Very busy and very stressed!

I feel so sad and bothered that I was not able to write my blogs the past weeks. I was down with a bit of flu-like syndrome and felt so exhausted.

I went to my favorite lady physician at the Raffles Executive Medical Centre and she thought I was extremely stressed. My BP was also slightly elevated (which came as a surprise for me because I am a health buff who watches what I eat and also exercises regularly).

I knew it was because of stress at work. My physician explained to me that stress may manifest itself through muscle pains, sleeplessness, exhaustion and elevated blood pressure amongst others. My oh my, I felt all these manifestations the past weeks.

I had been very busy at work that everytime I went home, I just drop like a log but on the contrary, I could not sleep well.

Well, that was two weeks ago... My doctor gave me some relaxant pills, gave me a certification to take a few days off from work and advised me to slow down. She was quite worried about my elevated BP so she advised me to monitor it morning and evening for two weeks.

I followed all her advise.I slowed down at work, took my "relaxing"tablets and tried to sleep well, and for the past two week-ends I tried to unwind as much as I could.

I went to Banyan Tree resort the other weekend with my son. We rented our own villa on the hill (overlooking the beach) and enjoyed the serenity of the surroundings, the beach, the food and our own jacuzzi amongst others. We also spent some time in the gym and the pool.

In addition, just last weekend, I flew back to my hometown to attend the alumni homecoming of my highschool (Class 76). I did that just to meet my former classmates, reconnect with them, recollect our teen-age years and just enjoy remembering happy memories of our innocence, naiveness, silly activities and adventurous learning.

Now I came back to work refreshed and feeling motivated. The past working days this week still offer lots of things to do, deadlines to meet, issues to resolve... but i noticed my mind has been clear so far and my logical, skillful thoughts just enable me to make decisions and take actions to make them go away.

Lesson I learned? To listen when my body speaks... If it is giving signals that I am already showing signs of being burned out, I should stop for a while or relax.

Our brain is indeed like a sponge, if it is already full of stressful thoughts, we need to drain them out before we could start using it again logically and productively.

And our body needs recharging too. We are not like machines whose parts could be changed anytime when they break down. Sure we could replace some parts but not all. And even if we have the money to have our broken parts changed, we do not know where to get the replacements too. Plus, the process could be difficult, if not fatal.

So now I am always telling myself...learn to stop, feel, listen to my body and be my own body's caretaker and best friend. It's the only one we got and we are our own (only)best friend.