Your daily commute: stress to serenity

Helmet under my arm, I slipped on my TOMS.

“Ok I gotta hop on my bike and go see a client then teach my last class.” I told my friend.

I had been up since 6a, already taught a 7a yoga class, been to a client’s home AND finished teaching my 12:15p class at Zen Yoga Garage. Each of them at different locations and I was off to two more.

“That must be kinda stressful running from place to place” she marked.

And guess what, it was. It was stressing me out, racing from place to place. Riding or driving in traffic gave me anxiety. I get mad at people going slow, and feel like my time is being wasted on the road. I’d rather delete some of my 150 emails I get, or something else productive. The stress of it all left me exhausted at the end of the day to the point where I didn’t even have energy to cook (and I love to cook).

At least that’s what my answer would have been several months ago…But something had changed. And it wasn’t my job. I was still a full time Health Coach and Yoga Instructor without a home base. I was still teaching the same amount of classes, seeing clients, and commuting between each of them.

My friend and fellow coach, Rebecca Niziol and I have been doing lots of research on stress the last several months. We both started using different techniques to transform our relationship to stress. One small change in how we looked at our stressors, created a BIG SHIFT in our lives.

My stressful commute turned into blissful me time. I now have several built in 15-30 min breaks throughout my day. I have the privilege that my job actually requires me to take those breaks and I get to listen to music, take some quiet time and breath, ride my bike and feel the wind in my hair, sun on my face, get some exercise, breath fresh air, and not have to talk to anyone (which is nice when you are teaching and coaching all day). Heck when I worked at lululemon I only go one 20-min break in a 7-hour shift. That commuting time turned from the stressful part of my day into something I looked forward to.

I had more energy at the end of my day. All because I made one small change. Something I could control, something from inside me and my outside world took a BIG SHIFT.

If I did it, you can too.

#smallchangeBIGshift