We often find ourselves running around with our busy lives and without knowing our day is ending. We feel exhausted and we lie down in the couch hoping to get some relaxation before falling sleep. This seems to be repeated time and time again with some variations on the weekend and holidays. That is depending on your circumstances because you may have to work on the weekend or look after a large family or clean the entire house because it is the only time you have at home.

The struggle of ‘slowing down’ gets to each of us in one way or another and the desire to achieve some kind of relaxation and quiet time, increases every day. Sometimes, we appear to have given up and resign ourselves that this is only going to happen when we retire. Well, I am convinced that we can all work on making some changes to allow some time to slow down right now.

Firstly, I would like to clarify that the idea of ‘slowing down’ does not mean stop working or having a holidays. I rather like to think that ‘slowing down’ can be something that everyone can incorporate to their routine just by making small changes. Here are some ideas to inspire you but I am sure you will be able to make a list on your own:

• Give it a go to use walking rather than a car at least one day a week for a small distance activity such as: picking up the kids from school; buying some groceries at the local supermarket; etc. If you are very far away from some of these places you can always park your car a few blocks away and walk to the place. 
  
  
• Make your own pizza dough without using the bread machine. You can google lots of recipes and pick one each week and add your own touch to it. This could be a fun activity and children could participate decorating the pizza with different toppings. 
  
  
• Get the family or friends together to play board games. You can get different family members to bring one board game each time and try all the different ones while having a great time together. Board games can go for hours and everyone will have time to talk and share while being entertain. Most board games can include up to 8 people.
  
  
• Go for a walk and take your camera/phone to take photos of the things you see. Most people won’t take photos of the park around the corner but if they were on holidays they probably would. The idea of doing this is to walk and observe, to stop and look and to enjoy what are you seeing and experiencing.
  
  
• Buy seeds from the local nursery and grow some plants for your garden. Watching plants grow is a very enjoyable experiencing and could be a great way to get the whole family involve. Children often like to take care of plans and name them. 
  
  
• Write a letter by hand. This may sound strange but most of us hardly do any handwriting at all. Writing a letter to somebody and sending it by post can be a bit of a surprise especially if we normally send an email for their birthdays or just a card with no letter. You may want to try to write letters to people who are close to you to let them know how much your love them and appreciate them. 
  
  

The most important of all is that when you are slowing down you are able to become aware of what are you doing and learn to enjoy it. So, we don’t need to take a holidays to slow down we can do it all year around in our homes, work and neighbourhood.
 
I would like to recommend a beautiful book that inspired me to write this blog: “The Little Book of Slow” by Sally Wise and Paul McIntyre.
The little book of slow

​Claudina Garcia
Psychologist- Director
Psychologists’ Corner

These days the need to stay connected is bigger than ever and the use of technology to facilitate this is a great asset. It seems like we are around the corner to our friend in Spain and we can share everything with a relative in Canada thanks to Facebook, emails and online chats and even more exciting we don’t even need to be sitting in our computers if we just have a smart phone in our hands.
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The reality is that sometimes we may forget where we are or who is around because we seemed to be lost in conversations with the world and people close to us may notice the distance even if they are just in front of us. Many marriages these days are facing the reality of having too many people in the room even when they are in a room by themselves. In a recent article by The Age http://www.theage.com.au/comment/put-down-that-phone-and-save-your-marriage-20161219-gte6j8.html the term “ phubbing” is being used as a fusion of “phone” and “snubbing” to describe how often your romantic partner is distracted by his/her smartphone.

As a recipient of this behaviour it could be quite upsetting to feel that checking the phone appears to be more interesting for your partner than having a conversation or doing something with you. Some people feel like they are competing with the partner’s phone for attention and it is not unusual for the couple to end up in an argument that started with this topic.

Unfortunately, we are not about to through our phones away any time soon so we may have to come up with some “rules” around how to use our phones better and how to place boundaries around its usage. You will need to create your own rules and having a conversation with your partner and agreed to a set of acceptable and non-acceptable ways to use the phone can be a fun exercise to do together.

Here are some ideas to start the conversation:

• Smart-phone down from 7 pm to 6 am
• Emails / messages checking five times per day and you may set those times (e.g. 8am; 10.00am; 1pm; 4pm and 6pm)
• Facebook time from 6 to 7pm
• Weekends happy free morning ( e.g. no phones from 8am to 2pm)
• Smart-phone away when having a conversation with partner
• Smart-phone away when having meals.
  
  

Staying connected is important for all of us and sending a quick message is a great way to do so when we are at work or away from home, but remember that it is important to show our love ones our affection when they are in the same room as you are. Marriages and any relationships needs nurturing and care and spending quality time together listening and communicating with each other is the best way to stay connected.

Claudina Garcia
Psychologist-Director
Psychologists’ Corner