Inner Strength

Welcome back!

If you can start the day without caffeine or pep pills,

If you can be cheerful, ignoring aches and pains,

If you can resist complaining and boring people with your troubles,

If you can eat the same food everyday and be grateful for it,

If you can understand when loved ones are too busy to give you time,

If you can overlook when people take things out on you when,
through no fault of yours, something goes wrong,

If you can take criticism and blame without resentment,

If you can face the worlds without lies and deceit,

If you can conquer tension without medical help,

If you can relax without liquor, if you can sleep without the aid of drugs,

If you can do of all these things,

Then you are probably the family dog.

Running From Depression

A recent study by Cruz et al, “Anxiety and Depression in Cystic Fibrosis,” (Semin Respir Crit Care Med 2009; 30: 569-578) came across my desk the other day.  Oddly, I was in the middle of creating a talk about exercise and was on the exact slide where I talk about my favorite book on the subject of exercise, Spark, by Dr. John Ratey.

Ratey is a psychiatrist at Harvard and one of his areas of expertise is the neurochemistry of exercise.  I read this book when it first came out and have practically forced most of my clients and several family members to do the same.

The Cruz study points out in grave detail the increased prevalence of both anxiety and depression in people with cystic fibrosis, noting that these have important consequences, including poorer disease outcomes and lower scores on measures of quality of life.  Depression especially wreaks havoc on adherence.   It makes sense, really.  When you are depressed, it is very easy to blow off treatments.  When you don’t care, why bother? When you are consumed with anxiety, a trip to the gym is not the first thing you think about doing.

After these grave facts are discussed, the authors conclude that better screening for depression and anxiety should be done on patients with CF, and treatment given to those with symptoms, including medication or therapy (or both).  I would add one more tool to the bag, one that in fact would also likely work as a preventative measure.  And…it’s free (a big plus these days).

If Ratey is to be believed (and he gives sound reasoning and research to back up his material), the BEST time to head to the gym or lace up your walking shoes is when you are blue and don’t feel like doing anything.   The reason is that exercise acts as an antidepressant.  In fact, exercise is nature’s perfect antidepressant…with no side effects.  The reasons are complex, but I am going to try to simplify:

First and foremost, to call “depression” a disease is like calling a “cough” a disease.  A cough is a symptom that something is wrong.  Perhaps you have asthma.  Maybe you are choking on a marble.  It could be that the air is extremely polluted and all sentient beings are suffocating.  The bottom line is the cough tells you that something is wrong.  The underlying cause is yet to be named.

In the same way, depression is a symptom.  Many things can cause depression: pain, stress, medications, trauma, addiction, AND altered neurochemistry, to name a few.  Just looking at the last one, the brain’s chemistry can be messed up in completely different pathways and yet the final result can look similar.  This is why a medication that blocks the re-uptake of serotonin may work on me, but not you.  Someone else may only respond to a medication that increases Dopamine…or Norepinephrine.  The names are not important.  What is important is to understand that the whole thing is very complex.

And yet, one thing that we all can do at some level, exercise, seems to be able to jolt the brain back into balance.  It seems to regulate the neurotransmitters that antidepressants target….all of them…and at just the right dose.

Almost immediately when starting to exercise vigorously, norepinephrine is elevated.  This is the wake up and get going chemical that also works mysteriously on boosting self-esteem.  Also, dopamine, the brain’s attention system and regulator of feelings of well being, is elevated.  Finally, the well-known chemical serotonin, important for mood, self-esteem and impulse control, bumps up.  And to add frosting to this cake, endorphins are made within the brain upon exercise, and we all know what endorphins do…

So that’s the chemical story.   But there is an architectural one as well.  Exercise causes release of something called BDNF (brain-derived neurotropic factor), which Ratey calls “Miracle-Gro for the brain.”  This, and other neurotropins cause the brain to a) make new cells, and 2) create and foster new connections between brain cells.  As he explains, depression is caused not just by a lack of neurotransmitters, but also by a lack of connections within the brain itself.  BDNF fixes this.  Exercise releases BDNF.

Yes we are at high risk for depression.  And yes, depression is very bad for compliance with a complicated medical regimen.  Sure, we could take another pill or two or three (and some of us may need to) to combat depression.  But one easy thing to try right now is to move.  Every day.

Five Reasons You Must Start Resistance Training Today!

