Rested and alert

Yesterday, I attended a work-sponsored webinar on restful sleep and discovered a few strategies to combat poor quality sleep. For example, if your mind is racing and have difficulty falling asleep, try to write down your thoughts as a way of unloading your brain. The speaker raved about camping pillows and how it could be comfortable as an alternative to regular pillows. Other things discussed during the talk, like avoiding caffeine at least 4 hours before going to bed (or ideally after 12 noon) and not looking at screens half an hour before going to sleep, seem like common advice even though majority of us don't always apply these habits. 

I've recently tried my best to avoid caffeine and electronics before bed and can attest to having a better disposition the following day. I've written about sleep before, but I cannot rave enough about the benefits of having a good night's sleep. It sets me up for success the following day. And by success, I mean fully functional, motivated, no drastic mid-day sluggishness, more understanding, less irritable, happy; wherein coffee is consumed for pleasure as opposed to serving as a fuel source. 

Sometime between my last post and today, there was a high pressure work-related situation. To make light of things, I mentioned something along the lines of 'alright, this is achievable--I just need caffeine on IV.' Of course, I was kidding. I thought that my colleagues would just brush it off as a trivial joke. I have received one complimentary coffee thus far. And this free coffee wasn't even a coffee-and-a-sit-down-work-chat type of thing. It was literally grab-a-mobile-order at the coffee shop in the lobby, followed by a discussion while walking towards the elevators, the clinics, then bye bye. That's how work looks like with these highly functional folks. For context, this is one of many groups I work with in an interprofessional setting. I can obviously get my own coffee, but it's a nice symbolic gesture of mutual professional respect.

Going back to the topic of sleep. The webinar mentioned coffee naps that are maximized during the mid-afternoon slump at around 1-3pm. That is, you drink your coffee then take about a 20-minute nap so that when the caffeine kicks in you are both rested and alert. There seems to be science behind it, so that might be something we can look into and practice.

If you want to reduce your stress (or help you fall asleep), you may opt to listen to the album embedded below. A study on the first track (the first 4 minutes) by Shepherd et al., 2022 [link] concluded that '...overall “Weightless” was not as effective as the monaural 6-Hz beats in reducing physiological arousal...it can be argued that “Weightless” has potential utility as a relaxant in systematic desensitization techniques, and as a general relaxant as stress-reducing intervention in its own right.'

Some ways to live better

 I began writing this post while waiting at the venue where my children were having their winter extracurricular sports activity. Ambient sounds included conversations between parents and children who had just finished with their gymnastics, swimming, music, or multisport session, or parents doing flexible remote work on some corner of the centre. What a unique experience! I situated myself at a spot where I placed two chairs with all of our belongings. I had just taken a sip of decaf coffee that I brought with me in a coffee tumbler--that thing I did for myself earlier today while preparing for this parental waiting situation so that I had something to look forward to once the kids are in their activity.
I also brought with me a copy of Og Mandino's "A Better Way to Live" that my father used to own and that I posted about over a year ago <link>. On page 64, it states:

"Always reward your long hours of labor and toil in the very best way, surrounded by your family. Nurture their love carefully, remembering that your children need models, not critics, and your progress will hasten when you constantly strive to present your best side to your children. And even if you have failed at all else in the eyes of the world, if you have a loving family, you are a success."

What a nice passage to read while in this circumstance.

----

In other domestic-related news, I have successfully made my first eggless tiramisu. One of my sisters make excellent tiramisu, and we enjoyed it over the recent holidays. I asked for her recipe, but I cut corners and used lazy mom alternative ingredients, and it still turned out okay. I made a large container and two small containers that lasted about 72 hours. On the topic of tiramisu, my other sister introduced to us this viral song called "Tiramisu Cake" <link> by a Korean band and it apparently created some dance craze in Asia. I now have a fondness for mascarpone cheese, which I consume in the morning with a mixed berry jam on a piece of toast. Couple that with good brewed black coffee and I feel like I can face any manic Monday like a pro.

