Get Happy! Pt 2. Engagement & Presence

Hi there and welcome to today's session.

My name is Jennifer and I am the owner of Ignite Health Coaching and Wellness.

I'm based up in the Canadian Rockies but I actually work with people virtually all over the world and I work with people that are physically active but are still experiencing anxiety and depression and I help them to transform and heal their body from the body and mind from the inside out so that they can feel like themselves again.

So I am here to do part two of a five-part series on basically boosting your overall happiness.

So today we're going to be focusing on the second part of a model that's developed by a gentleman named Martin Slakeman and I'm going to be talking about engagement.

Okay so this is the topic for today.

When I think of engagement I think people panic because they think I'm thinking big shiny diamond rings on fingers and no that's not what I'm talking about today.

I'm talking more about presence.

So being engaged in your life,

Being present in your life which is something that the research shows that people that are more engaged and more present in their lives are more happy.

So of course this is one of the pieces of the puzzle so I'm going to dive into that for you today.

So without further ado we will get going on that.

I'm just going to.

.

.

There we go.

So I want to start today with a little quote that I think really speaks to the nature of this whole talk today and that quote is by Nhat Hanh and the quote goes like this,

Wherever we are anytime we have the capacity to enjoy the sunshine,

The presence of each other,

The wonder of our breathing.

We don't have to travel anywhere else to do so.

We can be in touch with these things right now and I love that because I think it speaks so clearly to being engaged in our lives right.

We always have the capacity to enjoy the wonder of our breathing,

That breathing and that breath is always there.

We can always be engaged with our breath.

We can enjoy the sunshine right.

Something simple that we sometimes forget to experience right.

And being present and engaged with each other is something that is so simple but we often just like end up disconnecting and you know scrolling through social media instead of connecting with the people we love and care about that are in the same room as us.

So just something to think about and this is going to be kind of the whole theme of today's session.

I'm going to break this down into two parts today.

First I'm going to talk about presence and being more present and the other piece I'm going to talk about is flow which is another kind of psychological theory that's really kind of like the ultimate form of engagement.

So I'm going to talk about both of those things today.

So let's start with presence.

There is I think I'm going to call it an epidemic of being disengaged and not being present in this moment right now.

And this is really really challenging because when we are disconnected from whatever is happening in our immediate in this immediate time we it basically decreases our happiness right.

I will also say it's not necessarily it's not necessarily I will also say that it's not necessarily realistic to be engaged all the time.

So we want to do our best to be present as much as we possibly can but are we going to be 100 engaged all the time?

No and that's okay.

We do have to think into the future to be able to plan things.

We do need to reflect on the past so that we can grow and develop but as much as we can being present is important.

Okay we do live in a society I think that really emphasizes or tries to pull us out of being present right.

We've got things like our cell phones constantly dinging at us.

We've got email notifications coming through all the time.

In some ways we're more connected than ever but also more disconnected than ever you know things like social media right.

We feel like we're connecting with people by just endlessly scrolling but we're not actually.

It's kind of ironic actually that social media terminology for you know engaging with accounts yeah engaging with accounts is engagement right.

Like that's a social media term that's used how much engagement are you getting.

Just because you're engaging with others on social media doesn't mean that it's a quality connection that it's not that it's one that's going to boost your overall happiness.

So yeah technology definitely takes us out of being present and being in this moment.

So I'd like you to think about just for a second like when do you pull out your cell phone?

When do you use that?

Because oftentimes it's in moments that we're uncomfortable right or that boredom right.

Boredom is uncomfortable.

So we tend to get sucked into our technology at times when we don't want to experience what's happening in our present moment and these moments are so important right.

It's so important to recognize what is making us uncomfortable right now.

What are we avoiding right.

Because if we don't figure these things out then we are not actually fully engaging in our experience.

So it's human nature to seek pleasure and avoid pain right.

So even just the fact that you're listening to this right now you want to boost your happiness right.

So that's a goal and there's nothing wrong with that that's just that is the human condition.

But we use technology to avoid pain and so we numb ourselves or we disconnect with what's happening because it's uncomfortable.

So take notice like I don't know what your experience is.

I mean I know I see a lot of people and personally experience the moment that there's like an empty space and time.

So for example like standing in line at the grocery store or if you know you're at dinner with a friend and your friend goes to the bathroom and now there's this space.

That's when we choose to use technology right to kind of numb ourselves because those experiences we've now learned that they're uncomfortable.

So we don't want to do that as much as possible anyways.

We want to try to connect with our surroundings as much as possible.

So one of the things I'll challenge you to do I mean first of all notice and notice that discomfort that comes up.

I'm like whoa there's empty space I'm going to use my phone.

Sit with that and then get engaged in the moment.

So see how that how that goes for you and of course I would love to hear more about this.

So you know feel free to to send me a message or to leave a comment or whatever with whatever your experience is.

