The Gita Brown Show

#5 - The Gita Brown Show: Increase Your Happiness with One Simple Step

Check in with yourself for a moment. Are you experiencing happiness every single day?

Life can be hard; and in tough moments it can be really hard to remember that you deserve happiness. A lot of our lack of happiness comes from being disconnected from our selves, our souls, and each other. 

 

By connecting with ourselves and one another, we take a powerful step towards being more happy.

 

Our guest, Dr. Kallie Snyder, has a transformative story to share about how she used anxiety and isolation as a catalyst to improve her wellbeing. You’ll hear about her struggles with generalized anxiety disorder and get her best tips for creating a lifestyle that supports wellness. She’s a flutist, clinician, adjudicator, and music educator in Lexington, Kentucky. She has a doctorate in flute performance and specialized studies in world music from Florida State University. 

 

If that wasn't enough, she's also the founder of The Sound Musician, an online community for musicians to feel whole in mind, body, and spirit. Kallie says, “by sharing my struggles and challenges of being a classical musician and learning how to feel whole in the process, that my fellow musicians and non musicians, might feel a little less alone in their challenges. And that together we can form a community where we can feel seen, heard, and supported.”

 

 

Here’s Kallie’s top takeaways for boosting happiness, especially if you are facing stress or mental health challenges:

 

1. Make an appointment with a counselor or a therapist. It can be scary at first, but it makes a huge difference. Just talking to someone that doesn't know you, that has that kind of impartial perspective,  they can see at things more objectively.

 

2.  Make an appointment with your primary care doctor. Many issues can effect mood, including thyroid issues, sleeping disorders, blood pressure fluctuations. Take a holistic approach and help your body be in tip-top shape!

 

3. Create a morning routine. This helps you tune in and be more centered throughout your day. Experiment with different routines and see what might be of service to help you create space for yourself in the morning. It can be simple things that nourish you like: journaling, meditation, prayer, a walk outside, a quiet cup of tea. 

Kallie recommends the work of these guys:

Rachell Hollis-and her "Start Today Journal" 

Hal Elrod's book "The Miracle Morning: The Not-So-Obvious Secret Guaranteed to Transform Your Life (Before 8AM)" is a good read and is a great starting place.

 

4. Create Community: Talk to people that you trust and you love about what's going on with you. Share it with people that are safe to share it with. It's that connection that will help you to transform whatever you're going through. We all need each other, let’s remember that we’re in this together! 

 

Let’s increase our happiness and create community! Reach out to someone today and share your heart, the world needs you!

 

Om Shanthi, Peace to you,

Gita

 

 

 

Episode #5 – Increase Your Happiness with One Simple Step

00:12 – Introduction
01:28 – Taking a step to feeling even happier
03:52 – Introduction to guest Dr. Kallie Snyder
04:55 – Kallie shares her stories and struggles as a musician to support and help fellow musicians and non-musicians
06:00 – Kallie’s story about performance anxiety and when she knew she had to deal with it
09:17 – Kallie talks about feeling trapped and unwell before teaching and an orchestra performance
12:25 – Pressure as a professional musician to not show weakness
18:40 – Felt trapped which was part of leading to anxiety
19:55 – Disconnected from ourselves and each other and we think vulnerability makes us weak (it’s the flip)
26:14 – Kallie started to seek counseling and was consistently reaching out to people and always making the next step
29:30 – Hardest thing about anxiety was finding what works for you
31:30 – Create a morning routine
35:10 – Much of the root of anxiety is being disconnected from yourself
37:25 – Vulnerability is what connected us to our audience
40:20 – Find your community to share your story and be vulnerable – that helps other people share their stories
41:45 – Chant for peace

#4 - The Gita Brown Show: Secret Weapon to Beat Anxiety

Do you or someone you love have anxiety? You are not alone. Did you know that 40 million adults in the United States are living with anxiety disorders? Let’s break our silence about how anxiety affects our lives. And as we come together you’ll learn how to use a simple technique to shift your anxiety and improve your life. 

You can be free from anxiety; peace is as close as your next breath.

Our guest, Sarah Gilbert, has bravely shared her personal story with anxiety. You’ll follow along through her early days as a frightened and overwhelmed mom to a newborn with special needs, to her social isolation and health problems, and to how she decided to break her silence and share her story. She’s a special needs advocate, Yoga for the Special Child and Yoga Spirit practitioner, mom to two caring and creative children, and friend to everyone she meets. Listen in on her journey and get inspired as she shares how a simple technique, a deep breath, is her back pocket tool for beating anxiety. 

