On my mind - ridiculous cute. To manage migraine, I do yoga nidra at noon each day. Most of the time, this is a solitary endeavor. Yesterday, it was not. I developed -- a growth.
Crow decided to climb into my tee shirt with me. My fluffy black 17lb marshmallow cat flopped over between my side and my arm. He pillowed his head on my shoulder and 'assisted' with my nervous system reset.
Except.
When my session ended and I need to get up and go back to work, we came to disagreement. My furry son declined to rise. He also declined to relinquish my shirt.
Thus it is that rather than distress the sizeable feline, I risked an indecent exposure charge. Only briefly. I was outdoors, but inside the lanai when I shimmied out of that tee shirt and grabbed a blanket from the porch swing and got it around me to get inside. Good thing it wasn't yard work day.
I found myself another tee shirt to wear for the rest of the day.
My first one remained a place of feline refuge.
I suppose there's something to be said for being someone's sense of safety.
One final photo of a happy, ridiculous Crow cat below.
I was referred to a biofeedback specialist who is training me to state shift. Shifting from fight or flight states to relaxed but alert states. NSDR / Yoga Nidra are the method by which that shift happens. The video is a 10 minute NSDR session designed to shift you out of your head and into your body for a little while. You reset your nervous system, restore energy, and heighten focus. If you suffer chronic pain, this is also a balm that might not cure all the discomfort, but which will certainly lower the volume a little.
Yoga Nidra is another version of NSDR (so is self hypnosis). If you need a longer break or a longer session to help draw down pain or high stress, you can find sessions as long or as short as you like. I like Ally Boothroyd's ad-free channel.She offers an array of yoga nidra sessions.
Biofeedback is teaching me that all this time, I've been doing life wrong. Turns out you're supposed to rest. The modern worship of business and SO MUCH WORK TO DO is actively bad for our health and in my case, is likely a major contributor to chronic pain conditions. The hardest homework I have from biofeedback is learning that I need to structure my day around rest and that my productivity increases when I do. I hope this is useful to someone besides me - because honestly - establishing this new routine is at that all-consuming stage. I think I'll go listen to one right now.
