Train Your Brain
Throughout the years, I’ve continuously sought out opportunities to further my education and develop myself in a variety of areas. It should be no surprise that my favorite category frequently relates to health and fitness on some level. As a yoga instructor and someone who has worked with government entities a lot, the two combined have taken me down some new pathways.
The Veterans Yoga Project (VYP) is an organization that’s mission is to ‘support recovery and resilience among our veterans, active-duty military members, their families, and communities’. The organization is still in its infancy stages of development but has been gaining traction with the military community for some time now. They offer impactful courses, one of them being ‘Mindful Resilience for Compassion Fatigue’ (MRCF), which is a course I’m currently taking. I’m not here to sell you on anything, though If you are experiencing compassion fatigue, which I think many of us likely are these days, I highly recommend signing up for the course, MRCF.
Getting to the point, my instructor posed a couple of questions last evening that has prompted me to share with you today. Afterall, fitness isn’t just to do with our bodies. We need to always be working on the fitness of our minds too.
Back to the instructor’s questions to think about:
What do you engage in that helps relieve some of the stressors that you take on during the day/week?
How are you taking care of yourself so that you are of sound mind to be there for others?
Is self-care part of your daily routine, and if not, how can you incorporate it into your routine?
My first thought was “of course I take care of myself, I work out all the time.” But listening to loud music and throwing weights around in our gym is a much different kind of self-care than what the instructor was referring to. Working on the health of our minds is of equal importance for our own psychological wellness. It also gives us the ability to be a solid sounding board for others, especially when in a position of authority, leadership, law enforcement, care provider, etc. Easier said than done, I know!
The important take away here is to think about your own emotional wellbeing and identify what tools work best for you to be mindfully resilient and avoid the downside of compassion fatigue that we all have experienced at one time or another. Reading a good self-development book, taking 10 minutes each night clearing the mind without distractions, meditating (whatever that means to you), going on a walk and taking in some fresh air/new scenery, listening to an awesome podcast with Mr. AIP... There are dozens of ideas, but its all about finding what works for you and sticking with it.
*Today, do something for you.
~Sarah N Burke