But yeah something to try out.

The other thing that gets us really disconnected and not present is just autopilot.

Running on autopilot I think it's really common and it's not a bad thing all the time right.

So the reason that we have routine the reason that our brain loves routine is because it's efficient right.

If we had to think about every single thing that we did all day every day we would be absolutely exhausted right.

We don't need to you know if we had to think about how we walk the exact muscles that need to contract exactly how you need to move your leg where your foot needs to go we would be exhausted.

We can't do this all the time.

So that's where habits and routine come into place is that your brain is constantly trying to figure out ways for things to be efficient.

The trouble is is that you know there's certain things that should be efficient and should be you know routine movements or routine habits like walking for example.

But there's also a lot of things that we're doing in our lives that we could be engaged in that would actually bring us joy to be engaged in but instead we're actually disconnected and moved through autopilot.

So a few classic examples here so driving right we really disconnect when we're driving you know we're listening to the radio we're listening to a podcast and we're in our heads thinking about our to-do list and before you know it you arrive at the place you've gone and you have no idea what happened.

How many I'm not the only person that does this.

Sometimes you're like oh my god I really hope I didn't run a red light.

You know these types of things happen so do we have to be engaged for 100% of our drive?

No but it would be pretty helpful if we would take some time to actually get engaged in the things that we're doing.

Showering is another one I love this example because there's so much opportunity to be connected while we have a shower but we choose not to and also some somewhere at some point in my life and I still think about this all the time is I read like about getting engaged in the shower but also like who are you allowing into the shower with you and would you allow them in there in real life?

Which is like kind of an uncomfortable thought it's like oh you're thinking about your boss in the shower how much would you appreciate if they were actually standing in the shower with you?

I sure hope not that would be weird right so if you are not going to let them into your shower in real life then why would you let them into the shower mentally?

So instead of doing that you can get engaged in that moment by engaging your senses right?

You can feel what your hair feels like on your hands but also what your hands feel like on your head.

You can smell everything you can feel the water flowing over you you can feel the suds on the bubbles on your body these types of things right there's so many things that you can get engaged while you're while you're standing in the shower.

So being engaged and I think especially being present is not about adding things to your life right it's not about like doing something different it's about just getting connected with the things that you're already doing and instead of doing them on autopilot taking the time to just experience them and that experience in and of itself is shown to boost happiness by a significant level.

So if you don't have time and I hear this all the time from people is oh I don't have time to do these things you have time to be engaged because you are doing things every single day and there's an opportunity there to get out of your head and get into the moment.

So if you learn anything from these sessions try to get engaged right okay so that's really important.

Something I want you to think about in this in this topic of engagement I guess is and just I guess on that note of the things you're already doing what's something that you actually do pretty well every day or maybe every single day that you can actually get all your senses engaged in and when I'm talking about sensory engagement like this is probably the easiest way to do it and to be in the present moment is experiencing your senses right.

Get all five senses engaged as much as you possibly can.

So I would love it even if you had your journal handy or if you've got a notebook or sticky note or anything like write that down what is something that you're doing already every single day that you could be more present you could be more engaged you could get your senses engaged and I gave you some ideas already but see if there's something else that maybe resonates with you and I would love to hear maybe what your thoughts are feel free to throw something into the comments if that's if that's something that resonates with you or if you want to share.

So the other piece I promised I would talk about today is flow and this is one of my favorite things I love flow I think it's just the coolest thing.

What is a flow experience?

So flow experience and I think most people have had this at some point in their life but it's that feeling of like you know when you get so engaged in something that you completely lose track of time and you just like all of a sudden it's like you just like it's almost like you just like emerge from this experience but you were like in the zone right that's a lot of way the way that people a lot of people explain it they were so in the zone.

These experiences are super super critical to experiencing happiness and obviously they have some level of engagement right.

So in order for something to be a flow experience we need to lose track of time is one of the things.

We don't feel self-conscious so we're not thinking about or comparing we're just like doing it right.

And then the other piece of that is that we're totally completely involved or engrossed in the activity.

So these are some like the three conditions that need to be kind of in place in order for us in order for something to be defined as a flow experience but how on earth do we actually get there right.

So there's kind of three three things to think about.

Having goals and feedback is really important.

So when you think about a flow experience maybe that you've had in the past or an in the zone experience there was probably some sort of a goal something you were trying to achieve there's probably steps along the way that you completed so that's feedback right in order to get to this goal.

So like sports for example are really commonplace that people get flow experiences because they're trying to you know say win the game or I don't know get the ball in the basket or as a good Canadian get the puck in the net right.

So there's a set of things that you have to do to be able to accomplish that task and as you do them it's almost like a mental checkbox so you're getting feedback and then if it doesn't work then you that's also feedback and then you're able to tweak right.

