Metro Relationship

METROPOLITAN MARRIAGE & FAMILY THERAPY, PLLC

9 Tactics for weathering your quarantine

9 Tactics for weathering your quarantine

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It is a crazy time in the world, and it behooves us to take care of ourselves well to properly weather this storm and come out as unscathed as possible after this is over. Let’s make smart decisions and set ourselves up to actually thrive. Yes? Let’s do this also!

The coronavirus pandemic is impacting every thread in the fabric of our lives from where and how we work, to how our kids are educated, to how much internet bandwidth we need, to what food we have available, to how we entertain ourselves. Even to how much toilet paper we have to wipe our butts. LOL (a little humor never hurts!)

How we initially choose to respond to this challenge will have a trickling effect in all areas of our lives. While we don’t want to overreact, be alarmists, and trigger panic, we do want to be responsible in all our actions and decisions.

It goes without saying that some behaviors and reactions are just not acceptable – like racial distancing, violent, illegal, and completely immature behaviors. There are some crazy arrest stories in the news. Seriously? 

For those that have been lagging in taking this situation seriously because “you are not worried”, you are putting yourself and others at risk. You don’t have to believe this is a dire situation if you don’t want to. But why not be proactive and responsible, nonetheless. Just in case. There is nothing to lose in been precautious. The saying, better be safe than sorry came to be for a reason…

For example, I rarely come down with anything or get sick. Therefore, I’m not one to worry about getting sick. I can be exposed to sick people and not catch what they have (or at least not be symptomatic!). Yet, I moved all our in-person sessions online to protect clients from each other. Also, I could be a carrier and infect others and not even know it. So, I’m doing my part in reducing the chances of additional spread.

Thus, being proactive and responsible means: Self-quarantining at any indication of exposure or infection. It means avoiding unnecessary risks and practicing conscientious Social Distancing with respect and compassion. It means following all the guidelines presented by authorities, and where we believe they are lagging taking our own preventative actions.

We do have the whole world east of us exemplifying what to expect. We are smart, we can make our own inferences. We don’t have to wait for all planes to get grounded to cancel travel plans or for other govermental measures. It is our responsibility to enact personal agency and take proactive initiative for our own and others safety.

Once you are onboard with doing your part in the face of craziness, the next thing is to set yourself up to seamlessly weather the storm. I’ll even go as far as suggesting, to make the most of this situation and look for possible opportunities to enhance your and your loved ones’ lives in the end…

From Surviving to Thriving…

  1. Setting up your family: With everybody in the family possibly being stuck at home for the next couple to few weeks, adjust your daily routine, home spaces and activities to account for all family members’ needs.

You might want to get up earlier to take care of chores and other responsibilities that would take longer to do with everyone underfoot. You might build in special lunch and snack times. You might want to tweak the night routine to still mark transition times but make them more soothing and attuned…

  1. Working from home: When working from home coordinate work schedules and childcare coverage with other adults (partner, family member, friend, nanny/sitter – swap favors even…) to maximize productivity and great care. Don’t try to juggle both. This creates overwhelm, chaos, reactivity, acting out, anxiety, stress, and exhaustion…

Be flexible on how you tackle your “work hours”. Depending on the nature of your work, discuss with your supervisor a flexible plan to “put in your time” and get your work done that’s not necessarily the traditional 9-5.

If regular office hours presence is required, discuss covering the 9-5 in shifts by your teammates or coworkers and to have meetings scheduled during certain times of the day to allow for more flexibility for everyone. Other work can be completed off hours as needed.

  1. Getting work done: Also, when working from home, protect your work time by allocating a workspace that’s free from distractions. If you live in close quarters get creative on how to create a reduced distraction space and time-chunks…

Of course tackle all the other practicalities – have supplies and everything you need in one place and organized, have passwords and access to all platforms and accounts handy, use online shared spaces/apps to collaborate, up your internet speed, upgrade your software as necessary, and have a backup system in place.

This will eliminate multitasking, lack of focus and frustrations helping manage stress and time wasters and increase productivity. You might get your work done quicker and actually free up time…

  1. Kids schoolwork: Just like you are setting yourself up to be productive with work, you have to do the same for school age children. They might require different supervision during “schoolwork” time than during “free-time”. This is to be managed by the “covering” adult. Use your judgement on who covers what time during the days…

Also, set up children for cooperation. Explain that this is serious, and they are expected to cooperate, behave and be responsible for themselves and their work. This might be a good time to revisit your parenting style, how you discipline, guide/teach, support, encourage and inspire your children…

Be careful not to be too different from the usual as that’ll create more resistance and potential acting out. Keep things light, simple, and reassuring while providing guidelines and structure. Children do best when they know what’s expected and what’s going to happen. Layout the day in front of them to create security. Remember, they are affected by the upheaval too. Praise and celebrate cooperation.

