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How to Thrive this Holiday Season

Already feeling the stress of the Holidays upon you? It seems we keep piling more to our already full plate every year. We feel like we have to meet all our friends and family and do so much during this season that we overwhelm ourselves and stress ourselves out in the process bringing us further away from the joyous and magical Holiday spirit we seek and so desperately want.

It’s possible for us to take a fresh look at this and evaluate what’s important to us and what is too stressful to continue with it. In the video below I go over how we can to that.

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Rather read a transcript of the video? Transcript of the video is at the bottom of this page.

Here is a short summary of the video content

  1. Evaluate what’s important
    Take a good look at the all the things that we do over the Holidays and evaluate what is the most important based on your energy, values, time and enjoyment and make adjustments.

  2. Discuss with the people around you.

The people you celebrate with might have other ideas on how to make this Holiday Season more joyous and fun. Sometimes we are keeping traditions that are not that old and are outdated. Sometimes we might want to create our own. You might have to compromise as this can be a sensitive subject to some. Maybe tiny changes this year might open up the door to more changes next year.

  1. Make a list and delegate

Once you and the people you celebrate with have decided what is important. Make a list and go from there. Maybe you can delegate things on the list, but maybe you can’t. I get it 🙂 This is a progress and something we need to practice. It is much easier to have the list outside our head than circling around 🙂

I hope you can find out what are the most important things and with these tips now enjoy the holiday season even more. Also try my tips on how to stay calm during the Holidays. We all need quick and easy tips on that 😉

Love,
Ragna

P.s. Want more support? Try this Enhance your Calm – Holiday Offer – where I’ve carefully selected three elements that will make your Holidays joyous and almost stress-free. With beautiful easy-access meditations, wonderful Yoga Nidra deep relaxations and masterclasses just to help you thrive during this season. Click here to go over to my Membervault page where Enhance your Calm is hosted. If you are viewing this in the facebook app you might need to leave the app to open this page aka open in a new browser window.

Transcript of the video

How to thrive during the holiday season. We have a lot on our plate during the holiday season, and it seems to get bigger or the plate doesn’t get bigger, but we put more on it every year.

So it’s important that we plan ahead, evaluate, ’cause we seem to want to meet all our friends and family and, do a lot of things during the holiday season. And that’s okay if we choose to do it.

We just have to ground ourselves and keep, keep calm while doing it so we don’t lose the joy. Um and the fun of, of it all.

So I recommend, that we inspect our traditions because sometimes they’re not that old, but we still have it. And see if everybody that is celebrating with you are still enjoying those tradition, if it’s something that they would like to change, you might want to compromise. You might want to, just evaluate what, what brings me joy, what is according to our values, what, what, how much energy do you have? Do I have to do those tasks? Um, what time do I have?

So it’s important to just do that.

And when once you’ve done that, just make a list and see if you can delegate and somebody else can maybe do things. Um, or maybe that’s, you cannot let go of the control, and that’s okay too. I totally get it.

And it’s, it’s important to, to see this, because we often think that traditions are very, very old and they have been for hundreds and hundreds of years.

And I like to take the example of the, the food that is very traditional for, for, uh, Christmas Eve dinner here in Iceland. And that is like a smoked ham.

And it turns out, I thought it had been forever. Turns out it’s just, uh, I think around 60 years old tradition maybe. And before it was lamb, everybody had lamb. And maybe if you didn’t have lamb, um, you would cut this bird and, and make dinner out of that.

But sometimes we think that it’s so old, you have have it all every year and, and you feel like it cannot be changed. Maybe you are up for discussion, maybe the people around

you’re up for discussion. I want to change some things that might be stressful to you or, something that, um, is not in your, not in accordance to your values or, something like this.

So it’s good to evaluate this and just use the time, the energy, the enjoyment and the values, as a guide. Like is it bringing, of course, we have to compromise when we are with other people, but still try to see what’s, what’s working for you and what’s not working for you.

And then make the list and, and go accordingly.

’cause Christmas comes, or your holiday comes every year at the same time.

Not the health inspection that you’re not, you don’t have to clean the back of the cupboards anymore unless you want to.

And if you want to use your time that way, that’s okay too.

So enjoy, enjoy the holiday season.

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How to Stay Calm during the Holidays

The Holidays can often be a stressful time so here the three most important tips that help you stay calm and get you trough the season.

Already feeling the stress and overwhelm build up? Listen to this short video and get your key take-a-ways.

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Rather read a transcript of the video? Transcript of the video is at the bottom of this page.

Here is a short summary of the video content

  1. Breathe deeply

    Deep belly breaths are my go-to method – ALWAYS. When you breathe deeply you collect yourself and connect to your body. That helps you move from the busy mind into the body, bringing an instant calm. With every inhale you breathe in a little bit of calm and with every exhale you let go of some of the stress and overwhelm. Take three deep breaths and then check-in with your body and mind and notice what is there. JUST BREATHE AND BE.

  2. Be mindful

From the deep breaths we move into mindfulness. This way we can dig a little deeper on what is going on in our mind and body. It’s important to name the thoughts and feelings from a viewer’s perspective and just notice what is there. The key in mindfulness is doing this without judgement and that is always the tricky part because we are so used to being hard on ourselves. So just name what is there and say to yourself that this is normal. I’m feeling stressed. Yes that is normal during the Holiday season. I’m feeling overwhelmed. Yes that’s normal too.