Here’s your simple tip to begin to shift your anxiety using a deep breath:

Sit comfortably with your feet flat on the floor.
Make sure your body is aligned and well balanced. Find a position where you feel like your skeleton can do the work of holding you up so that your muscles can relax just a little bit.
Inhale deeply and allow your torso to expand with the breath. Think that you are filling up from the inside out, like a balloon. Breath through your nose. If you are congested, no worries, breath through your mouth. This is your breath; make it comfortable for you.
Exhale fully. Feel your torso relax and ‘deflate’ like a balloon.
Repeat. On the inhale, imagine you are filling your body with peace, health, joy, or any other word that speaks to your heart.
On the exhale, imagine stress, tension leaving your body.
Continue, with each inhale fill the body with positive messages.
Repeat at least three times.

Remember that you can use this tool anywhere, anytime you need it. The more you practice, the better you’ll feel. Your neurological response to anxiety will change, one deep breath at a time.

 

Om shanthi, peace to you,
Gita

Episode #4 – Secret Weapon to Beat Anxiety

00:12 – Introduction

01:00 – 40 million adults afflicted with an anxiety disorder

01:30 – Breaking the silence about anxiety

03:19 – Introduction to Sarah Gilbert

06:00 – What was it like when anxiety turned to something you couldn’t ignore?

07:05 – Needed to figure out how to take care of herself

07:55 – What it feels like to be in a body that is experiencing anxiety

10:50 – How were things socially dealing with anxiety?

14:15 – Sarah was open to many ways of dealing with anxiety

16:01 – What Sarah discovered practicing Yoga

17:20 – Change from Inside out

20:04 – Guided breathing exercise

23:23 – Chant for Peace

#3 - The Gita Brown Show: Tired and Exhausted? Go Ahead and Be Lazy.

Episode #3 – Constantly Tired and Exhausted?  Go Ahead And Be Lazy.

 Take a moment to check in with yourself. Do you have all the energy you need to enjoy life? Do you crash on your days off from work? Or do you worry that if you try to level-up your life that you won’t have the energy you need to sustain your growth? 

If this resonates with you it may be a sign that you are ready to master a critical skill: intentional rest. 

Most of us think of resting as the time we spend sleeping or chilling on the couch binge-watching Netflix. But what if you had a way to rest that filled up your energy more quickly? How much more could you enjoy life if you built a short practice that helped you feel refreshed? This is where intentional rest can be your new fav thing! 

In this episode you’ll learn two ways to practice the art of intentional rest: 

1. Take an energy gathering walk. Spending time in nature is a great way to bring balance to our bodies and also nourish our spirt. This walk is the opposite of a power walk. Your goal is to walk slowly, activate your senses, connect with the sights and sounds, and take time to notice your surroundings. It’s like filling up your battery with a charge from nature! 

It’s pretty easy: go outside. Walk slowly. Gather sunlight, fresh air, and beauty. Allow this to nourish every cell of your being!

2.  Practice deep relaxation or yoga nidra. This is a simple practice you can do daily to help train yourself into relaxation. Sometimes you may feel like you want a little bit of guidance to relax. It can be really freeing to find a comfy spot to lay down and listen to a recording and let it guide you to a deeper state of relaxation. You’ll also be training yourself in the art of active rest, so that you have this skill for yourself to use while falling asleep or taking a quick nap. 

Here’s a few links to get you started:

 

This is a full thirty minute recording-my students love this one! 

A shorter ten-minute version for when you need a bit o’ rest!

 A super-awesome resource is Yoga Nidra Network. They are doing great work and have lots of free tracks! Check them out at yoganidranetwork.org

There are other deep relaxations on YouTube and also on the iTunes store. It’s all about finding a voice and style that works for you!

Let’s start a revolution and get rested!

Om shanthi, peace to you,

Gita

 

 

 

00:12 – Introduction

01:32 – Checking in with yourself – do you have all the energy you need?  Are you overwhelmed?

02:20 – Intentional Rest

04:17 – Quality of your time producing the output is the important thing

07:10 – We are tired because we are disconnected from the natural world

14:26 – Power down, don’t numb out

16:30 – What more could you accomplish if you learned to power down

18:22 – Power Down – Take an energy gathering walk

21:00 – Power Down – Deep relaxation, Yoga Nidra, listening to music for meditation

23:25 – Schedule some time to be lazy

25:00 – Chant for Peace

#2 - The Gita Brown Show: Too Busy to Workout? Time Management for Real Life.

