Life Strategies behavioral Health

Life Strategies behavioral Health

intro,

Welcome to the digital age.

While we take for granted much of the technology that surrounds us and the way it has changed the way we work and relax; it’s actually very important to recognize just how much it has impacted our lives. Today we are constantly bombarded by information and stimulation and it is taking its toll on our brains. Meanwhile, the expectations placed on us by our work have only increased because of greater productivity tools and enhanced connectivity. And it is not just technology that has changed life for us either. The demands placed on us in other areas have also increased. The world is more populous, living costs have gone up and our roles in society have changed. More and more women are now working full time, which while a good thing.

Be Vocal With Your Goals

Whether you’re trying to make more time for yourself or whether you’re trying to lose weight, one thing you’ll often find yourself wondering is whether or not you should tell your friends your new goals.

On the one hand, telling friends goals is a great conversation topic, it’s fun to share things that are going on in our lives and we might be able to get advice from them – especially if they have recently given up smoking! Having your friends and family in your corner ensures that they’re not going to inadvertently make your life more difficult – by offering you that cigarette for instance or by inviting you out to lots of events when you’re trying to cut back.

The Downside of Sharing Goals

But there is also a downside to telling people your goals and you need to be careful of this. Studies actually show that in some cases, telling your goals can make you less likely to achieve them. This is particularly true for things like eating more healthily or giving up smoking.

The problem is that when you tell someone your goal, you can actually sometimes feel as though you’ve already achieved it. You get the same congratulations from your friends (“That’s great!”) and you get to feel as though it’s now a part of your identity. If you had been getting social pressure from your friends to change, then you’ll find that this is largely gone now.

In this case, sharing goals can actually be destructive!

Combating Information Overload

Perhaps then, the best way to judge whether or not you should share your goals is to think about the nature of the goal in question. Depending on the goal that you’re trying to accomplish, the positives of sharing that information with friends may well have much stronger benefits.

For instance, if your aim is to try and combat information overload and to make more time and space for yourself – then this is something you should definitely tell your friends and family. Why? Because a lot of the stress will likely have been coming from them! Unintentionally.

Tell your friends and family that you’re aiming to spend more time relaxing and catching up with chores and that you’re currently feeling a bit snowed under. Simply letting them know will not only reduce the amount of pressure they place on you but might also result in offers to help.

Do You Always Have to Take Huge Steps?

The drive to improve yourself is something that should always be commended. If you make a habit of self-improvement, then this of course increases the likelihood that you will improve with time. This in turn should hopefully lead to you being more efficient, happier, healthier, more confident etc. The better you get, the better you are at taking on life and the better life gets.
But there are ways and ways of going about self-improvement and some people will approach this effort in the wrong way.
For instance, many of us are under the assumption that the best types of changes we can make are those ‘big steps’. You hear terms like ‘turn over a new leaf’ and ‘start afresh’ as though you’re just going to hit that ‘reset’ button and everything will be perfect right away.
In reality, the best self-improvement often involves taking much smaller steps.
Why Slow and Steady Wins the Race
Breaking out of new habits and introducing new habits into our routine are both things that are very difficult and that require a lot of effort. Habits form due to repetition which eventually strengthens connections in the brain and makes those connections much stronger to the point where they almost fire automatically. It’s like creating a deep groove and then running water along the surface – it gravitates to the groove.

If you’re trying to change that habit, then you’re going to be exerting a lot of energy to go against this natural inclination each time you perform that action. This in turn means that you need a lot of focus and willpower if you’re going to be successful.
So if you’re trying to change twenty things at once, or if you’re going from no exercise to 10 hours a week of exercise, then you’re fighting a losing battle. You’ve set yourself up to fail!
This is particularly pertinent if it’s something like information overload that you’re trying to combat. In this case, your new routine is actually adding to that information overload!
Instead then, try changing just one small thing or introducing just one small new habit at a time. This makes it much easier to make that one change and that then allows you to try and introduce another ‘small step’.
Over time, these build up and start to have profound impacts on your life.
As Rocky Balboa says in Creed:
“One step, one punch, one round at a time!”

