head above the clouds
I was recently on a flight from Hamilton to Wellington, we’d been visiting my husband’s family and we were heading home. We were on a fairly small plane with 2 seats on each side of the plane. With 2 adults and 3 children, that meant one person in a row on their own. Hubby very graciously offered to sit with the 5 year old while the 7 and 10 year olds sat together, leaving me with no active parenting role and having an hour of relative peace on the flight.
I was coming up to final exams for my diploma and I had a stack of study I needed to get done, I had a whole load of work with me in my hand luggage, right at my feet, waiting for me. It had been an intense period of study leading into these exams and the pressure I was putting on myself was enormous. The perfectionist in me (I’m working on this) wanted to put in the mahi to make the time, effort and energy of the 10 month diploma worth it. I was a bit of a crazy lady, focused and productive one minute and emotional and defeatist the next. I knew the stress was getting on top of me and I knew what that stress was doing to my body, which was making me even more stressed! So here I had, an hour, where I could be productive and get some work done.
Sitting in that plane seat, I was busy deciding what I was going to do first. I looked out the window and saw this
And it was so beautiful, much more so than I can capture in a photo. I just stared at it in wonder, the layers of cloud, the way the sun was hitting, the streak of blue sky and all the busyness at ground level was covered up and I couldn’t see it all and it felt so peaceful! I realised that it was exactly what I needed.
I felt like God was inviting me to come up above the clouds of my study and all the busyness and just hang out above the clouds where I could see the sunshine and feel it’s warmth on my face and not hear all the noise that normally surrounds me.
Was my flight that day productive? No, not in terms of study and preparation for my exams but it was what I needed as I spent that flight staring at the clouds daydreaming, just letting my mind wander. It felt freeing and it de-stressed me in a way that I was not expecting.
Dr Caroline Leaf, a neuroscientist, describes daydreaming as ‘Thinker moments’, this is what she says about the importance of them:
Thinker moments (via daydreaming) give your brain a rest and allow it to simultaneously heal and reenergise by increasing and balancing alpha activity, creating an optimal state of relaxation and alertness and bridging the divide between the conscious and non conscious mind.
Not giving the mind a rest and letting it daydream can reduce blood flow by up to 80 percent in the front of the brain, which can dramatically affect cognitive fluency and the efficient, associative thinking required at home, school or in the workplace. Cumulatively, this can lead to unprocessed thoughts and nightmares, affecting your overall quality of sleep, performance and mental health. The reality is that you cannot afford not to daydream!
Caroline Leaf - excerpts from Podcast #266
When we are head down and bum up, working away and not taking a breath, when the busyness is relentless and we are like puppy dogs chasing our tails, when we don’t prioritise the time to stop and lift our head above the clouds, it has a profound impact on our health, mental and physical.
It takes intentionality to stop those clouds overhead from thickening up and getting lower and lower until they envelop us into the thick fog and we can’t see which way to turn.
Did you know that digestion is what’s called a parasympathetic process? Two states that our central nervous system can be in are sympathetic (our fight or flight response) or parasympathetic (our rest and digest response). When we are in a sympathetic, stress state, our body has the priority to preserve our life, that’s it. Our body will send all the resources to enable you to run faster or fight stronger, giving you faster reflexes and extra strength. Digestion, hormones and other functions within our body are just not important to survival and so the body ‘down regulates’ or switches off those functions in the body.
Our modern life, living in the thick fog of busyness, stress, deadlines, pressure, running from place to place, always feeling like you are dropping ALL of the plates you are trying to balance, this all leaves us in a sympathetic dominant state. Not to mention the inflammatory food like products we consume and the toxic ingredients we absorb through our skin and breathe in through the air around us. This all adds stress to our body and guess what! That means digestion CAN’T work properly. You won’t be able to break down the foods you are eating and therefore you will not be able to absorb the nutrients from the food.
This is why it is so important to look at the whole picture in functional nutrition. It doesn’t matter if you are eating the most perfect, nutrient dense, whole food, organic diet. If your digestive system is not working properly due to stress then you won’t be able to utilise all that goodness in the food you are eating. This is a huge topic and one that I will keep coming back to but it is so important to be parasympathetic when we are eating.
When was the last time you stopped to lift your head above the clouds? Our to do list, and other pressures look much smaller and much more manageable when we look down on them from above instead of looking up at them from below.
So what are some strategies I’ve put in place to help me prioritise thinker moments into my day.
On the hour every hour, I stop what I’m doing and change the scene. Whether it’s standing in the garden for 2 minutes, going to refill my water glass, having a toilet break, playing with the dog. It doesn’t matter what I choose, but I take a little break and let my mind wander while I’m doing it.
I’m careful not to fill every down moment with my phone. If I’m waiting for an appointment, or waiting for the kids at school, or during sports or music lessons, when taking the dog for a walk, or going to the toilet, I choose to use those moments to daydream. Not every-time but I’m conscious to choose to daydream sometimes. For instance, I love podcasts and music and often when I walk, it’s a great time to listen to something uplifting and encouraging but some days I choose to go without my phone and I just let my mind wander and dream while I let the dog sniff ALL the smells!
I don’t berate myself for letting my mind wander. I’m currently sitting at my desk which is right by a window and as I’ve been writing this blog post which really needs to get done, I keep finding myself staring out the window having a little daydream. In this moment, I actually need to stay on task and that’s ok as I know I will give myself thinker moments throughout the day but I don’t need to be hard on myself. I just bring my attention back to the task at hand and make sure I give myself that daydreaming time at a more appropriate moment.
Kids are amazing at daydreaming, or at least MY kids are amazing at daydreaming! My 5 year old particularly is away with the fairies, especially when it’s time to get ready for school. I am learning to not try to train him out of it completely and that actually when there is space, it’s one of the most precious things, to join him in his dreamworld. I get to connect with him in what’s going on in his mind and I know, thanks to Dr Caroline Leaf that allowing his mind to wander is doing him and me the world of good.
Having children is a great educator and so maybe instead of dragging them kicking and screaming into our world of deadlines, pressure and stress, we should all take their lead a little more and allow ourselves the freedom of getting our heads above the clouds and to wander in freedom there for a while.