  1. Creating flow: Aside from managing routines and time, you can manage and use your space to flow through the day with more ease. Use different parts of your home (even if different corners of a room…) for different types of activities.

Designate rooms or spots for work, schoolwork, projects, fun and play, downtime and relaxation and such. This helps the brain get with the program and cooperate. This helps manage mood, focus, energy, etc.

  1. Beyond the basics: Outside of responsibilities and doing the business of life, here is where things can get really amazing… This is where we can look for possibilities for great things to come from these tough times. The silver lining if you may. I see people bogging out about having to entertain children longer than usual. This is where we can be role models, inspire and help them thrive.

Aside from looking for more toys, games, crafts, TV shows and movies, and gaming apps, how about looking for opportunities for growth and development – this can range from learning how to play an instrument, explore a new language or culture, binge watch the science, history or documentary channels, focus on an interest, take on a new hobby, etc.

This can go as far as taking a talent or gift, such as music, art, writing, entrepreneurship, technology, debate, caring for others or anything else and creating a project of it. The project can be just for kicks or for higher accomplishment and impact. The sky is the limit. This is specially a great idea for middle and high schoolers. They can take something on and get consumed with it…

  1. Enjoying connection: Another terrific benefit of this imposed togetherness is the togetherness… LOL We usually have such filled and hectic lives that we don’t slow down enough to Be with each other. With less extracurricular activities, commitments, events, travel, commuting, etc. We have more free time in our hands and more free time with each other.

I know this is scary for most… But this is a gem when done properly… Create specific times that are designated family and couple time regardless that you are all together all the time… The different designation implies different focus, energy, activities and such. This is how you’ll move from a blob of togetherness and potentially getting on each other’s nerves, to enjoying being with each other.

This also means, creating separate times to be individuals… Can’t be part of the whole all the time, it can get to be too much… Intentionally build this into the routine and honor it. This is for everyone…

Our daughter, Vanessa, is already amazing at carving out and protecting her NessyTime. She knows she needs down-alone-time and she’ll make sure she gets it. LOL

  1. Your partner and relationship: And, of course, take advantage of the Couple Time… You’ll have a chance to connect differently than usual, seize the moment. Here you can explore common interests, different fun, deeper intimacy, more TLC, and more… This covers a whole spectrum of being with each other:

-From increasing fun by exploring interests like cooking different cuisines, learning new skills, exploring topics or concepts, taking on a new hobby or project, listening to influencers or fun podcasts, reading the same book, being playful and lighter.

-To nurturing the relationship with doing Appreciations, keeping a Positivity Journal, creating a Vision Board, stepping up caring gestures with your Love Languages, being super intentional about being present and attuned, flirting and increasing affection, ensuring moments to be intimate…

-To enriching the relationship by reading relationship success material, learning relationship tools and skills, working through any kinks and areas that usually trip you up, focusing on changing and upgrading how you show up to create the relationship you want…

~> Check-out our upcoming 1Day Virtual Event, the Relationship Enrichment Bootcamp™ (REB), on 4/4, where I delve into the 5 Elements of the Successful Couple Strategy™ and share specific tools, processes and protocols easy to implement but super powerful for creating the transformation in your relationship… Oh yeah, it’s a super-rich day! Don’t miss the bonuses and debut rates, learn more HERE.

  1. Paramount Self-care:And, it goes without saying to not forget the self-care… It is imperative that you don’t forgo your usual self-care practice (tweak as necessary). And, if you don’t have one that you create one!

It doesn’t have to be an intense lineup of things you do. But do be mindful to create some moments to recharge and reconnect with your Self… The world is a better place when you do…

This can mean soaking in the tub before going to bed, keeping a Gratitude Journal, meditating before you jump out of bed, getting a workout app to replace the gym, giving yourself  “spa treatments” from facials, to scrubs, to mani/pedis, seating with a cup of tea, whatever…

Here are a three of my favorite go-tos:

Rachel Talbott

Mindful Movement

Love Sweat Fitness

This challenging time doesn’t have to be the undoing of us. It could be a blessing in disguise, and the doing of us… How about we operate with that mindset from now on? You’ll be surprised at the yumminess that starts flowing…

ASSIGNMENT: Take note of what your go-to thoughts are, how you are feeling, and how you are managing yourself, your family, your home, and your work…

Identify where you can stand to clean up and align your approach for better outcomes. Where you can be more intentional and proactive. No need to overdo anything and overcompensate. Just notice, realign, and take gentle, caring and yet swift action.

