Ashok Gupta talks with Heather and Maria about reconnecting with joy while managing chronic fatigue. Maria describes mindfulness as rewiring attention to notice achievement-driven patterns, while Heather points to creative arts like drawing and painting as ways to shift from analytical thinking into intuitive, body-based relaxation.
So, Heather or Maria, either of you, is there anything that you want to add to that in terms of anything you've noticed with your clients? Re engaging with joy or relaxing the nervous system that can really be in addition to the program in terms of supporting that parasympathetic activity?
Well.
Everything is great, and that's basically what has to be said. But just to add that mindfulness also helps to be. I mean, to know many times what happens is that we use the techniques to heal so that without realizing, goes again into the achiever. And when mindfulness helps a lot is not only to calm the nervous system, but to be present and to be aware when you are doing things with the wrong purpose. I mean, you do it because of something, because you want. And to be aware when you are more defensive and stressed. I mean, mindfulness is not only a technique. I would say is something that changes where you pay attention to and how are you paying attention in your daily life. So it changes how you relate to your life, to your emotions, to your body. So I think mindfulness is very important in that sense.
Lovely, Maria.
But it's really a very core thing we use because it opens many, many useful things, abilities and resources within us.
Yeah, I totally agree, Maria. That's great, because I think the first step of mindfulness is using those tools to calm the nervous system. But as you say, as a result of that, we become more aware of our patterns, more aware of what's going on in our minds, bringing ourselves to the present moment and not being led by our unconscious, but instead we become more conscious. And that's a key part of obviously mindfulness as well.
Yeah.
Heather, is there anything that you wanted to add?
Yes. While you were talking and giving that lovely long list, I thought that it would be good to mention that the creative arts, whatever that might be, whether it's, you know, classically drawing or painting, but putting pieces of fabric together, doing things that are taking you into out of the prefrontal cortex and into the intuitive, non verbal, creative side, is just so good for getting away from that thinking, like the ultimate distraction, really.
Yeah. No, I love that. And we know in depression research that there's too much activity in the right frontal cortex in depression. And actually when we're able to shift the spotlight of consciousness onto something different, then that begins to calm down and we then get less activity in the right prefrontal cortex. Creative pursuits are a brilliant way of engaging the emotional mind and taking this beyond the mind, actually. So I love that. I think it's really really important for us. And it's so interesting because as children and even teenagers, we're encouraged to have a creative pursuit. It's part of school life. But then when we become adults, we get so lost in the day to day work and what we need to do, we forget to have a creative outlet sometimes for ourselves. And for me, that is actually singing. As a lot of people know, I love karaoke and singing, and I know that when I sing, it doesn't matter if I'm not singing. Great, I don't care. The approval seeker is gone. Thank God. I'm, you know, I'm in the moment, I'm enjoying it. And that's taking me beyond the mind. And I love for all of us to find what is a creative pursuit or hobby that can really reengage us with joy. I think that would be really lovely.