To close this post centered on ordinary home life, below is a scene from the film "Kate and Leopold" featuring mascarpone. Enjoy the weekend, folks.

indisposed

'Tis a day of herbal tea with a slice of lemon, slow cooker soup, fleece pajamas, and naps. How has your week been? My recent inspirational statement is from Philippians 4:6. Also, I've been enjoying holiday playlists and seasonal radio channels. I'm sharing with you a playlist that's been on my library for a while and have been playing:

Here's to taking care of our bodies and minds so we can recover and carry on with whatever purpose we've been tasked in this life...a verbose and dramatic way of saying that if and when unwell, rest.

Despite the unfortunate events, it's still a lovely day. Cheers.

{p.s. I'm enjoying being able to embed Spotify widgets, as you can see...}

restricted access

Photo by Tara Winstead

Social media conditioning is detrimental--this is not breaking news. I'm sure I've thought out loud about this before. Even if I've limited my social media accounts and kept a lurker (or consumer) status, what I encounter during the day has a smidge-to-large influence in my daily life. There were surely many times when social media was beneficial, as in the case of real-time news about weather, traffic, and technological disruptions--but there is still AM news. Then again, our radio streaming is still dependent on the internet....oh wait, our alarm clock has a radio--that's comforting. 

Before I decided to write this post, I drank a glass of water with Alka-Seltzer. Why? I had a hefty serving of poutine, half a hotdog sandwich (shared it), and a zero-sugar (had to emphasize) soda for lunch. My gut said, "How dare you consume these affordable, delicious, highly processed material after being on a semi-clean eating streak? You have betrayed us! We shall decrease your gastric pH....Proton Pumps fire at will!" Then the gate-keepers guarding the junction between my stomach and esophagus cried out, "Ohr noehr, we cahn't keep the bahrrier!" (they are apparently Australian). 

To connect these two paragraphs above and my topic two posts ago: even if I've tried my best to resist negative ideas and habits, those "just this one time" exposures tend to lead to an avalanche of repercussions. It could be wasting time on social media about strangers arguing about politics of another country, or impulsively buying a lipstick that's supposed to look good on all skin tones, having a box of special-flavour cookies delivered, or becoming guilty about being a fan of a fantasy series involving a school for wizards and witches because it is evil, or feeling that I'm missing out because I'm not a member of so-and-so group or have not read so-and-so book...it's a lot of unnecessary experiences. One may say, it's self care: Do what makes you happy. You do you. Nah, it's not self-care. It's self-absorption. You may disagree and I respect your stance. My past self may even disagree with me now...I remember writing something along the lines of we deserve small invaluable joys. To an extent, sure, my current self thinks.

I realized that it isn't that my efforts aren't enough to keep my inner peace in check. It's these external things which are voracious and persistent. Their motivation may range from money to world domination. I don't really know, I belong to the lowest rung on the ladder of influence so I'm not privy to such global scale strategic planning mumbo jumbo. 

So I logged off my Instagram and Twitter. I will try not to use the two apps for as long as I can (update this morning: I turned on Instagram because of active message groups with kin and friends). I keep LinkedIn for work-related news (barely use it too). I keep YouTube for some healthy smoothie recipes or uplifting and funky music (is Spotify social media? I don't think so). Oh, but I have an anonymous Reddit account (facepalm). To justify my Reddit usage, I read about current events, what healthy stuff to consume, health-related experiences of women my age, or my faith (where authentic and qualified people actually respond). I'm not on it frequently so that's manageable. Honestly, Reddit is not as intuitive to me and I normally use the search bar to type a topic of interest. I have no other social media apps and it's quite an effort to keep it that way. 

If I ever caused you to rethink your social media consumption too, I hope it's for the better. If social media is your livelihood, more power to you and I'm sorry for not being a patron. It's just not working for me at the moment. I will be more open to real-world interactions and any physical form of information. I shall allow these tangible forms of information to be considered in my thought process. An exception: digital forms of relevant information such as e-books, journals, newsletters, e-mail...essential electronic material, if you will. If a message needs to reach me, it will reach me. If I need to reach out for a purpose, there are multiple ways to go about accomplishing that. Let's see if this experiment will improve my quality of life. 

