Your Mental Wellness Podcast for Your Voice and Sanity

How to put your skin back into your game (and why that is good for your sanity)

Dr. Sibylle Georgianna's Leadership Practice Season 3 Episode 9

There's usually so much going on however, that really deliberately stopping and slowing it down seems like really essential. And then sometimes I find myself in this place of there's a lot to handle. 
And yet, the things that really kind of matter, most, I have to really push hard to have that at the at the top of my list, not at the bottom. So that's how the last couple of weeks have been. 

I get to stay on it just on the things that, that that represents my values. And then, on all the other stuff that comes our way, right, but what even what's going on in the world to really focus on the value driven pursuits first, and then on the rest. So that's been my last couple of weeks. It's been.
It's been an interesting couple of weeks. But talking a little bit more about which I think is so good. That sends up self examination, self love, maybe believes and then looking at our thought life, as all of that has so much to do with our mental wellness, and that sense of sanity. 

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Sibylle Georgianna:

Hey there, I'm always excited to talk with our Sherpa Sarah, who is such an expert in many ways of really making the best out of work and life in anything in between. So I couldn't have her back today. And I'm grateful to have you on the call. I'm excited. How is this going for you? How have you been?

Sarah Hohmann:

Hi, how's it gotten? It's been really good. Lately, I've been doing a lot of I've been doing a lot of self love and self worth kind of examination recently, and I think things have been going really, really well. How about yourself,

Sibylle Georgianna:

it is good. I feel there's usually so much going on however, that really deliberately stopping and slowing it down seems like really essential. And then sometimes I find myself in this place of you know, there's a lot to handle. And yet, the things that really kind of matter, most, you know, I have to really push hard to have that at the at the top of my list, not at the bottom. So that's how the last couple of weeks have been I'm like, Okay, I got to stay on it just on the things that, that that represents my values. And then you know, on all the other stuff that comes our way, right, but what even what's going on in the world to really focus on the value driven pursuits first, and then on the rest. So that's been my last couple of weeks. It's been, it's been an interesting couple of weeks. But talking a little bit more about which I think is so good. That sends up self examination, self love, maybe believes and then looking at our thought life, as all of that has so much to do with our mental wellness, and that sense of sanity.

Sarah Hohmann:

Oh, absolutely. And like you were saying before, it's so important to prioritize all of these things, and really focus on what your values are. And just make sure that they are there on top. And it's easy to get lost and of the negativity. And I think what I've been doing recently is focusing more on how I'm talking to myself, what's my inner voice? What's the inner conversations going on in my head. And I feel like what I've started to like, sit down and be mindful of that. There's a lot of positivity that comes out of it. And it kind of affects my day and how things go throughout my day. And like the challenges that I face. It's just like, like, for example, if I'm going to store my GPA, I totally forgot, because I was just at the store recently. Like, I, I forgot to put eggs on my list and like, you know what? I might be at the house, I forgot to check if it was at the house. And I'd say to myself, are you sure? Like, well, maybe I can text? You know, whoever's at the house has a moment and like, okay, see, look, we can we can solve the situation, we don't have to buy more eggs than needed. And then, you know, go from there and just think that like, a positive? Yes. situation. I mean, it's just like that. That's a small example. There's like bigger things that happened, like, you know, what if what if your car to tire the tire in the car just gets blown out? And like, ah, what am I gonna do you have to go off on the side road called AAA and like, you know, things are gonna be okay, look, you you have time to relax. Now, you know, the meeting, you had to go to my needs to be pushed off because you have an emergency. But you know, what, it's gonna be handled because, you know, the AAA is coming to fix the tire. And I find myself at least, you know, engaging that kind of self talk.

