Rachel Fleischman MSW, LCSW

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“Slow Down and Be Here Now”
by Rachel Fleischman, MSW, LCSW
Body-Oriented Psychotherapist and Founder of Dancing Your Bliss

Yesterday is
history.  Tomorrow is a mystery.  And today
Today is a gift.  That's why we call it the present. ~Babatunde
Olatunji

Studies have
shown that Americans are more miserable now than ever. With the challenges that
we face economically, it can feel as though we are just hanging on by a
thread.  This is not so. We all
underestimate our need to slow down. If we are not careful, we live as if our
schedules are our lives. At the end of the day, we haven’t necessarily been
present to our own experience. Mary Pipher, psychologist says: I
have never seen people as rushed and distracted as we are now. We have become a
nation of multitaskers.”

I am incredibly fortunate
to work with my counseling clients. Seeing such a rich and intimate side of
people has helped me identify what elements are essential to slowing down and
being here now. I feel incredibly privileged to have such a profound connection
with people.  However the occasions when
we genuinely need to rush are really a lot less frequent than we convince
ourselves. The simple truth is that
rushing has become a habit for many of us. And it has a
negative effect on our mental, spiritual and physical health.

Scientists
have studied emotions and their effect on cognition and brain function. When we
are in good spirits, our cognitive repertoire is broadened. That means we are
more able to problem solve, complete tasks and fulfill goals. (Seligman M. E.
P. (1991). Learned Optimism. New
York: Alfred Knopf. Happiness has even been proven to
increase pain tolerance. Negative emotion narrows our thought-action
repertoire; tasks not only seem more arduous, they actually are.

When you are rushing the
body literally is in panic mode. The physical systems feel as if they are
constantly being stressed to meet imaginary deadlines. An
occasional shot of adrenaline might be good for you but a continuous stream of
it will wear down the body and its immune system. You will tend to get sick more often,
feel more fatigued, enervated and listless.

When you are rushing
mentally, your mind is always ‘on’. Thoughts of things you need to
get done and things you have not yet gotten done keep streaming through your
mind making you feel out of sorts and unaccomplished. You may even feel panicked and
have trouble sleeping and relaxing. Instead of turning to chemical sleep aides,
why not change your habit of rushing around?

First you need to become
aware of your daily habits and thoughts. Most of the time when we are
rushing, we do not even realize it because it is such an automatic response. For example, I walk fast naturally –
excessively so. I walk as fast as I can no matter if I am talking a Sunday
evening stroll or walking to work. We all could use slowing down a bit.

By
slowing down, and sticking to one experience at a time, we are able to
experience more joy.  We need to learn to
do one thing at a time. Mary Pipher, psychologist, and author of bestselling Reviving
Ophelia, says “one of the reasons pets are so popular is that when we are with
the, we share their pleasure in being here now. Pets do not live in clock time,
and they allow us to rest from chronological time. We join them in older,
animal rhythms.” (Seeking Peace, by arrangement with Riverhead books, 2009)

I have
dished up a list of some things you can do today to easily slow down, enjoy one
activity at a time, and live with more joy. Get ready to Be Here, Now.

1)    
Plant something; nourishing, feeding, harvesting,
a plant can lower blood pressure, strengthen the heart and increase the
production of serotonin, the happy chemical. And flowers are beautiful

2)    
Have Faith; studies have shown that
spirituality affects health. In a study of 1,700 older adults, those attending
church were half as likely to have elevated levels of IL-6 (hormones associated
with increased incidence of disease)

3)    
Initiate a Slowing-Down Contest– find a friend and email each
other some joyful things that you do each day. Your entry can include the
simplest of joys; baking, watching a sunset, reading to a child)

4)    
Read The Artist’s Way (or any good book) (Julia Cameron; 1992, 2002) Many folks have found
this ground-breaking book very helpful in goal setting and connecting with their
creative genius. I believe that we all our geniuses. We just need the time and
space to let our amazing selves shine.

5)    
Keep a gratitude journal. This is my absolute favorite new
pastime. I love it especially when I am sulking in a moment of gloom and doom. I
go to my gratitude journal and put in all the things that happened that I am
grateful for, like having a seat on the bus, or getting a card in the mail, or
enjoying a lovely meal. (nothing is too small). Start your gratitude journal
today, and you will notice that you will attract more good things into your
world.

6)    Check out these smell-the-roses sites, and take it slow…

http://slowdownnow.org/ 

http://www.43things.com/
 

http://www.mindfuleating.org/ 

http://www.slowfood.com/

7)    
9.
End the day slowly: Having an evening ritual is a balm to the nervous
system. Before you go to sleep make sure that there is nothing stressful going
on.  Dimming the lights sever hours
before bedtime relaxes the mind, and intensifies the output of tryptophan, the
sleep-inducing hormone. It’s very hard to enjoy a good-night’s sleep after
watching the news. Find a slowness ritual that works for you; reading a book,
talking to your partner or a friend, drawing, journaling.

8)    
Play in nature:
This is a lovely way to help you slow down. To enjoy nature you have to be
patient, Go to the beach, look at the sea and listen to the waves. Visit the
county side, look at the greenery and listen to the birds chirping on the
trees. Admire the blooming flowers in your garden and study the snail crawling
on the ground. These are some of the delightful things that you can do to take
it easy. And here in SF, there is nature all around us.

9)    
Slow Your Attention: 
Slowing down helps give our full-attention to what we are doing. Like
full-attention Zen, slowing down can put us in the zone, or what Mihaly
Csikszentmihalyi calls flow (“Flow:
The Psychology of Optimal Experience”). Try walking more slowly. Pause before
responding to questions. Speak more slowly. Does this feel awkward? Why?

10)  Practice
Meditating: The first years of the twenty-first century have brought about
new and surprising findings about how Buddhist contemplative training can
affect the brain. The findings include unprecedented levels of brain activation
in certain regions of the brain during meditation, evidence that meditation
affects brain areas associated with to positive emotions, as well as strong
evidence the brain can be changed through prolonged and disciplined mental
training.  (J. Davidson, et al.,
Alterations in Brain and Immune Function Produced by Mindfulness Meditation, Psychosomatic
medicine 65.4 (2003): 564-70.)

Men, for the sake of
getting a living, forget to live. ~ Margaret Fuller.

Rachel
Fleischman, MSW, LCSW is a highly-skilled psychotherapist and dynamic workshop
leader, based in San Francisco.
Throughout her career, Rachel has pioneered the combination of traditional
psychotherapy with movement, body awareness and spirituality.

Embodying
20 years of expertise, Rachel's body of work synthesizes a vast repertoire of
movement and healing arts. Bringing her unique specialty of Body-Mind
Psychotherapy, she unlocks issues held inside the body: like fear, anger,
depression and creative blocks.  She
unlocks these issues through her proprietary work merging talk therapy with
expressive arts (sometimes with breath, & movement techniques) so that
these issues don't become diseases in our bodies.

Rachel's
fascination with spirituality, soul, mood disorders, and movement, has led her
to develop a movement system called Dance Your Bliss™, a playful,
powerful and highly original movement form which she leads across the globe.www.dancingyourbliss.com