I love list posts.  They are so easy to write, and even easier to read.  If only adopting the habit they propose were so easy…

But in this case, it is!  Resistance training is not difficult to do.  You don’t need to join a gym.  There is no requirement for fancy equipment or expensive clothing.  While a routine does take a little bit of time, you will begin to see and feel significant results in as little as 20 minutes 2 or (ideally) 3 sessions per week.  You could multitask, and do your routine while watching Scrubs reruns.  How simple is that?

Your own body weight can provide all the resistance you want or need, or if you are so inclined, you can purchase some very reasonably priced resistance tubing to use in your living room.

Here’s the trick.  Don’t fall for the fitness magazine articles that suggest complex moves, or drop sets, or supersets, or unbelievably crazy-sets.  Pick exercises that target multiple muscle groups like squats, lunges, front and side plank, or good old fashioned push-ups, and just start doing them!  Here is why you should start today:

Reason 1) Resistance training is a friend of your metabolism.  Why is this?  As you begin to overload your muscles beyond what they are used to, you injure them slightly (don’t go for major injury…that doesn’t do any good at all).  You cause little tiny microtears in the muscle fibers, and this is why you are sore one or two days later.  But this is good news, because as your muscle fibers heal, they become stronger and bigger.  You add muscle mass, and over time, this increases your metabolic rate.

How does that work?  Body fat doesn’t do much.  It just sits there and looks back at you in the
mirror.  It doesn’t use up much energy.  Heck, it doesn’t even need much of a blood supply since it requires so little maintenance.  As a result, it burns very few calories.

On the other hand, muscle is very active.  It requires food (glucose and amino acids) and burns tons of calories by just being there.  Clearly, if you want to be a lean, mean, calorie burning machine, you want as much muscle as you can get.

Reason 2) Muscle, because it requires glucose and amino acids, is very sensitive to insulin.  Insulin opens the doorway to  to the little muscle cells, so glucose and amino acids can get in.  If you are insulin resistant, as in Type II diabetes  (and possibly CFRD), lifting weights will increase your insulin sensitivity as you build muscle mass.  A finely tuned insulin sensitivity mechanism is required for a stable blood glucose level, which leads to good health.

Reason 3) This is a big one for me, and maybe you can relate.  Building muscle and feeling and being strong physically is one area of my life where having cystic fibrosis doesn’t even matter!  My lungs may not be the best in the gym, but I will take on any woman my age in a push up or pull up contest!  This is a very empowering feeling…I have at least a modicum of control over my body which is otherwise at the mercy of my lung status.  Now, some days my lungs even interfere with my time at the gym, and that is OK.  I know that when I recover, I will be back, strutting around the gym with the big boys, knowing that my muscle fibers are no different than theirs:-)

If you have an illness other than CF, lifting may just provide the same benefit.  Lifting weights is a very black or white thing to do.  You do it and you see and feel results in as little as two or three weeks.  You have control of this.  It may not feel like you have control of much else, sometimes.  But you do have control over this.
Reason 4) More and more studies are showing that well-designed resistance training programs in post-treatment management of cancer patients and survivors are beneficial in improving health status and quality of life.   This is true in other chronic diseases as well.  Weight training is anabolic, meaning it builds up the body.  Often, treatment for illness is catabolic, or breaks down the body (think steroids or chemotherapy).  While these treatments are necessary, we can counter their bad side effect of breaking down tissue by weight training.

Reason 5) Weight training is fun!  Ok, maybe I’m in the minority thinking this, but stand by this statement.  When you get over the initial “I have no clue what I’m doing,” and move through the “Oh my God this huts,” you begin to see improvement!  And this is fun!

Are you ready to begin?  I’m starting a YouTube channel where I will teach easy, and very modifiable exercises that anyone can start doing today.  Check it out, and subscribe today!

ANTS AND ELEPHANTS

Well, it’s been awhile.  I’ve been a bit under the weather lately and haven’t posted anything as I’ve dealt with illness.  Now, I have a PICC line, through which I am receiving antibiotics, and the magic medicine is starting to work, so…I’m back..

This current illness has prompted several ideas for blog posts, although up until now, I haven’t had the energy to act on the ideas.  One topic that comes up frequently when I deal with my cystic fibrosis and it’s ever-present ups and downs is what my mind does with the very simple information that my body is not perfect.

