Sleep to thrive

"Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise."

- Benjamin Franklin

 

We can learn a lot from the thriver, Ben Franklin.  Who doesn't want to be healthy, wealthy and wise.  My goal throughout January is improving the quality of my sleep on a consistent basis.  Sleep has been important to me since high school.  It has become more complicated in the last 5 years.  I have 4 reasons why sleep is a challenge.  I gave birth to them all.  :) 

I have a whole list of ways to improve sleeping that I look forward to being more diligent in practicing and forming strong habits.  I've heard different people say it takes 21days or 28 days to form a habit.  Well, I'm going to just work on this for the whole month of January and see how it pans out.  My plan is to share with you everything I'm working on.  If something sounds like a fit for you, please try it and let me know how it goes.  I would to hear your feedback.



Story Time: Our family was in UT for a wedding in December when this picture was taken.  My little girl was having so much fun with cousins.  It was hard to get her to settle down and rest.  So, I put Phinneas and Ferb on my phone for us to watch until she fell asleep. She slept the afternoon away which made for a long night. It was fun to snuggle with her for a bit.

My To-Sleep Better List

• Go to bed and wake up at the same time every day. (I'm going to try 9:30 - 5:30 am)
• Create an environment in my room conducive for a good nights rest.
• Set up a routine for bedtime to help prepare myself for rest.
• Plan my morning and the rest of the day the night before with the question in mind, "What can I get done or do tomorrow that will help me sleep well tomorrow night?"
• Exercise
• Water
• Foods to avoid
• Body Work
• Cranial Sacral Therapy
• Raindrop Therapy
• Essential Oils
• Breathing
• Visualization exercises
• Prayer/Meditation
• Teas
• Herbs/Supplement
• Helping my children establish a better bedtime routine to help them sleep through the night (which will help me)
• Healthy Eating habits

Happy New Year!  Here's to a restful 2013!!!

My quest

My quest is to conquer my life and become a thriver.  While blogging my journey, I will explore a few questions: What does it mean to thrive?  How do I become a thriver?  How will I maintain thriver-hood?

What does it mean to thrive?
Thrive by definition is to flourish, grow quickly, succeed, prosper, be fortunate, develop vigorously, advance, get ahead, to do well, to grasp for oneself.  How will you thrive?  Is thriving to have wealth, friends, social life, skills, a bountiful garden, advancing at work?  Being the top of your class?  Raising well behaved children?  Having a healthy and happy marriage?  Maybe it's having the big house, fancy car and the perfect spouse?  Or maybe being a hermit sounds like that optimal place to thrive?  However you define it for yourself, honor where you are at now. 

My definition of thriving is pretty basic.  I will feel like I'm thriving when my house is in order and stays in order.  When I have had a full nights rest for an extended period of time.  My body is feeling healthy and strong.  My mind is sharp and alert.  I'm spiritually feeling in tune with the Lord.  The majority of my time is filled with quality time with those I love (i.e. husband, children, family, friends).  Living within our means.  Helping my oldest child learn to read.  Figuring out how to help my son process his feelings in a healthy way. Helping my third child be potty trained.  Continuing to love that sweet baby of mine.  Pretty basic, huh?  Some areas I'm already there, but I still have lots of room to grow.

How do I become a thriver?
I'm sure this question is subject for debate.  Just like an egg can be scrambled many ways (I like using my blender), there are many roads to thriving.  My brain naturally arranges in an systematic order of what I need to do to achieve a task or goal.  I believe in order to build a strong house, we have to start with a solid foundation. 

Step 1: A solid foundation to thriving in life is to have health;  physical, spiritual, mental and emotional health.  I'm not suggesting that you need to have a perfect body and/or mind to thrive.  Not at all.  Just be healthy and do what is healthful. 



Story Time: Year: 1984, I'm the little girl in the red overalls.  I'm the youngest of 6 kids.  See the little boy holding a purple pony?  That is my brother and that is MY Pony I got for Christmas.  I was so upset that my brother wouldn't let me hold it for the picture that I decided that the only reasonable thing  to do was shove my fingers in my mouth. 
So I did.

My Aunt is an example of a thriver (pictured above) who worked with what she had.  She had severe birth injuries to her brain that left her with cerebral palsy and a quadriplegic.  Society told my Grandma to stick her in an institution because she'd amount to nothing.  Grandma believed differently.  She saw intelligence in her baby's beautiful blue eyes.  Like any other child, my Aunt was raised with love and discipline.  She went to school and received an education.  Eventually, my Aunt when to UC Berkley.  The process was incredibly slow but she knew her potential and never gave up. She loved and was loved.  Her life blessed my family in innumerable ways.  

