Tag: noticing

Seven Things Christine Noticed On Her Sunday Walk
dogs · fitness · walking · winter

Seven Things Christine Noticed On Her Sunday Walk

Christine Hennebury

I left my hatphones at home yesterday because I wanted to have a quiet walk instead of my usual podcast/book listening time.

And besides it just felt like a good day for noticing stuff so I decided to lean into that.

I’m not making this into a lesson in mindfulness or anything but as I was walking, I found it fun to make a list of seven things I noticed as I went along.

And maybe it’s related, maybe it’s a coincidence, but yesterday’s walk did feel more like ‘taking a breather’ than other recent walks have felt.

1) What are my feet doing?

Even though I have been consciously working on it, I realized that I was walking more on the inside edge of my foot today.

So, having noticed, I gave a little thought to walking on the ‘four corners’ of my feet like the YouTube yoga instructors say.

My legs enjoyed the change.

2) How am I breathing?

The ‘four corners’ prompt made me think about my breathing – I’m slowly working on breathing into the sides of my ribs as well as the front and back.

I think someone I follow on Instagram refers to that as ‘breathing on four sides’ but there’s a decent chance I extrapolated that description from something else they said. My brain likes making those kind of leaps.

So, having noticed my breathing, I kept checking in with myself throughout my walk. I wasn’t doing it continuously but it felt good to return to it over and over.

3) Do we have time to stop for a pat or two?

Usually, Khalee and I take the business of walking VERY seriously.

A dog on a leash stands on a sidewalk next to some snow
Khalee is deciding what to sniff next. Image description: Khalee, a medium-sized dog with light brown fur on top and white fur on her paws, belly, ruff and snout, is standing next to some gritty looking snow on a sidewalk. Her body is pointed away from the camera but she is facing a little to the right.

That doesn’t mean we take ourselves too seriously overall but it does mean that walks are about her getting to sniff everything. Walks are not about exercise, they are not about stopping to chat, they are about Khalee’s sniff opportunities and we only stop for her to, ahem, answer calls of nature.

Yesterday though, because I was really in a noticing frame of mind, and because it was warm enough that I didn’t need to wear gloves, I got Khalee to stop so I could pat her head and scratch behind her ears.

Shockingly, she is as soft and furry and great mid-walk as she is when she is curled up next to me at home. And she was very tolerant of my compliments even though she had to pause her sniff-mission in order to receive them.

4) No gloves and borrowed clothes

I love being able to go for a walk without having to put on gloves or snowpants. I did still wear a hat though…my husband’s hat, in fact. And this is his spare jacket, too. It was a borrow-stuff-from-Steve kind of day, apparently.

A selfie of a middle-aged woman in an orange coat and blue winter hat
Guess who left her glasses on the counter? Yep, it was me! I brought my smirk though. Image description: a selfie I took on the sidewalk not too far from my house. It’s a grey day and there is snow behind me next to the sidewalk. I am wearing a blue winter hat that says ‘Fastsigns. More than fast. More than signs.’ on the folded edge, and I am wearing a dark orange jacket with a hood. I’m a middle-aged white woman with a round face, I’m smirking in the photo but it’s a friendly sort of smirk.

5) Decorations are cheery, even out of season

Lots of people still have Xmas decorations up in their trees, on their lawns, and on their railings and I’m happy about it even though they are technically out of season. I’m sure there are lots of reasons they have been left up but today I decided they were left up for me to enjoy and I felt grateful about it.

I also felt grateful for the few houses that have hearts decorating their windows and I decided that I’ll going to put some heart decorations up in my window too. Even though I live on a cul-de-sac and few people go walking past my house, maybe they will cheer someone up.

6) A lot of people in my neighbourhood have wood stoves or outdoor fire pits

My walk was regularly punctuated by the welcoming smell of wood fires.

Every time I smelled a new one, I sent the people a little wish for good company, good comfort, and good snacks around that fire.

Maybe that’s a weird thing to do but that’s exactly the kind of thing that I do all the time. Probably best to get used to it.

7) I delight in unexpected greenery

Apparently one of the houses on my route – a house I have passed almost daily since last June – has ivy on the side of it.

Okay, it may not be ivy, I’m not up on these things, but the the fact remains that there is a house on my walk that has greenery covering a side wall and I have never noticed before.

I could only snap a quick photo because of the aforementioned sniffing business (the sniffing needs to get done and I do NOT want that task to fall to me!) but look at that wall of greenery! Isn’t that marvellous?

A side wall of a house covered in greenery
You’ll probably have to zoom in to see clearly, this is a quick iPhone shot. Image description: a photo taken across the street shows a wall of a brick house that is covered in greenery (ivy maybe?) The house is only partially visible behind a snowbank and the photo was taken at an angle that minimizes the possibility for recognizing the location.

