We struggle with sleep in all sorts of different ways. Some struggle to get to sleep in the first place, some wake numerous times in the night, and some find they’re constantly feeling tired as though the sleep they’re getting isn’t sufficient. It can be difficult to judge whether you are getting enough sleep just because it’s different for each individual – and can change over your life time.

How to help sleep problems:

• Ensure your bedroom is a calming pleasant place to be by keeping it clean and tidy, perhaps introducing relaxing smells with essential oils or candles.
• Avoid drinking caffeine or alcohol in the late afternoon/evening – instead drinking decaffeinated/non-alcoholic versions of your favourite drink or trying something like an herbal tea or malt drink instead
• Don’t eat big or really spicy meals late in the evening. It’s not great for your digestive system to go to bed on a full stomach, you don’t want to be hungry but you want to aim to be satisfied, not stuffed full.
• Doing some physical exercise such as a brisk walk in the late afternoon can help you make your body tired and help you to sleep.
• Set a regular time for going to bed and waking up to try and teach your body the routine you want to get into.
• Develop a short relaxing routine leading up to bed time. This may include having a bath, writing a diary, reading a book or doing a relaxation exercise (check out my post on the progressive muscle relaxation exercise). Try limit brain stimulating activities and choose relaxing wind down activities.
• Associate your bed with going to sleep by avoiding watching tv in bed. If you can’t sleep after 30 minutes, get up and do another activity such as reading or listening to music. After 15 minutes try returning to bed and going to sleep again.

Struggling with your sleep can have a huge impact on your mental health, and mental health problems can cause difficulties sleeping. If you are up all night struggling to sleep, this can then make it difficult to concentrate during the day. This might result in you worrying that you aren’t performing as well as usual at work or may cause you to withdraw from social events. You may start to feel anxious about your performance, or losing contact with friends and the worry itself may prevent you from getting a good nights sleep. Check back soon for some tips on dealing with worry.

The post Sleep Problems appeared first on Morrell Counselling.

DO:

• Ensure you wake up early enough to give you enough time to enjoy your breakfast and get ready for the day without having to rush.
• Be organised – spend a short amount of time putting some structure into your day so that you can use your time wisely. Prioritise important tasks and allocate time for them to avoid getting caught procrastinating or spending time on unnecessary tasks.
• Ensure you take your lunch break. If possible try take a walk outside for a stretch, and some fresh air for a change of environment.
• Don’t put too much on your plate. Ask for support from colleagues/managers when your workload gets too much. Learn to say no.
• Turn off work related communications. If you work from home, try do so from a different room so that you are able to enjoy the rest of your living space without being reminded of work.
• Exercise can be a really great way of managing stress.
• Plan holidays or activities so that you have things to look forward to.
• Try maintain a regular bed time routine at the same time every night so that you get enough sleep to tackle the day ahead.

DON’T:

• Grab your breakfast on the go whilst checking emails and dealing with phone calls
• Jump from one task to another without considering their priority or the length of time they will take – you’ll end up feeling dissatisfied having not completed any tasks.
• Work through your lunch break and eat unhealthy convenience food.
• Take on everything that comes your way to try look willing. You may end up shooting yourself in the foot when you’ve taken on more than you can chew and colleagues/managers continue expecting more and more from you.
• Get into a habit of staying late or taking work home with you
• Skip exercising or socialising as you are too busy with work
• Avoid booking holidays/time off for fear of the amount of work you’ll have to get back to.
• Stay up late trying to get a head start on work for the next day, you’ll only end up feeling tired and unproductive.

The post Work Life Balance appeared first on Morrell Counselling.

Are you feeling a little lost? Lacking motivation or feeling overwhelmed with how much you’d ideally like to change in your life? Setting SMART goals can be a simple yet effective way to help clarify what you want to achieve and give you the best hope for maintaining your efforts and achieving your goals.

SMART is an acronym you can use as guidance in setting your goals.

Specific – Exactly what is it that you want to achieve? When setting a goal it is helpful to include as much detail as possible (the what, why, who, where, when and how). If your goal is vague it will be much harder to achieve because you will struggle to define when you are successful.

Measurable – It’s important to be able to track your progress so that you will know when you have achieved the goal.

Achievable – Whilst having a goal in itself implies you are reaching for something, it is important not to stretch yourself unreasonably.

Relevant – Is this something that you actually really want or are there other more important things you need to focus on right now?

Timely – You must set a deadline for your goal to avoid putting them off. It might be useful to have mini deadlines along route to the ultimate goal so that you are able to measure the progress.

Example:

“I want to lose weight”

If we aim loosely at losing weight, we could keep putting off the things we need to do to achieve this by continually saying “I’ll start again tomorrow”. If we don’t see the immediate final result we’re unrealistically aiming for, we’re unlikely to stay motivated to get there and then may feel negatively towards ourselves. If I need to lose weight but actually right now I have so many other things I need to prioritise I’m not going to focus on this goal and thus will not achieve it. Instead I need to consider breaking down the main overarching goal of losing weight into smaller more manageable chunks and setting myself a SMART goal.

“I want to lose 1lb every week for the next 4 weeks so that I have lost a total of 4lbs. I will do this by going to a gym class two times a week in the evening after work and cutting out my usual Friday night takeaway. This will help me towards my ultimate goal of losing 8lbs in time for my holiday”

Sometimes if we think big picture, we can get too overwhelmed with how much we have to do. Using the above example, instead of thinking “argh I need to lose 8lbs!”, it feels more manageable and realistic to focus on the first 1lb.

Only you can decide what feels achievable for you, just make sure you’re not setting your standards too high but are also pushing yourself just enough for it to be a challenge.

Weight loss is just one example of goal setting practice. This tool can also be really helpful when dealing with depression. Rather than looking at big picture of “I need to get back to work, improve my relationships, deal with my mental health and stop taking medication” which can feel impossibly overwhelming, focus on setting yourself SMART goals for each day. It could be as straight forward as “I want to make sure I get out of bed and get dressed every day this week”.

If you feel like it would be useful to get some support in achieving the changes you want to make, please don’t hesitate to get in touch to discuss whether counselling may be appropriate for you.

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