How to Create a More Organized Desk

If you’re trying to organize your mind to reduce decision fatigue and information overload, then you need to make sure that you organize the space around you. In many ways, our spaces are a reflection of the state of our mind – but actually the correlation works both ways and if you have a very cluttered desk or home it will make your mind more cluttered too.
And when it comes to spaces that contain a lot of information and items, your desk is one of the most pressing areas for organization. Let’s take a look at some things you can do to make your desk better organized.
Throw Things Out
This is really how you start making any space more organized – you throw out anything that isn’t 100% necessary. If it’s a decorative item, then ask yourself if it really fills you with joy. If not? Bing it! Otherwise, ask yourself when you last used it and whether you really need it.
The same goes for that drawer that’s full of stationary. Do you really need that much stationary? Could that space not be much better used for other things?
Create a System That Reflects Your Brain
Another tip is to create systems that you can use to keep your documents in order. And a great way to get inspiration for this is to look at the way our brains store information.
Specifically, our brains have three main ‘compartments’ for storing information. These are:
Working Memory – which is the information we’re currently working with and doesn’t necessarily need to be stored.
Short Term Memory – which is the information we hold for a few days. If it doesn’t get used enough it will be thrown out, if it is important, it will be stored in long term memory.
Long Term Memory – which is the information that we have stored permanently. Nothing gets destroyed here but access can become more difficult without practice.
So how do you create something similar to this? Simple: you make one space for each type of information.
Your ‘working memory’ could be your noticeboard and desk itself. This is where you keep anything that you’re currently working on and need immediate access to.
Not using it anymore? Then it goes into short term storage – somewhere like a paper tray.
Then, at the end of each week, go through your short term storage and move anything important to your ‘long term storage’ and throw out the rest.

How to Get More Quiet and Nature in Your Life

One of the biggest challenges when it comes to beating information overload, is simply escaping the incessant bombardment of notifications, entertainment and stimulation. It’s no wonder we’re all so wired and tired when we spend our days writing against the clock under sterile lights fueled by coffee and our evenings blowing things up on an even bigger screen!
Sometimes you need to inject a little quiet and some natural light into your routine and this can give you a lot more space to be calm and to be yourself.
Here are some tips to help you do that:
Half an Hour Before Bed
One very good habit to get into is to take half an hour before bed to wind down and to read a book or something. During this time, you simply make the rule that you will not use your smartphone and that you won’t look at any screens.
Now I know what you’re thinking: you don’t have time to spend half an hour without your screens. My answer is that you do – even if it means going to bed half an hour later! If you can’t manage half an hour, try for 15 minutes first. The point is that this will help you to sleep better anyway, so consider it an investment.
Reading is particularly good because it requires sustained attention – something that we’re not always so good at any more. If you don’t want to read though, then try writing a journal instead.
Go for a Walk
Going for a walk will give you time to think and to get some fresh air.
Once again, you’re probably thinking that you don’t have time for this. Once again, the key is to work it into your routine.
This time, look at things you can do while walking – or look at making existing walks a little longer. Do you walk to the bus? Then try leaving five minutes earlier and taking a nice detour. Do you call your friend once a week to catch up? Then why not do it while walking around the block?
Practice Meditation
If you can find 10 minutes to practice some meditation in your day, then it will greatly increase your ability to focus, to combat stress and to keep your mind calm. A great app to help you get started is ‘Headspace’ but you can find lots of tutorials on YouTube as well.

