Let's Play - musings from OT Colleen

A common theme that seems to be presenting itself within myself and many people that I meet and connect with during this lock down is sense of disconnect, a numbness, a feeling of been stuck.  A disconnect from the world around us, our loved ones, our minds, our bodies. 

So why, what’s going on, why the disconnect?

Research tells us this is a common trauma response, our mind can not process and cope with the current environment, stress, and fear so we curl up, we put a TV series on for hours, we scroll Instagram (for an amount of time I wish not to disclose), we have the extra glass on wine anything to distract and shut off our minds. Our nervous system freezes. 

It’s natural, it’s our mind doing what it thinks is best to protect us. 

But at what cost? 

-        Conflict in relationships 

-        Numbness 

-        Fatigue 

-        Waste of energy & time on non-meaningful tasks and people 

-        Stagnation 

-        Depression 

We could beat our self-up about this all day but remember this is just our brain doing what it is naturally wired to do to protect us, our brain didn’t come with a pandemic manual after all. 

And well neither did I however I do have an offering that I’ve found to be extremely useful throughout lock down in re connecting to my body, my emotions, my thoughts along with my loved ones.

Playing through creative movement 

“It's about becoming safe to feel what you feel. When you're traumatized, you're afraid of what you're feeling, because your feeling is always terror, or fear or helplessness.”

— Bessel Van Der Kolk, trauma expert and author of ‘the body keeps the score’

A quote that can be easily applied to our current experience within this pandemic. 

So lets get curious, lets play, lets move our bodies lets reconnect.

Some attempts I’ve taken to reconnect,  

-        Placing a yoga mat beside my computer

-        Handstands, Head stands

-        Slack lining 

-        Long boarding 

-        Throwing a ball at the beach with housemates 

-        Juggling 

-        Running

-        Belly dancing class (haven’t tried this one yet! Coming up next week) 

If you read this list and it brings nothing but anxiety and fear – I would have had the exact same reaction a week ago! I had never been on a long board until 3 days ago, I had never juggled until about 3 hours ago. 

But I tried, I was curious, I got frustrated at my failures, I found joy in my achievements but the biggest take away was that I began to reconnect to myself and my environment. I noticed the tightening in my chest when I took my first step on the long board, I noticed the feeling of anxiety, I noticed the vibration in my arm and legs when slack lining, I noticed the feeling of joy when I made it across. I noticed the cherry blossom beginning to blossom in my backyard when I was practicing handstands. I reconnected to myself, my environment, and my loves ones. 

My activities yes are on the extreme side, so take what you like leave what you don’t and add whatever you feel called to. 

Lets move and reconnect – email us your ideas we’d move to hear! 

With Gratitude, 

Colleen 😊

mental health, mindfulness, allied health, psychology, occupational therapy, trauma, spiritualityLaura Kaganmental illness, mental health, mindfulness, movement, mental wellbeing, trauma, occupational therapy, occupational therapist, connection, pandemic recovery, joy