  1. Connect to your body

Connecting to your body is a way to activate that soothing part of yourself. You’re already doing this with deep breathing. Try giving yourself a hug and rub the upper arms. Try swaying from one side to the other. This always brings calm and relaxations to the body and helps you move the focus away from your busy mind.

 So these are my most important tips to stay calm over the Holidays. Maybe you need to use these often and maybe you don’t. Maybe you would like to put a reminder on your phone so you remember those easy to use tips and tricks.

I think that’s the hardest part – to remember to use them – as well as remembering how powerful these simple tips are and how they can help you find your inner peace and calm when you need it.

Enjoy the Holidays!

Love,
Ragna

P.s. If you want more easy to use tips and tricks that work like a charm, check out my resource page. Open in a separate internet browser if you are reading this from your facebook page.

Transcript of the video

Already feeling the stress of the holidays. I’ve got just the thing for you.

First of all, just breathe. Take a deep breath in,
Be. Hold it a tiny bit, and then just let it all out. Ah,
And again, take a deep breath in, feel your belly,
feel your chest, and then let go. Ah,
yes, you might want to keep breathing like this and feel the stress go
this way. You can collect yourself, connect with yourself,
and, and maybe not be as stressed. So tip,
this was my number one tip, and this is always my number one tip.
And that’s deep breathing.

Number two, be mindful,
mindful of what you are thinking because we are so caught up with,
um, uh,
all the things that we have put on our plates because usually we,
we have a lot of things on our plate during the season.
And so being mindful really means just take,
take a deep breath and then notice your thoughts and say, Hey,
what’s going on in my, in my head? Um,
what can I look at it from like a viewer’s perspective
and say, oh, yes, I’m feeling overwhelmed. Yes, I’m feeling stressed. Yes,
I’m feeling anxious. I feel like this is too much. Just name those feelings.

And the tricky part is to do it without judgment. It’s like,
um, so that’s the tricky part in mindfulness has to,
has to do with the non-judgment part.

So when you just name the feelings and see how you’re,
you’re doing and the thoughts, you say, oh yes, there’s this thought. Yes,
that’s normal. Yes. Then, then this, this thought and this feeling is there.
Yeah, that’s normal. I can see, I can see it. So that’s a good point.

And the third thing is to just connect to your body.
You do it already when you are, um, taking deep breaths,
you are connecting to your body and put, uh,
you can activate more soothing part of yourself.

If you just give yourself like a little hug, maybe you rub your upper arms,
what you’re doing, and if you sway like this,
it really brings you calm. And,
and that’s really important because when we have the calm,
we can choose our attention. We can choose what we focus on. We can,
we can,
we can have more choice and not feel so stressed and overwhelmed.

So those are my top three tips.

Deep breathing,

Being mindful without judgment and naming the feelings
and the thoughts that we are having and noticing them,

and then connecting to our bodies
And maybe give ourselves a hug and swing our body.

It’s even better when you do, like,
when you stand upright and you just connect that way.

Enjoy.

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The day I realized that I could hold space – Even in the most difficult situations

“He asked for you” – the nurse said as I entered the Oncology Ward Station. We had met several times before. I was his nutritionist and dietician. Let’s call him Jon. He needed guidance about nutrition as he had trouble swallowing. Or that is at least how it started out.

At the time, I was the nutritionist and dietician for all the cancer wards in a University Hospital. I worked both in oncology and haematology departments in- and outpatients’ wards. I saw thousands of patients and relatives for the few years that I worked there. 

When you work with patients in such close proximity that are going through cancer treatment you quickly develop a mixture of an educated guess and a sixth sense about who are going to make it and who are not.

This was not one of the – going to make it – cases. Jon had trouble swallowing for a reason. And it kept getting worse and worse. This I could help him with my education and training. I did everything I could. I guided him through, gave my best advice, applied for advanced nutritional drinks, ordered specialized textured food from the kitchen that he could tolerate and swallow.  

I don’t know when it changed. Why he started to talk to me about all the other things that were troubling him. I felt he had something on his mind. Were there questions about the nutritional plan that he was on? Was it something else? It turned out to be something else.

Jon was just a few years older than me. I was in my early 30s. He was in his late 30s. We both had kids of similar ages. I had one. He had two. I was healthy. He was not. We both knew that he was at the end of his life. 

And that became the topic of our conversations. How horrible he felt for leaving his two kids at this young age. How he felt about leaving his ex-wife to be the sole provider for everything for their kids. How he could not talk to his friends or family about this. It was too hard. He had to show strength for them. 

I told him that there were experts working in this ward that he could talk to. A psychologist and an excellent priest. I tried to convince him to talk to them about this, not me. I wasn’t sure I was qualified to do this. 

He said he felt comfortable talking to me. It felt good to talk to me. I still felt I was not the right person for these types of conversations.

I talked to the hospital priest on the ward and told him about the situation. I asked him if he could talk to Jon. He said that if my patient had not himself requested to talk to a priest that it would not be helpful for him to see him. He also said that if the patient only wanted to talk to me and he was confiding in me, I should continue to see him. These were things Jon needed to speak about and it was important conversation to have before he passed. He said that Jon obviously trusted me, and he also trusted me to have those hard conversations. His advice was to stay in the room, listen and just be with Jon as he relieved what was in his heart. The hospital priest himself had faith in me and for that I am forever grateful. 