How to Reduce Decision Fatigue When Getting Dressed in the Morning

Steve Jobs was famously wary of decision fatigue. Like many people, he believed that the brain has a limited capacity for making decisions during any given day and that by the end of the day, we might well be left with an impaired ability to concentrate, make choices and generally function optimally.
Jobs’ solution to this? He threw out all of his clothes and filled his wardrobe with only jeans and black turtle neck sweaters. Now he only had one outfit and there was zero decision making involved for him getting ready in the morning.
Understandably, you may decide you don’t want to do this. However, there are other less extreme ways you can make the process of getting ready in the morning less stressful, so let’s take a look at a few of them…
Plan Out Your Outfits
One simple strategy is to plan out your outfits at the start of the week and then to wear them each day. This way, you won’t be in the same outfit each day but you also won’t need to make that decision each morning.
Of course you might find that the weather has changed by the end of the week. In this case, you might do better to simply have a selection of outfits to wear for the next few days and then cycle through them as appropriate.
Have a Wardrobe That Matches
Another tip is to make sure that lots of the items in your wardrobe match one another. That means most of your trousers should go with most of your tops. Perhaps you have two main ‘looks’ (brown and blue) and the clothes for each look are largely interchangeable.
This way, most things you grab should go with each other and form an outfit. Likewise, if you are short on items, you will have backup options that can replace what you had intended on wearing.
Keep Clothes Readily Accessible
Another tip is to make sure your clothes are as accessible as possible. Make sure that your drawers aren’t too full and that there’s lots of space in your wardrobe. This will make it easier for you to look through your clothes and will remove the temptation to just leave your ironing in a pile on the chair because you don’t want to have to work out where it all goes and stuff it in.
This basically means you need to cut back on your number of items – which will also have the benefit of reducing the amount of options you have (making it easier to come to a decision).

Organizing Your Household

If you want to overcome information overload and decision fatigue and make your life that little bit easier, then organizing your household is one of the very best places to start. With an organized home, you’ll find that it’s much easier to chill out and relax when you get back after a busy day and at the same time, you’ll be able to find things you need more quickly and easily.
So the only question is… where do you start?
Here are a few tips that will get you started on the right track:
Outsource and Automate
If you’re very busy, then keeping your home clean and tidy can be a lot of work on top of your usual chores and responsibilities. A simple solution then is to outsource aspects of the work and to automate it.
An example of outsourcing would of course be to hire a cleaner. If you can afford to, then this might be one of the best investments you ever make!
Alternatively, you can automate some of the more time-consuming tasks by using the right equipment and systems. A dishwasher for example can save you a lot of work doing washing up, whereas a robotic vacuum cleaner can make it easier to vacuum!
Minimize
Another tip is to go minimal. The less stuff you have, the less there is to clean, the less there is to lose and the more spacious and light your home will feel.
Start with your ornaments and decorations. Cut those items in half and not only will it now be far easier to clean and tidy those rooms but you’ll also be left with a higher average quality of items on display.
You can even cut back on crockery. If you have less crockery, you’ll be forced to wash up more often. Or how about eating off of paper crockery when you’re alone and just throwing it away? It’s not as expensive as it sounds!
Systems
Another tip is to get systems in place. Systems can mean anything from having a sequence of places that you put washing on the way to the washing machine/line, to keeping your items in a specific place and throwing them out after X amount of time.
Turn your house tidying into a series of simple systems and you can make it much easier to stay on top of everything, giving you more time to do the things you love!

The Importance of Creating a Morning and Evening Routine

Many of the most successful and influential leaders in history describe themselves as having a morning routine and/or an evening routine. Those names include Barack Obama, Winston Churchill, Steve Jobs and many others.
Having a morning and evening routine like this is a great idea because it makes it a lot easier to start the day on the right foot. If you find yourself often waking up late, procrastinating by hitting snooze and then rushing out of the door with one sock on, you’ll know just how destructive this can be to your productivity later on.
Likewise, the morning is a block of time that will almost always be free from interruption, which means that you can fill it with useful tasks and activities. That way, even if the rest of your day is a bust you can rest assured that you accomplished at least those few positive things.
The importance of the evening routine is to help book end the day and also to ensure that your morning routine has the best chance of being carried out well. If you set yourself up in the evening, then you’ll make it considerably easier to follow through with your plans in the morning.
Let’s take a look at some examples of things you can add to each routine for your inspiration…
The Morning Routine
Healthy Breakfast
Eating a healthy breakfast is crucial to start your day off well. Keep a consistent menu and you can automate your morning process and ensure that you have fuelled yourself with complex carbs and all the nutrients that you need to function at your best.
Exercise
If you can exercise at the start of the day, then you’ll begin your day with more energy and enthusiasm and you can ensure that you’ll have burned at least a few calories before you begin. Even if you just do a few press ups and pull ups, this can make a big difference!
News
Reading the news is a perfect way to stay up to date with events and to start your day slowly.
Making a To-Do List
Why not set out your goals for the day right at the start?
The Evening Routine
Lay Out Clothes
Save yourself time tomorrow by laying yourself out clothes. And while you’re at it, why not lay out that gym kit?
Write a Journal
This is a great way to reflect on the day just gone!

