I am a little bit done in this weekend. This week has been pretty full on.
I have been trying to think what I did during the day on Monday, and I am really struggling to remember exactly what I did do, it is a bit of a blur. I remember meeting up with Janis and Ann-Marie to discuss what we were going to discuss during our work shop at the Chief Nurse’s Conference on Friday (I forgot to put that in the title). No then nothing I have no clue without look at my diary what I did in the afternoon. I know I was busy but, it’s not coming. If it comes to me later I will tell you. It’s beginning to bother me now. It will come to me.
Anyway on the evening we went to see Gaz Coombes in concert at The Welly Nightclub (the same venue my son Ben played at the week before with his band). For those of you who don’t know who Gaz is (other than the subject of my wife’s desires) he is a singer songwriter and ex-front man of Supergrass (A popular indie rock band from the 90s and 00s). He was thoroughly entertaining despite the fact that his guitarist who we presumed was a stand-in got a little over excited and needed to be helped off the stage during the encore. The only problem is that I am normally tucked up in bed in my PJs by 9 pm on a school night, and we didn’t get in until 11 pm. I just knew that this was going to put me out for the rest of the week.
On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday I was delivering a Human Factors training day to new registrants. Just over a hundred new registrants (Nurses) have just started with us at the beginning of October. For the past 4 weeks they have been taking part in an extensive induction programme. As there are some many of them they are split into smaller groups of about 20. Therefore I have to repeat my day on Human Factors day 5 times. So I did 3 days this week and 2 days next week. I love doing this training, it covers a lot of the subjects I am passionate about. Patient safety, stress management, leadership and teamwork. I throw myself in to every day. At the end of every day I am spent, so by Thursday I had nothing left to give. I could feel myself running out of steam in the last hour of the session.
Thursday night myself, Lisa and my colleague Debbie were going to see Ruby Wax on her How to Be A Human Tour. She was quite brilliant. I love that she is so raw when she delivers, so she stumbles over her words occasionally and shows us all that she is just as vulnerable as the rest of us. The second half of the show has Ruby come out with a Monk and a Neuroscientist. Now the Monk (sorry I forget his name) at one point was talking about meditation and mindfulness, and what he said really grabbed me. I have used mindfulness from time to time and try to do it when I run. I will often beat myself up as I don’t seem to be getting better at it. And this is what grabbed me, it is not about getting better at it, it is just about doing it often. Now the premise of mindfulness is concentrating on the here and now rather than worries and thoughts that are going around your head. One technique is to count your breathes to concentrate just on your breathing, your mind will wander, and when you notice that it has wandered you bring yourself back to counting your breathes. Now the monk said that each time you bring your attention back to your breathing you set yourself free from that thought. The more you bring your attention back to the here and now the more you set yourself free. I love that idea. No doubt like may of you I am a world-class worrier, now I know that I can set myself free of these worries is a game changer for me. Then the neuroscientist chipped in a said that if you do this often enough you will change your brain, as the neurons and their connections will shift as you practice mindfulness. I can tell you this was a revelation. With enough practice and making mindfulness a habit you can change the way you think.
So another late night on Thursday, but it was worth it. On Friday I tried to cram responding to my emails into an hour unsuccessfully before I went off to the Chief Nurses conference, we me and my good friend Janis were doing a workshop on Clinical Supervision. Rosie one the Matrons was opening and closing the workshop, then myself and Janis gave a brief presentation with some simple activities, then I interviewed the lovely Ann-Marie a ward Sister who has had Clinical Supervision for the past 10 years. We all repeated this 3 times. I can tell you by the 3rd time we were all the verge of losing the plot. We had a great day and it appeared we got our message across about the importance of clinical supervision and the impact it has on professional practice. From the conference I went across the city to do some coaching, with an inspiring young man. Even though I was done in, he managed to re-energise me. By 8 pm I was sat in front of the TV beer in hand. What a week, one of those weeks where you achieve so much, I feel tired but fulfilled and wholehearted. Roll on next week and more adventures.
Connected Coaching 