Switch Off Sessions - The Good Life Well Lived

Welcome to the final epsiode of the Switch Off Sessions on The Good Life Well Lived podcast. In this episode we are going to pull together everything that we have learned throughout the series and use it to weave our own bespoke wellbeing parachute. Jon Kabat Zinn refers to 'weaving your parachute' in terms of mindfulness. By which he means, create the habit of a daily practice so that it is there to support you when you need it i.e. when you jump out of the airplane. In this episode I take the analogy further and encourage us all to create our own wellbeing plan to support us in all aspects of life so that we are best able to support ourselves in difficult times. 

Welcome to the ninth Switch Off Session on The Good Life Well Lived podcast. In this episode, I talk about the power of showing ourselves kindness and self-compassion to help quieten our busy mind. Often we would not talk to our worst enemy the way that way talk to ourselves. Our constant internal narrative makes it difficult to switch off and give ourselves some breathing space. In this episode I share tips to help you give yourself a break and switch off that voice in your head. 

Welcome to the eighth of the Switch Off Sessions on The Good Life Well Lived podcast. In this episode we are going to explore how you can identify relaxation techniques based on your own Myers Briggs Personality Preferences. For a lot of people, traditional relaxation techniques don't work and can often have the opposite effect. I share an anecdote about a friend who repeatedly went on spa days and would leave feeling more stressed than she started. By understanding our personality preferences (e.g. if you are an extrovert and get your energy from other people then don't expect to feel refreshed after a day of solitude) we can best create situations and experiences that we will find truly relaxing. 

Welcome to the seventh Switch Off Session on The Good Life Well Lived podcast. Today we are discussing the ultimate switch off tool, sleep. We cover the importance of sleep, the effect sleep has on our body and what we can do to make the most of our sleep.  

Welcome to the sixth of our Switch Off Sessions on The Good Life Well Lived Podcast.  I call our mobile phone the modern day pocket knife, incredibly useful but potentially dangerous in the wrong hands! In this episode we are talking about how we can learn to switch off from our mobile phones. I don't believe that it is helpful to or indeed necessary to switch off from our phones entirely but I do believe that we can use them in a more intentional and mindful way so that they add value rather than take over our life. 

Welcome to the fifth of the Switch Off Sessions on The Good Life Well Lived podcast.  In this episode, I share with you how you can create your own retreat from home. This is the perfect opportunity to create your own cozy, oasis of calm at home and immerse yourself in a bespoke retreat experience. It's the perfect way to switch off your busy mind and give yourself some breathing space. 

Welcome to the fourth episode of the Switch Off Sessions on The Good Life Well Lived Podcast. In this episode we talk about managing the mental load in the context of a pandemic. This time last year many of us found managing the day to day mental load of work, family and life management a heavy burden. In the Winter of 2020 that mental load weighs even more heavily on many of us. In this episode we discuss how we can give ourselves a break and allow ourselves to more effectively manage our many responsibilities. 

Welcome to the third of the Switch Off Session on The Good Life Well Lived podcast.  Working from home makes it even easier to blur the distinction between work and home life. In this episode we discuss how establishing morning, lunchtime and end of day routines can be a helpful way to create boundaries to clearly separate work time from leisure time. 

Welcome to the second episode of the Switch Off Sessions on The Good Life Well Lived podcast. There are more people working from home now than ever before and this is set to continue even after the Coronavirus restrictions are lifted. In this episode we share tips on how to separate work and home life so that the boundaries don't get blurred and you are able to switch off at the end of the working day.  This one is for you if you are new to working from home or if you have always worked from home and have had a new 'workmate' join you during the last six months. 

Welcome to Series 3 of The Good Life Well Lived Podcast, dedicated to the Switch Off Sessions, where I share tools, strategies, and ideas that you can use to disconnect from the noise and the busyness around you, so that you can be present and focus on what truly matters in our life, work and relationships.  In this series we cover: Tips to help you separate your work and home life Creating routines to help you have a structure in your day How to manage your mental load in times of a pandemic Creating your own home retreat  Digitally detoxing and switching off from technology The power of sleep and how to make the most of your sleep Finding relaxation techniques to match your personality preferences Being kind to yourself, even when you find it hard Weaving your own well-being plan to support and nourish you Make sure you subscribe to get access to weekly episodes.

If you don't know where you are going then how will you ever know if you get there? In today's episode I walk you through the process of creating your vision of a good life well lived and I also share four different ways that you can create a vision board so that you have a powerful tool to help you bring that vision to life.

Christmas shouldn't be another thing on the 'to do' list. It's a time to enjoy time with family, take some time out from your normal routine and to reflect on what is important to you. This week I share my top tips to help you have a stress free Christmas. 

