Not sure how you do with music when you’re working or when you are resting but I find the right stuff at the right time does wonders for me!
I can’t work while playing music with words but there is some great instrumental stuff out there that just settles into the background and into your head and calms and relaxes create a great ambience for work.
I also love music when I meditate. Sometimes focussing on my breath just doesn’t work for me so listening to some music I can focus on a particular element or the feeling of the whole piece and try to clear my mind that way.
Here are some of my favourites – Spotify is my weapon of choice but I’m sure these playlists/artists/style are available on other platforms.
I’ve got into the habit when talking to people about self-care of finding myself often saying, “all we are doing here is playing psychological tricks on ourselves to get the best out of ourselves so ‘ourselves’ stop getting in the way”.
There’s a funny thing goes on in my head when I go for a run. Sometimes I head off and run a big loop but sometimes I run laps close to home. I have a route that is ‘near as damn it’ exactly a mile long and I have another route that is ‘as near as damn it’ one and a half miles long. If I want to run three miles I find it easier to run the longer route than the shorter one because I only have to do two loops and I’m done! On the shorter one I have to do 3 loops and that, psychologically, seems so much harder. Which is daft really because either way, it’s 3 miles! But it’s a very real thing. In fact, sometimes (like today) when I get to the end of the 3 miles on the 2-lap route, I think, well I might as do another lap because I usually have to! What’s that all about!
Everything we do has a psychological element to it that we can either let get in the way, make work for us, or use to trick us into convincing ourselves that something is a good idea.
Lockdown is difficult for a lot of us. Many people I sense are finding it hard to motivate themselves to do things they would usually just get on and do. Exercise is a good example of this. Lots of people seem to be finding it harder to motivate themselves to do what they know already is good for them.
How can we overcome that moment of inertia when, at the end of a busy day we know we should take some exercise but we just don’t feel like it.
Firstly, let’s give ourselves a break and in some ways identify the problem. When you are feeling stressed you don’t feel like exercising. This is a fact – well researched – well established. An American study from Yale University tested this out and found that levels of stress are a predictor for low physical activity. But it’s a double bind because exercise is a great stress buster. Indeed the same Yale University study showed that those who managed 30 minutes of exercise during the day experienced a reduction in stress.
There are lots of reasons why this might be and all have been researched. Which it is for you is probably down to your own uniqueness! For some the exercise simply takes their attention away from the thing that’s causing them stress and gives them a break from it so they can return to it refreshed.
For others it could the rush of feel good endorphins, the ‘runners high’ you might have heard of. It could be that our stress response, the fight or flight adrenaline and cortisol rush, readies us for physical activity, so in doing something physical we ‘burn off’ these chemicals and we return our body to a state of calm. We in effect ‘took flight’.
So, given exercise is good for us, how do we get past our inertia?
We need to plan for our future self – arrange what it is our future self needs to do. Then, trust our past self to have arranged things that are good for us. The just do them at the moment our past self planned them, safe in the knowledge that our future self will thank us for doing what we planned!
When we try to imagine our future we are strongly influenced by how we are feeling in the present moment. So if you try to imagine what something later in the week will be like when you are experiencing a tiring Thursday and you are just a tad grumpy and ‘down-in-the-mouth’ you are likely to think about the future event negatively. ‘That run will be hard work’, ‘Getting my gear on to do the online workout will be sooooo time consuming!’ And the same works the other way – if you are in a good place then you will think positively about the future. (See Daniel Gilbert’s book ‘Stumbling on Happiness’ for more – Professor Gilbert has spent his life studying the psychology of happiness – he knows his stuff!)
So, how do we make this psychological quirk work for us. Let’s keep going with the exercise example. When on a weekend are you feeling in a good place? I find I have a sweet spot that usually occurs early afternoon on a Sunday. I’m feeling rested and I’m not yet grumpy because it’s nearly time for work again. In this sweet spot I plan my exercise for the week because I’m feeling at the top of my game in terms of motivation. I still keep my planning realistic. I bring the future into the present so I can do something with it. I plan what I will do. I remind myself that about 20 minutes a day is sufficient and if I can do more great!
