Welcome back readers! It’s Friday, in case you lost track of the day, as I am sure many of us have. It is such a difficult time for us all as we try to do our best to help keep the curve flat and learn the new social etiquette of a pandemic. This has caused a monumental amount of change in all of our lives and dealing with that reality can bring a great deal of anxiety. It’s important to recognize you are not alone in these feelings. We all are feeling off balance and fearful of what may come next. With all this added stress and change to our daily existence it is even more important at this point to remember to check in with yourself. Are you sleeping well? Are you eating healthy and working out? Are you practicing self-care regularly and working on your breathing? All of these things can help you reduce your anxiety and stress, helping you be more resilient to all of these scary changes to our lives. Where we are not able to control what is happening in our world at this moment, we can control our thoughts and emotions. This gives the opportunity to choose where we focus our attention and where we let our minds go.

The one thing we are in control of is ourselves.

The videos below were sent to me by Kari Dupuis to share with you all in the hopes that they would help those who may be struggling during this time. Local clinical psychologist, Nicole Harrington, PhD made a series of videos with helpful tools and advice on ways to manage your stress and anxiety during this turbulent time in our world.

Mindfulness is a good way to ground us into the present moment and help us control where our mind is. This practice of bringing your mind back to the present moment can really do wonders for your stress and anxiety almost immediately. Where there is no magic solution, over time and with practice you can improve your mindfulness skills and make these practices more common in your daily life. During these highly stressful times we all could use a bit of this I think.

Bring your attention back to the breath.

Your mind isn’t the only part of you that needs calming during anxious and stressful times, your body holds all of those feelings and can be negatively affected. Our bodies often store all of the stress and anxiety and can cause us other problems such as headaches, sleep disruption, lack of appetite and G.I. issues that can affect focus. During these ever changing times in our world we must remember self-care is so important to your life. Taking time to check in with yourself and your feelings can be a great way to find what calms you. Once you learn what calms you then you can turn to those things in moments of distress to help you  reduce the anxious feelings and manage your mood.

I hope these videos help you learn new strategies or improve on existing ones you may have to help reduce your stress and anxiety as well as improving your mood during this time. I will be back on Monday with some more clips from Nicole Harrington, PhD about coping strategies that can help you feel more balanced and in control when things become difficult in our lives. I would like to thank Kari Dupuis again for sending these videos to be shared with you all. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and find time to practice some self-care and find your happy place.

Please remember to wash your hands, stay home if you can, practice social distancing and wear a mask to protect the most vulnerable among us.

I am writing this blog to be helpful to you all out there during this turbulent time and am looking for your feedback. Please feel free to leave your comments, questions and suggestions under the Contact Me tab at the top of the page. You can subscribe to this blog by clicking on the Subscribe button in the lower right corner. Just enter your email address and receive Self-Care Corner in your inbox every morning! Isn’t that wonderful?

In addition, you can now find Self-Care Corner on Twitter @selfcarecorners, where I will be posting daily affirmations and ways to cope with these changing times. I hope this will help others feel less alone, more relaxed and more empowered to practice self-care.