Do you have ANTs?  By ANTs, I mean automatic negative thoughts.  Do you remember the last time you watched a colony of ants, as the workers stream in perfect lines to and from the ant colony with the single goal of procuring food and whatever else an ant needs to live a good ant life.  Perfect, tiny little single file lines of ants, determined to stay in line and do what is expected for an ant to do.

This is the way unhelpful thoughts travel in your brain.  They are a series of repetitive synapses that have traveled the same neuronal pathways in your brain so many times that they have worn grooves in the sand of your brain.  Now, they are automatic, as are their emotional and behavioral consequences.  So it is very appropriate for the acronym for “automatic negative thoughts” to be A.N.T.  I’ve read that humans have about 50,000 to 70,000 thoughts per day, and that 90% of them are repeats.  We think the same things, over and over and over.  It reminds me of that ant in a single file line, doing exactly what the ant in front of him/her (probably him I guess) does, without question.

Here are some examples of my ANTs:  “This disease sucks.  You just got through two months of P90X, only to have to stop!  You’ll never get through this 3 month program.  IV”s again?  I  (sometimes I’m “you” and sometimes I’m “I”  If you lived in my brain, you would have me committed.) already had 3 weeks of IV’s just a few months ago…My CF is progressing.  My lung function probably stinks right now…God, what if it doesn’t come back.  What if I am now on that downhill slope?  Oh man, I am coughing so hard…what if I start to bleed and never stop?  No one is here to help if I have massive hemoptysis…what would I do?  WHAT?  103 pounds…oh no… You’re disappearing.  How can you be losing so much weight?  What does THAT mean?  Do you now have to deal with CFRD and insulin, too?  That would really suck.  You know Julie, that CFRD usually means worsening of CF.  The good days are over.  Your luck has run out….” and on and on and on

They are automatic.  I don’t try to think them.  They just happen.  And they’ve happened before.  It doesn’t seem to matter to my brain that it is thinking useless, negative thoughts that it has already informed me of a million times, thank you.  They keep on coming.  I’ve tried to stop them..but that definitely does NOT work!  You can’t successfully tell yourself not to think something.  Just try…right now, try to NOT think of a pink elephant lying belly up in your living room.  See?  You can’t do it.  Just by imagining what you don’t want to think, you think it.

But I’ve learned a trick in dealing with these thoughts.  It’s come with practicing mindfulness, which simply means being aware of what is happening while it is happening.  In other words, I’m watching my thoughts.  And at the same time, I am watching what my body feels in response to these thoughts.  It’s not pretty.  What I see is a direct connection between negative thoughts and bad feelings.  “Duh,” you say.  “That’s a no-brainer!”  Exactly.  These processes occur below the level of your “brain,” or consciousness.  But when you become conscious of them, something pretty cool happens.  It turns out that you can’t be fully conscious of something you are doing that is harming you, and continue doing it.  When you directly experience the fact that negative thoughts lead to bad feelings, you will appreciate that you have direct control of how you feel.  All you need to do is decide to think alternative, more positive thoughts.

So instead of, “Your lung function probably sucks right now!” I can gently decide (consciously) to change the thought to, “Yes, my lungs are a bit under the weather now…..and that is why I am taking care of them by resting and infusing wonder drugs.  Thank God I have health insurance and access to  great health care!”  The ANT will try to take over, and I will have to be very alert for this, as the grooves run deep.  But as long as I catch them, I can always substitute a life and health affirming thought for the negative one.  Over time, the affirming thought grooves will deepen and the negative grooves will smooth over from disuse.

Try to catch your ANTs.  Remember, don’t try to force them away (remember the elephant).  When you catch and ANT, replace him with an affirming thought that carries with it positive feelings.  Is this Pollyanna, New Age garble thinking?  I don’t know.  But would you rather feel bad, anxious, worried and depressed, or hopeful and grateful for what is good in your life?  Which feelings do you think are healthier overall and better for you?  Does being depressed and worried help you in any way at all?  Will it change the outcome?  I would argue that being optimistic and grateful can change the outcome…for the better.  So why not give it a try?

The Gift of Giving

I have recently taken on a new challenge.  I love challenges!  THis morning I was sent an email link to the most fantastic site, called the 29 Day Giving Challenge.  It was started by a young woman with multiple sclerosis, who found happiness (check out her video on the home page) and abundance through the simple act of giving a small gift to someone else every day for 29 days in a row.  This has erupted into a huge movement of giving by thousands of people across the world!  Imagine.