Then, my week starts. And, as we know, motivation wanes as the week goes on and stress rises. So when I spot at 5.30 on Wednesday evening that my diary says ‘3-mile run’ I trust my past self, when I was in a good place to have thought, ‘I’m going to need something to pick me up by Wednesday and I’ll feel great after a run. Clear headed, invigorated, and if I get some exercise I’ll probably sleep well’. Had I left my planning for exercise on Wednesday until I got home at 5.30 I would probably have said, ‘I can’t be bothered, stuff it, where’s the wine’. Familiar?
In that moment when you think, ‘I can’t be bothered with this running thing in my diary’, you have to trust your past self to have done the right thing for your future self and thought, when in a good place, he’s going to NEED a run by Wednesday. On Wednesday his future self will thank his past self for insisting he went for a run!
There is great power in planning. And there is great power in trusting what you have planned. David Allen (productivity guru of the highest order) says you can’t plan and do at the same time and this is why. The feelings of past self, present self, and future self will get all confused. Our ‘selves’ need to find a good positive moment and plan for our future selves so when we hit that ‘present’ moment we can be fully in that present moment knowing that this must be the best thing that can be done right now or why would I have planned it so!?
Plan. Then deliver on the plan. You’ll thank your past self in the future for knowing what will be good for you.
I don’t know about you but despite being a regular meditator I find it really really difficult. My mind just keeps chattering away!
I do like to think of meditation as having many facets and methods and I have written about ‘meditating on’ something as being a thing. I do like to quieten myself and see what comes to mind and then think about that. I have some wonderful thoughts and ideas when ‘meditating on’. But you have to be careful that you don’t get into ruminating and worrying and overthinking something so that ‘meditating on’ becomes negative.
Sometimes though I do like to (try to) clear my mind – and there are two things that I find helpful in doing this.
The first is my Shakti Mat – I’ve written about that here. I love it. Yes, in the first instance it’s uncomfortable but it does become blissful after a few minutes. But what I find is I have to concentrate on managing the discomfort and this helps me clear my mind of other things as I relax into that.
The other thing that helps is music. I listen to lots of meditative music not only when trying to meditate but also when working as it creates the right atmosphere for me in which to work. Now, you may or may not know but I am also a musician so I thought why not write some music for myself to meditate to and then i thought – well – why not share it with everyone.
And that is what I’ve done – and here it is! Available on Spotify and iTunes/Apple Music as well as many other lesser known but equally fabulous platforms!
Excited to be telling you that today (Friday 15th January 2021) the new book is out! Strictly speaking it’s a reworking of the other book – a remix if you like for the music people among you!
We wrote a book (myself, Lisa and Steph) and we aimed that book at Social Workers because we are all social workers and wanted to provide some sort of ‘toolbox’ to social workers to help them with their self-care, wellbeing, and productivity, because we knew for ourselves and from our social work friends that social work takes its toll.
But, what we and the publisher noted, as we were finishing the book and it was set for publication, was that the advice in it was relevant to so many more people than just social workers because many people in many workplaces experience work based stress and indeed many people experience the stresses of life overall. The book would work for everyone.
So, the publisher, Critical Publishing, had me re-write the book for the general market as the launch of their Business in Mind series – and there are more books to come in that series! Exciting!
So there are two ‘How to Thrive….’ books. How to Thrive in Professional Practice is the one aimed at Social Workers and How to Thrive at Work is the one aimed at everyone (and social workers would find it useful too). So buy one or the other – whichever suits who you are – but don’t buy both as they are very very similar.
I would say though there’s a very nice chapter in the How to Thrive at Work one on Rest which isn’t in the first one…. and even though I say it myself it’s a very nice addition!
Whichever you were to buy – I hope you get something from it!
Happy Christmas we have all just been saying to each other. And then Happy New Year. We’re obsessed! Once a year we say Happy Birthday to each other as well. Clearly ‘Happy’ is very important to us. Yet it alludes us – or at least its elusive more often than we’re like it to be. Daniel Levitin in his book ‘The Organized Mind’ says that generally we think life should be easy, so, when it proves difficult we don’t like it.
‘Life’ (in all its guises) is largely difficult and takes some ‘doing’ and every so often we get that little pocket of happiness. So, if there are little pockets of happiness then the more we can find them then the more we can be happy – and happy people get more done – more in their work lives and more in their personal lives
Sometimes we look for happiness in things – but that’s not where to find it. Advertisers and sellers of things wouldn’t tell us that though. ‘Buy this’, they say, ‘and it will make you happy, have the perfect life’ etc etc. This comes with a ‘Halo Effect’. The thing you buy is wonderful. The new TV, the new car. But after a while it becomes just the car you get from A to B in or the TV you watch Masterchef on. Oh – except you are now in debt possibly paying for it for the next ‘however long’ and now you’re not happy anymore!