Sibylle Georgianna:

Yeah, it's great. And I think I think you're hitting a point in terms of even when you when you share that self talk. It's kinda like how you would say it to your friend, when they would call you or, you know, you'd stand next to your friend when they're saying, Oh, I don't know about the eggs and stuff. So that type of kind of, like an encouraging or encouragement to the friend. Yeah, that's, it sounds like that instead of, you know, beating ourselves up or calling, you know, what I tend to so funny to say to myself, whatever if especially with a creative endeavor, you know, my my, my negative committee and my head wants to say that that's outrageous, crazy, or, you know, it's just not not a thing to pursue, but I really love the idea of of talking to myself more as a friend, or some you know, somebody who kind of cheers me on to good person. Yeah, instead of, you know, going going to the negative committee in my head that tells me that they already expected this to fail. So, but so in a way, you know, feeding That sense of, you know, that we are worth talking well to ourselves. I think for me, that is even saying gratitude, you know, even it's not a feeling of gratitude, but even just declaring, you know, point of gratitude to myself over and over, that helps me kind of go to that more friendly friend instead of the negative committee. And at the same time, the things that are on my, on my grateful list, the same things that could be on a negative list. So you know, even Yeah, declaring my gratitude that sometimes I even declared over the things that are more from them, that I could just have the negative committee declared or me all over, but any time I feel even shifting that sense of, you know, how are we perceiving ourselves? How are we perceiving the world, while there's probably much more of a focus on the negative all around us, then on the things we get to be grateful for? So a wonderful and, and you anything that you notice as to what helps you? You know, work on that mental wellness, and that mental sanity any time of the day? Are you eating chocolate afterwards to reinforce this thing that works for you?

Sarah Hohmann:

Oh, yeah, absolutely. And I do want to? Yeah, yeah. That actually, it's funny that you mentioned the the negative committee because I also find that there is a committee in my head as well, of people sitting around for like, you know, examining the situation from, like, objective perspective of what are we going to do. And that's to say, I'm not always positive, I know, there's some negativity that does creep in, I'm human, I understand that. But how I get started, throughout the day, is I know, first of all, I'm, like I said, I'm not perfect, I don't strive to always be positive or, or for something that's, you know, positive, if I, you know, if I feel a negative emotion, I sit with it for a little bit. And I, you know, listened to what it needs to tell me when it comes to the situation. And sometimes it's very insightful as well. And it brings positivity from that, in how I really got started on it was, well, I, I know I talk about this a lot, I love meditating. And I love like, the first thing that happens at the beginning of my day, is listening to nice guided meditation. If there's one on like, self love, or like gratitude, and something like that, I'll focus more on that, depending on like, the mood or what's needed for the day. And from there, I kind of just, you know, take deep breaths, and just breathe through throughout the meditation. And I guess that kind of helps me to be more mindful. And take a step back. And I guess if there are negative emotions, going about my my head and affecting my self talk, I just sit with them. And just slowly release it as needed. And from there, it kind of affects the conversation or like, for example, if if someone can't, like if I go to meet a friend, and they cancel on me, and the first thing is like, ah, you know, I've really wanted to beat up with them. And this is going to ruin my day. Well, you know, just what else am I going to do? And, like, as soon as I start getting to that spiral, I'm like, wait, hold on, hold on a second. And I just take it like I say to myself, I can take a few minutes to stop and breathe. And then from there, I can start thinking of something positive that came from that situation of, hey, you know, you have some time for yourself. Now. You can do something that you want to do, instead of like focusing on like work that may have been scheduled for later. You can take that time. And you can go some nice music or go do some gardening outside if it's like, if it's a nice day outside. You know, like, you could find things in like, oh, wow, you know, what's that? I didn't think of that. That's that's a really good. As I say to myself, I didn't think of that. But I was thinking that's my inner conversation like, Oh, I didn't think of it. I'm like, Well, no way I just did like that's

