The Art of Unplugging by Elayne Doughty – A great 5 min read!

Every day, before I start my day, I meditate and then check my e-mail for the plethora of motivational and inspirational knowledging hanging out in my email In-Box. It’s like a special holiday every day! As I ramp up for my own e-books and e-newsletters, I love sharing the knowledge that is sent to me!

The Art of Unplugging
by Elayne Doughty

The Art of Unplugging

When was the last time you completely unplugged from everything- and I mean everything?

I like to think that I am aiming towards a healthy life work balance- sometimes I down right fail at it- and sometimes I am successful…

What I know for sure is that the art of living my life in a balanced way is a daily challenge that I am dedicated to practicing! In a recent course that I have been co- leading “The Inspiring Women Leadership Program” we spent a lot of time exploring the need for our lives to be balanced upon a strong foundation of both masculine and feminine principles.

On one of our calls we took a poll of our callers and asked them how many of them had felt over-extended, over tired and fatigued- in fact how many had experienced adrenal burnout? We were not surprised to see that 45% put their hands !

We live in a world where we are overconsuming to the point of devouring ourselves. Finding a way to balance our need to do and achieve, with our need to rest and rejuvenate is now clearer than ever. As our planet continues to be out of balance we continue to reflect her imbalance. A truly wise client of mine said to me just today- “I hurt when nature hurts-I am hurting”.

In a recent chat with my adrenals I discovered that they not only felt overworked- but frankly in need of a vacation! To be precise they said “this tyranny of doing is outweighing my being- everything is beginning to suffer”

So I listened to my body and went away- and unplugged…

I decided to go on a real vacation and do- NOTHING! Its been long time since I took a few days off to simply BE. After travelling to get to the place were NOTHING was on the agenda- It took me a few days to unplug, unwind and to rejuvenate my own being.

With each minute of being away I could feel layers of busy-ness melting off me. I began to surrender to the ocean, sand and sun having their way with me! Even as the TV and the World cup rallied for my attention i chose the road less travelled – simply sat in the middle of it and admired the view!

As I sat and allowed myself to BE- something interesting happened: I received the following guidance!!

The 13 Feminine Intelligence Tips
Sleep- and sleep and sleep- its highly under rated- the deep delicious sleep experience
Play- in the ocean, on the sand, in the wind, in your garden, in your work – play
Laugh and giggle and wiggle your toes in delight
Engage in playful, imaginative, goofy and releasing conversations
Lie very still and breathe deeply
Feel the sand between your toes and the warm water lapping at your feet under the stars – look for the moon
Dance and sing Karoke!
Throw away the alarm clock (just the word alarm is too invasive to want to wake up to!)
Eat lots of fresh fruit and drink a lot of water
Listen to the still small voice inside of your own heart
Let go
Let go
Let go

This all sounds so simple right? Its not rocket science and yet it is the deep wisdom of our innate feminine nature which is within no matter if we are male of female- Most of us know what we need- when we listen- the question is are we listening?

So now I am home and I am once again faced with this newsletter, the emails, the connections that I desire to nourish, the work I love to be and do- and I am reminded of the 13 tips for unplugging that come straight from the voice of my vacation. How am i going to practice these everyday? How am i going to practice healthy habits around how plugged in I get?

Whilst I was on vacation I had a very strong image come to me- I saw myself as part of a huge web of vibrating information – all being shared across the world. I saw how we are all plugged in and how amazing this is, how empowering. And I saw that there needed to be a way to monitor and adjust the flow of information, a screening process, a junk mail file, a spam filter if you will! So this is my invitation to myself and to you:

Tips for Unplugging and Setting up a Spam Filter!
(compiled form my own experience and many other sources!)

1. First thing in the morning- before you look at the phone, before you switch on the computer, or the radio or the tv- maintain air silence just for a few minutes- and meditate- stretch, roll around, wiggle your toes, breathe and listen…
2. Choose a time in the morning and a time in the afternoon to answer your emails- if you have to attend to them that regularly. Limt the times that you check for emails.
3. If you work on the phone limit the number of hours you are on calls- if at all possible use a hands free option- even those headsets send us cranky after a while.
4. Limit your intake of news- rather than watching CNN use the Internet to choose the news you are interested in knowing more about and then stop- put it down
5. Choose a time to turn off the computer and walk away- preferably at least two hours before you plan to sleep
6. Limit your Tv watching to less than one hour per day
7. Do not keep your cell phone, your tv, or your computer into he same room that you sleep
8. Do not sit in front of your computer for longer than 1 hour without moving or stretching
9. Put on music, and take a dance break at least twice a day – get your cardio vascular system working and shake out the tension and unplug..
10. At the end of the day – do a version of my unplugging visualization in order to unplug all unneeded and unwanted lines of communication that may still be operating.. This is best done in the bath or a shower-

So here it is the 10 tips to clearing out the electro magnetic clutter that comes from being too plugged in!

I truly hope that you have an amazing month and I look forward to being unplugged with you!
(Elayne Doughty is an Inspirational Woman’s Coach -
her site: http://www.elaynedoughty.com/Inspiring-Women-Coaching.html
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