So that’s what I did. I gave up the idea that there was someone better than me to have those hard conversations. I came to see Jon every single day that week. I gave him nutritional advice that he already knew so we could make this a “legal” appointment and I could make notes for the records. And then I let him talk. 

About everything. All the horrible things. About everything he was anxious about. All the things he loved about his kids and his ex-wife. All his sorrows. All the things he could not do anymore or ever. What he could still enjoy doing with his kids. What he missed. The failures in his life. 

I sat with him. I listened. I held space for him. 

Maybe it sounds horrible, but it turned out it was not as hard as I thought it would be. It was just life with all its good and bad. Jon’s situation was grim, but all the emotions were recognizable. All the feelings were very normal given the situation. 

I learned that holding space came naturally to me. Even though it was hard to listen to him speak his truth, I could recognize that it was a shared human experience and all I had to do was to be there and listen. What he needed from me was holding space for him while he off-loaded everything he needed to share. 

At the end of that week, he was discharged home. I never saw him again. I’ll never forget him and the lessons he taught me. I’m grateful that I could be there for him to relieved what was in his heart before his journey to a different plane.

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Getting back to good quality sleep

So ironic. In the Summer of 2018 I taught two courses on better sleep named appropriately: Less Stress – Better Sleep. One in Icelandic, one in English. 

Ironically after I taught those classes my sleep got worse. Not better, worse. Not because I was not using my own tips and tricks for a good quality sleep. 

No – It was because of pain in my hips. Nothing serious but something pulling enough on the sides of my hips to wake me up in the middle of the night, sometimes multiple times. Messing with my sleep cycles, messing with my deep sleep, my rejuvenating sleep. 

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Trying to find sleep

I used all my sleep hygiene tricks. I went to see several specialists. I saw a doctor that prescribed pain killers for me but those didn’t last the night (and my body was not a fan). I saw my physical therapist who I deeply cherish and is the best in the world in my own opinion (and my dear friend). I felt better for a few days. Well, you know physical therapy, I felt worse at first and then better later but sadly it only lasted for a couple of days after each session. It seemed that as soon as I started moving my body like a normal person and not like a turtle, the pain came back.  I saw a chiropractor – Same story. Wonderful at her job. Felt better for a few days, then back to what it was before.

Was good quality sleep not within my reach anymore?

I gave up multiple times. And tried to face the fact I was just this old and this was just my life now. I would not sleep through the night again and this pain in my hips had come to stay. I would not be able to hike, ski, swim or even take a walk around the neighborhood, not without consequences. Moving my body, such as working in my garden, usually resulted in payback later. I had to rest for a few days and my sleep got even worse afterwards. Not a great motivation for movement at all. 

So this was my new normal. I tried to meet it with self-compassion and calm. But it was sometimes really hard because I felt I was failing on so many levels. I had a hard time focusing on tasks. I got irritable at things that normally wouldn’t bother me. Things that usually brought me joy didn’t anymore. Cooking was a drag. Watering my plants too. I felt like an old diesel engine. It took me ages to get going but once I started I was good.

When we are not sleeping well everything gets out of place. Our lives seem boring. Stress becomes a living companion. The effects on our mind and body get really clear.

Hopeful journey?

Even with all this I knew somehow, at the back of my head, that there was hope. I knew there was. Somewhere.

I had before the pandemic signed up for a Yoga Therapy training that kept getting postponed. I thought maybe that might be the thing to help me. That would be amazing if it did, even just a little. I almost didn’t dare to dream that it would. 

I finally got to the first part of the Yoga Therapy training. It was out in the countryside at a lovely eco village. I think I won the contest – “brings most stuff”, because I brought so many things that were to aid my sleep 🙂 I even took a memory foam mattress topper with me so I could at least sleep a little. I later found it helpful to bring with me to the house where Yoga Therapy training happened during the day, since we spent most of the day on the floor, sitting, listening to lectures, practicing with each other and so on. Just imagine me carrying my bed with me back and forth – It was almost like that 😉 

* Quick note on Yoga Therapy.

The easiest way to describe a Yoga Therapy session would be to say it’s a mix of a yoga class and a massage. It falls short on the therapy part of it though. It can help you release tension in your body that is ready to be released through the assisted yoga poses, could be another way to describe it. You have all the benefits of yoga and massage and then some in Yoga Therapy. 

Transformational Yoga Therapy session

Towards the end of the third day (yes the third day), it was my turn to be a recipient of a Yoga Therapy session with a sequence for the hips. I was both anxious and excited. Hopefully it would help a bit and I would learn something about what this was about, the pain in my hips. 

The session started with me informing my “giver” that I had really sensitive hips, I needed a lot of tender care with the poses and I would not be going as deep as some of the others. This check-in with the recipient (me in this case) is of course a part of every session but I needed to make extra sure my giver understood me completely. 

As she gently guided me into the poses and reminded me to breathe, I felt good. She was attentive to me and where my edge was. The edge is really important in Yoga Therapy because that is how far we go into poses and that’s where the release can happen. The edge is the place before pain. You might feel a stretch but there is no pain involved. 