Episode #2 – Too Busy for Wellness?  Time Management for Real life.

Do you ever feel too busy to make time for your health and wellness? You may have a planner, schedule, and a million appointments. You’ve organized your life around boxes of time, delegating tasks, and trying to “do it all.” But what would happen if you took a step back and looked at time management from a different perspective? How much better would you feel if you made simple shifts in your thinking and planning that prioritize wellness?

Think you’re too busy, or that wellness is something for other people to enjoy? This awesome lady, Jessica, proves that wellness is accessible for everyone.  

Check out what she’s got going on; she is a single mom to five kids; is in nursing school; she teaches yoga to adults and to children with special needs; she also runs Heartbeat for Downs, an organization that delivers care packages to families of children with Down syndrome who are in the hospital. Her eldest daughter, beautiful brown-haired Jaylin, has Down syndrome. Jessica manages all of this with joy, grace, and lots of heart-laughter. Here’s what she says about the small steps she recommends for a “too busy” person to make real-life choices for wellness. 

 

Simple tips to upgrade your wellness without busting a hole in your time management:

1. Keep it simple! Start with one deep breath. Step outside for a moment, take one deep breath, then return to your life. Boom, done.

 

2. Keep it short. Start with a simple daily practice like laying down on a yoga mat or making yourself comfy in a chair. Put on a piece of relaxing music and for five minutes give yourself permission to just listen and enjoy the music. If your mind wanders, just bring it back to listening to the relaxing music.  You’ll come back into your day refreshed and better able to handle stress and challenges. Mat + Music=ahhhhh

 

3. Practice positive thoughts. Remember that you are already enough! Give yourself practices to do that help you remember this; oh, like, maybe #1 and #2 from above! Or take a deep breath in and on the exhale think or say, “I am enough.” Repeat this just five times and let the positive message absorb. Reset your neural pathways with positive messages of health and wellness. The underlying messages that sit in your subconscious mind are the messages that dictate how you will respond to stress. Make your mind your best friend!

 

You’re never going to eliminate stress, but you absolutely can control your baseline level of relaxation and your response to stressful situations. You now have three easy things you can do right away, get practicing! 

 

 

 

 

 

00:12 – Introduction
01:37 – Introduction to guest Jessica Melville – Licensed Practictioner in Yoga for the Special Child
06:14 – How Jessica Started with Yoga
07:46 – Yoga helping to undo the conditioning of “why we can’t…”
09:11 – Things that Jessica noticed after making small shifts
13:30 – Small ways to start off with Yoga
17:25 – Letting go of expectations when starting a more formal yoga practice
22:24 – What would you say to someone who thinks they can’t do yoga or it’s not for them?
25:33 – Chant for Peace

#1 - The Gita Brown Show: How To Be Happy

Most of us want to feel happy. But we hold onto limiting beliefs that tell us happiness is for other people . Or we think we need more money, more friends, a better love life, or other external things in order to be happy. There is always the “next thing” to crave! 

What would happen if we broke this pattern and found a new way to live where we experienced more happiness? I’m not talking about the kind of airy-fairy happiness that denies the dark times we all go through, nor am I asking you to pretend your troubles don’t exist. To truly practice happiness means to practice equanimity; to acknowledge both the dark and light and to live skillfully and happily regardless of the ups and downs of everyday life. 

 But how do we feel happy when life is hard? How can we make happiness a practice? What if you practiced going within and connecting to your soul? Think how differently you would feel if you had daily and simple practices to do that connected you to your soul and innate good nature. 

 A couple of ways you can practice exercising your happiness muscle:

• Many of the great traditions say the same thing about the recipe for experiencing more happiness. It’s simple. Go within and practice gratitude. Daily gratitude practice reorients your mindset. Instead of chasing happiness outside of yourself, you learn to slow down and notice how many things you have working in your favor.
   
• The great traditions also point to serving other people. Think how good it feels when you help a friend out with a ride or a sympathetic ear. When you serve other people you create a little energy loop where they get helped out, and you get a buzz from seeing a smiling and grateful face. It doesn’t have to be fancy: let someone in during a traffic jam, hold a door open, or drop a friend a “You are Awesome” text. By serving others we connect with the best parts of ourselves and pull ourselves out of negative and limited thinking. 

 

03:20 – Being happy is fundamental to being human
06:00 – Don’t run after temporary happiness
12:12 – Remember who you really are
18:24 – Practice gratitude
20:30 – Serve other people