Five ways to wrestle back your mojo
Not feelin’ it? It happens. When life feels like it’s happening to you, here are five ways to get things back on your terms.
Sometimes it just feels like life is happening to you. You look around - maybe it’s the weather? Maybe you slept funny? Maybe it’s Mercury retrograde?
(Nope, I’m being told that’s over now, so I guess we’re back to problems being our own again. Bummer.)
Look, maybe you’re f*cking killin’ it right now, in which case I offer you these mindfulness techniques by cool women to help you double down on that joy and send you on your merry way!
But if you, too, feel like you’re getting your ass handed to you right now - then here are a few suggestions for wrestling back some mojo…
Cathart your ass off
We all have ‘stuff’; stories, traumas, excuses, experiences. The emotions attached to these things, or the idea of these things, may serve us and help us survive, but acting on them oftentimes does not.
‘Catharsis’, or letting go and cleansing yourself of strong pent-up emotions, can be a good first step on the road to mojo.
Be it a therapy session (or ten), knitting voraciously, dancing vociferously, or just a good ole fashioned snotty cry into the pillow - it might be time to investigate what you’re holding onto, and why, then find a healthy way for you to discharge those emotions (examples from qualified professionals) and get ready to march on, queens.
2. Connect with something, anything, that makes you feel good
We know by now that humans are hardwired for connection; we are social creatures. Sure, some of us may be more introverted than others - but we still all crave connection, be it to self, to others, to country, to animals, to ancestors, or spiritual beings.
But unfortunately when we’re ‘not feeling it’, we can often withdraw, isolate ourselves or cancel opportunities for connection, leaving messages unread, calls declined and events unattended. And, of course, sometimes we just can’t face other human beings - and that’s ok. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t connect with other things, anything, that makes us feel a little better and a little more plugged in, even just for a moment.
Source: @mellow.doodles
What else might you be able to connect with that isn’t a person? A book or movie that brings you joy? A favourite patch of grass, a vista or a piece of music that makes you feel connected to the world beyond the four walls of your mind? Perhaps an animal or a plant that you can talk to? (Yes, apparently it helps them grow!)
Sometimes, all you need is a glimpse of something good, a fleeting moment of connection, to know that it’s possible to get your mojo back. I’m a big fan of Okay Lady’s gorgeous mindfulness puzzles featuring work by talented women artists. Check out this Green Haven beauty by Rachel Hills that might help you boost your connection this month!
3. Collect moments of joy - they add up
My Mum used to tell me to ‘bottle’ moments of joy when they came along and save them for another time, which is delightful as a kid but unfortunately doesn’t actually work (yet another disillusioning part of #adulthood). Because the thing about joy is that it’s fleeting - and that’s what makes it so powerful.
While even scientists don’t always agree on what the definition of joy is, and often use words like happiness and positivity in its place, ‘joy’ is that feeling deep in our bones that makes us grin like a weirdo and feel like we want to belt out a tune over the Austrian Alps (consolation Julie Andrews reference for Mum).
Rather than happiness, which is more a measure of how good we feel over time, joy is about what makes us feel good in the present moment. We don’t need to wait for a special occasion - all we have to do is pay attention to the tiniest moments in our day where we feel a little bit Alexis joyful, and stack them up.
Write it down, say it outloud, text it to a friend, or snap a photo - however you want to mark the moment, do that and then look for the next one. And the best thing is that we become familiar with joy, the more our brain and body perceives it, looks for it, and ‘enjoys’ it. (Our daily Grrl Getter notepad is super good for this!)
4. Celebrate the small wins
How many of you get to the end of a week, a month or even a year (I dare you not to get the F.r.i.e.n.d.s *clap* stuck in your head), and think you’ve ‘achieved nothing’? Well, it’s not you - it’s all of us - because our brains are “like Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones,” so says psychologist and meditation teacher Rick Hanson.
If right now you’re all like ‘give.me.the.dopamine.hit.now.com’, then it’s time to start celebrating the itty bitty wins. While the power of small wins isn’t new - it’s worth reiterating that humans love progress; we love to be moving forward, to feel in flow.
So, whether it’s capturing your wins at the end of each month in a diary or spreadsheet, ticking them off when your ‘to-do’ becomes a ‘ta-da’, or sharing them with an accountability buddy in a WhatsApp chat - celebrating small wins can have a transformational power over your mojo.
What is a ‘small win’? Well, anything really - as long as it involves overcoming a challenge or obstacle of some kind. Think: crossing off a task you’ve been avoiding; winning a piece of work; making a sale after a lean month; keeping your kid alive another day. You decide what a win looks like to you, and then celebrate it in a way that has meaning for you, preferably one that cultivates and strengthens your ability to have the next win.
Do it daily, weekly, or whenever you damn well please - just give it a go, and enjoy the mo-jo.
5. Channel the strength of the women who’ve gone before you
Around International Women’s Day (March 8), you will see and hear a lot of references to the ‘women who’ve come before us’. I love it and it’s an important part of feminist activism - but have you actually stopped to truly think about the women who have gone before you?
Their lives, their fears, the challenges they have overcome, their badassery and their fortitude?
Although I never met her, I think about my maternal great-grandmother a fair bit - a woman who survived two World Wars, the Great Depression, the death of a daughter, the ‘wandering’ of a husband, and a great deal more. Sometimes I try to deliberately tap into her strength, resoluteness and no-nonsense attitude, and use it to carry me forward, particularly when I have to summon more ‘chutzpah’ than I feel like I have in a particular moment. But I guess I don’t really have to try, those genes are literally part of me.
While the privilege of whiteness is that I know who she was, where she came from, and some of the things she went through - this is absolutely not the case for all of us.
So, however it is safe and possible for you to channel the women who have gone before you (or those around you right now), take a moment to reflect and draw on how badass these ‘brazen hussies’ were can help us march on with courage and conviction.
So, there you have it, some tips for marching on when you’re really not feeling it.
The truth is - like in nature, we can’t be ‘on’ all of the time.
We are going to have down moments, hazy days, lean seasons, and turbulent times.
None of us has it ‘figured’ out, and we’re all just doing our best. Don’t bother trying to fight your innate humanness and remember: you are not a robot (regardless of what that stupid reCAPTCHA thing is trying to tell you).
Of course, if you have been feeling terrible for a prolonged period of time it’s likely that none of these will hit the spot. Please, please, don’t go it alone - reach out to a trained professional at Beyond Blue or Lifeline, or even an online course from the Indigo Project on how to manage your mind in times of uncertainty.
