6 Practical Ideas
Rattled.
From time to time, we get rattled. Excessive pressure at work, busyness that overwhelms, or the general craziness of life may cause this uneasy sensation. We all get rattled sometimes, and we would like to become unrattled.
I suspect it is not realistic to think that you might never be rattled again, but perhaps these 6 ideas will result in being less rattled!
- Begin your day on purpose. This practice pre-empts potential anxiety provoking events. If you begin your day ahead and on purpose, you set a pace of peace and control. If you begin your day behind, you are prone to be rattled easily.
- Exercise some every day. How much, how difficult, what time, what setting, etc. are probably less important than the fact that you do something every day. As I often say, a little bit of something is better than a whole lot of nothing! Seriously, exercise releases happy chemicals and processes that improve your chances for coping, enjoying, and living well.
- Connect to someone every day. Again, this is pre-emptive, cumulative, and simple. Make intentional contact daily with people you love, or at least like. Studies are replete with the fact that this is what fulfilled people do. Success leaves clues, and this is one of them.
- Take 10 deep breaths. Repeat as necessary. In the moment of rattling, you may not be able to remove yourself. You may have to grin and survive it. To help with this, take 10 deep breaths. And, then take 10 more if needed. I am working on this one.
- During those 10 breaths, zoom out on your perspective. Yes, like zoom in, zoom out. Zoom out to 30,000 feet. How important is this current situation in broader context? It probably is sort of important. But, probably not enough to fuss, cuss, and skyrocket your blood pressure. This one is hard to do, but keep practicing.
- Find the humor in the moment. For some, this is even more difficult. But, if you can breath, zoom out, and find the humor, you have diffused a rattling situation and you may even appear to be unflappable…unrattled. Try some mental cue for this one. Like, what if everyone in this scenario were naked? Okay, that might be scary, rather than funny. What is you pictured each person as one of the Three Stooges or one of the muppets? Just ideas, but find a mechanism that works for you.
Unrattled. Perhaps these ideas will help you navigate potentially rattling situations.
Worth Repeating
A calm mind brings inner strength and self confidence.
-Dalai Lama
