body moving in a different way, both internally and externally, and I usually feel a least a bit better by the time I am back in bed.

• if I have woken up in the middle of the night and am trying to get back to sleep, I remind myself that it is actually normal to have two blocks of sleep during the night, and this helps clam me down.

• I let my mind wander for a time, and then if I am still buzzing, I bring myself back to something like a meditation practise where I focus on my breath, or the sensations I am feeling on my body. In particular, by controlling and slowing down my breathing and then observing my breath, I am usually able to relax enough to fall asleep.

They are by no means magic tricks for falling to sleep, but they give me a better chance then stewing on the goings on of my mind.