Be Calm

The great little nap

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The need to catch up on sleep is on every woman’s lips these days.  Between juggling kids, aging parents, home, chores, work, and who knows what else, the last thing we experience is proper sleep.

We hear many women laughingly talk about being forgetful, misplacing the keys, forgetting their own heads if it wasn’t screwed on straight!   All signs of little sleep and one of the symptoms of burnout.

So bring on the power nap!?  I read this little article in RealAge the other day and thought I’d pass it on.  Give the advice a try—I know one of my clients swears by napping!

Improve Memory with a Power Nap*

You could improve memory skills with this brilliant little habit: power napping.

In a study, people who took a power nap after learning a new task performed 50% better than the non-nappers when they were later given a test on the task.

Power Nap, Total Recall

The process of making memories is complicated. And new memories are the most fragile. But in the study, researchers discovered that nappers who got quality deep sleep (slow-wave sleep) during their naps learned new material much better compared with the sleep-deprived participants. Scientists think something about deep sleep helps new memories encode into higher brain regions where memories become more permanent.

Something About Sleep

Getting 7 to 8 hours of sleep each night is a good health goal. It boosts your immune system, helps control stress levels, and may even be essential in keeping your heart and other body parts healthy. And a power nap every now and then can be a good way to catch up on lost ZZZs — not only to improve memory and keep your mind sharp, but also to help you reach your immune-system-supporting, stress-reducing [optimum].

*(from Improve Memory with a Power Nap – RealAge.com)

Ps: at the end, not included here, it said proper sleep can trim 1.5 years off your real age!  I’m in, night-night ladies

The Burnout Queensxx

Thinking like Marlene Dietrich

marlene dietrich

Filling up your schedule because you thrive on being busy or you just don’t have another choice between the demands and challenges of home and work can wear you out and wear you down. 3 words come to mind:  exhaustion, irritation and burnout.

Making time for yourself, having solitude, is beneficial to both your physical and mental wellbeing. Spending time alone can improve stress and tension, enhance creativity, and aid problem solving.  Even personal relationships can benefit from you taking some time alone.

Obviously then, taking guilt-free downtime is definitely worthwhile. Miss Dietrich knew the benefits of ‘being alone’. Now let’s find ways you can benefit from your own alone time:

  1. Make solitude a regular part of your day or week. Schedule periods of time for yourself that you can count on.
  2. Maybe you already have times in your day when you are alone, taking a shower, walking the dog. Treat these as opportunities to relax rather than seeing them as “chores”.
  3. Taking the bus or tube instead of driving to work can offer a brief respite from stress and time to catch up on reading or listening to music.
  4. If you work outside the home, make lunchtime your digital downtime by leaving the mobile phone at the office

These easy solutions just take a decision to create less pressure and more ease in your life. Go for it.  All you have to lose is the exhaustion, irritation and burnout!

Grab life by the crown!

The Burnout Queens xx

Be the Queen is taking off

ebookcover150We’ve had a lot of women signing up for their free copy of our beautiful new eBook

Be the Queen of Calm, Cool & Collected! 60 tips to help you live with less pressure and more ease.

And we are excited to hear which tips are being used to great success.  Here’s our initial few emails and feedback.  Feel free to add your inspiration!

Tip 16: (If you smell burning rubber it’s time to shift gears) was so simple to get my head around.  I’m shifting and feeling the relief, Ta!

Tip 58 (Forget Work/Life Balance) Such easy questions to make it really, really clear what I need to change right now.  Thanks for this.

We KNOW our tips are useful and easy to apply.  We designed them with ‘busy’ in mind.  What’s we’d like you to know is just ONE tip can start you on a wonderful path to changing your life for the better, forever!

Powerful because you, dear one, are important

Keep your feedback coming.  We welcome all your comments and responses.  We love seeing women change and grow their lives.

If you want to join the growing community of smart women using easy tips to create some ease in their stressful lives, grab your free copy and Be the Queen of Calm, Cool & Collected!

The Burnout Queens xx

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