Letting Go of the Mind Chatter

It's the Monday after Thanksgiving and I'm sitting here with a cup of coffee typing bleary eyed. I was up til 1 am last night staring at the ceiling. This seems to happen to me everytime I stop running. My anxiety goes up and I sit in bed for hours tossing and turning. I've come to realize this is just a part of me that I have little control over--unless I run. But to update everyone, my doctor has ruled that I stop running because I started having Braxton Hicks contractions at 16 weeks. She told me there was no way to stop labor at this point, so I needed to recognize when the contractions were happening and make myself lie down and relax. RELAX? To me that's a foreign word sometimes. In my mind I was thinking, "How do I relax when the only thing that was working was running?"



Kathy Worley, Certified Massage Therapist

That next week, I asked The Hubs if he minded watching Baby Girl while I received a massage. Of course, he didn't mind at all. So I called up one of the best--nope I'd say the very best massage therapist I've found since moving here, Kathy Worley. She's so amazing at her job and really understands stress and where it hides in a person's body. For years, I have enjoyed massage but I'd say in the last two years I have really gotten into massage geared towards health and not so much fluff. Fluff? You probably don't understand what I'm talking about. Well, you can go to any commercialized chain spa and receive a very relaxing massage. But usually, it's so light that when you come out you feel the same tension you started with. Basically, it did no good. Massage geared towards health says, "I have a problem and I need the kinks worked out." For me, when the neck pain begins and it radiates down my back and up my head, I know I'm way overdo for a massage. So anyway, it had been 6 months since I received a massage (too long really)! Kathy Worley, my massage therapist was amazing. She worked the knots out of my back and neck for an entire hour and a half! As she was talking she pressed on my back and said, "I notice every time you exhale you relax a little more." She said, "That's really good because you don't fight it. You really are looking for peace. Alot of people fight it." She was exactly right! I do want peace and seem to be on a constant search for it. But what I told her is that it doesn't come easy and I have to constantly work on it. Kathy is so intune with people. You can sense her spirit is good and because of that, she is great at her job. Click here if you're interested in learning more about her.

So I thought about enrolling in prenatal yoga classes but when I saw the prices, I realized paying that bill would send me into anxiety overload. I've thought about just walking (which I probably will do on my own) but I just hate thinking about taking my daughter out there in the freezing cold. One thing I know for sure, I have to get rid of the mind chatter.  I have to learn to turn my brain off? And quit listening to that little "Anxiety Voice" in my head that says, "What will I do?" I've been doing some research and found a great article about this very thing from Sandra Hersey.

She says, "To stop your Mind Chatter, you need to learn how to stop your subconscious mind’s habit of “running off at the mouth,” so to speak. You have to first recognize that you have mind chatter happening. You need to pay attention to your mind chatter and what it is saying. If your mind chatter is negative and using words like I can’t, I should, or what will I do, then you need to stop the voice going on inside your head immediately. Change your thought process. Begin to get control of your subconscious mind by thinking, I’m okay, I can handle this; even start saying some positive affirmations like “I can figure out how to make this work,” or “I am smart and successful.” Click here for her full article.

Yes, this is exactly what I needed to start with! I remembered learning about this in my counseling classes. The one thing I can control is my mind chatter. But I also know from personal experience this is a daily process. If you are one who is naturally anxious about everything, you have to make the conscious decision to live each day in a positive light.

So a few other things I plan on trying and blogging about is...

1. Buy a Prenatal Yoga  DVD to try at home.
2. Make myself walk twice a week.
3. Spend more time in the Bible and talking to God.
4. Change my eating habits (atleast til I can run again). I want to try to eliminate some of the soda and refined sugar that I eat and drink. I know I can't eliminate it completely but I do know when I drink or eat it, I become very sluggish and tired.
5. Spend some quiet time each day by myself. Turning off the mind chatter and listening to the quiet sound of nothing. Basically meditating.

I'm not gonna do all these things at once but I want to try a little at a time. So here goes! Wish me luck and keep reading : )