Mindfulness and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome are maybe not subjects you would expect to see together. However, today I want to show you how mindfulness meditation can be a tool that you use anywhere, at any time, to get you through a day with Chronic Fatigue.
Mindfulness is all about practice, you can’t try mindfulness once and expect to get results. I wish I had a quick fix for you but unfortunately, they just don’t exist.
I’d love for you to implement the tool I’m going to give you today as a habit in your day. You will find that as your mindfulness improves, you get better at it and you will find it easier. You will go on your own journey, but mindfulness will help reduce your severe fatigue.
With mindfulness you are going to notice your chronic fatigue symptoms change
During your journey to learn mindfulness, you are going to notice several improvements in yourself. Your self-compassion is going to change for the better, your quality of life will be positively impacted and your relationships with others will improve. You may even see these improvements in your workplace. Because when we’re working, we’re fatigued, we’re grumpy, we can be difficult and sometimes with the best will in the world, we can feel sluggish and can struggle. So you are going to find that both relationships inside and outside of work will improve.
As you go on your mindfulness for chronic fatigue journey, you will find the fluidity of your mindfulness will develop, it will become easier, and it’s just a case of sticking with it. With mindfulness, you are going to quieten your mind.
Imagine your thoughts, they’re like bubbles, millions of thoughts every day. Then they go, the bubble pops, the next one comes in, it pops, again and again.
Those negative feelings and thoughts that you’re having, do not own you. They are coming from feeling so chronically fatigued, they are taking over you, we’re going to change that.
What you’re going to do is refocus, from those bubbles, to your breath. You’ll become profoundly aware that your thoughts don’t own you.
How long do I need to do Mindfulness for Chronic Fatigue for?
Just 10 minutes of mindfulness meditation a day, is going to really impact your energy levels and improve your brain function.
If you start by doing 10 minutes a day you can increase the time as it becomes more comfortable. The longer you spend the more benefit you could see.
Mindfulness works to modify and reduced stress because that’s what can lead to exhaustion. The chronic fatigue that you’re feeling is often caused by your body being stressed with pain. With pain giving you negative thoughts, which you may then be anxious about, you can become depressed.
Your pain and negative thoughts turn into a vicious cycle, mindfulness can get you out of that cycle, and back to where you want to be.
Mark Williams, who you can watch on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQfKpPpOxBM says that ‘scientific research has proven that mindfulness not only prevents depression, but it also positively affects the brain patterns underlying day to day, fatigue, anxiety, stress, depression, irritability, all when they arise, and they’ll dissolve more easily.’
How great is that? You don’t need a pill for it. You just need to breathe, we’re doing it anyway, so let’s make the most of it.
Mindfulness improves Energy Levels and Memory
Not only are you going to find that your energy levels are going to increase, but you’re also going to find that your memory improves. This is because you’re oxygenating your brain, fuelling your body with oxygen, in that very moment you are pushing away all your stress and pain.
Imagine if you could take your hand and just push your stress cloud and your tiredness away from you. How great would that be?
Will this help my Chronic Pain and Fibromyalgia?
You will find that your chronic pain improves and you’ll hopefully find that if you are medicated you become less dependent. This is because you’re going to have the holistic tools to be able to overcome these nerve sensations, these neural pathways. You’re going to tell your brain that you don’t need that medication, you’ve got everything you need.
You are going to go through times where you’re going to feel like you’re not able to meditate. And that’s okay. Because even if you’re feeling that you’re learning, if you do it for a couple of minutes, and a million thoughts come into your mind, it doesn’t matter. Take a deep breath, start again. And you’ll notice that over time, those thoughts will become less and less and less. So let’s get started, let’s give you the tool that you need to beat severe fatigue at work.
How do you practice Mindfulness for Chronic Fatigue?
You can practice mindfulness at any point in your day. So, if there are people around you, and there’s noise, that’s okay. We’re going to learn how to tune out of that noise and tune into our noise.
I’d like to invite you to just come into a seated position. This can be at your desk if you’re there already or somewhere you feel comfortable.
Just allow your shoulders to drop away from your ears. You might need to give them a couple of rotations just to release any tension through your shoulder blades.
Allow them to sink down, you can do this with your eyes open or eyes closed. Just come into a comfortable position where you feel your body becoming softer and softer, lighter, and lighter.
You’re going to take a deep breath here.
In through the nose and out through the mouth.
And again, but this time you’re going to bring your awareness to that breath as you inhale.
Feel and notice the abdomen and chest rise.
As you exhale, send that breath to where your body needs it most.
It may be that you’ve got some aches and pains today. So for example, I’m going to inhale and I’m going to exhale bringing my awareness to the breath as I send it down to my knee.
You may have thought after thought come into your mind right now. That is okay, this is going to take time so bare with it and don’t judge it.
A couple of breaths more. See if you can increase the depth of the inhale and the exhale.
The last one now, just take a moment to bring yourself too, now how are you feeling?
Does, anything feel different? I’m not expecting you to feel the top of the world, but you may feel a little different.
I close my eyes when I do mindfulness meditation because I feel like it helps me bring my awareness inside without my eyes looking everywhere and no birds flying past catch my sight. However, you can do mindfulness meditation, whilst you’re walking, driving, eating or drinking, really whenever you have time.
Moving forward with Mindfulness
By doing mindfulness meditation, you will find that your energy levels will increase over time. You’re bringing your body down, you’re calming it down and you’re relaxing it.
I don’t know if you’ve ever realised that when you’re at work, if you get an email or message that’s not the answer you wanted to get or it’s particularly frustrating. It automatically sends you into a negative cycle. You may get cross at the email. That doesn’t help your fatigue because your winding yourself up.
You don’t need to, you need to unwind yourself, you need to uncoil your stress because that’s going to get you through the day with reduced pain and fatigue.
There is a lot more we can do for working with severe fatigue and I am going to cover that over time. But for now, what I’d love you to do is take what we’ve gone through today. Give it a try, just for a couple of minutes a day and build up to at least 10 minutes a day, consistently over a week.
Write down how you’re feeling before it, and how you’re feeling afterward, it’s really good to make a note of how you found it.
Was it easy? Was it frustrating? What thoughts came into your head? What did you find challenging, because actually, over time, you’re going to read back on those notes, and you will see how far you’ve come. If you’re consistent in your practice, then you’re going to see changes happen.
This doesn’t come easily to everybody. Please don’t beat yourself up if you find it a challenge or if this takes a little bit longer than you want, have realistic expectations.
In the long run, mindfulness is really going to have a profound impact on your chronic fatigue.
What’s next?
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