Nourish – what nourishes you?
19th Nov: Nourish and Flourish by Helen Taylor CC BY NC
Nourish – what do you think of when you are trying to explain this word? concept? and what would you talk about?
I have been invited to give a 10 minute talk at our school’s Nourish Conference on Well-being and being a recognised PE Geek I am trying to work my way through what to share with a crowd of parents, teachers and students. How do you begin to know what really nourishes you?
I have decided to take the chance to look at how technology allows for us to measure some of the ways in which we are nourished and how this fits into my life. I have gained a lot from listening to Shawn Achor as he talks about Positive Psychology and if you check out this TEDx talk (the whole thing is awesome, but if you go to 9m20s to the end (about 3mins) then he talks about how we need to ensure our brains are happy and when we are happy we are more productive, make quicker decisions and things will be better for us. We need to raise our positivity now, as a happy brain is 37% more productive than neutral or stressed). Dopamine turns on the learning centres of our brain! And by re-wiring our brains we can be more optimistic and successful.
Shawn tells us that we can be happier by taking these steps:
- Be thankful and give gratitude via email or other forms – acknowledge others
- Journalling – write about one thing every 24h that you are thankful for (learn to scan for positive not negative first)
- Do Exercise to relieve tension and stress
- Meditation
- Random Acts of kindness
I like to think that this is one way to nourish ourselves – to be happier and to scan the World for positive happy things rather than seeing the negative side of life first. I would also like to think about how technology is allowing me to check that I am getting the exercise that I need, looking at the fitbit to measure steps, calories, stairs, hours of sleep etc and to measure my positivity over time against the numbers of steps – there is an optimal level and I am enjoying finding that out. But I suppose just like parenting, the new things that I learn will change as I go through seasons, stress at work, get older or am in training for an event. Nutrition and addiction to sugar is an issue for my well being! I also find that connectedness to others really has an affect on the person that I am and this can be tricky when you move as part of an international crowd.
I would be interested in hearing from others about how they see ‘nourish’ in their own lives and what you would discuss or share if you were presenting!