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In today’s world calm has become a buzzword, calm parenting, calm meditation, inner calm etc. Why is everybody so fascinated with this? Well, I have realized the importance of calm in my life. I have never really felt calm throughout my life until 3 years back. The first time I experienced it was during my yoga classes and meditation. I wanted to change my life, change the way I used to look at life. It was pretty much mundane.

The experience of a calm mind was totally new to me. My mind has always been overactive, rather “hyperactive” in my husband’s words. I never even thought I could actually understand what’s going on in my mind and inside of me. By adopting calmness I have been able to manage the chaos around me much better.

I learned mindfulness and started practicing it. It was amazing. I slowly started teaching mindfulness to others and children. Then I moved on to various activities to bring my calm. Today if I am a coach, I will totally credit it to these activities which have actually shaped me.

I am starting off a series of DIY calming activities. Not everyone can spend a lot of time meditating, neither can I. So I am going to share all the activities that have brought calm inside me. You could use any of it or a mix of them.

Before we move on to the activities, let me share few benefits of being calm.

Better Focus:  Staying calm helps in increasing our focus better. We tend to have lesser distractions.

Notice Around: When the chaos inside is reduced, we will be in a better position to notice all the things around us. I have seen so many people, even if we cross them and go they would not know.

Eat Right: The awareness inside prevents us from eating junk and ensures we eat right and on time. Food habits become healthy.

Great Relationships: Our socializing skills are enhanced and we tend to have very good relationships within and outside our family.

Better Decisions: With a clear mind all the decisions that we would be taking would be correct. There will not be a need to revisit or review any decisions taken.

Right Perspective: Our perspective of life would be perfect. There will not be any assumptions or mistakes. We will never react instantly for anything, which might be regretted later.

Manage Emotions: Emotions play a key role in everybody’s life and if we know the art of managing it, we would become perfect. A calm mind helps in understanding everything that is happening around us with better clarity.

Clear Communication: When there is clarity inside, there would be clarity in the way we communicate. We would be able to say and do things the exact way it needs to be done.

More Sustainable: We would become more sustainable in all our efforts. Whether it be for the environment or ourselves.

Now to start off on the calming series, here is the first one.

Calming Activity 1 : DIY Mandalas

The word “mandala” is Sanskrit meaning circle. The mandala designs are circular, representing the circle of life. There is a center point, which I look at as my inner self. Then come the rest of the circles which represent my outer body, family, earth, cosmic etc. It is a psychological expression of the totality of the self.

There are a lot of studies, which says that we are born to look at circles and curves. The ability to recognize circles is built into our visual apparatus. Circles look the same from all sides, which means the brain does not need to do any intermediate processing to recognize a circle. Also because our eyeballs are spherical, our visual field is circular. This is why at an infant stage vision becomes an important part of senses development. The infant at this stage is able to connect to the self and creates a self-image.

How mandalas bring calm? Drawing these circular mandals take us back to our sense of self. It helps us orient ourselves. The orderly pattern of the mandala drawings tries to align and order our thoughts. As we keep repeating designs around the circle, our focus is strengthened. The intricate style of the mandala helps us see the finer things around us and make us a better person altogether.

I have done a simpler version of a mandala just to show you how to do it. The design can be anything or even repeated many times in different parts. Just keep sometime during the day to do this and you will be able to taste calm.

Await my other calming activities and do share your comments on which one suits you better.

Calmness brings in a great level of satisfaction and will enable you to live Lifefuly.