THE OUTLOOK #46

#46 - Authentic Author, Canal Cleaning & ‘STOP’ practice

PEOPLE

Inspiring students through the power of storytelling

Author, Graeme Armstrong is about to have his honest and heart-felt debut story adapted for television. His first book to be published, The Young Team, follows the journey of a teenager from joining a local gang into adulthood. Educating college students on the value of storytelling, Graeme’s book provides a transparent and inspiring look into his personal experience overcoming gang culture and drug addiction during his youth.

PLANET

Netting a boatload of rubbish with magnets

A group of volunteers from Ealing have set up a group known as the ‘Lager Can’ squad - a community-lead clean-up team that are determined to change the state of our national canals. On their latest ‘litter cruise’ in Southall, they were able to remove 64 black bags of metal scraps from the canals using magnets. The 1800-strong squad are helping to preserve and protect the often forgotten natural beauty found amongst our British Canals.

PRACTICE

The ‘STOP’ response

Over the course of January we’ve taken a brief deep-dive into ways of improving and developing your patience - tackling both the mental and physical aspects of this puzzling and at times frustrating phenomenon. Hopefully now you have a better understanding of what underlies those impatience urges. However, whilst it's all good and well learning how to anticipate and prevent these experiences, we wanted to end the series by giving you a practical, step-by-step routine you can apply to your everyday lives to help bring impatient symptoms under control.
This is the ‘STOP’ response and it really does work! Firstly, STOP what you’re doing and deliberately take a pause, mentally and physically. Then, TAKE a mindful breath that’s deeper than usual, shifting attention away from your mind to your body. OBSERVE everything that is going on at that moment - sensations, thoughts, emotions and urges, acknowledging that they exist but that they are only temporary. Then finally PROCEED having taken these steps to check-in with yourself and decide what’s the wisest (not necessarily easiest) way to act. If you still feel that pumped up frustration, simply repeat this routine again…