So today is Day 1.  I just joined the Global Giving Village, as one of the 29 Day Giving Challenge member suggested.  I think I’ll update my giving here, to keep me honest.

You know, having CF is no picnic.  But when I check out these organizations and what they do, it reminds me first, that I really have so much to be grateful for, and second, that the quickest way to happiness is to give to others.  Of this, I am certain.

Now….off to the pharmacy for the third time this week!

What is the Right Career?

How is a career choice related to wellness?  First, when I write about wellness with CF, I am not simply talking about physical health and wellness, but also emotional well being…a sense of contentment and fulfillment.  Many things are related to this sense of wellbeing, and fortunately, most have little to do with physical health.

I’ve been reading and thinking a lot about happiness lately.  If you’ve read my column before, you probably know that I find the field of positive psychology fascinating.  Essentially, it is the study of what causes people to be happy and to live rich and fulfilling lives.  Happiness is a popular topic these days.  You see happiness “secrets” revealed on book and magazine covers, on PBS specials, on happiness blogs, websites…you name it.

My purpose is to mine the field of positive psychology and happiness research to come up with scientifically validated ways to improve the subjective wellbeing of people with chronic illness, and of course, cystic fibrosis is a perfect example.

So what does this have to do with career choice?

The research tells us that one of the most important elements of living a good, fulfilling life, is the ability to use your strengths in a manner that serves a purpose that is larger than yourself…one that you believe in deeply and that aligns with your core values.  Those people for whom work is a calling feel the most fulfilled.  And there is a strong positive correlation between happiness and using your strengths every day.  Wouldn’t it be awesome if you could do that and get paid?  You can…and you should strive to do just that.

We all have strengths, and I’m sure you have a very good idea of what your particular strengths are.  It has only been a recent discovery that people who are the happiest immerse themselves in using their strengths rather than using their finite amount of time and energy to “shore up” their weaknesses.  I believe that the very first thing to take into account when deciding a career path is “What are you good at?”  Notice, I didn’t say, “What do you think you can handle, given CF?”

If you want to try a fun and often revealing exercise, take the VIA Signature Strengths Survey at http://www.authentichappiness.org.  This is a series of 240 multiple-choice questions (it takes 45 minutes or so), and when you are done, you will immediately see which are your top five (or Signature) Strengths.   I thought I knew what my results would be, and I was close, but there were some that completely blew me away.  You will also get an interesting perspective on your own strengths by asking those that know you well what qualities they most admire in you.  Finally, make your own list of things you love to do and that you know you do well.  Try to narrow this down into five or six things in which you take great pride and satisfaction.  Combining all of these methods together will give you a very accurate map of the kind of career you will find most fulfilling.   It will be the one(s) where you see the need and the opportunity for these strengths at every turn.

Looking back to my decision to go to medical school to ultimately “cure cystic fibrosis,” I realize that I could have used this advice.  When one thinks of a good researcher, strengths like the capacity to love and be loved, humor, zest, curiosity and love of learning, and hope/optimism/future mindedness (my top five) are not the ones that first come to mind.   A great researcher would show strengths like industry, diligence, critical thinking, caution, judgment, ingenuity, and leadership (not even close to my top five).  While my passion was in the right place (curing CF), my strengths were not suited well to this career decision.

Now, this didn’t turn out all bad.  I loved going to medical school.  My love of learning and curiosity strengths were force-fed every day for 10 years of training.  I got to tell great pathology jokes.  But let’s just say that sitting around diagnosing cancer (after the intellectual thrill of figuring it out) did nothing for my zest, my hope and my optimism.  And who loves their pathologist?  Was I happy?  Not so much.  When it came time to retire to take care of my children and myself, I went through a slight existential crisis (well if I’m not a doctor, then who am I?), but then settled into post-physician existence quite happily.

Now I am entrenched in career number two, coaching and training wellness to people, who, like myself, live in less than perfect bodies that often require care and attention above and beyond the norm.  I use my strengths in a much more effective an ongoing way, and I am appreciated for them more than I ever was sitting at my microscope.  And, I care deeply about the meaning and usefulness of my work.  I feel that I am doing what I “should” be doing.  Given that I have always had a passion for fitness, nutrition and stress management, I get a kick out of sharing this with other people, and love learning even more about these topics.  This leads to a sense of fulfillment and contentment that I didn’t feel as a surgical pathologist.