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi says we have to find joy in everything in order to create flow. Flow is that ability to move effortlessly from thing to thing and get things done. But he means joy in everything – not just that new purchase. Joy in the washing and ironing, joy in the reporting writing. By doing this we will find flow and flow leads to people being happy.
We find happiness in the most unusual places sometimes
Sometimes, I’d argue, we get joy in difficult and problematic things. In Alex Pang’s book ‘Rest’ he talks about how difficult things – things that we are trying to master but are difficult – are actually restful and good for us – something that is mentally absorbing, that feels difficult to do, is deeply satisfying – such things – difficult things – hard work – make us happy.
In a Jewish Parable there are two men arguing over some knotty issue in the Torah. God gets annoyed so comes down from on high and says, ‘I’ve listened to you two argue about this for 20 years so let me tell you what it means’. ‘No’, they say, ‘what right have you! Clear off!’ They delight in the difficult thing – they are thinking, striving, and making a connection with one another.
I find that I am a person who finds great joy in the process rather than the outcome. Stoic philosophers say that some things are outside of our control, but we still need to do them. Some things are completely under our control and some things are not fully under our control, but we have influence. The influence is where we have control.
The secret, they would tell us, is to focus on the bit you can control and as Massimo Pigliucci (in a video presentation I watched recently on iai.tv) said “bet your happiness on those things”. We have no choice other than to take the stuff we can’t control just as it comes, because, well, we can’t control it. We also have limited control over the outcome of things. I can control when I write a blog, what I write about, what words I use, and take great joy in the doing. But I very little control over how you receive it. That is dependent on so many things, like, what you already know about the subject, what you think of me, whether you agree or disagree with the idea. So I set my happiness on the doing of it (I am currently very happy in the doing!) and not on how many ‘likes’ it gets, or how many people read it…. although I do hope you enjoy it. The pleasure and happiness is in the doing not in the plaudits.
So we need to find our happiness in every moment – the work we do – the study we do – the fun we have – tidying things up – we need to find joy in all of these things. Where do you find your joy and where do you find your happiness I wonder? And here’s the thing – if we think that everyone else has found it and we haven’t – then – sorry – for the most part they haven’t either.
Sometimes those difficult things will be at work, some will be home, some we’ll create all on our own by not being in charge of ourselves – how we approach things – how we set our minds to what is to do
Daniel Gilbert in ‘Stumbling on Happiness’ says that we come into this world wanting to control things and we go out the same way – and that research suggests that if at any point during our arrival in, and departure from, this world, we lose our ability to control things we become unhappy, feel helpless and hopeless and can become depressed. I hate to use the ‘P’ word again but planning is the key. Bringing the future into the present so we can have a look at it and control, I’d suggest, is the root to happiness. Delight in the doing!
We look into the future so we can make predictions about it and control it – that’s where happiness is.
I recently did a Facebook Live on Sleep – which is here – and I was asked afterwards whether being a ‘night owl’ was damaging to your health. My instinctive reaction was ‘yes’ because I’m always telling people that the best sleeping pattern is to be in bed by about 10.30 and to rise at 6.30. I genuinely believe this on a personal so my answer is ‘yes’. The reason I believe this is because of what I’ve read. But a simple ‘yes’ is simply not good enough. So, as it’s been a while since I’ve read about sleep, I had to go back to the literature to find out a better answer than ‘yes’. Although the answer is still ‘yes’…… kind of.
As you may be aware we all have a circadian rhythm. An internal clock that keeps everything ticking over nicely, driven by the chemical and biological rhythms of our bodies. And it is true that some of us have a propensity towards being morning larks and some of us have a propensity towards being night owls. That’s the way our circadian rhythms are. The other factor we need to consider is that we need about 8 hours of sleep. Now – from what I read – I’d say – the 8 hours is a little more important than the timing of when we start and end sleep. To a degree if you are a night owl and like to go to bed at 12 then this is ok. You are programmed to go to bed at that time by your circadian rhythms. I’m not sure I wholly agree with this – I think we artificially keep ourselves awake beyond a sensible time to retire – but I’m going to go with it! So – if you are a night owl and want to go to bed at 12 then fine. But – and here’s where it starts to get interesting and where the problem lies – you still need 8 hours sleep. So that will take you to 8 a.m. The problem with this is that for the majority of people sleeping until 8 is not an option. Most of us start work at 9 (or earlier) and have to travel to work. So, at best, your morning, starting at 8, is going to be a hurried affair with little time to take stock of the day, have breakfast, and emerge into the day slowly and deliberately.