Think on how this imposed lifestyle change can actually be a blessing in disguise and full of opportunities to design the life you want…

Embrace the change…

ADDITIONAL ASSIGNMENT: Support businesses that are losing foot traffic by purchasing gift certificates to be used at a later time.

Think on how else you can be proactively supportive in your community.

 

AND, IF THIS RESONATES…

Register for our upcoming 1Day Virtual Event on 4/4:

Relationship Enrichment Bootcamp™

In a nutshell, we’ll cover:

1 ~ Context / Mindset – Getting Unstuck, breaking the impasse

(effective boundaries, personal ownership, personal empowerment)

2 ~ Communication / Alignment – Improving communication and getting on the same page

(deescalating fights, resolving conflict, detailed communication protocols)

3 ~ Clarity / Dynamics – Changing patterns, getting needs met, resolving recurring issues

(self-healing and growing, self-reprogramming, self-regulating)

4 ~ Connection / Intimacy – Increasing connection, intimacy and fun

(feeling connected, rekindling desire, dating each other)

5 ~ Collaboration / Partnership – Creating a strong partnership

(synchronizing, sharing the load, creating your dream home, relationship and life)

I’m telling you; it’s going to be AMAZING!

A couple of things to note:

  • You should both register for better access
  • There will be a replay for your future and ongoing reference
  • You can attend separately (on different devices/locations)
  • You can attend individually (if one is not available)
  • There is no interaction with others, you only participate by posting comments or questions if you like

Plus, it’s on a weekend and from the comfort of your own home… Can’t beat that nowadays!

You can Learn More and Register HERE!

Hope you join us!

Complete the Assignment, and share your takeaway, insights, and results with a note in the Comments box at the end! I’d love to hear how you are using this content.

Happy Thriving!

 

 

   Copyright (c) 2020 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.

 

Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication? 

Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: 
Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com. 

 

The KEY is to master being your best self

The KEY is to master being your best self

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Focusing on the things that are good for us, make us feel good, and create a stronger connection to our Self are massively important in our Journey. Not only do we feel good (haha, who doesn’t want that?), but this is imperative for creating our successful relationship, and meaningful life…

When we take care of ourselves, when we set effective boundaries, when we focus on personal development, when we invest in ourselves, when we expand our repertoire for pampering, fun, stimulation, interests and the like we become better at our Human Experience, closer to our Best/Higher Self, and increase our ability to Be a better Partner…

For as you know, we don’t need to white-knuckle anything in life… Specially, we don’t need to white-knuckle Being in relationship with our partner… A lot of times partners focus so much on all the behavior changes and long a**s list of things to do and not to do to please their partner… This is not the way…

I remember a conversation with a client who before this concept clicked, was keeping a running list of all the things to “work on”, “be better at”, “do differently”. At one point he said something like, I just can’t hang on to all these behaviors in my head, I’m going to miss something and mess up.

What we worked on was to focus on how to Be the person and partner he wanted to Be, not how to change a list of behaviors. For, when we are who we want to Be, our Best Self, the behaviors follow suit… There is no white-knuckling in that.

And, when we are our Best Self, our most Authentic Self we can muster in the moment, we are aligned, inspired, connected, full of love. No bad behavior or outcome ever comes from this state…

There is a protocol that helps us shift and align so we can Master Being Our Self:

What you think creates

How you feel

Which influences your actions

Which creates your results…

Going straight for changing the behaviors before you changed your thinking is challenging. I’m sure you have experience with this in different areas of your life: dieting, exercising, sleeping, connecting, creating, and all the rest of it…

The behavior-change or action is not sustainable as an ongoing behavior change on its own because its driver wasn’t changed. The behavior change on its own right requires will power and ongoing decisions to continue to be carried out:

– Every morning you convince yourself to snuggle for a bit and hit the snooze button for an hour

– Every morning you ponder if you should go to the gym and talk yourself out of it

– Every evening you think about getting closer, in proximity, to your partner for connection to then clean the kitchen, fall asleep in your kid’s bed, or binge watch Netflix

Know what I mean? Why are these things even decisions or options?