Step 2: My current vantage point doesn't provide me any perspective on what life will be like once my foundation is complete.  All I really want is to have a solid foundation to thrive from.  When I am standing on that foundation, I'm sure the new perspective of life will offer me many viewpoints to explore the next level of thriving.  So, I'll get back to you on this step...

How do I maintain thriver-hood?
I don't know.  We'll have to explore that question after we knock out the first two. :)

Why Practice Thriving? -- You're worth it!

There is a lovely life lesson we can learn from caterpillars. While it is in the chrysalis, it breaks down into something unrecognizable.  Miraculously, it reorganizes into a beautiful, graceful butterfly.    Similarly, life breaks you down, sometimes to the point that you don't recognize yourself or your life. In a moment of despair you may wonder if there is hope.  There is, you can choose to reorganize your life and become a person that doesn't just inch through life but soars!

That is where I feel I'm at in my life.  I feel broken down by all the surgeries and the wear and tear that came from bringing children into the world.  I see pictures of myself and am shocked by how I look. "I'm way cuter than that!" I think to myself.  It isn't just about appearances though, like the caterpillar, I know that I'm divinely capable of so much more.  The caterpillar succumbed to his potential and allowed his divine greatness to transform him.

A caterpillar's potential is to be a butterfly.  As children of God, we each have infinite potential far greater than to wistfully glide about.  What makes us unique is that we each have a specific purpose in life that can bless the lives of those in our sphere. Throughout my life, I have always been drawn to a variety of healing arts.  I feel called to it.  I read a lot and continue to be led to great sources of knowledge that can improve overall health and wellbeing.  I have been blessed to help many of my friends and family.  In recent years, I have lacked discipline to practice all that I preach and improve the quality of my own life and truly thrive.

On this blog, I plan to share with you what I learn as I practice the glorious art of thriving. Hopefully something I share will resonate with you and help you in your practice of thriving.  Life really is a practice.  In sports, we have to practice skills and plays until we get it just right and it becomes effortless to do.  There are certain skills and habits that help build the foundation for people to thrive.  It takes time to form a habit and develop skills.  We must be patient with ourselves.  I must be patient with myself.  I am worth the time it'll take, as are you because we will be more majestic than a butterfly.

Story time: This is my sister (to your left).  She is one of my inspirations of a thriver.  No matter what, she makes life wonderful, beautiful and meaningful.  She consecrates her life to be a blessing to her children, family, friends and coworkers.  I love her for the example that she has always been to me and for the woman that she is. 

Background and Context

  Since 2007, I have been in the "baby making" practice. :)

2007 baby girl!

2008 baby boy!

2010 baby girl!

2012 baby boy!

After a long difficult labor with my first, I learned that my body is not capable of delivering a baby naturally and I had to have a caesarian.  My hippie heart was devastated by this revelation.  On the flip side, I felt tremendous gratitude to live in an age where both I and my children could survive childbirth.  During my last pregnancy with baby #4, we pondered and prayed a lot about whether or not our family was complete.  We felt strongly that it was and decided while I was already open, to have a tubal ligation.  There were serious life-threatening complications during my last caesarian.  I was blessed with great peace of mind and confirmation that we were making the right choice to shutdown my "baby making" practice.  It was time to enter the next chapter in our family.

Not everyone has a negative experience with caesarians.  Some friends of mine love them and recommend them.  That is just crazy to me.  Great for them.  CRAZY to me.  I have a horrible reaction to the anesthesia.  The pain killers make me loopy (a feeling I do not enjoy).  My body is heavily weak for far too long during my recovery.  It got easier with each baby because I knew how to prepare myself and what to do during recovery but it was still terrible.  My body felt violated and my natural rhythm is still disturbed.

It takes a long time for me to feel like "me" again.  Because I had my children so close together, I haven't felt like me that often in the last few years.  My body has put on a lot of excess weight that bogs me down.  My brain has been fuzzy due to severe sleep deprivation.  I have been in survival mode.  I have ups and downs with my productivity.

My personal struggle is that I'm not a high energy person to start with and then I'm adding on to it extended post partum recovery due to surgery and all the hormonal imbalances that come with having babies.  I have  a lot to work with right now.  I have many responsibilities as a wife, mother, member in my congregation, massage therapist, friend, daughter, and the least of my favorites, house work!  All are good and necessary parts to my life but let me be honest, I feel like I'm barely holding on a lot of the time.

There is nothing wrong with my life, I'm just not managing it well in order to maximize on all the wonderful aspects that my life offers.  For over a year now, this blog has been popping into my mind.  I'd push the thought away because it was just one more thing to add to my already demanding life.  But all good things are persistent in coming back and giving you gentle nudges of what to do next, this one nuzzled back in again and now I'm ready for it.