A study by Northumbria University in 2018 found that it is such social factors, or the choices that people engage in when being night owls, that causes some of the problems. They found that people who go to bed later tend to have unhealthier diets, consume more alcohol, sugars, caffeinated drinks and fast food than early risers. You are maybe more inclined to drink coffee later because all of the other signs that your body relies on to get to sleep, for example it being dark, are pushing you to go to sleep – but you don’t. Also if you go to bed at 12 and need to be up at 6 then you have lost two hours sleep so maybe you then drink more coffee (or caffeine) to stay awake during the day. When tired and stressed we tend to grab high sugar high fat snacks because these are easy sources for our bodies. I’m confident that at 11 p.m. you are unlikely to think – ‘tell you what, I’ll rustle up a salad!’?
In the Northumbria University study night owls consistently reported more erratic eating patterns as they had a tendency to miss breakfast and eat later in the day. Probably, I imagine, because they didn’t have time for breakfast with getting up later or were tired and lacking motivation to make something. Fatigue has a huge impact on motivation. Also, possibly as a consequence of erratic diet, the diet of night owls was found to contain less grains, rye and vegetables and they ate fewer, but larger, meals. Morning larks, interestingly, eat slightly more fruit and vegetables per day.
This could explain why night owls have a higher risk of suffering from chronic disease. Eating late in the day was linked to an increased risk of type 2 diabetes because circadian rhythms influence the way glucose is metabolised in in the body. Night owls often eat close to going to bed which increases blood glucose levels just before they go to bed which could negatively effect metabolism as this is not in tune with biological processes. People with an evening preference were 2.5 times more likely to have type 2 diabetes than those with a morning preference.
Why is 8 hours important? In his book ‘Why We Sleep’ Matthew Walker explains that we have a pattern to our sleep. At the start of the night our sleep is predominantly NREM (Deep Sleep) heavy and at the end of the night (or early morning) our sleep is REM heavy. Both have important functions that we can’t afford to miss. So, assuming whatever your bedtime is – let’s say you are definitely a midnight person (bear in mind I’m not convinced by this argument – I still say 10.30 is the best time for us biologically!) and you stop up late till 2 in the morning, your body started to try and do what it needed to do at 12, so you have lost what it was trying to do between 12 and 2. You’ve lost that NREM sleep that does a lot of sorting out of memories before consolidating them.
One thing that night owls do is sleep less during the week and then catch up on a weekend. Walker is clear. What you have lost as a consequence of the shortened nights sleep can not be caught up by sleeping for longer on a weekend. Not only that but you then end up losing lots of hours from your weekend which could have been used more productively and can put you further out of step with the society you are living in.
One thing that is worthy of consideration though, if we accept that it’s ok to be a night owl and sleep 12 till 8 or 2 till 10, or whatever, is that if this works for you then maybe we need more flexible working and social arrangements so that night owls are not placed in this position of their biological chemistry being badly aligned to social expectations? Personally I’m not convinced that staying up till 2 in the morning is good for you. But maybe the problem is that night owls have to live a life of misalignment?
There is a well research health impact. Shift work, which often places people into the night owl bracket whether they like it or not, is the only non-chemical item on the American Cancer Society’s carcinogens list, and other evidence shows that night owls can experience weight gain and diabetes because of diet, and are more susceptible to depression and psychiatric disorders. Now this is an interesting conundrum. Usually we associate a poor sleep pattern with being a symptom of depression and poor mental health. But actually, Walker says that we need to start exploring if it is in-fact poor sleep that is a cause of these things. The reality is it probably works both ways.
This is not fatalistic though! If you are a night owl and you want to stick to being a night owl then so be it but be conscious of what you can do to mitigate any negative factors – in essence that’s what all self care is about.
