Highlights of the workshop are:
1. Recognise your Sensory threshold (Sensory Profile Quadrants):
Know your personal baseline response as Sensory-Sensitives, -Avoiders, -Bystanders, or -Seekers
2. Understand your stress levels: Look at the general flow of your daily activities –
Understanding our stress levels, and the support of our safety net, is the key to restoring ourselves to the ‘just right’ level of alertness.
Your ‘safety net’ is your personal feeling of safety and support and reflects your ability to control your alertness and focus during the day.
– Draw a flexible line to show how your focus and control changes during the day.
– Ask: How stressed am I now? – How tight is my safety net?
How you are feeling:
Highly Stressed: Bouncing off the ceiling – Freaked Out !
Balanced: OK but could use some support
Slack: ‘Up and Active’ but just not on top of it all
Not up yet: Sleep-walking !
Identify the times and activities that cause you to be stressed
3. Use your favourite sensations to modulate and override stress
Sensory activities are useful to maintain focus and attention
– Identify the activities you choose that always give you a sense of well-being and calm i.e. visual, movement, auditory, taste, touch, aroma/smell?
– Look at the habits and patterns that help you focus (questionnaire in the workshop)
– What are your 2 favourite sensory systems that you use in activity to reach the ‘just right’ level of alertness?- Visual, Touch, Movement, Auditory,Taste,Aroma/ Fragrance
Schedule favourite activities into peak stress times of your day – use sensations you enjoy.
4. Change Environmental Contexts
Design the Layout of your Work Area – change how, when and where you work:
Work Room/ Meeting layout
– position relative to people traffic;
– room layout & size – partitioning and furnishing
– alone or group
– flooring carpets; sound level; décor, (white-)sound
Equipment:
– laptop screensaver; cellphone (BBM vs calls); desk-lamp; filing
– sensory snacks in your draw – stressball, chewing gum, sports-bottle with water …
Seating: chair, hammock, beanbag, gym ball/ ball cushion, couch
Routine: work time vs. leisure time
– get organised – use a diary!
– transition between tasks, and take a break?
– find activities to ‘chill’ or de-stress?
Design your work area sensationally
5. Set up strategies for ‘Just right’ level of alertness -Design your work area sensationally
Use more of your favourite ‘strong’ sensory activities for enjoyment at work, and Take a Break for greater well-being in your daily tasks.
Give yourself TIME
Enjoy the SENSATIONS OF LIVING !
Just a thought:
This is all Common Sense, but as Voltaire said ‘Common Sense is not all that common’!
MySense 