Story Time: I'm seriously drugged up in this picture.  My baby had been born just a few hours prior to this picture.  There is no way I could've handled having my kids on me with my swollen, stitched up belly without strong painkillers.

******Let me make it clear on a certain point, I have no regrets with the spacing of my children.  I know that this is how my family was designed to be organized.  Our decision may be insane to you.  Let's be honest, it is. :)  But it is right for us.  I love my children and am eternally grateful to have them in my family.  I know they needed to come into our family together quickly to be a strength to each other as they grow.*******

Let it be known to all....

that I am a Mormon.  Yes, I'm a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I write this post separate from my initial introduction because this deserves its own space. This blog does not officially represent the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The purpose of this blog is not to discuss Mormonism.  If you have questions, I am happy to answer your questions individually.  I will most likely invite you to visit www.mormon.org or www.lds.org.

Not everything on Practice Thriving will represent official teachings or practices of the church but it is my hope and prayer that everything on this blog will be in harmony with the Gospel because my faith is at the very core and center of my being.  This blog reflects me, Marvia, and who I am on a whole.   With every piece of me that you will learn about, there will always be a portion of my faith shining through.  I don't know how to separate it out in my mind and I don't want to.  I love it, I'm not ashamed of it and I like who I am. 

The is me with my Mission President and his wife (my "Mission Mom")

Love them!

 

Story time: As a child I prayed that the Lord would never want me to go on a mission for our church.  The thought of it terrified me and I thought missions were for 'old ladies' that gave up on life.  When I turned 17 and had some neat experiences sharing my beliefs with friends and working with the missionaries, I had a strong desire to serve. For the following 4 years I prayed my guts out to know if a mission was what the Lord wanted for me.  As much as I wanted to go, I wasn't going to go unless I knew in my heart that He wanted me to serve.  My answer finally came after those long years of spending hours on my knees pleading to know His will (which I believe was a critical time for me to be tutored in listening to the Holy Spirit).  So I went and absolutely LOVED it!  One of the reasons why I loved it is because I truly thrived as a missionary.  I had a purpose, I was committed, my life was in order and I didn't waste time.  I knew what I was going to do every day.  And I loved most of what I was doing.  There are lessons from my mission that I need to implement more fully in my life now. 

Who am I?

Eleven years ago, while in class at the Utah College of Massage Therapy in Salt Lake City, our instructor had each class member take a turn standing in front of the room and share one word they would hope people would use to describe them. The word that came to my mind that has stayed with me and has become a standard by which I hope to live by is: Real.

My name is Marvia.  I'm married to a great man that works hard.  We love each other, we are committed to each other but that doesn't mean our relationship comes easily.  We are very different people with a common goal.  We chose each other because we knew that together we could do amazing things.  We are better together than apart.  This I believe to be true.  I'm so grateful he is my husband.

I'm a mother to four small children.  My oldest is 5 and my baby is almost 6 months old.  Currently I put the majority of my energy towards raising my family and spend a couple nights a week doing massage.  I love being a mother.  Being a mother to 4 little people has its challenges.  Taking care of a home is a boring task that needs to be done.  (I have been praying that cleaning will become a joyful practice) 

I love to learn.  You will find the majority of what I read about is whole foods nutrition, alternative medicine, various arts of healing and studying from the Holy Scriptures.  Since I got married and became a mother, I had some surprises about myself and personal challenges.  My frustration is that I struggle to do what I should in order to truly thrive in life.  I still believe that I'm authentically "real" because I put on no airs of being more or less than who I am.  With that said, I think in the last few years, my "real" self is just surviving.  Thankfully I know that through Christ, I can become a person who thrives. 

Story Time: This is me with my children on Christmas morning this year.  We had a wonderful Christmas!  Full of life.  No matching pajamas.  Just us. :)  Some are happy and others not so much.  You see, they are hungry.  Why?  You may be also wondering why I'm holding frozen concentrated orange juice.  Here is the story;  I was making a big breakfast for the family.  I just finished frying up the bacon and when I put the sausage in the pan already filled with hot bacon grease, the grease let out a huge splatter on my hand!!!!  OUCH! I dropped to the floor and jumped back up to the sink and ran cold water on my hand to get the grease off.  Then I dashed upstairs to dump Young Living Lavender Essential oil on my hand.  Then I spent the next couple hours holding frozen juice.  The burn could've been terrible.  Today, there is almost no sign of a burn.  Thank you Lavender!!!!!!  Oh, so back to my hungry children.  My sister took this photo of us while we were waiting for my husband to finish up breakfast.  We all ate well. So grateful that we tackled Christmas morning like a team. And we won! :)