I don’t know why I haven’t noticed (or maybe I noticed and forgot?) There’s a dog near this spot that is sometimes off-leash and Khalee gets a little ansty about that. And there’s often someone out front in another house nearby and I often say hi to them. And I guess this spot is shaded by trees in the summer. Could be lots of reasons I haven’t noticed before but I was happy to notice today.

(Also, why is still so green? Is this a vine-based evergreen? Clearly, there is more to discover here!)

ANYWAY!

The long and the short of it was that Sunday’s walk was especially good and I enjoyed myself immensely.

Khalee says that the slightly warmer weather meant that she had some especially good sniffs.

We thought you’d want to know. 😉

A dog sniffing the snow-covered ground
For some reason that part of the snow required extra sniffing. Let’s not speculate as to why. Image description: a side view of Khalee’s shoulders, head, and front paws. She’s a medium-sized dog with light-brown and white fur and she is leaning her head forward so she can sniff the snow-covered ground intently.

Go Team! January 14: What can you notice?
fitness · habits · motivation · self care

Go Team! January 14: What can you notice?

Christine Hennebury

When I was doing yesterday’s video from Yoga with Adriene’s current series ‘Move’ and she reminded us to pay attention to HOW we were moving I suddenly realized that I have a lot more mobility in my upper back that I did when I started the series.

It has only been 12 days of practice so I wasn’t expecting any results yet. I doubt that there’s any visible change in my movements or my mobility but something good is definitely happening. And if Adriene hadn’t prompted me to notice, I may not have felt that extra mobility right at the base of my neck.

That feeling, in turn, prompted me to notice a few more differences in my movements. My ankles are moving with slightly more ease. It’s a little easier for me to go deeper into downward dog. All kinds of small differences that I hadn’t recognized until I was prompted to notice.

So, I wanted to prompt you to notice some small things about your practice today.

Is there anything different about how you are sitting in meditation? How does your body feel while you are there? Are your thoughts behaving any differently?

If you have a physical practice, have you noticed any differences in your movements or in your strength? You probably aren’t breaking any world records at this point but I’ll bet some things feel a bit easier or more natural or at least little less hard.

If you are trying to rest more or to be more mindful, can you notice any difference in the details of your practice?

If you are at the ‘trying to figure things out’ stage, have you noticed any softening around your concept of what would be useful to do? Or around your steps toward clearing time or space for your planned routines? Is your brain starting to maybe, perhaps, kind of, work its way around to considering the idea of making a low-key plan?

It’s worth your time and energy to notice any and all changes that you are experiencing.

This is part of focusing on the process of change rather than on a specific result. Noticing and celebrating positive changes (or noticing and adjusting things that aren’t working) lets you be more in charge of your routines (notice that I didn’t say in control!) and shifts your focus away from a distant future and into what’s happening today.

Noticing lets you celebrate every stage of expanding your comfort zone.**

It lets you enjoy even the smallest difference in your capacity, ability, or strength.

And even though your efforts ALWAYS count, having a little bit of evidence can really reinforce that message.

So, Team, today, I invite you to notice even the smallest of changes and celebrate them.

Whether you sat for an extra second of meditation before checking the timer, or you took one extra step, or your outstretched fingers are one iota closer to your toes. Or if your hips are more comfortable when you sit down, or you have a little more energy in the afternoon, or you feel a bit calmer behind the wheel. It all matters, it all counts, and it is all worth noticing.

To celebrate your small efforts, your small victories, and your small changes, here are three small gold stars that I drew earlier today. I had so much fun with yesterday’s burst of creativity that I decided to give it another whirl today.

A small ink drawing of three stacks of coloured shapes on strings with a gold star at the end of each one. The background is white with green dots.
Apparently, these drawings on strings are called dangles, which I think is a fun name for them. Image description: A drawing I made of three gold stars on individual strings. Each star has a small stack of shapes on top of it, an orange triangle, a purple square, and a red circle, in a different order. The background is white speckled with green.

*I like to consider myself as expanding my comfort zone rather than stepping outside of it. I know it is really a matter of semantics but word choice matters (it matters A LOT to me.) The idea of expanding my zone of comfort has a lot more appeal than being forced outside of that zone. I can tolerate discomfort in the name of growth but I sure as hell don’t want to be told that I have to leave all comfort behind in the process. Your mileage may vary so feel free to expand your comfort zone or to step outside if it, whichever works for you!

About the Go Team! posts:

For the second year in a row, I’ll be posting a Go Team! message every day in January to encourage us as we build new habits or maintain existing ones. It’s cumbersome to try to include every possibility in every sentence so please assume that I am offering you kindness, understanding, and encouragement for your efforts right now. You matter, your needs matter, and your efforts count, no matter where you are applying them. You are doing the best you can, with the resources you have, in all kinds of difficult situations and I wish you ease. ⭐💚 PS – Some of the posts for this year may be similar to posts from last year but I think we can roll with it.