Top Tips for Cutting Out Your Habits

If you’re trying to combat your information overload and get your mind and life more organized, then there are a range of different negative habits that can make this more difficult.
Some examples:

• Procrastinating in the evening and watching rubbish TV instead of doing something constructive
• Procrastinating at work on Facebook instead of diving straight into something productive
• Doing too much work for others
• Using the phone all the time and stressing yourself out with unnecessary information
  The problem is, habits are… well habitual. Due to repetition, they become very deeply ingrained not only in terms of the neural networks they form but also in terms of the other routines we build up around them.

So how do you start changing these habits?
Change Your Routines and Environments
There’s actually more of a connection between the neural side of your habits and the lifestyle factors than you might realize.
The key to understand is that the routines and habits you have built up can become triggers. Thus, the moment you’re left alone in the hose, you might load up YouTube. It’s that moment of your partner/family/housemate leaving through the door that starts firing that neural pathway that leads to the ingrained behavior.
One way to break out of those bad habits then is to remove those triggers and the associations. How do you do this? By changing your environment and by changing your routines.
This is actually one of the reasons that drug and alcohol addicts are often taken to rehab – it takes them out of their usual environment and removes the triggers that can trigger those bad habits. Of course you’re no addict, but a long holiday or just a change to your routine can make a difference.
Make it Easy
While you’re in the process of changing your habits and routines, then you should also try and make sure that your new set-up makes it as easy as possible for you to succeed. If your aim was to go to the gym more, than would mean joining a nearby gym and it would mean setting your gym kit out on the bed night before.
In this case? It means being vocal about your plans and it means making changes like turning off your phone. If your phone is off at a certain time – even installing apps that restrict usage! Set yourself up for victory and ideally it should be easier to stick to the new goals than it is to fail on them.

What Are the Symptoms of Information Overload?

Information overload is a problem that a large number of us face every single day. This is one of the biggest concerns of the modern, digital age and it’s something that can have a devastating effect on our health and on our mood.
Despite this though, many of wouldn’t describe ourselves as suffering from the condition, quite simply because we don’t really know what it is…
How do you know if you’re really suffering from information overload or if it’s just regular old ‘stress’?
Let’s take a look at specifically what information overload really is, what the main symptoms are and how it might be affecting your life.
What is Information Overload?
Information overload, also known as ‘information fatigue’, basically describes a situation where you begin to feel weighed down by the huge amount of data that you’re forced to deal with on a daily basis.
The most obvious source of this information is all our technology. At any time you might be looking at multiple different screens at once, you might be waiting for notifications from your smart device and you might be listening to music. That’s a lot of different data streams, all of which require concentration and all of which can create at least a small amount of stress.
The Signs and Symptoms
Thus, the main signs and symptoms of information overload tend to be somewhat similar to general stress/adrenal fatigue.
The thing to recognize is that each time you’re focused on your screen, or you’re jolted awake by some kind of notification, this causes an elevation in stress hormones. At the same time, it requires mental energy, which of course is a finite resource.
This can then cause you to feel tired and ‘burned out’. At the same time, you’ll see the symptoms of chronic stress such as:

• Increased cardiovascular stress
• Blood pressure
• Tiredness
• Low mood
  You might also find though that you start to get tired from focusing and decision making, which can ultimately leave you very much drained and make it hard for you to continue focusing and making decisions regarding other things. Thus you may find that you are slower to make decisions, that you are less motivated or even that you suffer with confusion and impaired vision.
  If you find that you have no motivation in the evenings, that you feel almost incapable of making even the smallest decisions, or that you are constantly stressed – consider just how much information you are dealing with during the day!