I remember so many times when my mum used to walk around our house ‘counting to ten’ to try and prevent herself from losing the rag as one of her beloved children (never me of course!) had smacked/broken/hidden/destroyed/punched/drawn over something – possibly one of her other children!

I always wondered, as a child, how effective it was and why counting to ten seemed so important.  “Weird grown up stuff” is more than likely the conclusions to my youthful pondering.

But as I’ve grown up and learned more about the mind and emotions I have discovered that many of the ideas that we now see as clichés, the little rituals that we dismiss as silly, make fun of or say sarcastically to our stressed out colleague when 3 days of work disappears in a random computer blip are actually true and can really work to calm us, chill us out and help us when times are tough.
Here are five of my favourites:

1. Count to 10 –  Many of our most powerful emotional responses happen instantly and therefore bypass the part of our minds that rationalises, calculates and has an awareness of other people’s emotions.  In some cases, like joy, love or even ecstasy, this is a good thing and allows us to lose ourselves in a wonderful moment free of our usual inhibitions.  In others, like anger, having some time to think – even 10 seconds – allows that rational part of our mind to try and work out the most effective response to get us our outcome before we act on impulse and say something we might regret.

2. Take a Deep Breath – When our emotional state changes our body changes with it.  When we are happy or excited we breathe deeply from the bottom of our lungs, when we are anxious or stressed our breathing becomes quicker, shallower and higher in our chests.  Just try breathing big, deep steady breaths and then try and feel anxious..it doesn’t work!!

Here’s a wee experiment.  Sit up straight and, wherever you are now, take 10 long, steady, deep breaths.  Go.  Now, where did you lose count? The lower the number the more your mind is controlling your body and the more you need to breathe.  Try again later until you can get all 10 in a row.

3. Go to a happy place – All of our feelings are based on our interpretations of reality – not reality itself.  If you don’t like flying, it’s not the plane or the pilot that’s the issue it is your thoughts about what might happen to the plane.  But we can literally ‘jam’ this ‘negative’ signal on purpose and replace it with something more positive if we choose to.

Think of somewhere that is your idea of bliss.  It might be a real place or a fantasy, somewhere you’ve been or somewhere you’re going.  Now, next time you are in a place or situation that you don’t like, ‘jam’ your mind’s negative signal by running your happy place again and again and again.  If you slip out of it, just go back and make it so good you find it easy to stay.

4. Sing a Happy Tune – Well if going to happy place can work then so can singing a happy tune.  I lost count of the number of times I would start singing one of my all time favourite songs inside my head before doing presentations or even going to interviews because it changed the way I felt so radically!

Think of the happy tune or the happy place like a jamming signal for negative thoughts.  If you can flood your mind with something else then there is no space for anything else.  This gives you time to return your breathing to normal and start feeling better.

Even better, choose a tune that is filled with some sort of positive meaning and emotion for you and you will get a big dose of all that good feeling and emotion back again.

Try it now, choose a tune that is packed with good memories – the first dance, the school disco favourite, the football chant, that tune that means so much to you – and notice how you feel.  Next time your thoughts begin to run away with you, sing goddamit!

5. Positive Mental Attitude (PMA) – If you live in the UK you might remember that advert that was on a few years ago, “you just need PMA, positive mental attitude”.  Mix that in with countless satirical comedy sketches, painful attempts at motivation from so called experts  and people who lie to themselves about how great everything is as their lives turn to dust and it’s no wonder the thought of anyone ‘thinking positive’ has become one of the biggest clichés of them all.

Why?   Well, because we are told that once you start thinking positive then you can’t stop.  But that’s now how to really make it work.  The simplest explanation of thinking positive is to start thinking about what you DO want rather than what you DON’T.  For example, imagine you have to do a presentation in front of 15 people.  For lots of people this is their idea of a nightmare.  But many people lie to themselves, thinking that they are ‘thinking positive’, by telling themselves “I’m fine, I’m OK.  I’m going to be great” when inside they feel terrified and are worried about all 15 audience members wetting themselves with laughter at everything they say because they don’t really know what they are talking about!!

Making ‘Thinking positive’ work is about asking yourself how you DO want it to happen, to accept that you feel nervous, discover what you feel nervous about and know that you have the skills and ability to deal with it.

It’s also about knowing that you can go to a happy place, sing a happy tune, take a deep breath and, if all else fails, count to 10 before you make your next move!!

