• Home
  • What’s On
  • Press
  • Podcast
  • About
  • Donate
Dementia Cafe

Friends of the Humane League,
The Dementia Cafe proudly supports The Humane League's work helping farm animals and promoting a vegan diet.
Being Instead of Doing - The Ultimate Freedom in Life?
Dementia awareness 0

Being Instead of Doing – The Ultimate Freedom in Life?

By Simona Georgieva @cafe_dementia · On September 16, 2016

We often find ourselves in the monotonous hectic routine of life, where we finish one task and immediately start a new one. We plan so many things for the future and we always try to stay focused and concentrate on trying to achieve all goals that we set for ourselves. So much so is this the case that we often forget to stop and just breathe.

We loose ourselves in a world of tasks and the comfort zone of our routine. Get to work, go home, do laundry, pick up the kids, cook dinner, feed the dog…it’s never ending. We’re writing more To Do lists than ever and yet, it never seems to all get done.

We live in a competitive world where society expects us to always be ‘doing’. With everything changing so fast and everyone overly busy constantly, even when we meet new people we tend to ask: “What do you do?”

Being Instead of Doing - The Ultimate Freedom in Life?

Our focus centres on the “doing” of our lives and not the “being” of our lives. We often forget to live in the moment, relax and leave worries aside. Granted, learning to do even this, may be easier said than done for most of us!

“In the moment lies a very valuable gift, that is why it is called the present. It is the gift of connecting with ourselves and with a higher power of source that provides peace, clarity, simplicity and serenity that can only be found in the here an now.” 

Being Instead of Doing - The Ultimate Freedom in Life?Recently brought to our attention was the very essence of being and doing.

The DC was approached by a company regarding a partnership which on this occasion wasn’t right for the cafe, a frequent occurrence although on this occasion our founder wrote a reply that got us to thinking about being and doing.

Here’s part of the reply she wrote. After reading it back, with a different perspective in mind, we realized just how important being and doing is, not just for ourselves but for those with dementia as well…

 

“As those with dementia progress, the focus tends to be on removing objects/difficult tasks and removing things that cause concern, “obstacles” if you will. As advised by charities alike and health professionals, for dementia, the approach should be on what the person can do and not on what they cannot. 

 

Dementia friendly areas publicly (airports etc) help those that are still able, with clear signage etc and removing words and replacing them with pictures…. 

 

While most people are learning and absorbing information, their actions are progressive and new information can be obtained. 

Unfortunately with dementia, actions become reduced. To prompt is fine but to teach or remind someone is impossible. If the memory has disappeared, it is gone. It cannot be brought back. Dementia is degenerative. The person will not ‘get better’ only worse over time. 

 

A common mistake is to ‘helpfully remind’ someone with dementia how to do something or to try to teach them something. This makes them feel stupid and confuses and upsets them.

Additionally; these two aspects rely on memory cells. For someone with dementia, new information can very rarely be obtained and reminding someone is hardly ever an option. If the brain cells carrying those memories have died, medicine at the moment (in 2016), cannot sadly bring those brain cells/memories back to life.

 

At the Dementia Cafe our aim is to love people as they are at whatever stage they are at in their journey and not to try to alter them in any way. We don’t expect anything from anyone or try to teach anyone with dementia new skills. 

For us, it’s about being instead of doing”

-Emily-Jane Stapley – DC Founder.

 

Being instead of doing is for any age, not just those in later life or those with dementia. A particular article of interest on this subject written by Gabrielle Lane was recently published in ‘Psychologies’ magazine. She writes detailing how anyone at any stage of life can take stock and allow themselves to ‘be’ instead of ‘do’. In this context she writes with regard to taking time out from a busy career in London on a sabbatical to Australia.

 

“I am able to ‘be’ rather than ‘do’. And I’ve realized how much richer that experience is when you allow yourself to acknowledge the highs and lows.”

Being Instead of Doing - The Ultimate Freedom in Life?

If you’re interested in how to focus more on being, here are some helpful articles…

https://eblingroup.com/blog/mindful-mondays-five-ways-to-be-a-human-being-instead-of-a-human-doing/

http://consciousworkingmama.com/success-starts-with-being-instead-of-doing-more/

 

It is often asked whether you’re a Human Being or a Human Doing. An interesting concept. Connecting with the self may be seen as a waste of time but it’s actually more frequent among successful people than you’d think.

When considering the self, we look further into mindfulness. This can include meditation which is often part of yoga and can be called upon to help us just be and relax, to rest the mind.

Being Instead of Doing - The Ultimate Freedom in Life?

 

We talked about yoga for stress and yoga in dementia in our post: ­­­­­­ Nama Yay! Yoga to Prevent or Slow Progression of Alzheimers, which you can read here.

 

Thank you for reading. We hope that today with all that you have to do, you are able to find some time to just be.

 

 

 

 

#comfortzone#ThorpeLeSokenDementiaDementiaCafeDementiaCafeTLSENDALZfreedom
Share Tweet
mm

Simona Georgieva

You Might Also Like

  • Bath Toys & Dementia Dementia

    Bath Toys & Dementia

  • Cutlery & Dementia Dementia

    Cutlery & Dementia

  • Dehydration & Dementia: Smoothies & Puréed Drinks Dementia

    Dehydration & Dementia: Smoothies & Puréed Drinks

No Comments

Leave a reply Cancel reply

…
Follow @cafe_dementia
Follow on Instagram
Follow dementiacafe

Calendar

July 2022
M T W T F S S
 123
45678910
11121314151617
18192021222324
25262728293031
« Feb    

Archvies

  • February 2019
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • Home
  • What’s On
  • Press
  • Podcast
  • About
  • Donate

Operated by Meeztech

We are using cookies to give you the best experience on our website.

You can find out more about which cookies we are using or switch them off in settings.

Dementia Cafe
Powered by  GDPR Cookie Compliance
Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

You can adjust all of your cookie settings by navigating the tabs on the left hand side.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.

3rd Party Cookies

This website uses Google Analytics to collect anonymous information such as the number of visitors to the site, and the most popular pages.

Keeping this cookie enabled helps us to improve our website.

Please enable Strictly Necessary Cookies first so that we can save your preferences!