If you’re irritable, frazzled or overwhelmed a lot… Or you’re numb, down, or depressed, or aren't able to connect to love or warmth or affection... If you don’t have much interest in being around or touching your partner… If you don’t have a lot to say, or when you do say things they’re judgmental or snippy… ...You may be in what I call a Mind-Body-Heart-Slump (MBHS)! Basically, it’s when you’ve been overstimulated chronically. Which happens easily for Highly Sensitive People living in this type A society.
Interestingly we might not fully recognize we are in a MBHS until we do something to help shift ourselves out of it...and we suddenly feel alive, or “like myself“ again.
A couple of my clients recently told me they were “wowed” by how much better they felt after simply carving out a little time for themselves to play or rest.
Going on a solo hike or doing some extra meditation had the effect of calming and re-energizing them so that they felt happy and vibrant again.
This is one of the key ways to get ourselves out of Mind-Body-Heart-Slump.
But it’s important to understand that the chronic overstimulation that leads to a Slump doesn’t just come from outside of us in the form of loud noise and other people’s demands, our bosses requests, or our to do list, etc. The world is not responsible for your Slump.
An MBHS comes very much from how we think about and relate to those outer things inside our own minds:
When you think you Have To do it all..
Or meet others expectations...
Or keep the house in perfect order...
When you think down time will negatively impact people you care about,
When you focus on all that’s missing from your life and marriage…
...All this, and more, will send your sensitive nervous system into chronic fight or flight, flooding your mind, body, and heart with stress hormones-- and take you far from who you really are...
You are not to blame for your MBHS, either. But you ARE responsible for finding your way back out to the centeredness, aliveness --and love--on the other side.
The good news is that we can always turn inward, go back to ourselves to find a remedy to get us out of a Mind Body Heart Slump!
Some of the most important work that I do with my clients is identifying and dissolving the thinking that leads them into, and keeps them in, the Slumps. So they can STAY out of them. And have a much better marriage.
But you --today, right now-- can decide to ignore the voice in your head saying you “should” be doing other things, and gently guide yourself out of this Slump by choosing to do something decompressing, or playful. Something you enjoy.
Such as putting on some really good music and dancing freely in your living room. Or doing a Yoga Nidra meditation. Or going for a long walk in the woods or park, or going to your bedroom and putting an eye pillow over your eyes (all personal favorites!).
When you do such things regularly, and teach your mind to stop leading you into such Slumps, it will bring you back to yourself---and to those you love.
With Love, Hannah
P.S. If you chronically feel FAR from yourself and your partner, you CAN find your way back to your self and to LOVE. It takes more than good self-care. It takes knowing how to work with your MIND and developing great Emotional Agency--which we HSPs need to stay out of Mind-Body Heart Slumps, and be self-honoring, love-generating Sensitive women with a marriage we ADORE. When you coach 1:1 with me, you'll master the full spectrum of Emotional Agency--and the 3 other steps of my 4 step process...So that instead of life and marriage draining you, you'll know how to get so much nourishment, stability, lightness and joy out of you marriage that you'll have lots of extra energy for the other things that matter most to you--and feel better than you ever have about yourself. Email me at hannah@lifeisworthloving.com and say "let's talk", and we'll set up a call to chat about whether or not coaching with me is right for you.