Yoga, meditation, long hot baths. When you hear the word 'wellbeing' that might be what you imagine. Mind Maps? perhaps not. However we are passionate advocates for their value, and we believe that they can be powerful tools for decluttering our minds and helping to reduce anxiety.Clear Your HeadPicture the scene: it's long past midnight. You came to bed early, hoping for a good night's sleep, but so far all you've done is toss and turn, worrying about, well, everything. Work, family, health, that stupid joke you tried to make to your cute new colleague. Every time you close your eyes another thought pops into your head and sets you off on another round of angst. Between 30-40% of people report having sleep difficulties, and one of the most commonly cited reasons is struggling to 'switch off'. The good news is that there are some simple things that you can do to prevent this.Research has shown that spending some time writing down your thoughts before bed can help you get that elusive 'good night's sleep'. The explanations around why this is the case remain somewhat hazy, but scientists have suggested that it helps us to 'off-load' these thoughts from our minds, which helps us to relax. Importantly, a study in Texas found that this is most effective when individuals map out a 'to-do' list for the following day, rather than just focusing on events that have already happened. This is because tasks that are unfinished remain at a heightened activation level in our brains, leading to heightened levels of worry, in comparison to tasks that have been completed. The other finding from this study was that the more specific you are in writing out your to-do list, the bigger the impact it will have on your ability to fall asleep quickly. Enter: Mind Maps. These are perfect for identifying all of the different tasks that you have to do, and then adding in more specific detail to break these down further.view mindmapChallenge Negative ThoughtsYou may have heard of cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), which is an approach designed to help individuals to identify and change unhelpful thought patterns and the behaviours that accompany these. These could be thoughts which catastrophize ("I haven't responded to that email from my boss yet- maybe she'll fire me!"); those that focus only on negatives ("Kim said that the blue shirt doesn't suit me and I should wear the red one because I look good in it. I can't believe she said the blue one doesn't suit me. Have I put on weight?"); or those that always assume that you are to blame for something that's gone wrong ("Buster found a chocolate bar in the road and now he has to go to the vets. It's all my fault- I should have been watching him more closely"). Whilst we would advise seeking professional support to anyone who's struggling, there are some simple and effective things that anyone can do at home to challenge these thoughts and begin to develop more helpful thought patterns and responses.A key part of this is to question the negative thoughts that we have:is the thought true?Is our worry valid?Is it based on external information from other people, or just from our own internal dialogue?How likely is it that our imagined situation will become reality?What has happened in similar situations in the past?Using the answers to these questions we can reframe our thoughts to more accurately reflect reality, rather than allowing our anxieties to spiral out of control. Mind Maps and flowcharts can be a great way of working through this: breaking down our worries into those that are valid, and those that are distorted or exaggerated. They can also be used to map out potential scenarios, in order to minimise anxiety about them, and they are a good way to track and identify triggers for our anxieties, and our helpful and unhelpful behavioural responses to those.view flow chartview flow chartMake Time for YourselfMy current, 'personal' to-do list for today looks like this:Family food shopOrder father's day cardBook vet appointmentPhone JohnBake birthday cake for HannahI call it my 'personal' to-do list, as opposed to my 'work' to-do list, and yet all of those tasks are for someone else's benefit, not my own. It's easy to spend a lot of time thinking about, and doing, things for others and it can be a lot harder to make time to do things that benefit ourselves. It can also be easy to fall into a trap of focusing too much on one aspect of our lives, for example our work, and not make enough time for other aspects. Creating a visual representation of who you consider yourself to be as a person, and the different things that you enjoy doing, can be an important way to help you keep balance in your life and make sure that you're making time for self-care.view mind mapThe take-away message here? Not only are Mind Maps fun and pretty, they can also support your mental health.Posted by Catherine, May 13th 2020
