Laser Tag Fun!!

What do you do to clear your mind and find balance when you are stressed out? Do you watch TV? Listen to music? Talk with a friend? Everyone unwinds in a different way and it is part of what makes us unique. Stress leads to many health problems, including heart disease, weight gain, depression, and much more. There are so many ways to take it a step further if you feel like that one deep breath (or counting to 10) didn’t do the trick. As for me, I like to run.

When I was in school, I never joined the track team. I could have, but I watched when my older sister joined the swim team. She soon started to detest her favorite sport because it became a chore instead of fun. So I always kept running to myself. I can run through almost any problem; the monotonous pounding of my shoes on the asphalt are white noise to help me sift through my thoughts. In high school, I was able to get away from confusion and frustration with my family, friends and classwork. In college in Illinois I ran around a boring track in the winters and was able to think through the complex theory they were teaching in lecture halls. At the workplace I have been able to skirt away at lunch time and feel like my workday is split into two pieces; a morning and afternoon, which makes long days much easier to get through. It’s something I’ve been able to turn to throughout my life to make sense of this sometimes crazy and chaotic world.

Running is a piece of me, and I could talk about it for a long time. I’ve run in short and long races, learned about the immense benefits of insoles, perfected a technique that suits me if I get a cramp. I’ve made great friends and we take turns telling and listening to long rambling stories because we have so much time to kill on the road.

It’s important to find an activity that suits you to help you de-stress and make sense of everything because the world is so fast paced. If you don’t already have a healthy habit that makes you happy, think of something!! Give it a try.

Next week we will be playing laser tag with the kids at Casa de Amparo- hopefully to help all of us get away for a bit to de-stress from our crazy and busy lives. I hope you can join us!

Melissa