So what can you learn from this story?  First, it pays to learn your strengths and give them serious consideration when choosing your career.  The same goes for following your passions, and figuring out a way to merge your core values with your daily job.  But finally, what you can learn from this story is that sometimes, despite your best intention, your “dream” job takes awhile to manifest.

You may decide on one path, and find out later that it doesn’t work out as well as you had hoped.  Or, you may love what you do for a time, and then physical challenges may force you to be more attentive to your own health needs than that particular job allows.  All of this happens…to everyone, really.  When you are first deciding on a career, in your early twenties, it may seem like you only get one chance, and you can’t afford to mess it up.

You might be making yourself crazy by thinking, I can do this now, but what if I get sick?  Sure, be practical.  You probably shouldn’t become a firefighter!  But why paralyze yourself by imagining what may happen in the future?

Barack Obama said something in his inaugural address that stuck me (actually, most of what he said struck me…but this I remember).  He said he rejected the notion that as a nation, we couldn’t both follow our values and be safe.  To paraphrase him, I reject the notion that as people with cystic fibrosis, we can’t both follow our passions and be well.

Your career is obviously a very personal choice…one that you will live with day in and day out.  Most people you talk to will give you practical advice:  Think about your health.  How stressed will you be?  Will you be able to care for yourself appropriately?  How healthy are you now?  What can you do now?

These are obviously important to consider.  But remember also to consider the following:  What are your strengths?  What are your values?  Is it more important to you to work your tail off doing what you love, or to work at a less stressful job so that you can place more energy and attention on your own health and family?  These aren’t right or wrong questions.  They are just questions…to which only you know the answers.

The Wellness Recovery Package

As a nation, we are in deep doo-doo.  Jobs are disappearing in droves.  People are losing their homes, their health care, their confidence in the “American Dream.”  It’s a tough time, no doubt.  At a time of crisis like this, the worst thing we could do is to ignore the fact that this is an extreme test of our stress resilience factor.  While clearly, some people are hurting more than others, the uncertainty we all face is stressful.

We will get through this, of course.  Despite all of our hand wringing, the universe will unfold and we will survive.  The question is, will we come out stronger and wiser, or will we be a collective frazzled mess.

I’m a fan of the stronger, wiser option.  One way to do that, is to use this opportunity to improve upon those things in our lives over which we have control.  We don’t have a lot to say about freeing up the credit market, but we can dump our own “toxic assets” by dropping a few pounds and getting closer to our ideal weight.  We may not be able to do much about our home’s dropping value, but we can focus instead on the value that those we love bring to our lives.  The obvious greed of Wall Street may make us mad as hell, but instead of letting it eat at our gastric lining, we can make use of that energy and hit a heavy bag with abandon.

As our President gives press conferences and leads town hall meetings delineating his Economic Recovery Plan designed to lead us out of this mess, I would like to propose my own “Wellness Recovery Plan.”

To use the same rhetorical tool as our President uses, I will describe my Plan as a combination of three things….a “three-legged stool,” if you will.  This is a very simple plan consisting of three things…three actions…to take each day, that together will work to improve your physical, mental and spiritual wellness.  I promise that if you do these three things consistently every day as we all work to get out of the economic hole we are in, you will emerge as our country will,  stronger and healthier.

The Plan is to take ONE step each day in each of three Initiatives:

1) The Movement Initiative
2) The Eat This, Not That Initiative
3) The Wealth Appreciation Initiative

The Movement Initiative

Every day until this crisis ends, make one choice in favor of movement.  This may be a choice to walk instead of drive.  It may be to stand and stretch during commercials instead of sitting numb as marketers feverishly peddle their junk food.  It may be a choice of stairs over the elevator.  The point is to, at least once a day, make a clear choice to do the healthier thing.

This doesn’t need to be a big deal.  It doesn’t have to be overwhelming.  I’m not asking you to train for a marathon.  These are small, easily accomplished tasks.  As you look for ways to make this choice each day, you will naturally become more conscious of how to be more active without even trying.  It will work….but only if you do it.