Make sure that you get 8 hours of sleep a night. I’m convinced this is a mush more decisive factor in your well being than whether you go to bed at 10, 11 or 12. This will give you a problem though depending on what time you need to be up the next day. But it is crucial as you can’t catch up on what you lost at the weekend.
So, second, don’t try and catch up on weekend! Get 8 hours and get them at the same time day in day out!
Next, watch what you eat. Be particularly careful what you eat late on a night and don’t eat just before you go to bed. Also, try and give yourself some space on a morning to eat breakfast. Watch your choices throughout the day. It seems to me that this is a significant factor rather than simply the time you go to bed. Are you making poor choices because you are tired because you are not getting your 8 hours because you went to bed at such a time that you couldn’t get them?
If you want to change your sleep pattern it is doable I believe. But, like everything, it takes time. There are idea in these blogs that might help: How do you sleep? And Sleep…. They both contain the same information
The secret to success is not to suddenly try to change from going to bed at midnight to going to bed at 10! That’s not going to work and will lead to frustration. Try to adjust your going to bed time by about 20 minutes a week. Crucially go to bed at the same time every night and once you have adjusted to that try another 20 minutes.
“Mushrooms are miniature pharmaceutical factories, and of the thousands of mushroom species in nature, our ancestors and modern scientists have identified several dozen that have a unique combination of talents that improve our health”.
(Quote by Paul Stamets, (2011)
It’s surprising what mother nature gives us as a means of keeping us healthy. Have you ever considered the medicinal benefits of mushrooms?
Disclaimer
Before we take a closer look, as always, seek medical attention or advice before pursuing any natural remedies and this blog is NOT about diagnosing any condition or even saying the following products will be right for you. So please use your own judgement and common sense especially if pregnant, nursing or on other pharmaceutical medication. Nor have I received any payment from the below mentioned companies.
Also, it is extremely dangerous to pick your own mushrooms as there are many which are poisonous and can result in death. We are not advocating you do this. We would advise you buy from a reputable source as an alternative.
What are Mushrooms exactly?
Encyclopaedia Britannica, (2020) explains mushrooms are…..”…..edible sporophores…. fleshy fungus fruiting structure of fields and meadows….” Paul Stamets, (2011) explains there are an estimated 2-4 million species of ‘fungi’, with 150,000 thought to be mushroom-forming fungi, although only 14,000 species are formally identified.
Ancient History
Mushrooms used for medicinal purposes is not a new concept
as revealed by the frozen human mummified remains of Ötzi, found on the Ötztal
Alps on the Austrian–Italian border in 1991. Ötzi is believed to have died
around 3300 BCE, and amongst his remains were Birch Fungi, known for
their Anthelmintic properties, (Capasso,
1998), and the ability to expel parasitic worms and other internal
parasites from the body.
Egyptian Hieroglyphics suggest society saw mushrooms as a
plant of immortality, (Grocycle, no date). They would also apply a poultice of
mouldy bread to infected wounds, (ACS, 1999).
Texts about Chinese Medicine dating as far back to 100 BCE
discuss various mushrooms and fungi that were used to treat cancer, respiratory
ailments, and many other conditions, (Grocycle, No date).
Modern Times
Whilst not all mushrooms are edible, culinary mushrooms such
as Shiitake, Maitake, Oyster, Enoki, Shimeji, and Pioppinos are low in fat,
have no cholesterol and are rich in vitamins, so from a nutritional viewpoint,
help with boosting the immune system, (Stamets, 2011).
Picture-courtesy-of-Getty-Images
It’s interesting to note the medicines available to us these days such as antibiotics. It is mind boggling to think that as little as a hundred years ago, if you developed a bacterial infection such as Pneumonia or blood poisoning from a simple scratch, the chances were, you may well have died. The discovery of Penicillin by Alexander Fleming in 1928 changed how we treat infections, when he identified the healing properties of ‘mould juice’, (ACS, 1999).
Mycologists, (people who study Fungi) and other types of scientists are now starting to understand how mushrooms can offer safer alternatives to many modern pharmaceuticals.
Here are some of the more popular benefits.
Antiviral, and Antibacterial Properties
Like all live moulds and fungi, they are a food source, so
as a means of staving off being eaten or to fight off bacteria which may kill
them fungi produce toxins to protect themselves. It is these toxins that can
act as natural antibiotics in our bodies when we consume them.
