Seeking Balance

I have been feeling so out of balance lately.  Swirly.  Not in a good boysenberry ripple choc top at the movies kind of way.  More in a can't find clear space in my mind or in my life kind or way.  



This is a bit of a recurring theme for me.  And it's perplexing because I don't, in reality have the sort of life that really warrants swirlyness, or anxiety, or stress.  

I have a really great, easy life.  And intellectually I know that.  But still there is something that inhibits me from relaxing into that, from trusting that completely and from taking a deep breath around it.

It's been exacerbated lately because we have been busy.  Comparatively, for us that is.  

I qualify this because when I mentioned to an aquaintance a while back that we had a really busy June coming up she nodded sympathitically and said, "I know End Of Financial Year is a nightmare."  Note to self: don't complain about having a busy June, just because you have to go out a couple of times (at night!) to a single mother of two who runs her own small business.

My swirly, off kilter-ness has lasted longer than normal this time around.  Normally I can attribute feeling off balance to a finite period of time, like birthday month or just a busy social patch or preparing for a trip away.  I can ride it out.  I can say well by next week it will all be over and we can relax.  

But this time those milestones came and went, the birthdays passed, I went away and came home and yet I still feel busy and a bit frantic.

The truth of the matter is though that I needn't feel this way.  Yes our family has hit a little busy phase, but it's all with great, fun, positive things we are doing in our lives either independently or together.  It's nothing that should amount to me feeling like I'm in the spin cycle of my washing machine.

And let me not over-state it.  I'm not feeling terribly cripplingly anxious like I have done in the past.  I'm just aware that my mental agitation, while not debilitating is still disproportionate to what I should be feeling.

And it's not just my mental state either.  I've had a shocking cold that I just can't kick.  Which means I haven't been running in forever.  And my skin is a disaster zone.  Pimples.  At forty.  Please!

You know what it feels like to me?  It feels like I am out of balance.  Me.  Not my life, or the people around me.  Me, inside.  Deep down.  So I looked around for something to remedy that.  How do I get back in balance?

I love it when I come across things by chance that seem to be just made for me, right now.  So it was when I read this really interesting post by Katie Tymms at her blog Time with Katie.

In it she talks about digestion and Ayurvedic medicine.  Ayurvedic medicine is something that I had a keen interest in over two decades ago and I did quite a bit of reading about it back then.  Then I went overseas, forgot about it and got on with my life.  

But then I read this startling statistic that Katie shared in her post "95% of all our neurotransmitters (brain chemicals) are in the intestinal wall.  Only 5% are actually in our brain".  And it kind of blew my mind.  And it also resonated because it makes sense to me on a not scientific level, that what we eat effects our mood and the way we function in our lives.  

If I'm honest with myself I know that for the last little while I have not been eating in a way that would best support both my physical health or my mental health, my moods. 

The problem is a familiar one.  I get a bit run down and reach for stimulants like chocolate and coffee to get me through the day.  Then at the end of the day, still feeling tired and like I need to unwind I head for the wine.  And while I do believe that there is nothing wrong with any of these things in moderation (I am never living in a world in which there is no chocolate) none of these things support me in feeling better when I am run down.

In the past these little crashes haven't mattered, after a short period of time I have started feeling better despite my poor dietry choices.  And as I've felt better I've been able to make better choices.  How about an apple at three o'clock in the afternoon instead of a coffee and three anzac biscuits (just because they are home made doesn't make them healthy).

But this time has been different.  I've been in a prologned state of swirly-ness and I need to get out of it. Now.  This time I know I have to start making better choices if I want to get back on track.  And I'm hopeful that getting back in balance might even lead to a reduction in my anxiety levels generally.

Reading Katies article prompted me to take a short quiz to determine my Ayurvedic body type (as I couldn't remember from all those years ago).  And in doing so I unearthed some advice that, dispite being from a questionable source (aka the internet) resonated so greatly with me that I am going to give it a try.

What I found was this, my body has accumulated Kapha, leading to "heaviness, sluggishness and congestion".  While my mind has accumulated Vata resulting in mental agitation and instability.  This made perfect sense to me.  My body feels heavy with little or no energy, congested sinuses and skin.  My mind meanwhile is a whirlpool of thoughts, doubts and anxiety.

The prescription: stimulate the body, calm the mind.  It just makes so much sense.  Despite having not enough energy I need to get back to running and yoga.  But to support myself in doing this I also need to get back to my much neglected mediation practice.  

This week is the week to turn things around.  I need to create some routine and discipline to help support myself to make better choices. The choices I know will ultimately lead me to better mental and physical health.

Do you ever feel swirly and out of balance?

Listen to Ani DiFranco My Name is Lisa Kalvelage

Image by One Small Life