I shall end this post with a statement by a writer named W. Somerset Maugham: "If fifty million people say something foolish, it is still foolish" (as quoted by Rolf Dobelli in his book 'The Art of Thinking Clearly'). 

 

Sunny Serenity

Every morning when I prepare for the day, I play some background music whether an artist, an album, or a particular song. I previously mentioned that I discovered the track "Never gonna be alone" and so I would let my streaming platform play that song as some sort of "seed" (a programming simulation term meaning a starting random number) and let the platform play the succeeding songs. I realized that the songs that start to play after that are really nice related tracks and so I created a playlist based on the upcoming suggested tracks that I liked.

I just had a brief walk outside and I shuffled the tracks on my new playlist. It was a great complement to the sunny and breezy weather this afternoon. And because my walk was short, I didn't get to play all of the tracks. Looking forward to a much longer walk and having this new playlist as the soundtrack. The playlist title I assigned is literal--if you think the type of music is something you might want to listen to when you spend time in the present moment, please go on ahead and add it to your library or maybe choose some songs as your "seed" and then create your own playlist. I could rename the playlist title to "sunny serenity" or "smooth optimism" or something that is related to being uplifted yet calm. I'll keep it as is indefinitely. 

Cheers. 

wistful

 

Photo by cottonbro studio from Pexels 

My daughter has been constantly listening to music (One Direction, Taylor Swift) and I'm thrilled about it. It's nice to know that she's able to identify what interests her and recognize her tastes. For me, I just found out that John Mayer (JM) is on tour and unfortunately, I did not get to see him in concert a few days ago when he was in town. I simply had no idea, because I wasn't keeping up with events in general. I had the pleasure of seeing him live in 2019 and I certainly would like to see him live again. (Glad that there are snippets of his concert online, especially the talking bits) Many folks consider Continuum as their favourite JM album, but mine is his first one: Room for Squares--just because it was released around the time I was in university and it's very nostalgic. Also, I wanted to be able to play guitar the way he played guitar-- of course, I'll never be able to because I will remain a perennial amateur plus I do not have big hands to do all his Rachmaninoff-esque finger gymnastics abilities. 

This nostalgia or wistful longing for the past in terms of listening to certain songs for the first time or recalling how I would patiently wait for FM radio or music television (a.k.a. MTV) to play songs I liked, has compelled me to also revisit my admiration for The Beatles. I remember one birthday when I asked for the complete set of Beatles albums on cassette tape, which my wonderful parents bought for me--and I got a free poster and silk-screened T-shirt. I may or may not have posted about this story before, but there was one summer sometime in the late 80s-early 90s when a new TV station aired Beatles videos and interviews for about 1.5-2 hours (I've been Googling this but can't find it...either ABC-5, RPN-9, PTV-4...I don't remember which channel exactly) and I became I fan of the Fab Four. I became particularly fascinated with Paul McCartney and his left-handed bass playing (and cuteness, come on). Anyway, I've decided to curate my favourite songs here. How amazing is technology, eh? Music on demand. Whereas when I was young, I saved money to either buy stationery (pens, perfumed paper with envelopes) or blank cassette tapes so I can press the record and play button at the same time if a song I liked started to play on the radio. It's yesterday once more...

Update: John Mayer had a few unreleased songs or deep cuts during his tour and I’ve added clips like “Hotel Bathroom Song”, “In the Neighborhood”, and “I don’t miss you” (which is by JP Saxe; update: this single already exists on Spotify  https://spotify.link/7X6VEgUuOyb thanks to JM’s IG story!) in my curated playlist of favourite songs/music videos: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2wfslVJDE_A7G1oQ_mo75WPqWjia9KEW

sugarcoating

 

As advised by someone I spoke with earlier today, I treated myself to a cup of specialty coffee (a drink called Cafe Nordique, which I posted before) and a ginger cookie. My screenshot shows the piece of candied ginger as ornamentation on the sugarcoated, molasses-y cookie. It’s festive and comforting. What’s the occasion? Self-care and vacation time. 