High in Antioxidants
UV sunlight, inflammation, air pollution, and smoking all
contribute towards Free Radicals that can cause oxidative stress and damage to
our cells and DNA. Mushrooms contain antioxidants which seek out free radicals
and thus diminish the damage they cause. I view them a bit like Batman seeking
out villains in Gotham City!!
Beta Glucan: is a substance that helps to stimulate the immune system.
Polysaccharides Compounds: found in mushrooms are known to offer anti-cancer, anti-obesity,
anti-diabetes, and antibiotic properties.
Health Benefits
As we have mentioned above, there are a huge range of
mushroom types, but generally the health benefits include the following:
Help prevent DNA damage, cell mutation, and tumour
formation so aid fight against cancer and Leukaemia
Loaded with antiviral and antibacterial properties so are
good for boosting your Immune System
Contain natural ‘Statins’, the compound used to lower blood cholesterol
that can cause hardening of the arteries, thus can protect against heart
attacks, strokes and heart disease.
Improving Energy Levels due to compounds that increase the
flow of oxygenated blood cells to muscles, clearing toxins from the body that
otherwise can leave you feeling tired.
improving Brain Health by producing nerve growth in the
brain, to improve memory, focus and cognitive functioning.
Low in fat and calories, so a diet high in mushrooms can aid
weight loss (which brings with it its own health benefits)
Has a hypoglycaemic effect, meaning they lower and regulate
blood sugar levels, good for diabetes
Mushrooms inhibit histamine release so are good for relieving
symptoms of asthma or allergies
Some Basic Types And To Use Them
Some of the more popular and well known ‘healthy’ mushrooms
are:
Reishi Mushrooms which grow on the side of trees, they are too bitter to eat,
but their Terpenoids compounds mean they are good for reducing
inflammation. They also help with heart disease, cancer, diabetes and liver
damage to name few.
Reishi Mushrooms
Consumed either in soup or made into
a tea, they are usually dried and come in either powder or capsule form.
Chaga Mushrooms grow on Birch Trees, (not to be confused with Birch Fungi
found on our Ötzi man). Come across this and you would be forgiven for
thinking it is charred wood as it looks more like charcoal, again not edible in
its natural state.
Chaga Mushrooms
Often combined with other mushrooms, Chaga can be consumed as herbal tea, in a powder or capsule form. Its healing properties are believed to aid the fight against cancer, improve immunity, chronic inflammation, blood sugar and reduce cholesterol levels.
Maitake Mushrooms
Unlike the above two, Maitake
Mushrooms are edible and are said to have a mild flavour and grow at the bottom
of Oak, Elm, and Maple trees, normally found in parts of Japan, China, and
North America.
Maitake Mushrooms (image courtesy of Andrew Weil)
Maitake are a good candidate for all of the above health benefits but are also useful for fighting cold and flu viruses, managing both high and low blood pressure, boosting immune function and reducing side effects of chemotherapy. You can add to any meals such as salads, stir fry, pasta and also be taken in either liquid or capsule form.
Cordyceps Mushrooms
For an unknown reason, I like the
word Cordyceps, just thought, I’d throw that snippet of useless information in
there! Cordyceps is considered to be a ‘parasitic’ fungus in as much as its
spores attach to the larvae of insects such as ants and caterpillar’s.
Cordyceps Mushrooms (Image courtesy of Wikimedia)
It feeds and sprouts on its host
insect growing into a mushroom and remains attached for most of its life,
growing mainly in high altitude regions of about 3800 m above sea level, in
cold, grassy, alpine meadows of the Himalayan mountains. So evidently not the
edible type!
Cordyceps is known to enhance energy,
aerobic capacity (breathing), reduce fatigue, anti-sickness, promotes health kidney
function and can even boost low sex drive!
You can buy cordyceps in
tinctures, liquid extracts, capsules, and powders.
Shiitake Mushrooms
Thanks to Catherine Tate, Shiitake
mushrooms are probably one of the more well known, edible variety. Native to
East Asia, Shiitake grow on decaying hardwood trees in United States, Canada,
Singapore, China, with 83% of the worlds production coming from Japan. Coming
in dried and fresh varieties shiitake mushrooms can be used in dishes such as stir-fries,
soups and stews
Shiitake Mushrooms
Benefits include being antibacterial
and antiviral, fight infections, cancer, strengthen bones, reduce high blood
pressure. They also come in powders, capsules and liquid format.