The flow of the session was good and I felt safe to experience whatever came my way. During the last pose I felt suddenly fearful that my giver would overstep my edge as she moved my leg 1 centimeter to cross my center. This was the start of waves of release that kept coming. It was just amazing how the waves kept coming. Soon my giver didn’t need to hold my pose and the tension left on it’s own. 

After the session I felt amazingly light and calm. I was on a pink cloud. I wondered if this grand release would show up in my life somehow or if this was just one of those experiences where you feel amazing like after a yoga class, good night’s sleep, great walk, meditation and so on, that slowly wears off and you go back to feeling normal. 

Adjusting my experience

I went to bed still feeling the lightness and wonders of the session. When I woke up the next morning I realized that I had not been woken up by a pain in my hips. My roommate had gotten up around 4 but the pain in my hip was not to wake me. I wondered if this was a fluke. I went hopeful to sleep the next night. Again the same thing. 

I went into overthinking mode. I thought maybe because I’m moving my body and giving Yoga Therapy sessions  and also receiving them during the Yoga Therapy training, I was sleeping better. Or the wonderful time off from my daily life was responsible for this new found sleep. Or that I don’t have to stand in the kitchen cooking everyday. There were a whole group of people doing that for me, and the rest of the group 🙂

Basically I thought once I was home, the pain would return. I was not hopeful really. 

Back at home – Back to sleep

But that did not happen. At first I slept a lot. My body was really ready to rest and sleep. After a few years of not having good sleep. If I was woken up it was my children needing help or a cuddle in the middle of the night. Or a storm. Or something else, not the pain in my hips. 

It is and was amazing to experience the difference between going to bed at 11pm or 1am. Before it didn’t matter because I was always tired. I felt no difference. Now I do. 

After a couple of months with Christmas and the New Year Celebrations I noticed that I could wake up more easily. I was more alert. I was more focused. My brain fog had lifted. I was able to move my body and not feel so tired that I had to rest for days. I felt alive. I felt happy. I felt joy in my everyday life again. Things that I used to enjoy, I started enjoying again. Like cooking and gardening. And teaching and planning ahead. Seeing one-on-one clients. Being outside. Playing with my youngest in the snow. Spending time with my loved ones. Everything was more joyous.

I had space in my brain for all of it. Wonderful feeling. I felt and feel like a new person. Someone that can easily take a deep breath and enjoy every moment if she remembers to do so ( because sleeping does not fix everything. But almost everything :))

And I’m so grateful for Yoga Therapy and all the wonderful tools I have in my toolbox for less stress, better sleep, well-being, feeling joy, peace and calm.

How would your life change if you were able to breathe calmly and get good quality sleep? 

Video – Coming back to sleep

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Why self-compassion helps?

Self-compassion is often misunderstood for sympathy, kindness, empathy. Those qualities can be a part of compassion or self-compassion, but it might not necessarily be part of it.

It also seems that we are a little bit afraid that if we show ourselves self-compassion everything else will fall apart. But self-compassion is not about self-pity. It’s more about looking within and being curious about why you feel this way and helping you to create a relationship with yourself that is helpful for your health and well-being.

This video explains how and why self-compassion helps put our perfectionist and our inner critic a little bit to the side.

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Rather read a transcript of the video? Transcript of the video is at the bottom of this page.

Here is a short summary of the video content

  1. Self compassion is often a misunderstood concept.
    Self-compassion is not the same as sympathy, kindness, empathy but those concepts can be a part of it. It’s also not the same as self-pity because when using self-compassion you are not the victim (as we sometimes think when we are in self-pity mode) but the compassionate friend to yourself.
  2. Self-compassion is helpful to counteract the inner perfectionist and the inner critic.

It is very helpful to not always being in inner conflict with yourself and that’s where self-compassion is the most helpful. The inner critic always tearing you down for everything you think and do. Or feeling small and not taking action because you feel that everything has to be perfect. Those parts are here for a reason – to keep us safe but they can overreact. This is where self-compassion helps us move forward despite the inner struggles. 

  1. Self-compassion is something we can train and work with.

This is a progress and something we need to practice. But it’s something we can practice so we can accept ourselves and see our accomplishments as something good that we have done.

  1. Self-compassion helps us create better self-care for ourselves

With self-compassion we can investigate what works for us and what does not. It can help nouch us in the right direction little by little. We can find out what works for us without just copying what other people are doing. 

  1. Where can self-compassion help you?

Ask yourself in what areas in life can self-compassion help me the most. Where can I be more accepting. How can I show myself more compassion. Investigate what’s there, what’s going on without judgement and having a whip on your back all the time. 

For me self-compassion was the missing piece for self-care and made me more capable to create a self-care plan that works just for me. It also took a lot of stress away because now I’m not always letting my inner critic and my perfectionist run the show. Self-compassion allowed me to find and accept the self-care that was most helpful for me, not anyone else. Me. 

Now I hope you can find out where you can apply self-compassion so it works for you. YOU. 

Love,
Ragna

P.s. I talk about things that are close to my Icelandic heart in this video so sometimes it was hard to find the right words in English. So the perfectionist in me wanted to delete the video. I decided to go ahead anyway. I’m practicing self-compassion and you can too. 