This is troublesome because willpower can be finite for a multitude of reason… Including decision-fatigue… If every little thing has to be debated and decided on, we’d never get anything done and we’d burn out before we know it. Or, even worse we could not be intentional, self-owning and alive in our life and create a life by default instead. And, then one day we’d wake up to the reality we created – not so pretty.

What’s required is a change in thinking, a mindset shift. A mindset shift is permanent. Once you change your thinking and believes the rest flows easily from there. Constant ongoing decisions, remembering long lists, fighting your mindless approach, and walking on eggshells is no longer the norm.

Once the shift happens the behaviors don’t require choosing, deciding, and white-knuckling. This is because they are now flowing from your core Self, who you are, your love and they are in alignment with your values, they flow from your intentional and systematized habits and routines, they are part of your lifestyle and how things are. Bam! That’s what I’m talking about.

Isn’t that much easier? This applies to everything in our life, from health and wellness, to being in relationship to creating a meaningful life. It behooves us to monitor and clean our thoughts, to upgrade our believes, to identify and own our values, to Stay Connected with our Self. This is where all the yumminess is. This is who our partner fell in love with to begin with… And, then we got busy and erected defenses and things started going south.

Reconnect with yourself. Fully own and take care of yourself. Cherish yourself. And, even indulge yourself – with good stuff… And, then show up to your relationship, and your life…

ASSIGNMENT: Identify how you are white-knuckling in your relationship – do you always run late, do you forget to touch base with your partner, do you make plans without consulting them, do you finish eating before your partner makes their plate, do you have an extra drink, do you buy junk food, do you go against them in front of the kids.

What’s your flavor of undermining, rebelling, not owning yourself, not showing up that then you have to fight yourself not to do?

What is the theme to the items you identified? Does is have to do with accountability, conscientious, honesty, transparency, control, vulnerability, equality, worthiness, self-agency…

It might not be so easy to find the items you are white-knuckling on, they are so ingrained that you think this is how you are, your partner is, the flavor of your relationship.

But, I beg to differ and encourage you to observe, pause judgement and witness, with compassion. Just see yourself and your partner in your dance. Identify those items. This is the first step in liberating yourself from the shackles holding you back…

It might also not be easy to name your theme. If you want a transformation, play with gusto. Invest in getting it, keep at it until you get it…

Then invest in addressing the dirty thinking and limiting believes driving it. Dismantle the dirty, the illogical, the old and no longer true, etc.

Create new thoughts to replace the old that are more in Alignment with who you are Becoming, who you really are…

It helps to do this when Connected with your Higher Self… For then you are your Best Self…

This is how you create a mindset shift, reprogram yourself, how you create a new operating system, how you can flow with ease and stop the white-knuckling for now everything you do flows from an updated version of you…

And, when You show up, your Partner feels you and responds in kind, and now you can create your Successful Relationship… Connect, Shift, Show-up

 

DRUM ROLL PLEASE…

You can now register, Yay!, for our upcoming 1day virtual workshop on 4/4:

Relationship Enrichment Bootcamp™

This is going to be such an incredible event. It is the most comprehensive, insightful and laser-focused work of its kind. It’s our work in its most streamlined form. It’s years of personal development and relationship enrichment condensed into this 1Day Experience.

It captures a Transformation Process in easy to implement tactics. You’ll have my brain downloaded and proven targeted strategies at your fingertips. LOL

The day is packed with thought-provoking, mindset shift concepts and simple, yet extremely powerful and transformational, easily implementable tools for immediate results.

You’ll learn how to:

~ 1 ~ Easily get on the same page and break the impasse

~ 2 ~ Improve your communication and resolve recurring arguments

~ 3 ~ Change your patterns and meet your needs

~ 4 ~ Increase your connection, intimacy and fun

~ 5 ~ And, create a strong partnership

You will love it! I’m so sure of it, that I’m even offering a moneyback guarantee.

Don’t delay, register now to get the very cool bonuses I’m offering as well. You can read more about this awesomeness here.

AND, because it’s a debut and celebratory event (more on this in upcoming notes!), it is super discounted. This is a onetime opportunity. If you are interested in a deeper dive with the concepts I write, and preach about (LOL), this is your chance to get it with this amazing deal. Register now!

 

I hope you join us at this Epic event!

Complete the Assignment, and share your takeaway, insights, and results with a note in the Comments box at the end! I’d love to hear how you are using this content.

Happy Becoming!

 

 

   Copyright (c) 2020 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.

 

Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication? 

Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: 
Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com. 

 

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