We are WAY harder on ourselves than we are on other people. Why do we do it? That the topic of conversation this week on The Good Life Well Lived podcast. I share my reasons why I think this is the case and also give suggestions for what we can do to give ourselves a break. 

In this episode I walk you through how you can create a vision board that represents your good life well lived. I share four different ways that you can make a compelling vision board that will help bring your vision of a good life well lived into reality. 

Our brains are incredible. This week I share with you insights into an incredibly powerful part of your brain called the Reticular Activating System. When activated the RAS helps us to identify opportunities and resources to help us to get what you want from life. It is like having a superhero on your team to help you make your vision of a good life well lived a reality.

Today we discuss the power of writing down exactly what you want and I share evidence that reinforces the impact this can have.

A call to arms to take a leaf out of our fishy counterparts book and follow our goals with tenacity and determination. I share my observations of a salmon's river adventures and what we can all learn from them.

I catch up on where I've been over the summer, what's coming next for The Good Life Well Lived, some ridiculously exciting news (well I think so anyway) and how you can get involved with a free masterclass to help you create your vision for 2020 and beyond. 

Lisa Warner is the producer of A Life Full of Meaning vlog. A couple of years ago Lisa and her husband Glenn sold their house and possessions and moved on to a narrowboat called Nutshell. Lisa talks about what it’s really like to make such a massive life changing decision, why you don’t need to have it all planned out in advance and how she has to constantly check in with herself to make sure they actually are creating their life full of meaning and not getting sucked into the minutiae of day to day life.

Nina Grunfeld is an author, coach and founder of Life Clubs, practical workshops  and communities to help individuals and organisations become happier and more productive. Nina and I talk about developing the superpower of self awareness, how we all need to be kinder to ourselves and how sometimes you need to let life evolve and go with the flow rather than having on set path. Nina’s wisdom, experience, warmth and humanity shine through in this interview, you’re going to love listening to her.

The Mental Load. All the planning, organising, list making that you do to manage your life. The minutiae. The stuff you can't escape that if allowed to get out of control can suck you in and make you feel like you are sinking.  In this episode I share my tips on how you can lighten your mental load. You might not be able to escape from the mental load but you can learn how to manage it more effectively. 

Cat Rose, founder of The Creative Introvert talks about what introversion is and some of the misconceptions that people have about introversion. Being an introvert does not mean that you are shy, socially awkward and lock yourself away all day. As a fellow introvert Cat and I share ways that we manage our preference for introversion and how we get over our natural tendencies to show up for the things that are important for us. This is a great episode for you to listen to if you already know that you are an introvert or you suspect that you might be. And it’s also useful listening for the extraverts of the world to help them understand how the mind of an introvert works.  

Vicki Knights is a photographer, photography trainer and business mentor and host of the Shoot, Edit, Chat, Repeat podcast.  In this episode we are talking about the important role that photography can play in our good life well lived and why photography is not just about taking photos. We cover a wide range of topics in this episode, from using photography as a tool for mindfulness to creating magic memories with photos and create memories of the experience of a photoshoot as well as the photos that are created. She also encourages those of us that are camera shy to get over ourselves and get in front of the camera and she shares some powerful research on the impact of family photographs on our children’s self esteem.

Sarupa Shah, otherwise known as The Soul Agent works with people all around the world helping them to improve their relationship with money so that they can live a life of abundance and freedom and is a columnist with Spirit and Destiny magazine under the title of The Abundance Aunt. In this episode we talk about how the stories we tell ourselves about money influence our thinking and our expectations around money, some of the common money blocks people face and how to start to recognise these blocks in our own life and take the first steps to overcoming them.

Cara de Lange is the founder of Softer Success and author of the book Softer Success: Prevent Burnout, Find Balance, Re-define Your Success. Cara runs workshops and talks focusing on relieving stress and changing people's mindset to prevent burnout. Having experienced her own personal burnout Cara helps people to slow down, tune in and develop wellbeing strategies.  In this episode she shares some simple wellbeing strategies that we can all adopt to help us prevent burnout and enhance our good life well lived.

Louise Goss, a journalist, founder of the The Homeworker magazine and online community. For lots of people working from home in a flexible way is either a big part of their good life well lived or something that they aspire to in order to enhance their good life well lived. Louise has created her magazine The Homework to inspire, encourage and motivate those of us that do work from home. In this episode we talk about the phenomenal growth in the number of people that work from home, what the reality actually looks like rather than the idealistic fantasy of complete freedom and flexility and Louse shares some fabulous advice on how overcome some of those challenges of working independently from home. .

