Letting Things Slide, While Not Letting the Present Slip Away...

[Lab 4- April 12: Enabling occupation through thoughts and feelings: Mindfulness and relaxation]

I found our Mindfulness and Relaxation lab very helpful because I have never taken the time to seriously give relaxation techniques or mindfulness a try. My one and only exposure to Mindfulness exercises from a Positive Psychology class had been a memorable one. I have never thought of myself as being patient enough to sit still and focus on something as subtle as my own breath. But since then, I have not tried it again. It was great to experience how relaxation techniques (both passive and progressive!) can feel and compare it to mindfulness exercises.

At One with Nature.

Lab 3- April 5: Psychoemotional health through activity

One of the readings for this lab, Vitamin Green: How viewing, being and “doing” in nature affects our health and well-being (Moll, Gewurtz & Saltmarche, 2013), reminded me of an experience in nature during my placement.

My preceptor enjoyed engaging in outdoor recreational activities with her clients, both in one-on-one and group settings. In fact, I went on a hike at Cataraqui Creek with 2 clients on my first day of placement. After telling my preceptor that winter wasn't exactly my favourite season, she said (jokingly?) that one of her goals for my placement was to convert me into a winter loving girl! Not sure if I am, but I do have a renewed appreciation for nature and the outdoors.

The JDA: More than just your job description.

[Lab 2- March 22: Cognitive-behavioural job demands analysis]

Coming out of this lab, and the role playing that was involved in our simulation of conducting the Job Demands Analysis (JDA), made me realize the complexities of the many occupations that we engage in throughout our everyday lives. The JDA brings out the implicit elements and skills that a typical job description would fail to include, bringing attention to some psycho-emotional determinants of occupation compared to a functional assessment or activity analysis. If I ever decide to use this in my future practice, I have to keep in mind that I need to be more resourceful to attain the full occupational profile of my clients. It's unfortunate that the JDA doesn't ask about how the client's different life roles impact her job performance and experience in the workplace. The stresses of her other occupations definitely plays a role in how she demanding she feels her job is at this point in her life. We're not super humans who perform each of our occupations in isolation from each other. As much as we try our best to put one hat away when we put on another, our stack of hats is usually in within our peripheral vision as we carry out certain occupations because we never know when we'll have to switch roles!