The Eat This, Not That Initiative

You can probably guess this one.  Again, it is a very small choice that I am asking you to make, every day.  We all know what the better choice is when we are faced with a nutritional quandary.  It is usually pretty obvious, but if you really are unsure, there are books out there to help (Eat This, Not That).  It may look like eating an apple instead of chips…or a drink of water instead of that Coke…or munching on a bowl of whole grain cereal at night instead of ice cream.  It could be as simple as drinking skim milk instead of whole milk.  If you make just one decision in the direction of better nutrition each day, by the end of this crisis you will be healthier, possibly lighter, and definitely more enlightened about how much control you really do have over your health.

The Wealth Appreciation Initiative

So your 401K doesn’t look so great right now.  It is depressing, but it is what it is.  You can focus on that and be bummed out and angry.  The result:  You will be bummed out, angry, and less wealthy than you were a year ago.

Option two:  You can focus on the wealth that exists in your life right now that cannot be taken away.  The result:   You will still be less financially wealthy than you were last year, but your emotional wealth will grow exponentially.

Take time every day to take an honest inventory of your true wealth.  This includes the important people in your life, the dogs who love you, the home you live in, the amount of material wealth that is in your life, especially when you think about the millions and millions of people around the world who have so much less.  We may think we have it bad…but compared to the rest of the world, we are still quite well off.  As you start focusing on what is good in your life, what isn’t so great takes on less importance.  It also simply feels a lot better.

That’s it!  It is a very simple plan.  It pales in complexity next to what the Senate and House must wrangle over this week.  But it will work.  And it is one way to take charge, right now, when life seems so out of control.

How to Make the Most Out of Vest Time!

I don’t really know anyone who actually enjoys doing their Vest.  In fact, if baffles me, because it is probably the most passive of all the requisite treatments those of us with CF are asked (told) to do, but most people hate it.  They put it off…they rationalize…they ignore it…some actually hide it!  One client told me this week that she actually had the Vest on, and wore it around the house for a few hours, psychologically unable to hook up.

I think a study should be done, frankly.

But, short of that, I have come up with a list of “sure-fire” ways to spice up your Vest time.  Beware, you may actually find that you want to schedule in an extra session!

Here is it:  The Top Ten Ways to Make Vesting Fun!

1) This is the most obvious.  Television.  You are hooked up to a machine and can’t move.  There is nothing else to do…if EVER there is an excuse for mindless TV, it is now.  These days, with technology on our side, we even have the advantage of Tivo (or some knockoff), so we can actually schedule a show that we truly want to see as a carrot to bring us over to the dreaded machine.  Not only that, but in case the rest of your neighborhood doesn’t have your similar taste in shows, now there are wireless headphones  to strap on (one more thing to get tangled up in).
2) Audiobooks.  I know.  Reading while vibrating at 14 hertz is not a pleasant nor relaxing activity.  However, your sense of hearing is not likely to be upset by the shaking (as long as you can hear over the roar).  Here is another case for headphones,
3) Enjoying a mindful cup of coffee of tea.  Again…you’re not going anywhere.  Why not fill up (not too full) a cup of your favorite morning drink, and just completely experience the pleasure of taste (another sense that is immune to shaking).
4) Take pleasure in another sense that can’t be destroyed by loud, shaking sounds…your sense of imagination.  Vesting is a good time to try some guided imagery.  Guided imagery audios can be found online or in bookstores, and cover anything from learning how to relax, to improving confidence, to perfecting your golf swing.  A favorite one of mine, given the setting, is to imagine that I am receiving the World’s greatest massage on a beach somewhere in Hawaii.  In this case, I am not guided by a tape, but by my own imagination.
5) Surf the internet.  Join the 21st century.  There is ALWAYS something to read or look at online.  For fun, sign up to StumbleUpon.  Here you can create a profile describing your likes and interests, and cool websites are just generated for your pleasure at the click of the mouse.  If you like it, give it a thumbs up rating, and you get more like it.  If you don’t, thumbs down….they won’t send you to another one like it.  It is WAY fun, and easy to kill hours on!  It’s amazing how, after a few times playing with it, the site knows you and your likes like the back of it’s….whatever is at the back of a web program.
6) Meditation intervals.  I say “intervals” because I’ve tried…it’s really hard to meditate while shaking for the whole 20-30 minutes…especially if you are simultaneously nebulizing.  But what is NOT so hard is to do short periods of meditation-–say a minute or two–– and then relax and think about whatever for a few minutes.  Repeat this a few times and time is up before you know it.  Most people think “they can’t meditate”…like it is a skill or something.  It’s not.  It is simply a way of paying attention, on purpose, to something.  An easy thing to meditate on is your breath.  It is always there.  All you do is watch is and pay attention to how it travels in and out of your body…without forcing anything.  Just watching it.
7) One of my favorites:  Pet a dog.  Here is one of my favorites.  This is Jaxon.  He loves my Vest, and comes running when he hears it turn on.  Do you know why?  Because he knows I am cornered for 20 minutes, and have nothing better to do than to pet him.
Hug a kid and make funny noises as you talk to them.  This used to be a hoot when the boys were younger.  Now they look at me like I’ve lost my mind.
9) ChiGong mindful stretching.  Lately, I have been doing a 20 minute Chi Gong routine during my Vest treatments.  It’s great, because I work on my flexibility and relax at the same time.  All of the exercises are VERY easy…really they are just stretches….and can be done while I’m teathered to the machine 3 feet away.  It is too difficult to explain them, so look for my “Chi Gong” Vest workout in a TouTube video coming your way soon.
10) Write blog posts.  Or better yet, comment to mine, and let me know how YOU pass the time!