We’ll Meet Again

My wife and I were in a large shop in Glasgow the other day and joined what appeared to be a whole city full of people looking for gifts and presents. We were ticking off our list of names and ideas making sure everyone was covered when we realised that, for the first year since we became a couple over 10 years ago, one name was now missing from our list.

This festive time of year brings many aspects of our life into sharp focus, doesn’t it; the quality of our family relationships, our financial position, the depth of our network of friends, our health & wellbeing and many other things that, as we near the turning of the year, we spend time thinking about.

It’s also at this time of year that we are reminded of those that will not be with us (physically anyway!) around our festive dinner tables. I know that many people reading this have loved ones, parents, friends, children, relatives or even beloved pets who have passed away this year and who will be dearly missed as we enter this time of family and togetherness.

As we go about buying for family and friends the fact that this person is missing is all the more apparent and that makes it easy to spend the coming weeks noticing they are not where they used to be. I want to tell you that you have a choice as to whether to spend this next couple of weeks sad as you continually mourn their loss or smiling as you periodically remember their life.

When someone close to you passes away it can be really tough, I’m not denying it. When my dad passed away in 2003 it was a difficult time for the whole family but, and this is a big but, I made a choice at that time to look back on his life with a pride and a happiness about who he was. It didn’t stop me being sad sometimes when he wasn’t there, it doesn’t stop me missing him sometimes when a big family occasion happens and it doesn’t stop me just wanting to hear his voice or his words of wisdom (that in reality I’d probably ignore anyway!!) but it does allow me to feel happy for what I have had rather than what I have lost. Do you see the difference yet?

When we grieve for something or someone, we are focusing on wanting what we have lost. Wanting ‘them’, whoever that is, to be there when they aren’t, imagining how much they would have enjoyed <insert name of event here> but they can’t, basically wishing that they were still with us. But, and this is just the reality of the situation, they aren’t.

Before I go on, I positively encourage you to sometimes miss that person and to sometimes feel sad that they are not with you, this is a sign of how much you loved them, how much you cared for them and how big a part of your life they were. I just don’t want you to live there. One person has already died, there is no point in making it two.

So what do you do? Well there are many things we can do but here are just 2 simple things we can focus on that will conquer any of the negative feelings we have talked about and I urge you over this festive period to fill yourself to the brim with both of these about those that are here physically and those that aren’t..

Firstly, Gratitude. Be grateful for everything you experienced with this person, no matter how long or brief a period they were a part of your life.

Try it now. Inside your mind and your heart remember a time that now, as you go back, if you could, you want to say ‘Thank You’ for. A happy time, a funny time, a tiny thing, a big thing, a quiet time or maybe an exciting time. Whatever comes to mind. And inside you, in the most caring and loving voice you can muster, say ‘Thank You’ to yourself, to that special person, to the world! Now how does that feel to do? How does it feel just to say ‘Thank You’?.

Yeah, there may be a tear or two but they will be tears of gratitude, not loss or grief. And grateful tears are tears worth shedding!

Now anytime you feel that dark blanket of grief coming on, recall another time and another time and another time with that person and inside, from deep down in your heart, say ‘Thank You’ and mean it.

Secondly Love. Love is a funny emotion because the right kind of love will stay with you forever. If you have loved you can always love again. The fact that the person you loved is no longer here physically doesn’t change that.

Let’s do it again; Remember a time now - it can be a tiny time that just meant something to you or something huge that almost made your heart explode with love or even somewhere in between - but remember that time vividly in your mind and in your heart and remember what that person’s love feels like. Wallow in it, recall it, be Grateful for it and live with it in your heart.

That feeling of love is just as real as when they were here, it isn’t in your imagination. It isn’t a fake feeling just because you can’t touch them or tell them that you have felt it. These feelings of love are as alive today as they ever were and while those feelings are alive, so are they.

My mission to you is to make this festive period a time filled with Gratitude and Love. That is your choice. Do you choose the path that smiles or the path that mourns? Well, when I put it like that surely there is no choice! Is there?

I hope you have a lovely Christmas period whatever your beliefs and I urge you to spend the next couple of weeks remembering the joy, love and laughter that you have experienced in your life and vowing to get more of it next year.

Happy Xmas, Slainte, here’s to your whole family and let’s go get an amazing 2010

PS The name that was missing from my list? My wife’s best, furry feline buddy Worf (yes, after the Star Trek Character!) passed away in July this year. He’s missed but remembered with a smile. Always there when he’s needed.