Adele Stickland is a Fitness and nutrition coach, founder of the Get Gorgeous community and author of the newly released book Get Gorgeous. In this episode we talk about her ethos for looking and feeling fantastic every day. Adele also busts some of the myths and conflicting advice that we receive from the diet industry. A must listen if you want more energy and vitality to help you have a good life and live it well.

Sarah Cornforth, otherwise known as The Magical Creatrix, is an artist and the Founder of Live Your Life By The Moon.  Earlier this year I became interested in lunar cycles and how our energy changes at different points of the lunar cycle and when I came across Sarah I jumped at the chance to interview her. We structure our work and our life around the Gregorian calendar, set resolutions on the 1st January and set goals and objectives at the start of each calendar month. Sarah shares why this isn’t necessarily the right way to organise our time and how we can better work with our energy levels if we follow lunar cycles rather than traditional months.  I found the idea of working with the moon utterly fascinating and it’s something that I’m going to try out for myself. Have a listen and see if it might work for you too.

Gratitude. A simple concept with extraordinary results. In this episode we discuss the power of taking time to be grateful for all that we have in life. I also share scientific evidence that reinforces that gratitude is not just a 'good practice' it makes a tangible impact on our personal wellbeing. 

In the true spirit of mindfulness we must focus on the present moment. Not worrying about the past or anticipating the future. By focusing on the present moment we will be able to embrace all that happens as life unfolds each day. This is your encouragement to enjoy each step on your journey of a good life well lived. It's the journey not the destination that matters. 

If you died tomorrow what would you regret? A fairly morbid question but an important one. In this episode I encourage you to focus your attention on the people that matter the most to you and make sure that you are spending time with those people. No excuses allowed because I want to make sure that you have no regrets. 

Jacinda Ardern, Prime Minister of New Zealand, Mother, Leader,  symbol of compassion and empathy, a true role model. In this episode I discuss how we can ALL learn from Jacinda and show a little more compassion and empathy to those round about us.

Once you have figured out what you want from your 'one wild and previous life', you need to do the work to make it happen. Every single day. In this episode we talk about doing the work that matters to you, staying motivated and never underestimating the power of taking small steps. 

You have choices. No matter what situation you are in or how stuck you feel there are always choices.  In this episode we talk about taking responsibility and embracing your power to make the best choice for you. It's time to pull up your big girl pants and go after the things that really matter to you. 

We spend much of our time trying to fix ourselves when actually nothing is broken. What would it feel like if we accepted ourselves exactly as we are? In this episode I share insights and exercises to help you appreciate yourself for the perfectly imperfect person that you are. You can expect a greater appreciation for yourself, your talents and even your quirks. 

The most downloaded episode of the year was an interview with Shivonne Graham, the Director of Fundraising, Marketing and Communication at Women for Women International. In this episode we talk about the great work that Women for Women International do to support women in countries that are affected by conflict. We also discuss the lessons we all can learn from these incredible women and how while we may come from very different social and geographical backgrounds, we have more in common that that which divides us. I hope that you enjoy listening to this episode as much as I enjoyed recording it. Women for Women is an incredible charity but over and above that Shivonne is a truly inspirational lady, who without a doubt is living her own version of a good life well lived

The Good Life Well Lived Podcast is one year old today!  In this episode Nicola shares the highs and lows of creating the podcast and also gives you a loving kick up the backside to encourage you to follow your passions and get your work out into the world.

Beatrix Schmidt is a sleep coach, speaker and author of The Sleep Deep Method.  She specialises in helping people with insomnia by helping them to make changes to all aspects of their lifestyle and she believes that sleep is a skill that can be developed, by anyone and at any time of life. This episode will be of particular interest to those that suffer from insomnia or have friends and family that suffer from insomnia. But even if you are not personally impacted by insomnia Beatrix shares some great advice that we can all take on board to help us to sleep better and have more energy and vitality.  

Jo Gifford helps amazing people to unbox their brilliance and get their message out into the world.  Jo juggles all of the projects that she does around her twin girls and also manages a number of chronic health conditions. In this episode we talk about what it’s really like to live with chronic health conditions and Jo shares amazing actionable tips on how to conserve and maintain energy and really look after ourselves in the best way possible. Jo is a real inspiration to me and I know to many others, I know that if you are managing long term health conditions that you will be uplifted and inspired but even if you are lucky enough to be in good health Jo’s advice on how to make the juggle a reality is amazing and well worth a listen.  

Severine Nemen is a Nutritional Therapist and motivational Health Coach who helps her clients to boost their levels of energy and drop unwanted weight by changing their relationship with food and making better food and lifestyle decisions.  In order to have a good life well lived we need to have sufficient energy to do all of the things that are important to us.   In this episode Severine shares some practical strategies that we can all put in place to help us boost and better manage our energy levels.