Resolution/Schmesolution

I’ve never been very good at keeping New Year’s Resolutions, and I have a feeling I am not alone in this regard.  Many a January first has gone by with me having the best of intentions.  I will eat more fruits and vegetables…I will gain 10 lbs of muscle…I will play the piano every day…I will be better about calling my family…I will stop yelling at my kids, and, a favorite and recurrent theme, I will begin a daily meditation practice and stick with it.

Though I have often done well for a few weeks, I didn’t often have great success.  I know why, of course.  As any good wellness coach knows, lasting change comes only when proper motivation, preparation and support has been put in place.  If I look at the things I have accomplished in life, they have all been because I have been motivated by fear of failure (i.e. academics), or a true passion for and interest in doing something (i.e. fitness goals).  Just FYI:  passion and interest and much better motivators than fear.

This year, I have decided that I’m going to try a new tactic.  Instead of declaring, “From this day forward, I will (fill in the blank),” I’m going to work backwards.  Somebody smarter than I am once said, “Start with the end in mind.”  So here is the plan:

Decide what will be the state of your life (the goal) as of December 31, 2009.  Ask yourself “why” this is important.  Then ask “why” the answer to “why this is important,” and so on, until the real reason you want this is clear.  You’ll know it is the real reason when you have no more answers to “why.”

For instance, I want to have a daily meditation practice of 1 hour/ day, and be well into Holosync Awakening Level 3 (currently in level 1) by the end of the year.  Each level of the Awakening Series is about 6 months long.  I have had success with this program before, and I really want to get back into it.  I’ll write another time about it.  For now, I want to be doing my meditation every morning at 5:30 am, followed by 30 minutes of yoga before the kids wake up and chaos ensues.  If I had set this all up as my New Year’s Resolution, to start at 100% full throttle on Jan 1, I would have quit already.

First, the why’s.  Just for brevity, the following includes short answers as they occur to me with each subsequent “why.”  Why do I want to meditate every day?  It’s good for me.  Why? Relaxation and stress relief are important.  Why?  Life with CF is stressful and I need to deal with it.  Why?  Because eventually I will be pretty sick, and I want to be able to find a sense of peace and calm within me when that happens.  Why?  Because I want to die the way I try to live, with courage and a sense of humor.

When your motivators are clear, break the final goal (what you will be doing in one year) into 12 smaller “chunks.”  Then, break the first chunk into 30 very small pieces.  Do one piece/day for January.  Do the same for the rest of the “chunks” and the rest of the months.  Easy, right?

With regard to my meditation goal, the one-hour per day is intense, but it isn’t the biggest obstacle.  I’ve been able to sit for 30 minutes daily for a few weeks now, and it seems to be getting easier.   It’s the 5:30 am part that is killer.  However, I know myself pretty well after these 49 years, and I simply won’t do it if I put it off until later into the day.  Life just always seems to get in the way when this happens.   I need to establish a morning practice…and it has to be that early because of those wonderful kids of mine…they need to be asleep.  Now, 5:30 am is easily 90 minutes earlier than I now wake up.  That is way too much to tackle at once.  I made the mistake just this morning of forgetting the “small bite” piece.  “I can do 6:00,” I thought…”no problem.  I’ll start slow…just one day a week.”

I ended up hitting the snooze exactly 6 times, and got up at the usual 7:00 am.