Turkey Tail Mushrooms
Growing on almost any type of wood,
these mushrooms can be found in woodlands all over Europe and China. The tend
to grow in colonies and their black, brown shades of thin, wavy rosettes bodies
take on a similar appearance of the plumage of a turkey’s tail, hence its name!
Turkey Tail Mushrooms
Although edible, they are known to be very chewy, so powder or capsule form tends to be the most common. Turkey Tail Mushrooms are said to be useful in reducing phlegm, increasing energy, helping with pulmonary problems, promoting a healthy liver, boost immune system, effective in managing diabetes and reducing inflammation.
Lion’s Mane Mushrooms
Doesn’t take much guess work to understand how this mushroom
gets its name. Its large, shaggy white appearance resembles a lion’s mane.
Edible, some describe its flavour as akin to crab or lobster and can be eaten
raw, cooked, dried or steeped as a tea.
They grow on hardwoods such as oak, maple and birch, found
in Europe, North America, Japan, China and Korea.
Lion’s Mane Mushrooms (Image Courtesy of Medicinal Herbals)
Lion’s main mushrooms are believed to promote mental wellbeing, reduce symptoms of depression, slow down signs of memory loss and reduced cognitive functioning, promote good digestive health, reduce risks associated with heart disease, beneficial for diabetes, reduce inflammation, fight against cancer and boosts immune system. Primarily capsule form, but is also available as a powder.
Conclusion
Its astonishing how beneficial mushrooms are said to be. I can remember drinking mushroom infused coffee and whilst it does sound pretty gross, actually it tasted ok. There is a range of products on the market these days and I have to say one of my favourite brands has to be Vida Divina. This is because I have had close links with the company for a few years now so have a good understanding of their products which is what got me interested in the concept of mushrooms for promoting good health. But having said that there are other companies and products available.
Given their general ability to the boost immune system, reduce inflammation as well as having antibacterial and antiviral properties I would say we are onto a winner with these.
If you’d like to grow your own mushrooms there’s some great advice here
I came across some really useful websites if you wanted to
take a closer look at the mushrooms mentioned above, a lot of which I have used
as references:
Those Stoics again! Marcus Aurelius this time, who said, “Fire feeds on obstacles”. Ryan Holiday takes this idea and says the Stoics also held that ‘The Obstacle is the Way’. He says “The obstacle in the path becomes the path. Never forget, within every obstacle is an opportunity to improve our condition.” Aurelius wrote, “Our actions may be impeded, but there can be no impeding our intentions or dispositions.”
What does this mean for us? Simple really. Sometimes in life the path looks difficult, things seem insurmountable. But, that direction may be our path. We need to be like fire and consume what is in our path. Consume it to feed us, to nourish us.
Is this hard? Goodness yes it is. But no one said the path was going to be easy. Experiencing difficulties can help us learn and make us grow, coming out of the other end stronger, less fragile.
Once we set our intentions, identify our goal, we set out on the path to achieve our goal. There will be bumps along the way, and maybe even huge obstacles, but if we want to achieve something we should set our approach goal and set about it with intent.
I have a caveat to this. A contradiction in a sense. I like to turn the maxim ‘Failure is not an option’, on its head and offer you that failure is always an option. And failure is not to be feared, as long as we learn and grow from it. Sometimes we have set the wrong goal, sometimes we have overstretched ourselves (for now), and sometimes we simply change our minds. All of these things are fine. But something being hard shouldn’t put us off. Sometimes we need to pause, take stock, and figure out what to do next to get through that obstacle. Sometimes that takes minutes and sometimes it takes years. But it can be done.
Feed on your obstacles but don’t be afraid to say ‘you know what, I’ve changed my mind’. There is power in both. That power comes from control.
Control what you can, accept what you can’t. That way lies some degree of happiness or contentment. That way lies wisdom.(That’s the Stoics as well!)
I think you know this already but maybe don’t acknowledge it or feel you can do anything about it? Motivation is finite. The further you get into the day the less of it you have at your disposal. The perfect time to top it up is lunch time! So here are the Lunch Break Rules!