Transcript of the video

Hey, it’s Ragna here, and I wanted to talk to you today about self-compassion. Self-compassion is often misunderstood for sympathy, kindness, empathy. Those qualities can be a part of compassion or self-compassion, but it might not necessarily be part of it. 

I, for myself as a recovering perfectionist, and I think self-compassion is the thing that has helped me the most to counteract and work maybe with my inner critic. Instead, sometimes some days it’s harder than others, some days it’s easier. And the inner critic is sometimes not as busy tearing me down. And sometimes it’s quite busy, tearing everything I do and say and don’t do tearing it down. 

So we all have that part of ourselves that is very critical, and it’s there for a reason, it’s there to protect us, and it thinks that is being helpful, but it might not always be helpful, and it might help just make us feel small and insignificant and that we are not enough and we don’t have a place and don’t have a voice. 

So, it’s important to have something to counteract against it. And self-compassion is one of the tools that we have, and we can train and work with. And for me, this is the thing that has helped me the most. It’s something that has helped me take better care of myself because we often need, and it has, yeah, how often do what we feel that we need to do and without maybe taking the time to think if it right for us. 

So self-compassion has helped me, yeah, work with myself instead of always pushing myself and, you know, having the whip on my shoulder and making things much harder than they have to be. 

Instead of somehow with self-compassion, it helps me build resilience and helps me feeling more positive towards myself. And I feel that, I’m not impossible person to begin with. And I am allowed to see my accomplishments as something that I have done. And they are benefits for me, instead of saying, well you know, it’s useless, it’s not helping you at all. 

So, I know it’s sometimes hard to find this part, this compassionate part of ourselves that can show us, be there for us and be resilient with us and help us take better care of ourselves and see, connect us with other parts of ourselves. 

And it can also help us with soothing system, and, so again, activate that. So our threat system and our drive system are not as big. So our inner critic is not taking as active role, but it’s a journey. It’s not something that you just decide one day that you’re going to do forever. It’s something that we have to work on, and we have to be aware of. 

And, but it’s doable, and it’s helps with acceptance of who we are and just gives us time and space to be ourselves more than just trying to fit into a box and be just that, don’t go out of the box because it might be dangerous. 

So yeah, I think it helps. 

So think about how self-compassion can help you because it’s not the same as self pity. Self pity makes you feel like you’re only one with this problem, and you’re… But we are, you know, humans, we are often have the same inner struggles, and it’s better to have the resilience and the compassion to deal with it rather than this self-critical pity. 

So see if it’s something that can help you notice, maybe your thoughts around it because we often mix compassion with other terms like kindness and empathy and sympathy. 

It can be, you know, all those things with the compassion but sometimes it’s not that because for me, at least if I just share one thing about myself is it has helped me with self care much more because it comes from self love and not like this, this thing that I have to do it, like I have to eat better because you know, I’m a nutritionist, I cannot eat unhealthy. 

It comes from like, I want to take better care of myself. I want to have… it comes from a different place. And it helped me move further instead of just having the constant whip and that, you know keeping me, like in my place, don’t do it! Don’t do it! 

You know, it helps and just have a think. Where in, when, what areas of your life care could self-compassion help you? Because it’s not just, you know, removing yourself from the situation, it’s looking towards it, seeing what’s there and being curious and, you know, maybe investigate it a little bit. 

What’s going on? 

What’s there? 

So have a look in your own life. 

See you later. 

Bye.

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Five (and then some) tips on how to calm yourself when you are feeling stressed

Have you noticed that your shoulders are sometimes all the way up to your ears or that your jaws are clenched together? Stress can manifest itself in our body in many ways but it’s not always easy to notice that. But when you do notice it, you have the perfect opportunity to relax your shoulders and take a deep breath, slowing down both your mind and your body at the same time.

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Rather read a transcript of the video? Transcript of the video is at the bottom of this page.

Here are the tips from the video

1. Lower your shoulders.

When you notice that your shoulders are up to you ears: Lower your shoulders and roll them a little bit back. This way you can give your lungs more space to breathe. Which brings us to the next tip.

2. Breathe deeply.

This tip sounds so easy that we often dismiss it for that reason. But I’m telling you it works 😉
Be gentle when you are taking deep breaths. There might be constrictions in you chest when you are stresses but with each breath you can breathe a little bit deeper. Put your hand on you chest so you can feel if your breath is short or long or shallow or deep. Then put your other hand on your tummy so you can feel how it expands as you breath in (this tip is easier to understand with the video, I promise :)).

To breathe in first expand your tummy, then your chest and at last your shoulders move a little bit backwards. When you breathe out, relax your shoulders first, then your chest goes down and at last your tummy.

Be gentle and tender if you have restrictions in you chest area. Expand your breath little by little.

3. Breathe slower and deeper so we can notice our thoughts.

Next tip is to breathe more slowly and deeper. Now you know how 🙂 By slowing down our breath, we slow down our mind. Then we have the change of noticing our thoughts. The thoughts that go around and around and keep us stressed. And when we do have this self-awareness we can write down our thoughts, making our thoughts separate from our head. This helps a lot.

