As lockdown restrictions are gradually eased and we are encouraged to resume more of our regular activities, this stretch of working from home or being on furlough is likely to be coming to an end for many.

I talked in my last post about cognitive distortions, or thinking errors, particularly the concepts of catastrophizing and ‘should’ thoughts. In this post I wanted to look more at the tools I help people develop to challenge these unhelpful thoughts – thinking skills.

Do you find yourself struggling to stay focused? At the end of the day do you feel like you’ve been busy but not really accomplished the tasks you needed to get done?

Whether you are used to working from an office or from home, your work environment has certainly changed during this crisis.

Stress is not just experienced at a psychological level – the physical and emotional effects are just as important. Too often, our bodily responses are overlooked in favour of a more intellectual focus on what we are thinking.

The capacity for forward thinking is a wonderful element of the human experience. It opens up the joy of planning for your future and gives you the benefit of problem-solving abilities. Unfortunately, it also welcomes thoughts of all the worst-case scenarios you might encounter. This is what psychologists term as hypothetical worry.

Biohacking is essentially the practice of changing our chemistry and our physiology through science and self-experimentation to energise and enhance the body. If that sounds a bit overwhelming, consider it as implementing lifestyle and dietary changes that improve the functioning of your body, as well as wearable technology to help you monitor and regulate physiological data.

Given the unprecedented situation we are all facing now, I wanted to take this opportunity to reassure you that all of the feelings you are experiencing right now are entirely valid.

We’re currently faced with a time of great upheaval, uncertainty and, for many, anxiety. With as many people as possible staying at home across the country, everyday rhythms and patterns will undoubtedly be disrupted. To help with this, I’d really recommend putting a daily routine in place for your new setup.

Like it or not, we all have our own mindsets. You may not be aware of yours, or how it impacts your day-to-day interactions and behaviour, but it’s there. It’s there in the shape of the way you think, formed by a combination of attitudes, values and beliefs.

I’ve talked before about the importance of emotional agility and I wanted to come back to the topic to consider some specific examples in more detail. The first step in developing emotional agility is to notice when you’ve become entangled in knee-jerk ‘hook’ in which...