Rule Number 1: Take a lunch break! Don’t feel guilty. I remember a poster in a senior manager’s office that said – Just because everyone else is doing it doesn’t make it right, and just because no one is doing it doesn’t make it wrong. We need to overturn this ethos that you are somehow more worthy if you work through your lunch break. The reality is taking a break makes you more productive in the afternoon. You will get back the time ‘lost’ to the lunch break in increased productivity. A study at Bristol University showed that a lunch break (with some gentle exercise – see rule 4) boosted mood and motivation by 41% and improved peoples ability to deal with stress by 20%. Put some motivation in the bank. Oh…. and you are legally entitled to a break. Just saying!
Rule Number 2: Move away from your desk. There is strong evidence that simply taking time away from your desk and moving your thoughts onto something else replenishes your ability to stay on task when you return to work. In fact when you take your attention away from the external and take some time to be a little more internal through ‘switching off’ and thinking of nothing, maybe through meditation (or just by not thinking too much!), you engage your brain’s Default Mode Network. This is the part of your brain that gets to work when you stop engaging with the external world. Interestingly your brain is only 5 to 10% less active when you are not thinking about anything. That’s your DMN getting to work on what it needs to do at a sub-conscious level, consolidating things, making connections, and the like. You must have experienced something coming to mind, a solution to a problem maybe, when you weren’t even trying to solve it. So get away from work, get away from your desk.
Rule Number 3: Get outside. Being in the natural world is a great healer. If you work somewhere where you can spend some time in a green space then do it. We are hard wired from an evolutionary point of view to be in such spaces. They have a calming effect. And fresh air is good for you. Moving around is good for you. And that brings us to rule number 4…..
Get Outside
Rule Number 4: Take some gentle exercise. I’ve already mentioned the Bristol Study above that involved some gentle exercise. A different study looked at how sitting less and moving more helped peoples productivity. They showed that a lunch time walk reduced stress, reduced sickness in staff, and led to more mindful practice. A walk will suffice but him the gym or go for a run if you want! As the UK Chief Medical Officer says…. some is good… more is better!
So…. You must achieve Rule 1!And then… if you can achieve 1 or 2 of rules 2, 3, and 4 – we’re onto a winner!
I was reminded recently of this Chinese proverb – “The man who moved a mountain was the one who began carrying away small stones.”
This resonates with me so much. I’m often put off getting started with big tasks because they just seem, well, too big! What reminded me of the Chinese proverb was Nassim Nicholas Talib writing in his great book Antifragile about the the analogy of asking someone to move a one ton rock or one ton of pebbles. One person alone can not move a one ton rock but can move a ton of pebbles, over time, by chipping away at the task.
This is how we need to approach mammoth things that confront us. Procrastination is fuelled by feeling things are too big for us to achieve. The power of small wins – a psychological concept – relies on us breaking big tasks down into smaller constituent parts. I was recently saying to someone that success is sometimes about using our brain chemistry to our advantage and tricking ourselves into better ways of thinking or doing. So, what we know is every time we tick something off our ‘to do’ list we get a little dopamine hit that drives us onto the next step. If completion of the task is only ever ‘ticked off’ when the whole task is complete we only get the one ‘hit’. If we break it down into lots of tasks we get lots of hits! Win!!
What’s even better is if you have the right tools for the job! Shifting that ton of pebbles is going to be so much easier if you have a shovel and a wheel-barrow. If all you have is your hands, you’ll get it done, but it will be painful and slow. Before you start any task ask yourself, “do I have the right tools for this task”. ‘Tools’ can be many things. Simple things like pen and paper, information things likes names and phone numbers, or bigger things like the right software or equipment. With the right stuff around us things get done.
The crucial technique for this is planning. Plan every day. Think – “what am I doing tomorrow”, and, “do I have what I need?” Prepare what you need, or check you have it in the right place and accessible. Plan big on your last working day before a break (for most of us a Friday before the the weekend). Plan all of next week – get your ducks in a row. Check before you leave that you have everything you need for next week. If you haven’t, find it, buy it, email someone about it. If there’s no chance of you getting it for next week can you move the task. If you can’t how will you get around the lack of the right thing. Planning is everything!
Planning brings the future into the present so you can do something about it (Alan Lakein). I have a little planning session daily (usually just checking stuff is where it should be because…) I have a big plan every week, and a massive plan every 3 months, usually going up to six months ahead to see what I need, including, crucially, how much time do I need.
Control it or it will control you, says David Allen.
In a recent on line conference I was asked, “what are your 3 key messages to help people with their well-being and productivity. I pinched an idea from the property world and said….
