growintolife by Elizabeth Papalia
Photo by frank mckenna on Unsplash
Hey!
So Wellbeing and I have become close friends over the last fifteen years. For much of those years I didn’t know that what I was pursuing was good wellbeing. What I knew was that I was seeking inner happiness and to embody a fairly stable experience of happiness and satisfaction in the way I lived life. This journey was raw, troubled, and emotional. Punctuated with positive experiences as well as exhausting and painful moments too.
My process at first, was about learning to find the silver lining, to grab hold of the joy, to smile through the troubles where possible. Not pretending that they didn’t exist, but rather focusing on where the joy could be found and highlighted. I found that it helped as if I invested more energy in the good feelings, that’s what I felt more of. However as we all know, there are times when the healthiest choice we can make is to feel the feelings and let ourselves sink into the sadness to truly “see” it. If we ignore, repress, squash and quieten the darker sides all the time, they will inevitably just explode out and rip us apart in an unmanaged way that can impact more than just our evenings.
It can spill out further into areas that affect our family, friends, work, self, faith and more.
By noticing and feeling more it was almost like the emotions could spill out little by little in a less chaotic way. Some days it felt dark 80/90% of the time and others it felt like a quiet mournful presence.
By noticing the challenging moments I could also unpick the root causes more consciously because I allowed myself to be aware. Then it led to being able to explore what aspects of those root causes were potentially adjustable, to name parts that had been mysterious feelings, and explore what I wanted to replace it all with too.
Over the last 10 years wellbeing has become a buzz word for our personal and professional lives… it’s something that individuals aspire to personally have and that workplaces often attempt to foster. The thing about wellbeing is that it often seems intangible and ungraspable, which can leave workplaces floundering as they try to nurture it while individuals can end up feeling a bit lost in their search for it.
For me, wellbeing is experiential, involving the whole person and the practice of wellbeing must include practical processes, habits and bespoke strategies that reflect each individual and organisation including their unique needs and priorities.
I’m looking forward to sharing some of my tips, useful habits and strategies on here.