I know that we can feel inflation all around, yet I am also aware that we only live once. Once in a while, I think it's okay to splurge. It’s a recurring theme that I write about—that we all deserve our little invaluable joys. 

What a challenging time to be alive, eh? I formally admit that I’ve sought help over a year ago and am going through the process of processing things. It's not news that I tend to close myself off on occasion. I also know that this tendency can be misconstrued by others. At this point in my life, I've become certain about whose opinions matter to me. Again, what other people think of us is none of our business (someone popular once said that). 

I don't find isolation fearsome, to be honest. That doesn't mean that I don't talk to my husband nor my children. Every night before we all go to bed, we say our night prayer together after which we take turns saying what we are grateful for about the day. You can imagine that there are many nights when we recite what we are grateful for by rote. I think that's okay. That's likely the reason why I mentioned that I don't find isolation fearsome. I suppose I'm referring to physical isolation. The fact is that knowing that I'm part of my nuclear family or a part of something...and that this belongingness gives me purpose--it is enough. At least that's my most authentic feeling right now.

On the topic of sugarcoating...why did I use that title? In the literal sense, it matches my blogpost image (lol). In the non-literal sense, it's useful to sugarcoat things especially when there is no benefit to brutal honesty. And no, there's nothing particular in mind that I'm thinking about that is around brutal honesty. I suppose a concrete example is the use of "therapeutic lying" to avoid escalation of challenging behaviours manifested by persons with dementia. I know "lying" is a pejorative term...let's use sugarcoating. For instance, when a person living with dementia whose partner has passed away a long time ago starts behaving agitated because he/she is getting impatient waiting for his/her partner to visit---one would try to use diversion or similar strategies to calm down the person. Maybe even say, "Oh, I heard that there is a traffic jam on highway 401 so your partner may just be delayed." This is because telling the person, "No, you're partner is dead and has been dead for over a decade" is probably the least helpful thing to say to that person at that particular moment especially when the person is agitated and you know that their memory is already impaired. I'm not an expert in dementia care so I won't even attempt to go into hypotheticals like I know what I'm talking about. 

So before the year ends, I wanted to say happy holidays. And that sugar is okay (unless you have a condition that prohibits it). Not too much. Just the right amount. A spoonful helps the medicine go down, as Mary Poppins once exhorted.

Ocular Vacation

Among the randomly suggested videos on Youtube included this hour-and-a-half long walking tour of Positano, Italy: https://youtube.com/watch?v=KiAF2393Lzo&feature=share

It’s incredible how technology these days can allow all these instant forms of entertainment on demand. As well, if you are the more calculating kind, you can make much more informed decisions in terms of purchases, travel, etc. Personally, I like being equipped with information about navigation…the lay of the land…where the washrooms are and such. :) 

Unfortunately, the uncertainties in our current situation really requires very good decision-making because there are so many risks. And the risks these days are weightier and the absolute opposite of trivial than before.

We recently gifted ourselves with a local family trip and unfortunately took home an illness.  All is now well, but the frustration I felt post-trip was really, well, up there in the frustration continuum. But the experience was still positively memorable. Add to that would be the non-stop bombardment of bad news in the world resulting to much hesitancy when it comes to going outside. I haven’t taken a walk in the park for more than 2 weeks. I just try my best to preoccupy my mind with funny and relaxing images. Inspirational things only. Because that’s what I can control. It’s certainly not easy—I’ve had anxious moments and occasions of being on edge these past few days. I realized that what works for me is to do what calms me down at that particular moment. Again, that’s what I can control. Anything else that I feel helpless about, I try my best not to allot more attention than it requires; not really a good idea to dedicate time for exercises in futility. Honestly, it’s challenging. I have a bad habit of fixating on the negatives. Though I try my utmost best not to.

