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Train Your Brain

Lotte Vesterli on April 16, 2021

Are you getting smarter or dumber? If you’re not challenging your brain, it loses power just like muscles you don’t use. The physiology is completely different, but research shows that we can add more brain cells by using our brains just like we can add more muscle mass by using our muscles.

Because it takes so much energy to run a human brain, the body is always looking for shortcuts. Routines and habits mean that you don’t have to think – you just do as you normally do. It is your job to keep your brain fit by giving it new challenges. You don’t have to learn a new language or to play the piano, but you should always have something new to keep your brain fresh and interested. What new skill or challenge will you give your brain to work on this weekend?

Improve Your Sleep

Lotte Vesterli on February 26, 2021

Sleeping too little is bad for your health in a thousand ways. Trying to catch up by spending the weekend in bed is not a long-term solution.

Notice what time you wake up on Saturday and Sunday without an alarm clock. If that is not about the same time you get up on work days, your sleep rhythm is disturbed and needs fixing.

To improve it, go to bed ridiculously early each day next week. Seriously early, like a 8 or 9 PM. Make a note of when you wake up fully rested. If that is not before your usual time, you have a sleep deficit you need to address. Keep going to bed very early until you wake up before you have to. Then you can start adjusting – if you want to get up at 7AM and you wake at 5AM, you can go to bed two hours later. A good sleep rhythm is necessary condition for health and success.

Sometimes You Need Help

Lotte Vesterli on February 25, 2021

Sometimes you do need help. I try to provide useful self-help advice for everybody who follow me on social media, but if you have a serious issue, you will need to work individually with someone.

One point where my American friends are ahead of us here in Europe is that there is little or no stigma attached to visiting a psychologist in the US. In Europe, it would be very surprising to hear someone in casual conversation say “as I told my therapist…”

I want to make it as easy as possible to work with me, so you can simply click a button on my website to set up a free 20-minute call. Or click this link: https://vester.li/i05. I’m here if you need me.

Reach into the Future

Lotte Vesterli on February 24, 2021

Our lockdown is gradually lifting here in Denmark, and my friends in Israel tell me they’re getting close to normal after a massive vaccination effort. In many places around the world, vaccinations are proceeding and lockdowns are having effect.

What will you do when restrictions are lifted? Think of something you want to do and can’t do now. Close your eyes and imaging yourself involved in that activity. Some people are able to visualize the activity, others can imagine hearing the sounds or feeling the physical sensations. You can use this method to harvest energy from the future to re-energize yourself while we all wait for the things we can’t do now.

Spring is Coming

Lotte Vesterli on February 23, 2021

Winter is drawing to a close, and spring is approaching. Here in Denmark, the days are getting longer and the first early spring flowers are breaking out of the ground. This is a time for preparing. What will you be doing this year? If you haven’t set a few goals for 2021, now is a good time to do it. And find some easy first steps you can do to start you journey towards your goal. It can be something really simple like looking up the information you need on the internet. Count that as progress towards your goal. Spring is coming.

Look for the Good News

Lotte Vesterli on February 19, 2021

When we cooperate, we are capable of incredible things. At the beginning of the coronavirus epidemic, experts expected it would take 3 or 4 years before we had a vaccine, but several teams have managed to create vaccines in record time.

Yesterday saw a Nasa spacecraft land on Mars. If you haven’t seen the illustrations of how it was done, I can recommend looking it up. It was an amazing feat of engineering involving heat shields, parachutes, and a hovering “sky crane” that slowly lowered the huge one-ton robot onto the surface of Mars.

This weekend, make a decision to read only positive news and stories. Simply scroll past the bad news. You won’t miss anything. If it is really important, you will see it again on Monday. Your weekend should be a time for recovery and re-energizing. To achieve that, feed your mind with all the good stories out there.

Uses for Your Bed

Lotte Vesterli on February 18, 2021

You should only use your bed for two things, and working isn’t one of them. Even if you your partner has already occupied the kitchen table for their important zoom meeting, find someplace else. It might feel nice and cosy to cuddle under your blanket in bed with your laptop, but don’t do it.

Firstly, the ergonomics of sitting in bed are horrible. Everything is too soft and you are unable to sit with a straight spine. Secondly, you don’t want to associate your bed with working. If you do, you are setting yourself up for sleep problems. (And by the way, don’t watch TV in bed, either.)

Working with people in all kinds of situations, many of them trauma victims, I usually don’t give strict guidelines. But this is one of the few. Don’t ever work in bed.

You Have Options

Lotte Vesterli on February 17, 2021

In comparison with my American friends in Texas and elsewhere who are freezing without power, I have it easy. Even though our gas boiler just stopped, we have a fireplace to heat our home and we still have electrical power.

When you are faced with an unexpected problem, take a moment to think about your options. If your normal heating is out, do you have alternative heating sources? Do you have a cottage with a fire-burning stove? Do you have an RV heated with propane? Can you stay with someone who does have heating? Does your community provide emergency shelter for people without heating?

The most important thing you can do to improve your life is to break the chain between an event and an automatic response. You always have options.

Celebrate Pancake Day

Lotte Vesterli on February 16, 2021

Remember to celebrate. For example, today you can celebrate International Pancake Day. That’s not something just dreamt up by the marketing department in a company that sells pancake mix. It comes from the Christian liturgy, where this day is called Shrove Tuesday and is the last day before the fasting period of Lent. Because you were not allowed fat and sugar during Lent, you had a feast on the day before where you used up all the good stuff, for example by making pancakes. This day is also called Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) for the same reason.

In times like these, it is important to find reasons to celebrate. If you don’t actively act against it, lockdowns and other bad news will affect your mood. But it is completely within your power to lift your spirit by deciding to celebrate something. Like pancake day.

Make Time for Two Hours Outside

Lotte Vesterli on February 15, 2021

Were you outdoors for a walk this weekend? The research is piling up showing that spending time outside in natural surroundings is associated with lower levels of stress hormones, less anxiety, less depression and even improved cognitive ability.

A children’s hospital in the US has a question on their discharge questionnaire: Does the child have access to outdoors and green spaces? If not, they are offered to take part in a nature program. Clinical trials show that this program increases the children’s health and decreases the parents’ stress levels.

Spending two hours per week walking in nature gives a significant improvement in health and subjective well-being. If you like numbers, a study shows that the effect increases with more time outside, reaching the maximum at 5 hours outdoors per week. That half an hour on workdays and Saturday, and one two-hour walk on Sunday. For everyone without a significant mobility impairment, that is completely achievable.

Make sure you get your two hours outside every week. That gives you the energy to work on anything else you need to change in your life.