I am joined by Scott Newby the managing director of NewbyCore Consulting, an employee engagement and wellbeing consultancy based in Edinburgh. He is also the author of mental health blog Me, My Mind and I and the driving force behind a new mental health social media campaign to encourage us to spend more time talking to each other. In this episode we talk about how to support our own mental health and what organisations can do to encourage good mental health among their employees

I'm joined by Stefanie Fowler, owner of ‘Fanny’s Real Fitness’, which offers personal training and nutrition coaching and the author of www.fannysrealfood.com a food blog providing hundreds of healthy recipes and tips and advice for a healthy lifestyle.  Stefanie is uber practical and down to earth and is able to demystify a lot of the conflicting health advice and get to the root of what is really required to have a healthy lifestyle.

Life can be frustrating! In today's episode I share one very simple hack that you can use to eliminate 99% of life's frustrations. Mastering this skill has been my biggest learning point and allowed me a massive mindset shift and I can't wait to share it with you. 

If you are thinking of New Year Resolutions then setting yourself some health and fitness goals will probably be high up your agenda. A couple of months ago I decided to try out the 30 Days of Yoga Challenge with Adriene Michler and it was a revelation. Not only did I start a daily yoga practice but I learned a lot about myself in the process. Today I share with you what I learned, some of it might surprise you!

It's now time for something completely different and something of an experiment. A simple exercise that shows how five minutes can change your day. 

Bruce Daisley is European Vice-President for Twitter, host of the UK's number one business podcast Eat Sleep Work Repeat and the author of The Joy of Work: 30 Ways to Fix Your Work Culture and Fall In Love With Your Job.  We spend a third of our lives at work so if we are to have a good life well lived then it's important that we enjoy and are fulfilled by the work that we do.    In this episode Bruce shares his insights and tips into how we can all fall in love with our job again. What I particularly like about Bruce's approach is that he wants to empower individuals within organisations to take action rather than wait for their employers to tell them how they are going to make their working life better. Talking to Bruce was fascinating and he shares important lessons on how to enjoy our work more, whether we are employed or work for ourselves.

In this episode I share how to have a stress free, calm Christmas. It's the 'most wonderful time of the year'. A time to take a break from routine, connect with family and friends and have some fun. Yet sometimes the 'most wonderful time of the year' can feel like the 'most stressful time of the year'. Finishing off work before the holidays + back to back social events + family commitments + Christmas shopping = Stress, Overwhelm and Exhaustion. The desire to be all things to all people can leave us feeling like we are not good enough in any department. I share my top seven tips to help you have a stress free Christmas. Listen all the way to the end where I share a free tool that you can use to help you find a breathing space and get perspective this festive season.

Jo Dodds is a productivity and wellbeing specialist.   We talk about a topic very close to my heart and that is productivity and getting stuff done.   We are busier now than we ever have been before.  Having systems and strategies that we can use to be productive and get things done is vital so that we can have more time to focus on the things that matter to us. In this episode Jo shares: What the busy, stressed and overwhelmed have in common How to get clear on what you really want from life (and why this is so important) Why motivation to be productive is a myth Her top productivity tips to help you get things done with ease How systems can save the day, even if you are not a naturally organised person

Paul Jarvis. Paul is the author of Company of One, a book about why staying small is the next big thing for business. His writing, and in fact all of his work, focus on the view that business growth isn't always good and isn't always required. I have followed Paul for a while and he is a true inspiration and a man who lives life on his own terms. In this episode we talk about: The importance of creating our own definition of success Why business owners really need to know when enough is enough How to block out the 'noise' from other people and stick to your own path Being brave and constructing a life that works for you Why it's often the simple things that mean the most to us

Kirsty Bowman-Vaughan, Deputy Head of Strategy and Innovation at the Money Advice Servic shares her top money money management tips for a good life well lived. I can almost hear the intake of breath as you read this.  Money? Money? We're British we don't talk about money?!?  Well, in this episode we are talking about money.  In fact all of this week (12th-16th November 2018) the Money Advice Service are hosting an event, Talk Money to encourage us to talk more freely about money, debt and financial planning. Kirsty shares her advice and tips to help you get into the best financial shape possible and also gives insights into how we can all encourage the younger generation to become more financially savvy and more comfortable and capable talking about money.

Does it ever feel like everyone around you has totally got their act together while you have no clue what you are doing? if so then this week's episode is for you! You might look at people with an active social life, or who exercise every day or who are making great advances in their career and think. How on earth are they able to do that and I am just about keeping my head above water?  If you have children this feeling can intensify even more. You can barely peel your kids away from the screen and you are being met with images of your friends kids getting their PB in a cross country run or coming top of their class in Mandarin lessons. I am going to give you the straight, honest, answer that you seriously need to hear about why everybody else has their act together and you don't.