We all could need a little more Zen in our days, right?
Often we are just so busy, rushing from A to Z and back to B throughout our days, but we forget to take a little break here and there. We forget to rest because quite frankly: we don’t give “rest” enough value because we don’t know how to slow down without losing momentum.
Why? Somehow we associate rest with weakness. Not achieving anything. No growth.
But we couldn’t be farther from the truth. So to show you that rest – in any form and methods – is absolutely needed,
let’s take 2 analogies that most of us should definitely know and understand:
1| MUSCLE GROWTH
Building muscles work in a very specific way. You have to go to the gym, work on muscle groups, do specific exercises. Stretch. REST. Repeat.
Yes. Rest. Your muscles do not grow during all the hours you put into working it out but when you actually rest. That’s it. It does grow when you do NOTHING. Obviously only if you go through this cycle in repeat and the rest period does not become your new form of being. But it does take its new form during the time you do not work on it.
This is the same with our minds. It does grow when we leave it and rest. We keep learning, adding knowledge or going through painful periods outside of our comfort zone but the true growth happens to our mind, spirit, and brain when it is processing all of that information – and that ONLY happens when you rest.
2| BAKING BREAD
You’ll be laughing hard now do you? I am gonna compare growing our business and ourselves to baking bread. Yes you bet! See here is the thing, it’s the easiest to understand how to slow down without losing momentum works and how this results in growth:
You take a big bowl, you add all of the ingredients, you mix it all up, put in the work and give it a real good squeeze – then you gotta cover the bowl, put it in the fridge and: Let it rest. Why? Because the bread dough must grow. It can not grow when you pull, squeeze and work on it. It can only grow when it rests.
If it does rest long enough it will be the most fluffy, most delicious bread around.
So let’s bake some fluffy business bread shall we?
I know you are busy, you ain’t got time for baking or anything close, so let’s keep it stupid simple instead.
With these 5 apps you can add some resting time to your day that will help you slow down so you can speed up! It will help you calm your mind, take some deep breath and make sure you recharge your energy for the next big push.
Ready? Let’s do it.
1| INSIGHT TIMER
Where to find it?
What to find there?
This app is pretty extraordinaire for what it does & offer, even already in the free version. It has the most extensive library of guided mediations, spiritual talks & music to offer out there to support your mindfulness.
You can choose any topics, benefits or features and start right away. No long overthinking about what to meditate on (yep, that’s totally me!) or how you can best fall asleep and benefit from some subtle affirmations.
Why do you want to use it?
If you don’t yet experienced the many benefits of mediation, you are not convinced about them or you simple won’t want to believe that this could give you any type of beneficial rest – then please read any of the many studies out there that show how meditation helps improve our mind, body & spirit like this one from Harvard
So in short:
With meditation you can get very beneficial rest in a very short time AND you can get better results such as more focus, less pain, more revenue and others by adding as low as 15min. meditation a day. Convinced? Then get Insight Timer & get started today!
Meditation besides other mindfulness practices has been proven to improve mind body & spirit with as little as 15min. a day practice.
What are you waiting for?
2| Mindbell
Where to find it?
What to find there?
Why do you want to use it?
So in short:
With no effort it brings gratitude, deep breathing and a smile on your face back into your life if you let it. It has been one of the most beautiful additions to my day, as I do take the time when the bell rings to stop, breathe & smile and just be in the moment and realize how magical this life we live in is.
More Gratitude and happiness daily without a massive effort? Who wouldn’t want that?
3| OURA RING
Where to find it?
What to find there?
Why do you want to use it?
It also recently upgraded to a new meditation feature called momentum, that tracks the rest you’ll get during meditation & gives you a body reset. You can choose between guided & unguided meditations or rest sessions.
So in short:
Improving your sleep means improving your life and the OURA Ring is the best way to get started and dive into it heads on.
“great days start with good sleep” – Oura
4| FOREST APP
Where to find it?
What to find there?
Why do you want to use it?
So in short:
A great app to practising focus & being present in a world full of shiny objects. The gamification is beautiful, too so it really encourages you to stay on track & plant more trees. But what motivates me to use it is the effort Forest has taken to create Social Impact, too.
“Forest team partners with a real-tree-planting organization, Trees for the Future, to plant real trees on Earth. When our users spend virtual coins they earn in Forest on planting real trees, Forest team donates to our partner and creates planting orders.” (from their website)
Learn how to focus and do good by actually
Letting tree plants in this world!
Win-Win.
5| 5-Minute Journal App
Where to find it?
What to find there?
Why do you want to use it?
So in short:
A great app for those who want to constantly reflect and improve their lives but do not want/need to write in free form, instead like a simple guided form of capturing their gratitude and even a photo memory of the day.
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