4. Move the attention from your thoughts to your body.

This can be done in many different ways. One way is to trace a pencil along the side of your hand (shown in the video), tracing along each finger. Be mindful when you do this. Be in the present and try to do that without judgement. It’s not always easy but that’s OK too.

5. Activate the Soothing system.

The Soothing system is one of three systems that regulate our emotions. The other are the Threat system (the fight, flight or freeze response) that is activated during the stress of our lives (and we all know so well), and then the motivation system (Drive system) that motivates us to have a house over our head and being fed and stuff like that.

The soothing system is often ignored, so I recommend giving yourself a hug, just embrace yourself. That gives you a feeling of belonging and feeling that you are okay and you’re going to be okay. It’s okay, at least for this very moment, it’s okay. That helps too.

So in summary those are the quick, most helpful tips that you can easily access wherever you are.

I recommend taking at least three deep breaths and if you feel this restriction in your chest, just be gentle and tender with yourself until you get a little bit more familiar with taking deep breaths.

One more tip 🙂

6. Be mindful of your thoughts

It’s often very hard to notice our thoughts because they go so fast but if you go with the tips that I have gone over already, you can do that more easily.

The most difficult trick is not to judge your thoughts, just to notice the thoughts, just like they are clouds in a blue sky. Just notice the cloud come and you see it, there it is and then it moves away. This is a practice that takes practice 🙂

But it’s something that gets easier with time.

Those are my 5 plus tips that I recommend to feel more calm. I hope some of those tips will benefit you. Share what helped you the most.

Love from Iceland,
Ragna

Transcript

Hey, it’s Ragna here and I wanted to give you a few tips on how you can calm yourself down when you’re feeling stressed and anxious.

We know that we often get this tightness in our body and our shoulders go up to our ears, so my first tip is just to lower the shoulders and get the, maybe have them also go down and a little bit back and that gives your lungs some space to breathe a little bit more.

And the second tip is just to take a deep breath and we often dismiss those easy tip because we think they don’t work for us, but I’m telling you, they work and when you deep breathe or take a deep breath, there might be some restrictions in your chest because you’re so used to shallow breaths. And that’s just when you are stressing, you can go a little bit further each time you take a breath, so it sometimes helps to put your hands on your chest and maybe you can feel if your breath is short or long or if it’s deep or shallow.

So, if you can feel that you are breathing only with moving your chest, you can also put your hand on your stomach and you first expand the stomach and then you expand the chest as you breathe in and you can put your shoulders a little bit back. And then your shoulders go a little bit down, your chest goes down and your tummy goes inwards, so you can push out the air that’s left. And then you let your breath in, through the tummy, expand the chest, you might feel some restrictions in your chest, that’s okay, shoulders go a little back here, still breathing in, right? And then again, you let go of the breath. So try this.

I know there’s restriction in the chest can be a little bit painful, don’t overdo it, just do it, be gentle with yourself, do tiny little bit at a time and see how it works for you and where it takes you. But when we take a deep breath, it also means we breathe a little bit slower, so we lengthen our breath and we deepen it. So it’s good that you can do that.

So that brings us to the next tip, which is just to breath slower and deeper and that can actually slower your thoughts because we know it’s usually our thoughts that keeps us stressed. So if you don’t know it, I’m telling you. It can be silly, our thoughts. And when we breathe a little bit slower, it can slow our thoughts down so we can notice, what it is that is stressing us out and maybe we can then more write it out and have it like a separate thing, out of our head and I think that’s really important because when it’s in our head, it’s going around and around and around, but when we write it down, it’s out of our head and it’s separate from us. And that helps a lot.

So the next thing is to take the attention away from the thoughts in your head and to the body. And that can be done in many, many different ways. Most people have maybe a pencil or something on the desk, on your desk, so you can maybe trace along your hand, so the side of your hand, along every single finger and be present when you do that and try to do it without judgment, just try to be mindful. It can be easy and it can be hard and both are okay, it’s okay. It’s not always easy to change the focus.

Another good tip is to activate the soothing system. I’m not going to go in too deeply into the soothing system, but it’s said that we have three ways to regulate our emotions and one of the things that we have is the soothing system, the other one are the threat system, the fight or flight response that we know so well when we’re stressed and then the third system is motivation system, just to keep us fed and have a house over a house and stuff like that.

But the soothing system is often ignored, so I’ll recommend giving yourself a hug, just embrace yourself, it’s okay. And when you do that, it gives you a feeling of belonging and feeling that you are okay and you’re going to be okay. It’s okay, at least for this very moment, it’s okay. So, that helps too.

What else? Yeah, I think those are the quick, most helpful tips that you can easily access wherever you are. I recommend taking at least three deep breaths and if you feel this restriction in your chest, just be gentle and tender with yourself until you get a little bit more familiar with taking deep breaths and I think that’s helpful.

And then one more tip is, in other words be mindful of your thoughts and it’s often very hard to notice our thoughts because they go so fast but if you go with the tips that I have gone over, you can do that more easily.

And the trick that’s the most difficult one is not to judge your thoughts, just to notice the thoughts, just like they are clouds in a blue sky, just notice the cloud come and you see it, there it is and then it moves away and this is a practice that takes practice. But it’s something that gets easier with time.