So having this constant feedback is really important and that's why sports are such a such a great place for people to experience flow that's not the only place so fear not if you're not an athletic person that's totally fine there's other things that you can do but it's really thinking about how you can set a goal and get feedback along the way.

I personally sometimes also so for somebody if you're watching this you're not active I love scrapbooking and being creative and I get flow experiences through that so you know I have a product I'm trying to create for example a card or a scrapbook page whatever that looks like I've got an end goal and I get lost in the creative process right so that's another time you can experience it.

There the other thing that's really important here is balancing skill and challenge so you want to be just like on the brink of that pushing that comfort zone just a little bit right you if you push too far then and the task is too challenging for the amount of skill you have you're going to have to be way too focused on like on like you have to think too much about the steps right you have to you're going to be self-conscious because you're going to be too engaged and thinking about like the the actual movements or whatever you're not just like experiencing it there's nothing wrong with that but it's just that that's not going to put you in a flow experience.

The opposite of that is that if you have too much skill and not enough challenge then you're bored right so you're not going to have a flow experience when you're feeling bored because boredom is boring right so you're not engaged at that point and you're you're looking for a way out when you're feeling bored.

So making sure that you're able to as your skill level increases that you increase your challenge and that you are able to put yourself in places that do challenge you.

The other piece here is that you need full presence and I know I just talked about presence but presence and focus right no distractions so when you are doing whatever this task is that you are trying to get a flow experience in or that you maybe have experienced flow in it's because you weren't distracted by anything you didn't have your cell phone dinging off at you in the background every two seconds you didn't have people bothering you so if you're really keen on having flow experiences having a distraction-free environment is super super important and I know a lot of people panic when they hear this because they're like oh my gosh like I have kids at home or I've got roommates or I've got all these things that distract me I need to be connected to my phone for work whatever that looks like.

I guarantee that you can find a little bit of time to have that distraction for you does that have to be every day no I mean awesome fantastic it could be but like even if it's once a month like fit for 15 minutes I think most people can find that kind of a space where they can be distraction-free and able to fully engage in something so see what you can do with that.

A couple things to note about flow I mean obviously it's a really incredible experience it's really important for happiness but when we're like striving to be in flow all the time it's not going to work right because that's not the goal.

The goal needs to be doing the task right so we can't expect that we're going to live in a flow experience all the time these are really micro moments actually like there's like sometimes even seconds to minutes and that you're going to stay in a flow experience.

Some people have longer right some people get really big flow experiences and that's that's fantastic but the expectation doesn't need to be that high you can benefit from having these short experiences and you don't and then also just not getting stressed about seeking them and not getting stressed if you don't experience it so when you're not if you are doing an activity and you don't get into a flow state that's okay you're probably present right so presence is important and flow is just another level of that so just something to think about for yourself is that it's totally okay if you don't get fully into a flow state.

So just a couple things to think about ways that you can get engaged in your life one other suggestion I have I talked about most of these already so obviously I'm just to summarize I guess engaging in your routine tasks right not functioning on autopilot finding those things that you do most days or every single day that you can just get your senses engaged tune into your breath right like these just these things getting more engaged savoring those really small moments so this is taking a chance to like fully immerse yourself in things like your morning cup of coffee right you know eating eating I love food and drinks are just a really good way to do this but like becoming more engaged in your meals and really tasting them and feeling them and these types of smelling them right really good sensory experiences and slowing down in nature so something that I mean most people value getting out nature to some extent whether that's just like a walk in the park or exercising outside or whatever that looks like for you but instead of just like walking being the task you can also just really try to get in touch with your surroundings so something that I do here with myself is I play a little bit of a game and I try to find all of the colors of the rainbow in order while I'm moving through my environment so and no cheating you can't find say yellow before you find red just because you see something yellow you have to find them in order so this gets me really looking visually into my environment and I typically notice things I would never seen before it's especially fun in the winter because it feels like everything is white but you would not believe how much color there actually is in the winter and just like realizing that makes me so much happier so something to think about slow down when you're in nature and then last but not least and like I said this is just kind of a topic review here but disconnect from your technology create space for yourself to shut off notifications shut the thing right off if you can and turn off the tv and just like don't disconnect completely disconnect that could be five minutes a day that could be you know one afternoon a week or a month whatever that looks like whatever you can fit is going to be better than nothing because getting engaged in your life in general not being distracted not functioning on autopilot those are the things that actually make you happy so doing these things consistently being engaged this is super key so thank you so much for being here today if you have any questions or anything feel free to shoot something into the comments and I can get back to you there you can always head over to my Instagram somewhere that if you want to message me or talk a little bit more you're welcome to go over there my handle is at ignite health coaching and I love to hear from people so get in touch and I hope that this really helps you in getting boosting your happy boosting your happiness and getting more engaged in your life so thank you so much for being here and take care