My Personal Story

So I’m going to have an exercise on that today. Just briefly, so that you know that I’ve tried this for myself too, my experience with supportive practices. When I was 40, I was over in Paris. My husband and daughter came over to meet me. I was studying for my master’s in positive psychology, so that was seven years ago. I was pregnant, about five months pregnant, and I was trying to keep it all in balance. I wanted to have a happy, healthy pregnancy, but I also really wanted to do well on my master’s and have time with my daughter. I had a part-time job, and I needed to show up for my husband. All of this stuff. And on the positive psychology coaching module, which I went to Paris for, a very prominent positive psychologist set an assignment. It was to pick five positive psychology interventions that met our needs, that we would do for six weeks and then report on them. So I decided to first check in on what was already working for me. Knowing positive psychology, I thought about what I already had in place. My morning walks after dropping my daughter at nursery were important. Pausing at certain times, bedtime routines, and other things I wanted to keep in place. I made a list of what I wanted to keep, and then I picked some additional practices, some of which I’ll introduce in more detail later. I had never really tried gratitude practices, so I picked the easiest one, three good things. At first it felt really clunky. It felt really worthy, and I couldn’t do it before bed. So I personalised it, remembering that you can always personalise. I did a bit of mindfulness, which I hadn’t really worked with before, using an app. I picked sacred moments, deciding to imbue my pregnancy class once a week with a sense of sacredness. Savoring remains my favourite practice. I also came up with my own personally designed intervention based on some evidence. I called it dancing as a family. This is what you can do too. You can draw on what I’m sharing today, personalise it, pivot, and come up with your own. Every day, because my husband makes music, at the end of the day we danced around his music, and it was energising for us. After six weeks, I was feeling great. I was sleeping well, I was balanced. Not only did I continue to have a happy, healthy pregnancy and a healthy baby, I performed better in that assignment than I’d performed in anything before. I went on to do the best in my master’s that I’ve ever done academically. It really shows that our wellbeing does not have to be at the cost of performance. Lots of studies show that if we support our wellbeing, we can also show up for the other things that matter to us in life. It’s not an either-or. To simplify it, you can turn to practices to do that. You’ve got two things: the science of positive psychology with all of its brilliant practices, and mindful self-reflection. Looking back, I knew that when I got focused on a goal, I could get really intense and burn myself out. So I asked myself, how do I focus on this without dropping everything? I knew I needed good sleep to reduce stress and help balance energy. That’s what I mean by insights. Taking time to pause, check in with yourself, and ask: what do I need, and which practices would suit me best?