So I recommend that and you will find more tips on that elsewhere on my site . So, I will see you later. I hope some of those tips will benefit you and share what helped you the most. I’ll see you later, bye.

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How I came to realize my theme word for my life

I realized something today. Something BIG. Something that I should have seen before. If I had been paying attention.

See, I‘ve been struggling for a long time to find out what I can help people with. I’ve been asking myself this question again and again. What can I help people with? What can I share on social media that will show who I am and what I do for people? What are my themes? What is it that I’m here to do?

I’ve struggled with this even if I’ve been teaching various online courses, hosting online retreats and webinars, speaking on summits and so much more online since 2014.

So I opened up this big A3 sketchbook that I only open up when I’m planning something big. Like a course, lecture, or a membership. I took it out because I wanted a social media plan. A big big plan. Something tangible for me to work after. And I wanted it ready right now! 😉

So I got the book out and started staring at the big blank page. Asking myself- What can I talk about? What do I know? What is helpful for others? What can my themes be?

Then I remembered something – I had made some kind of a plan before. Maybe it was in this book. I started flipping through the pages, looking for that plan.

I found many things. Somethings even dated back to 2015 when I was starting to work online. And as I was flipping thought the pages, I kept seeing the same words popping up again and again. And then again and again.

And that’s when I realized it. I HAVE been talking about the same things again and again. I have the same themes. What I’ve been doing is not so random as I’ve felt it has been (teaching course on various themes come to mind).

What I have been doing is dressing my themes up in different costumes. But the themes have remained the same.

I´ve always been talking about the same themes. It has always been about acceptance and compassion toward yourself. It has always been about nourishment for your body, mind, and spirit. It has always been about cultivating your mind so it can serve you better. It has always been about self-care, self-compassion, and self-love. It has always been about activating the soothing system. It has always been about meditation and mindfulness. It has always been about connecting within so you can find that inner peace.

But first and foremost, it has always been about calm. Finding calm in everyday situations. Finding the calm within. Being calm whenever possible so you can make better decision, so you can have better focus and concentration, so you do not miss out on life as it moves past you. So you can enjoy your life better. Your everyday life. Not only when you are on vacation on a faraway beach.

Because to me calm goes together with joy. Calm goes together with feeling content. Calm goes together with feeling happy, for being happy. Even in the midst of the chaos of everyday life.

And that to me is life.

Love,
Ragna

P.s. I’m working on a membership where all of my themes come together so you can live your happy, calm and content life in the midst of the chaos and stress of everyday life. Join the waitlist here.

P.s.s. I’ve been called the Icelandic Queen of Calm and up until now – I’ve laughed about it because it implies that I’m calm all the time in every situation and nobody is calm all the time. But now I’ve come to realized it’s not that what is meant by this. What is meant is that I have a calming presence. Something that might be hard to convey through words. That calming presence helps people feel calm and at ease when they listen and talk to me. Again very hard to convey through words. But videos are easier. Follow my on social media for a better look 🙂
I spend most of my time at Instagram and Facebook.

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Why should I meditate? The top three reasons.

We know that meditation has many benefits but sometimes we don’t know why it is good for us 🙂

Sometimes we might need something a little more personal to make meditation a regular part of our lives. Something that connects us to the new habit so we keep going, also when we are not feeling “it”.

This was at least the case for me. For years I kept trying to make meditation a regular practice. Sometimes meditation was in and sometimes it was out. It was like this for a long long time.

It was not until I got very clear on why I was doing it that I managed to make it a regular part of my life. 

Here I want to share with you my top three reasons for meditation in the hope that you will find your reasons in there.

When our reasons are clear it’s makes it easier to go over hindrances that always come up when we are getting in a new habit that supports our health and well-being.

Here is the video were I share my top three reasons.

Meditation and the reasons why it’s good for you

Video not working – Watch it on Vimeo? Click here!
Rather read a transcript of the video? Transcript of the video is at the bottom of this page.

Here is are my three reasons – in a short summary.

  1. Calm my mind.
    Meditation helps to calm my mind and clear my head. When we slow down our breath, our thoughts slow down with it. When the thoughts go slower through my racing mind, I can notice them and maybe clear them. It improves focus and concentration, cultivates compassion for myself and others and therefore makes my less judgmental and less reactive. All hugely beneficial.
  2. Calm my body.
    Meditation helps me to slow down my breathing which can slow down my heart rate and blood pressure. That somehow helps me to release some of the stress that lives in my body. I can breath in calm and breath out stress and tension. On a cellular level it regulates our stress hormones (increases dopamine and melatonin, modulates serotonin and decreases cortisol and norepinephrine). I didn’t manage to get the biology of stress into the video even with my Bachelor degree in biology. I should be sprinkling my biology knowledge everywhere 😉
  3. Reminds me that I’m more than my thoughts, my emotions, my actions and what I do in life.
    When we are in meditative state we can notice our thought processes which lead to emotions and feeling and which then can lead to actions (or no action). If we can notice our thoughts/thoughts patterns and emotions/feelings that follow in meditation, that means there is something more. Someone that is noticing that process. That is the true inner self, inner consciousness, metacognition (whatever you would like to call it) that is not affected by all the others (thoughts, emotions, actions). That knowing brings me calm, just knowing there is more to me.
    There is also a gap between all those the inner self, the thoughts, emotions/feeling and action/not action. Meditation cultivates those gaps and helps me to be less reacting, sometimes at least 🙂

    Those are me top three reasons for meditating regularly.

