Nature Can Nurture

This year, I set a goal for myself to get back into working in schools again. My heart is in a school building, working with teachers, students, staff, and administrators. I know first hand how challenging working in classrooms can be. The rewards, while they are tremendous, can sometimes feel out of reach. I know as a public school classroom teacher, I often felt overwhelmed and exhausted. But at the same time, I felt excited and inspired. The emotional rollercoaster of one school day is truly incredible. It takes a strong ability for educators to use emotion regulation tools in order to manage it all! And as I know first hand, using these tools isn’t always seamless!

I am excited to say that I’m doing it! I am working in schools, leading wellness workshops and collaborating with educators. I share tools that teachers and staff can use to help their own social and emotional wellbeing and share with their students. 

So yay! I am taking a moment in this blog to celebrate! I feel proud! I feel excited! I am feeling successful in my goals and intentions for this fairly new path in which I find myself walking!

With this pride and excitement inside me lately, I remembered something about myself that I’ve known for a while…. 

I like routine and structure. 

I like lists. 

I like to check off items on my lists.

I like schedules.

And when I feel out of a routine, off-schedule, or I can’t complete my to-do list….I feel stressed and overwhelmed. So while I feel thrilled to get back into working in schools, also I feel aprehensive about this new adventure I am on!

Let me explain….

Writing wellness workshops for educators takes a lot of time and creativity. Talking to interested schools, learning about their needs, remembering my feelings when I was in the classroom, knowing what children and educators face in school everyday, and then creating a workshop that I think will be entertaining and valuable for educators and students is hard work. 

Once I create a workshop, I need to advertise it. That means self-promotion, something that I am not used to. And then once a school is interested, I need to practice and build enough confidence in myself to make an engaging presentation for an audience that doesn’t know me from a hole in the wall. 

I am learning and creating at the same time. And while it feels incredibly pleasant to follow my dreams, goals, and intentions…..it can also feel incredibly nerve-wracking! My to-do list builds and builds, and then suddenly I feel like I don’t have enough time. 

I started to notice an increase in my pace of life in the last week or two. The list of things I needed and wanted to do got incredibly long. I began working at night and over the weekends. I also noticed that all of this working and thinking about working, was leaving me distracted. I wasn’t entirely listening to my family when they told me stories at dinner. I was having a hard time falling asleep. My stomach was upset. I was late for things. I wasn’t reading my emails carefully so I missed details and dates. I felt out of control, off my routine, and unable to keep up. It was hard to keep the doubtful thoughts out of my mind while I was in this state.

My stress response has always been the same for as long as I can remember….the way I combat feeling overwhelmed is to work harder! So I made myself a very long and detailed list of everything I needed to do for my work and my family. And then I proceeded to use every free minute I had to do it all! This impacted my sleep, my digestion, and my ability to be present. I am so glad that this time, I noticed these feelings bubbling up inside me.

  I know perfectly well that I don’t have to respond to this new-found work stress in this way. Making a list is good to get everything I have to do out of my head and keep myself organized so I don’t miss anything. The only problem with that is that I wasn’t thinking about blocking any time out for taking care of myself in this busy schedule. Everything on the list pertained to what work and my family needed. And by the start of this week, I knew this pace would not be sustainable. 

I know that I cannot take care of anyone or anything else unless I make sure my needs are met, too.

So….what did I do? Good question….

The first thing I did was ask myself how I was feeling. I preach this a lot….name it to tame it. Or, feel it to heal it. At the pace I was running, I wasn’t taking the time to notice that I was feeling irritable and cranky because I was exhausted, overwhelmed, and nervous. Once I was able to label these feelings, I knew exactly what I needed.

I was craving fresh air.

I wanted to move.

I desired a slower pace.

Notice I didn’t say that I needed a cocktail, a pedicure, a shopping spree, or a bubble bath?! While those things are lovely, they weren’t going to fulfill my needs. And I never would have known that if I didn’t first stop and ask myself how I was feeling. But our culture will tell us that when we are feeling stressed….

Have a drink.

Go to the spa.

Do some retail therapy.

But those things weren’t going to give me the fresh air, movement, or slower pace that I knew would help me.

So I decided to make it my intention to go outside for a walk this week. Just one walk. If I could do more than that, BONUS! I looked at my schedule and the weather (it is winter in New England, after all) and decided that I would go for a walk after the kids went to school this morning and before I started to tackle my to-do list. 

I did everything I could to set myself up for success and not succumb to all the things I knew I had to do. I took my workout clothes out of my drawers so they were visible when I woke up this morning. I put my sneakers, winter hat, and gloves near the door. I cued up a playlist on Spotify and I set a reminder in my calendar to take a walk. I had no excuses.

So I did it!

I walked for 40 minutes.

In the cold air.

Down to the beach in my neighborhood and back.

And it was glorious!

I didn’t even think about working up a sweat. I forgot to turn on my Spotify playlist. As soon as the fresh air hit my lungs, I knew I made the right choice.

While I walked I noticed so many beautiful things…..there wasn’t a breath of air, so the water down at the beach reflected the land around it. I was the only one by the shore but there were footprints in the sand so I knew that there were others that were enjoying this beautiful morning, as well! I noticed little fishing and quoahoging boats dotting the horizon. The clouds made beautiful colors and patterns in the sky. Even the dying dune grass looked gorgeous along the blues and grays of the water and the space around it. I giggled at the seagulls (which I usually find annoying) squawking at each other while they waded in the freezing cold water. As I circled back home, I enjoyed the sight of several bright red cardinals and their mates in the leaf-less trees. 

I have no idea how fast or how far I walked. It didn’t matter. I gave myself exactly what I needed….fresh air in my lungs and on my skin, movement, and a slower pace to notice the beauty around me. The time I gave myself this morning slowed me down enough to remember that connection with nature is important, even in the dead of winter. And since the beach is my favorite place on Earth, it is no wonder that my feet took me in that direction.

I am sitting here thinking, “where would I be right now if I didn’t take that walk this morning?” A few more items on my to-do list would have been checked off than there are right now. I’d probably be showered. But I would still be in my own hurricane of unpleasant emotions, sitting in my typical stress response state that I know I don’t like and doesn’t serve me.

Instead, I am feeling confident. I am feeling proud of myself. And, I am feeling relaxed. It is amazing what one little change in my approach to my day can do for my mindset.

So here I am….writing this blog post, still in my workout clothes and it is already 10:30 in the morning. My kids went to school almost two hours ago and time is flying! Writing this post was on my to-do list but after the walk I took this morning, it doesn’t feel like work. It doesn’t feel overwhelming to write. Because of the time I gave to my needs this morning, I am working more efficiently and effortlessly. I know that the other 25 things on my list to do today will get done.

And if they don’t?! There’s always tomorrow and that is OK.