Sibylle Georgianna:

like when I look at something and sometimes I'm saying to myself, This is not what I see. But I'm just commenting on what I see, you know, Same idea, you know, mind is so funny sometimes. I really like that example. Because I feel even as a technology driven world, it's we're just sometimes so disconnected from from truly ourselves or our values. And it's just this bombardment of, you know, stimulation. And you know, it's common that people move times around even our time for our call, I moved around. So thanks for being flexible. And at the same time, I feel that, that slowing down is the mechanism to ward off the impact on the brain and ward off the there was things that keep us from our mental sanity, you know, that want to keep us in that more potentially, like a little overstimulated or hyper vigilant state that I feel is a lot of times induced just by the amount of inflammation we are facing every day. Or distraction, even through that. So. So I love the idea of for me, it's the same thing I have to do not I don't have to do, but I really want to do my early early morning meditation, because it really sets a different course for the day I do, you know, more of a, like a devotional reading and and then, you know, phase two is ideally to be quiet and to sit there and to not think, and to not, you know, be distracted with something blinking or beeping or, you know, something that wants to be distracting me and maybe even physically, so, but at the same time, part two of that, so that sitting and being quiet and slowing down, that is the hardest part of that phase of meditation for sure. In order to listen, and to really not just have a committee automatically come in, but really just to say, okay, yeah, you know, what's, what's the other, you know, what's my, I call it high power connection? You know, what's my, what's my bigger picture? And my, my bigger sense of life all about in that, you know, for today? So, so Yeah, usually, we're setting ourselves a challenge with, you know, I at least set myself a challenge was with our compensations here. Yeah. Gonna be to, to really work on embracing that friend and ally, that would comment on situations, maybe more favorably than my, my committee would for sure. I do think that that's a good, good challenge for me just to lean to the friend and not to the committee. Nice. Yes. Yeah. So I think that's what I want to focus on. What's What's your challenge? What's your wellness and Saturday,

Sarah Hohmann:

me, you know, I've saw something somewhere on the internet, that if you work with, like, white noise playing in the background, or if you're doing something with white noise in the background, it helps the mental chatter to quiet down. So I was thinking of implementing that before I go to sleep, just playing some white noise, or even test it out, like if I'm focusing on a task, I can have, like, you know, go on YouTube and play like white noise on loop, and see if it has an effect on my mental chatter. And just, I guess, continued breathing throughout the, you know, just keeping a keep a mental mindset for it, you know, and just understand that, you know, this, this mental chatter that's happening in your head, it will pass, there'll be moments, we'll come back again, but then it will pass. And I think that will be my main focus is trying into implementing some tools that may help with that, if that makes sense.

Sibylle Georgianna:

That makes a lot of sense. So and I think that is actually the way to also go into more of a creative mode. Really, moving, you know, past that past the chatter, so to speak. Yeah. The other thing that I try to use a lot on myself because I really notice how effective it is to get through the chatter is when you move your left and your right body half. So that's it, tap with right foot, left foot, right foot, left foot, like in an alternating fashion. You know, tapping your steering wheel with the right and left hand, you know, as you in traffic, so that will be me. And so with that movement, the movement basically induces that the brain's halfs have to coordinate kind of what's going on. Yeah, thereby then discharge the chatter or the stressors. Once Why don't we want to call it and he was more into more like a productive slash forward looking or more of a, you know, I don't want to call it a problem solving but more like inquisitive, like what's going on? You know, what's my best option type of mindset? So,

Sarah Hohmann:

yeah, like providing clarity. Yeah, yes,

Sibylle Georgianna:

absolutely. So, or sometimes just to not be stuck in the, in the chatter or in the fallout of, you know, physical sensations following from, you know, that's for me, you know, I can, you know, feel my body amping up, and I'm like, okay, you know, I'm just aggravated. No, are we? Yeah, my blood pressure has to go up. So you give

Sarah Hohmann:

a name to it. That's good. I like that.

Sibylle Georgianna:

So yeah, I have a lot of a lot of opportunities to practice those things, I guess. Okay, well, you know, we have our challenges set up, and we can't wait to check in again soon. And to really pick your brain. Again, on the next piece here or our you know, we I feel there's so many good things for helping us with our mindset with our mental wellness in our sanity, and even ultimately, with expressing what we want to express from all value and sell us a voice. So thank you so much for all chat today, Sarah, and let's talk again soon.

Sarah Hohmann:

Absolutely. Nice talking with you today.

Sibylle Georgianna:

Likewise, I always enjoyed so much. Thanks for your time.

Sarah Hohmann:

Thank you. You take

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