Dear Anita,

“it is as if you were born to be mindful, you are so good at it.” I do believe I have always been very observant about the world around me, so yes I do believe it does come fairly easily to me. The only thing I struggle with is going off on tangents of what ifs, theories, etc. I am just a very curious person, so it does not come easily to me to not observe or analyze the information.

“way less chances to get injured walking briskly than running because walking you always have one foot on the ground and it is as effective as an aerobic exercise and stress relief, if you walk fast” Great point Anita, you are very correct. I won’t be able to do much physical activity for the next week or so, so running and jogging are definitely out of the picture. But when I do get back to it, I will definitely walk briskly. For now, I can walk with very little pain on my leg. However, when sitting down I can hardly move it because it aches a lot. Rather than risk further injury I am going to lay off of physical activity so my leg can heal.

“You planned a lot, took the extra time, so no rushing… you decided where to sit in class, in the front. And you did not execute perfectly: you forgot your earbuds, BUT you didn’t get distressed over it. (Perfection can never be achieved!)” Yes, I planned a lot. I realize I do that a lot. I tend to plan as much as I can when it comes to going out the supermarket, the post office, school, the bus, etc. While it helps calm me down, I have to admit that I feel like I am adding to my burden, in the sense that when I am not able to plan I am a nervous wreck. So essentially I am creating a dependency on my planning, and that planning itself takes a long time, I always go over my plan more than a few times.

“Excellent job, Aislynn! Excellent. You minimized all the factors that could cause you distress (being early, planning how to get to classrooms, and having plenty of time every step of the way) and you calmed yourself when you started getting distressed (TV show)- this is so important, to notice when you start getting distressed and taking a calming action right there and then!” Thank you for that. Yes, I did notice that right as soon as I start feeling that dread or anxiety creeping up, that is when I need to take action and do something to put myself in a good place.

“Please continue… and take care of that muscle… walking fast next time?” I will most definitely take care of that muscle and not run for a while. So yes, walking fast. However, I feel that sometimes I want to go faster, and faster and faster, as if I could just run away from it all. A good feeling, but not so good for my body.

I have an observation to make. A few months ago I started picking up on just how anxious my dog had become. Specifically around people or other dogs. I thought it was just his personality, but about a month or so ago I came to the realization that it was because of me. Because I was scared and anxious all of those times. I felt anxiety that the other dog would be mean to my dog, or that it would bark or growl. Then I would feel anxious when anyone passed by me at the park, or asked to pet my dog, so in a sense I was passing all of that anxiety to my dog. He would twitch his ears, shrink away and stick his tongue out nervously. They say that dogs are very keen at sensing our emotions, and I see how true that is. My dog loves to be pet, all the time. He’s a lap dog. He would always stick his tongue out a little bit or twitch his ears when I would pet or cuddle him, and I realize that this all coincides to when I was feeling dread, nervousness, uncertainty, because just yesterday, and today when I wasn’t feeling anxious, he didn’t do any of that. He didn’t do any of his nervous habits.