Canmore and My Healing Places

The morning view I've been craving for months.

Hi Friends,

How were your holidays? I feel like I’m in slow motion, re-adjusting back into my routine. I discovered I am able to live entire days and weeks solely focused on either what I just ate or what I’m going to eat at the next meal. :)

I headed home to Calgary for the holidays this year as I wanted to welcome Christmas back into my life again. Last year was really hard with David being gone and I remember wishing I could skip the whole season altogether. I took things really easy this year and just focused on being with family and out in nature. Shortly after I booked my flight, I booked a condo in Canmore for 4 nights. This would ensure plenty of time in the gorgeous Canadian Rockies which I find so healing. Someone once said to me that when they are in the mountains, they feel so protected, almost like they are getting a hug. I like that.

Thinking back on my trip, there were definitely some highlights:

On New Year’s Eve, my eldest sister and I were determined to get into the outdoor hot tub at the condo we rented. So we donned our toques, grabbed our plastic cups and made our way to the tub surrounded by ice. My parents surprised us by joining us for a bit too! I love, love, love being in a hot tub outdoors looking up at the starry sky. It’s something a good friend of mine and I used to do all the time when we’d go skiing in Fernie.

Going hiking with my nephews up around Grassi Lakes. They are such a reminder that the world is a playground and you can make a game out of anything in any situation.

For NYE dinner, I made a reservation at one of my new favorite restaurants, Tapas in Canmore. Yum, Yum, I discovered this place with some good friends this past summer. It is sooo delicious. It’s so popular that when I made the NYE reservation back in October, I got one of the last spots! We ordered whatever we wanted and brought in the new year with well-satiated bellies.

Getting coffee from Beamers in Canmore. I don’t know what it is about their coffee but it always tastes so good. I make a beeline for their brews anytime I’m in town.

Back in Calgary, I tried to get a healthy start on the new year by going to my friend’s yoga studio called The Yoga Shala. She teaches an early morning self-practice called Mysore and I’ve been meaning to try it for years.  It was such a good decision and I was totally surprised by how good I felt afterwards. I say surprising because it was still so early in the morning once the class was over! We went for breakfast afterwards and it was so good to spend time with such good friends.

Do you have places in the world you like to go that you find ‘healing’? I’d love to hear your thoughts so be sure to leave a comment below.

To your authenticity,

Love, Christine

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How to Stay Calm and In Control in Any Situation

Everyone handles stress differently. It can be hard to learn how to stay calm. Some people can breeze through a last minute deadline without breaking a sweat. Others get anxious at the mere thought of having to drive to the airport for specific time. No matter what your reaction, understand that it’s entirely natural. Also understand that there are universal coping mechanisms that you can employ to help you stay calm and in control, because losing your cool is never fun. To help you stay calm, cool and collected I’m sharing my top five tips to keeping calm. So, keep calm and read on!

1. Remember to Breathe

When you receive a passive aggressive text message, vague email asking you to keep your manager in the board room, last minute notice that your in-laws are coming to town tonight or when you realize you hit “snooze” a few too many times and are bound to be late – take a second to breathe.

In fact, take sixty seconds to breathe.

Concentrating on your breathe and getting your heart rate back to normal will help you conquer whatever the situation may be with a cooler head and clearer mind. There’s nothing worse than a knee-jerk reaction in a stressful situation!

2. Tell Yourself It’s Temporary

It can be easy to let the situation swallow you whole and lead you down a path of panic. Remind yourself that what you’re feeling is just a temporary reaction to the situation now and that it will pass. Sometimes letting yourself see that there’s an end in sight will bring you back to the present and let you charge forward instead with your day.

3. Take a Walk

Putting your body in motion can be incredibly helpful in combatting a case of “losing my cool”. Take a five-minute walk to the nearest coffee shop (if you go inside, opt for a caffeine free option… you don’t need to hop yourself up further!) or even walk inside of your office building or home. Get yourself moving and you’ll feel the thoughts in your head start to shift just the same.

If you can, take this opportunity to hit the gym or get in a thirty-minute workout. The natural hormones your body produces during and after a workout are mega mood-boosters.

4. Phone a Friend… but Talk About Something Else

If you can, phone a friend or family member who isn’t involved in whatever the stressful situation may be. Let them know that you’re having a tough day and want to chat and get your mind off whatever’s bothering you. Whatever you do, make sure that you don’t spend the phone call dwelling on the issue – it’s only going to fester and make you feel worse.

5. Play Your Favourite Song

If you work at an office, it’s helpful to have a set of headphones handy for stressful days. Hearing your favourite music will help you keep on track and stay calm. Whether it’s just an average day or you’re working your butt off trying to wrap a project up by five o’clock – your favourite tunes will help you through it.

When do you feel yourself starting to lose your calm? How do you cope? I’d love to hear your take on things!

To your authenticity,

Love, Christine

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5 Ways Your Body is Telling You It's Stressed

We all know that stress is bad for us, but we don’t always recognize when we’re feeling stressed. Our bodies are like relay towers. They’re constantly taking in information through the environment, the food we eat, and the chemicals and toxins we’re exposed to. Then our bodies translate that raw data and let us know what’s working, and what’s not working, by how we look and feel. Stress comes in many forms though, which adds to the difficulty in identifying when we’re experiencing it. Someone who is under a chronic amount of stress will exhibit more noticeable, outward signs of stress in their bodies, then someone who is experiencing stress as a result of a passing situation. The distinction being chronic versus acute stress is the latter is temporary but quite intense.

Often stress is an underlying chronic condition, contributing to a multitude of symptoms, which also has an acute element to it. For example, you may experience an underlying low level of stress in your life as a result of social anxiety. That low level stress can then be triggered by a social situation that happens each year at the same time. Every year you may find yourself preparing for the acute flare up in your anxiety that increases your stress, and takes a greater toll on you than the rest of the year.

So how do you know that you’re under stress? What can you look for to start preparing yourself before your stress becomes a chronic condition?

Here are 5 ways that your body is telling you it’s stressed.

1. Most people when they are stressed experience sleep disturbances. That doesn’t mean that it you have no trouble sleeping that you’re not also under stress, it just means that’s a good place to start looking for signs that you are. Every body responds to stress differently, some require more sleep and some less. When you’re restless and anxious you tend to have more trouble sleeping. Start to notice if there has been any change in your sleep patterns, either sleeping more or less, having trouble falling asleep, or waking up in the middle of the night unable to get back to sleep.

2. Notice what your eating habits are. Many people overeat when stressed as a way to disconnect and shut off the stress, or numb out. Others will stop eating as away to gain some sense of control over feeling not in control of the situation causing the stress, and the impact it’s having on them. Either one is possible; the key is to notice what is different than usual for you. Much like changes in your sleep patterns, you’re looking for what’s new or out of the ordinary for you. Your body may also crave different foods as a result of stress.

3. Regardless if you’re eating more or not, stress produces cortisol in the body which tends to make you put on weight around the belly. So even though you might have a loss of appetite as result of stress, you may also be carrying extra weight around the middle.

4. Cortisol also affects your immune system, big time! So when you’re stressed, you’re more likely to get sick. You’re body will have less resistance to fight off infections and will take longer to get over a cold when you are sick. Cuts and bruises will heal more slowly and will also be more susceptible to infections.

5. Stress can also present itself in the body as dull and lifeless skin, hair and eyes. Your usual shine or brightness can be become faded, much like your spirit feels. The body is expressing outwardly what is going on inside.

Commit to paying attention to the language of your body. It’s always speaking to you.

To your authenticity,

Love, Christine

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