Today I am planning on applying some of the techniques I have read about in Sarah Knight's seminal book 'The Life Changing Magic of Not Giving a F**k'. Henceforth I will refer to her theory as the NFG (no f**ks given) approach to avoid repeatedly typing swear words all over this page.
Her approach involves evaluating the things that cause you anxiety, hesitation or worry that when you ask yourself honestly...you may not actually consider as important and core to your life, especially when you consider what you trade for them in terms of energy, time or money.
Academically I am interested if her techniques of evaluating elements of your life can be useful to someone with all the above acronyms as DSM category illnesses (except the WTF**K, natch) and I have decided to translate her four categories (which are ordered in increasing degree of application of NFG) of Things, Work, Friends, Family into something a bit more relevant to me: Things, Tasks/Activities and People.
Personally, I am having a bad day and have made it as far as my local Starbucks and need to try something more than forcing myself to read my next MAPP module materials about positive emotions (extreme irony warning) or putting my head down and crying into my grande Americano about the state of my overactive yet unproductive brain.
The book is a great read, hysterically funny at points and refreshing in it's approach. Even if NFG is not something that helps me today and going forward I think it could help many others who are mentally a bit more sound but going through periods of stress.
You can of course find it at most bookshops and on amazon but here is more about the author.
Wish me luck in my journey to the land of NFG! (Turns out acronyms have their uses!)