Recently, I discovered a great blog, Zen Habits, where I read a post entitled,  “10 Benefits of Rising Early, and How to Do It.” ( Link ) It made great sense to me, especially after my experience this morning.

“ Don’t make drastic changes. Start slowly, by waking just 15-30 minutes earlier than usual. Get used to this for a few days. Then cut back another 15 minutes. Do this gradually until you get to your goal time.”

Now there is a concept.  I can certainly wake up 15 minutes early!  Of course, that doesn’t give me much extra time…but, it’s certainly a step in the right direction.  If I can wake 15 minutes earlier each week, I’ll be up by 6:00 at the end of January, and hit my goal of 5:30 by mid-February.

So here is how this one particular goal comes to pass:
Jan:  Work on waking up by 6 am by end of month.  Spend extra time in morning enjoying coffee, alone time, yoga…things I like.  Continue with 1 hr Holosync ( Level 1) in early am (after kids are in school).  Concurrently adjust bedtime to 10 pm (from 11 pm).
Febr:  By end of month, established routine of being in bed by 9:30 pm, up at 5:30 am (gulp).  Continue Level 1.  By Mid- February, begin early am meditation.
March—May: finish Level 1
June—Nov: Level II
Dec—Begin Level III

Now when I look forward to tomorrow, I don’t say OMG I have to get up at an ungodly hour and do an entire HOUR of meditation and THEN yoga!  I simply have to get up at 6:45 and reward myself with a cup of hot Joe.  If every resolution is set with the end in mind, a good reason “why,” and small steps to get there, I think RQ (resolution quotient—I just made that up) would be much closer to 1.

Irrefutable Evidence of a Universal Plan

I have had a massive left-sided sinus infection for a few days now.  Misery does not even come close to the right descriptive for what I have felt.  Thoughts of ripping out my watering, throbbing, burning, itching left eye, and scooping out the offensive obstruction were persistent.  Competing with them were images of just finding the nearest guillotine and taking care of it, once and for all.

Today is a new day.  I feel better, and for that, I am extremely grateful (in addition to Theraflu and brandy).  While showering this morning, I was able to find the underlying message in my recent illness.

As I always do now, I was mentally thumbing through my NOTDEADYET acronym, looking for new and exiting ways to use this tool in my upcoming day. The letter that stood out today was “E:  Envision the Opportunity“…found within your illness.  Here is why:

Yesterday, in my extreme desperation, I purchased a product new to me, called “Sudacare.”  This is an effervescent tablet containing lavender, mint, eucalyptus, menthol and camphor…which, when it dissolves in water, creates a veritable Drano-mist for the nose.  The idea is that you place this tablet on the floor of your shower, and take a long, hot time breathing the fumes.

You would think this would be quite evident to your sense of smell while showering with such a tablet, no?

So, I kept looking at this thing, shrinking on my shower floor, wondering when I would smell it.  Was it defective?  I smelled NOTHING.  Then it dawned on me…perhaps I was defective?

I then proceeded to sniff the shampoo, the conditioner, the Ivory soap (the smell of which reminds me of childhood vacations), the refrigerator contents, and alas…Cisco’s breath.  Nothing.

I believe the medical term is “anosmia.”  I currently have absolutely no sense of smell.  It’s a very disconcerting thing, really, because it also affects my sense of taste.  But I digress.

Here was my realization from this morning’s shower.
As often happens on days that I oversleep and am rushing to get the kids fed, lunches made, and get off to school on time, the sewer backed up.  Just at the moment when I could delay no longer, and excused myself to convene with my dogs in MY bathroom, my son shouted from the OTHER bathroom, “Mom, the toilet is flooding!”

Sure enough.  I had to use the emergency trick a nice plumber had taught me to stop the water from rising.  One more millimeter would have been disastrous.  Knowing the probable answer, I went outside to look at the cleanout (this is a recurrent issue at our house…. it has to do with roots––that’s all I know).

You guessed it.  There was not simply water and tissue backing up out of the hole in the cement, created by the cap being blown off by the pressure…There was so much more.  And it wasn’t just in the hole.  No, it was all over the driveway…spilling into the street.  I will not try to describe the disgust I felt.  Griffin summed it up best:

“GROSS!!!!  LET’S GET OUT OF HERE!”

Suddenly, I didn’t have to do anything to rush them out the door.

And the irrefutable evidence is this:

I smelled nothing.

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