Positano looks like a great place to visit, time and resources permitting. However, the video above showed way too many people than I would prefer in real life. Perhaps, a boat trip? A section with less Homo sapiens? But lots of seafood. I don’t think those are mutually exclusive. You know what, I’ll just watch the YouTube video for now. :)

Looking forward to the summer

The slow transition to normalcy is exciting yet still tinged with hesitation. Like dipping one’s toes in the pool waters before committing to actually swimming. I wasn’t always a fan of going outdoors when I don’t need to. Any type of nature-related activity I’ve engaged in, whether a hike or camping, weren’t motivated by personal leisure. It was more likely because I needed to do it as part of an obligation or work. Four decades of existence plus the pandemic made me realize how much nature was taken for granted in my reality. I now appreciate walking along a grassy park on a breezy late afternoon amid lots of trees and bird sounds. And how walking on the grass feels cushion-y on the feet as opposed to walking on a gravel path for as long as the grass isn’t super damp from rain (not fun on the shoes). I also find this practice very relaxing and calming especially on mega busy days. Therapy in between formal therapy. I’ve mentioned a personal mental bucket list and it’s now lengthening with the inclusion of actual camping in the mountains and that bubble hotel resort in Iceland where the accommodations are see-through so that you can sleep and have a full view of the northern lights on a clear evening…

Diaries

 

July 3, 1994: my very first diary entry! I was in high school, during a time when slam books and diaries were common. I remember purchasing my first diary from a store called "National Bookstore", which was my go-to school supplies and bookstore. Like my peers, I had a stash of stationery (including those cheap perfumed ones), envelopes, pens, or stickers (to seal my letters) since writing notes or letters was a popular pastime. My high school class is about to celebrate our silver jubilee (unbelievable how time flies--though mind you, we were not in the K-12 system then). Part of this celebration involves a fundraiser for the benefit of mission schools in my home country (ang Republika ng Pilipinas) through a special undated daily devotional journal with reflections contributed by some of my batchmates. I think it's a fantastic idea which was why I purchased a few copies for myself and as gifts. A journal is certainly very representative of who we were as a class--a generation of teenagers who enjoyed handwritten notes and carried a filofax organizer (see Wikipedia entry here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filofax). Truth be told, I still keep a daily agenda--mostly for work or appointments. There are calendar applications on the web, but I still keep something physical. When I write something on a daily planner or agenda, I'm more likely to remember it. Or if I don't remember the thing I wrote, I will remember that I wrote something down which will lead me to that thing that I wrote down.

Compared to the 90s, I write about my day much differently now--this blog is a less literal expression of things I want to occasionally capture about my daily life rather than a "Dear Diary" sort of thing. The point of this post is that I may revert back to that "Dear Diary" sort of thing through the daily devotional journal from my high school class. BUT it will not begin with "Dear Diary" nor will it have many trivial things in it (such as what I ate for lunch). Maybe a single important thing per day that is worth writing about. A little noteworthy fact about the daily devotional journal I have is that it has empty sections for "I am grateful for" and "Lord, I pray that"...what a beautiful way to examine one's daily life. Socrates once said that "the unexamined life is not worth living."

This doesn't imply that I will end this blog; it is, after all, a journal of sorts, isn't it? You may notice that I've added some Google AdSense here, but honestly, I have received zero-nil-zilch monetary benefits thus far (and that's since 2006!). So, you, my sparse readers can understand that this is meant more for capturing important thoughts than for anything  else. It may seem like a form of aggrandizement since it is publicly accessible, yet the truth is that this platform has a greater potential for longevity than paper. I just wish I knew how to save the contents. 

To end this post on a funny, nostalgic note...here's the inner front cover of my first diary with pasted cut-outs of celebrities I obviously had a crush on during that time. And by posting this, I am subjecting myself to various forms of judgment. Come on, I was a teenager. It was the 90s.

Here you go, presenting clockwise from the top: Joshua Jackson, Hugh Grant, Stephen Gately, and Scott Wolf. I was surprised that I didn't paste cut-outs of Brendan Fraser and Will Friedle....and if you're wondering where I got these, these were most likely from those Bop or Smash Hits magazines.

Since we're talking about diaries, how about listening to Bread's "Diary"?...Too much? Hah.

5 minutes

 

The condition is that once you opt for either, you must do it. Just 5 minutes for your well-being.

• Choice A: https://youtu.be/vZFYjKkZuuU
• Choice B: https://youtu.be/aPYmZOhJF5Q