Exploring resilience with Joni Peddie. Joni Peddie, MD of Resilient People, is a behavioral strategist who has a deep passion for health and wellbeing.
In this episode, she talks about the connection between our physical bodies, sleep, and our resilience to the challenges of life.
01:20 Exploring Resilience
“It’s all very well that you look at your emotional, cognitive and even your spiritual side. But if you don’t have the base of your personal performance pyramid, you’re not going to be resilient.”
“A large part of resilience is investing in our physical ability to cope. And then that translates to affecting our emotional ability.”
Three-pronged approach to resilience
- Fuel your body correctly
- Activate your body correctly
- Behave correctly
04:17 Describing Resilience
Three parts to resilience:
- You need to be prepared for change.
- You need to bounce back from challenges
- You need to bounce forward with agility.
05:56 Bouncing Forward with Agility
“Don’t be so challenged in a situation that you can’t look to the opportunity.” “If something happens and we are stuck in survival, we can’t begin to access the skills of critical thinking and creativity.”
07:55 New Year’s Resolutions – Making sustainable changes
Why do we have great intentions at the beginning of the year – New Year’s Resolutions – but we just drop those by March?
“It is because we don’t think realistically in terms of your resilience and physical wellbeing. You need to answer the following questions:
- Are you time-poor?
- Are you stress-rich?
- Are you decision-fatigue? ”
Be mindful of your food/fuel –
- Understand what your body lacks and doesn’t lack.
- “We banned DIET because it’s the word die with a T on the end.”
Activate your body every single day
- Have macro-bursts of activity.
- It’s better to do smaller bite-sized chunks of exercise every day than to go to the gym twice or three times a week.
“Think about how we move our bodies daily. It affects serotonin and dopamine to the brain, but it also affects your general resilience, your ability to cope, and your ability to be consistent.”
Sitting is the new smoking. “We sit for far too long.” While at your desk, set your phone to go off every hour on the hour as a reminder to get up and exercise. Use the stairs. Learn Ageless Grace.
That way, “you are developing more BDNF (brain derived neurotrophic factor). It’s miracle growth. When you sit down again to solve that problem or design that spreadsheet, your brain is going to be firing on all cylinders.”
“We also know that the hippocampus – the learning centre of your brain – gets bigger when you exercise more often.”
18:53 Sleep impacts your emotional and physical health
Sleep well, live fully awake.
A good night’s sleep boosts:
- your patience,
- your empathy,
- ability to pivot and be more agile.
23:06 Looking at a screen two hours before bed affect our sleep state?
“If we sit in front of a screen – most screens – for two hours before bed time, our brain is not able to as easily slip into the more important sleep states.
Go Red for 60 to 90 minutes before you go to sleep.
Blue wave light goes into our eye and affects our pineal gland – the gland responsible for producing melatonin which gets you into a deep slow-wave sleep that helps the brain detoxify.
Red-tinted glasses block the blue wave light going into your eye.
“When you understand your circadian rhythm, you make sure that you’re getting minimum 7 hours sleep a night. And you make sure that you either have your devices and lights off, or you wear red-tinted glasses. You’ll find that you’ll have the most beautiful quality sleep.”
“In the sleep world of research, quality trumps quantity.”
27:50 How parents can help prevent burnout and anxiety in young people
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Role modelling
“Lay the foundation for the physical activity – getting the right sleep, movement and correct nutrition.”
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Name it to tame it – Use emotion words to label sensations
“Help young people learn about their emotional health, emotional awareness so they are able to recognize and speak about how they are feeling.”
“Improve the vocabulary of your children, and you will also help them change their world.” “The minute you label your emotions, you tame them.”
32:08 The Trick to Calming Down – the six seconds PAUSE
“The time it takes for your prefrontal cortex to simmer down after you’ve gotten really heated and cross is six seconds.”
When you are frustrated and angry, “say your mobile number backwards.”
33:50 Using Distraction as a Positive Force
“We don’t use distraction enough as a positive force for good in our lives.” Use distractions e.g. reading a good novel to give yourself breathing room, to give your body the ability to come back online.
35:55 Build Quality Connecting Time
“Really building quality connecting time with people we care about make us more able to have the muscle to be resilient when we need it.
“In order to have good connecting time with my hubby, we have signed a little contract where when we open our bedroom door at night, there’s no discussing whatever the daily problems are. When we go into the bedroom, It’s real connecting time. It’s only good discussions.”
Download this episode by right clicking
LINKS
- Read The F+A+B Quotientby Joni Peddie
- Visit Joni Peddie’s websitefor her eBook, blog and free resources on building resilience.
- Ageless Grace Exercise
- Learn more about EQ from Six Seconds.
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- Download the Change Model
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