I wish I could say that mindfulness has been apart of my life forever, but unfortunately I’d be fibbing if I wrote that. I started practicing mindfulness about 2 years ago after I had been through a tough family situation and also just as I had gone off the pill and I was trying to naturally balance out my hormones.

I used to be the type of person who would generally keep quite a lot of stuff bottled up inside of me because I wouldn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, or cause a problem that other people may consider as ‘silly’. I also just simply struggled to voice my feelings in general. As well as keeping stuff to myself, and causing my body to become internally stressed, I also decided to come off the contraception pill because I had been doing a lot of reading and just decided that the artificial hormones it was putting in to my body was something that no longer sat well with me. Once i came off the pill I got my hormones tested and the results showed that my hormones, especially my oestrogen and progesterone, were completely out of balance. It was here that my love with health, the body and living a wholesome way of life was reborn and taken to a whole new level.
If only I knew then what I know now.

It was at this time that I became addicted to researching and reading about how to naturally balance a woman’s hormones after coming off the contraceptive pill, and the words ‘mindfulness and meditation’ came up in almost every article and study I read.

I had heard a lot about mindfulness and meditation in the past and had occasionally dipped my toes in to meditation purely because my mum told me it would be good for me, but I had never committed myself to test it out and embed it into my daily routine. Looking back I can see that I never gave it a proper shot because I was not ready in myself and I think I was in denial that I even ‘needed’ to meditate. Fast-forward 2 years to now, and I believe that mindfulness is beneficial for absolutely everyone!

So what is mindfulness?

‘Mindfulness is basically the psychological process of bringing your attention to experiences occurring in the present moment’.

Initially, I thought that the only way to practice mindfulness was to meditate, and to do it for a verrryyyy long time everyday. Oh, how wrong I was.

Mindfulness comes in many forms, and it varies for every single person. For me personally, I like to rotate the type of mindfulness I participate in, but I do include it in my daily routine, every single day! In fact, I honestly cannot remember the last day that I went without my mindfulness time. It has become the best and most special time of my day.

I now see mindfulness as my ‘me’ time and my daily ‘self-care’ time. Spending a little time each day doing something just for MYSELF has really helped reduce my internal stress, eased my digestive issues, slowly balanced my hormones out and even made me feel more present in my everyday life.

For my daily mindfulness time I like to engage in some form of practice to ease my brain and tune out from the world temporarily. After much trial and error I have finally found a rhythm that works for me. Sometimes all I do is a 2-minute deep belly breathing exercise and on other days I will do a 30-minute walk or meditation lying on my back with my feet up against a wall.

Although I include mindfulness in to my every day routine, I do not schedule it at a certain time in my diary as such. Every morning before I get out of bed I take 5 deep belly breaths to start my day, then I am up and at em’. I also do a 5 minute breathing meditation exercise at around 12pm everyday (I am a Primary School Teacher so I do this with my students as well, they absolutely love it) to help refocus in middle of the day.. it is so beautiful to take a few moments of stillness amongst all the busyness that work brings us. Then in the evenings, once I am home from work, I will then engage in my ‘self-care’ time, whatever that may look like on the day. I like to do mine in the afternoons because I feel like it helps me unwind from the day so nicely and then allows me to feel more present with my partner and family members for the night ahead.

Some of the forms of mindfulness I regularly engage in are:

• Walking in nature
• Meditation
• Laying on the floor with my legs up against a wall
• Getting a massage
• Laying on my Shakti mat
• Reading a book
• Listening to a podcast
• Colouring in
• Sitting down with a cup of tea in the sunshine
• Deep belly breathing or alternate nostril breathing

Spending as little as 5-10 minutes each day doing one of these activities or something else that tickles your fancy will have you feeling the benefits of mindfulness in no time!

Play around with self-care and find a time of day that suits you and an activity (or a few to have on rotation) that help you to switch off from the world. To feel the full benefits of mindfulness and self-care, give yourself a 2 week challenge to set aside 10 minutes (minimum, can do more if your feeling it) each day to do something just for YOU, and I can promise that your mind will feel clearer, you will be able to manage stress in a much calmer way and you will feel so much more present and alive in this beautiful life.

Please keep me updated on your mindfulness journey, whether you are just starting out or have been practicing it for a while now, I would love to connect and hear about your experiences!

Ashlee xx