Life Snippets – A World Wide Traveller

June 6, 2017

Sophro Life Snippets

Travel

If you’ve read through my website you’ll have come across the idea that after regular sophrology practice one notices that sophrology becomes a way of life and that you utilise the techniques in snippets of daily life.

My current snippet is one of a euro holiday through Switzerland, Denmark and the UK. Anyone who’s travelled knows that even the best laid plans can be subject to unexpected change. For those who don’t lay many plans in place and are more of the spontaneous type they’ll know that travelling still throws some spanners in the works.

I’m a combination of these two types of traveller, I travel by my personal blend of planning and spontaneity.

Does this mean that I’m immune to a spanner in the works? Or that my planning is perfectly open to change? No! I’m still very much an open goal to the wonders of travel mishaps.

Shall I list a few this trip so far?

An already expensive Swiss train ticket costing twice the planned and budgeted amount. The train is 5 minutes away and I’m heavily luggage laden.. What to do?

I’m en route to the airport in Copenhagen and realise I haven’t seen my passport at all whilst packing? Or at all for the previous week for that matter. Where on earth is it?!

A short walk made mistakenly long involving too much heavy luggage, poor directions, wrong bus stops, darkness, rain, a full bladder, more wrong directions.. And FINALLY arriving at mydestination.

A few more “took the wrong bus” stories could be included, but you get the picture. Travelling is trying on the patience and nerves of even the most experienced of travellers.

Sophrology, how does it fit in? Each of these described situations are heart rate raising, adrenaline injecting, cold sweat inducing, patience challenging situations. And each one of them, I can confidently say, I sailed through with extreme ease and calm.

My regular sophrology practice has helped me immensely to cope and succeed through trial and tribulation.

What is it that helped me:
I breathed calmly and slowly when I noticed my heart rate rise.
I reviewed a calm mental visualisation of my packing to see if I “knew” where my passport was before my heart rate could climb and inhibit the process.
And throughout my luggage lugging traipse in London I kept the positive perspective at each turn, kept a smile on my face and giggled at each “wrong” turn. This is a body trick to fool the mind into thinking everything is ok (which it is!)

Anyone can smile.. anyone can breathe.. However regular sophrology practice helps you to default to these positive actions and positive reactions even through the toughest of times.
During the structured exercises of sophrology you are frequently guided to mentally find positive situations, to smiling at your body and life. And regular breath work is an integral part of a sophrology practice.

And most importantly It’s the regular guided practice that resets your brain activity to default to these positive settings. So that in times of stress the default setting is calm, happy, easy. And it’s amazing how much easier answers and solutions present when in this state of mind.

Contact me today to talk about how you can incorporate sophrology into your daily life.