Find your own personal reasons to keep you connected to your meditation practice and make it easier to keep going when going gets tough. 

My hope for you that once you found your reasons, getting settled in a meditation practice will be a breeze 🙂

Love from Iceland,
Ragna

Transcript of the video

Hi. It’s Ragna and today I want to talk to you about meditation. We know that meditation has many benefits, but we might need something more personal to keep up a practice or set up a meditation practice.

At least that was the case with me. Until I got very clear on my why it was hard for me to maintain a regular practice so I want to go over my top three reasons so you can find yours in there.

So, my number one reason is just to calm my mind. It helps me to calm my mind and somehow to clear my head and that’s important in the time and age that we live in when we have so many different things coming at us up all the time. So, it helps us calm down and clear our head, and when we are meditating, we slow down our breath, and when we slow down our breath.

We also slow down the thoughts, so the thoughts don’t go as fast so we can notice them, and maybe clear them, and not react to them.

So, that’s my first reason, and it also helps us to be more focused, and improves our memory, or at least I hope so. And it can also help us cultivate a little bit more self-compassion, and also compassion for others. So, it makes us a little bit less judgmental which I think is helpful in today’s world.

And number two is just to calm my body. As I said before when we meditate our breathing slows down, and that slows down our body, slows down the heart rate as well as the blood pressure, and it somehow helps me, at least, let go of some of the stress that lives in my body, so I can somehow breathe in calm and let go of stress when I breathe out.

And it really helps so I can just let go of the stress and not keep it in my body.

And then the third and the most important reason, for me at least, is that it helps me remember that there is more to myself than thoughts and emotions and actions and what we do.

So, when we are in the meditation state, we are following our thoughts or noticing our thoughts, and that means there is someone to notice the thoughts.

So that means there is something more than just the thoughts, the emotions, and what I do. There is some inner core. Some inner self, inner consciousness, that is following the thoughts. So, if we can follow our thought processes that means there is more of me, or my inner self is watching, and that for me, is important.

And also, to cultivate the gap between myself and the thoughts, and then the emotion, and from that we take action, or we don’t take action.

So, it can make me a little bit less reactive, at times, and I think that helps with emotional regulation. And that is actually shown in research, that it helps with that. So, we can better regulate our emotions, and that’s important to have.

And it helps me bring more calm into my life, and just to remember that I am more than my thoughts and emotions, that calms me down.

And so now it’s time for you to find your reasons and see if it cannot help you set up a regular practice.

Love,
Ragna

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Let go of stress NOW!

We often think we need so much time to let go of stress when the truth is we have this awesome tool available and ready for us whenever we need it. The only problem is remembering it and then actually doing it.

When things are easy to do like this we often think it doesn’t account for anything and skip it just because it’s so easy to do.

But we are mistaken.

It does account for something.

It’s important to have everyday measures to let go of stress as we go through our day.

So take the time.
Watch this video now.
Enjoy!

Rather watch the video on vimeo? Click here!

Taking short breaks to do a short meditation or just take a moment to take few deep breaths can help us to let go of stress. When we are stressed our breathing is faster so taking the time to slow down our breath is an excellent way let go of stress.

Taking few deep breaths slows down our body and our mind. It helps us reconnect to ourselves. It moves the focus away from head and into the body. The fast thoughts in our head that are often the cause of our stress so when we move the focus to the body and the breath it helps to calm us down. When we deepen our breath it actually slows down our body, and when we slow down our body our razing thoughts do the same.

We know when we are stressed our breath is shorter and shallower so when we deepen the breath and make it longer our body and mind believes that we are not as stressed as we were just minutes before.

It’s a great way to calm our whole being and our whole system.

So take the time to notice your breath and deepen and elongate it so you can let go off stress now. The video guides you how to do that so you can reconnect to your breath, and yourself. Then you can find your inner peace, calm and quiet within.

Love from Iceland, Ragna.

P.s. If you need to let go of more stress, check out my favorite thing to recharge and rejuvenate, yoga nidra – a sleep-based meditation and deep relaxation. Use this link in membervault to learn more: https://ragnagudjons.vipmembervault.com/products/courses/view/1043010

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Activate your soothing system and meet your Best Future Self.

I´m excited to announce my new Calm and Sleep program.

This amazing program is put together so you can activate your soothing system. That means you get out of overwhelm and stressed state into state of calm and inner peace so you can meet your Best Future Self.

It’s important that we move away from constant stress because stress affects our whole being, directly and indirectly. Stress hormones flood our body and that might be for a short time but this is not healthy for long periods of time. It affects our cells and affects how we eat, sleep, if we exercise and how we rest and last but not least it affects our relationships.

Calm and Sleep Program

Constant stress also affects our state of mind and our very being. My Calm and Sleep Program is designed to activate your soothing system so you can relax, recharge, reconnect to yourself and nature and just be – Just BE.

Imagine how your life would change if you got good quality sleep during the night. What would change in your life? I’m betting a few things.

Go from overwhelm and stress to calm and quality sleep.

Meet your Best Future Self in eight weeks <3

Calm and Sleep Program