Wellbeing & Mental Health with apprentice Darmalingum Armoogum
Selven Armoogum
My name is Selven Armoogum I have developed an early interest in hospitality in Mauritius where I am from. I am currently an Operation manager at Dorset Square Hotel and have over 20 years of experience in hospitality.
I have worked as an apprentice chef, tour guide, teacher, builder, with many different roles in hotels whether full service or select-service properties in almost every sector of the business.
I am doing level 5 management with Umbrella to learn more about myself and have this one step ahead to reach my goal. I have developed a curious mind to be around different people, religion, cultures and food. Whether it is personal or professional, I have always tried to be the best at what I do. Many situations in life have taught me how to behave, how to approach them and has helped me a lot in what I am now as a husband, father and hotel operations manager.
Lockdown
During the period of lockdown some of us continued to work, some were made redundant, some were on furlough, some lost love ones and experienced countless unimaginable changes in people’s life. We have all been through a very hard time and have taken unprecedented steps during the period of lockdown.
Steps on how to protect ourselves or others from the virus, or how to keep ourselves mentally healthy or how to survive financially and for many, we thought a lot on how this virus has made an impact on our work/ careers etc. furthermore made our goals a lot further than we had imagined.
I aspire to encourage you to take up running, exercising, thinking positively, eating healthy food or noticing a light in the tunnel sort of thing, these are too common.
The concentration is now on you. What are you going to do about it? How to achieve this long goal you have always had? What is your ambition? And where does it work in your favour?
Wanted to…
When talking to people and their achievements during lockdown, I heard many people expressing themselves with ill will telling me that they wanted to achieve certain goals but lockdown has blocked them from achieving these goals.
I have emphasised wanted to because what I hear is that there was a possibility of achieving that ambition or that goal. The goal was not real for them, that they could not see what they wanted. In another word there was no clarity.
When we come out of lockdown, it is important to know what you are going to do to reach your goal, to move that one step toward that goal.
Creating a new path for myself
“Years ago, when I was still a night manager in a smaller property, I kept telling myself I want to be a deputy general manager, few years passed I was still a night manager and my goal got further away. I was getting frustrated; I was not sure what to do until I change my mindset on what I want to do to a strong what I am going to do to be a deputy general manager.
This has helped me creating a different path, a little be longer and harder to achieve my goal. This has helped me finding and learning more about myself, about what I can do and has develop new skills. This has helped me reaching few steps further towards my goal. It is not the highest step to my goal, but most certainly higher than where I first set my goal.”
What are YOU going to do?
You are all on social media, and have read or seen how COVID-19 has been a major obstacle for everyone. This virus has not only affected one group of people. It has affected and made a major impact on everybody in certain ways. It has undoubtedly also helped and taught many to learn about themselves, learn new skills, appreciate small things and the importance of life and what each individual needs to do to find ways to get to clarity.
Along your goal either small or big, your personal journey will always encounter different challenges. When you set yourself a goal and tell yourself what you are going to do; break your goal into small or smaller targets to achieve your main priority. There will be at least 5 things that might hinder your progress. Perseverance and focus on your small targets will take you closer to your goal in small steps.
What will hinder you are:
Sensual Desire (get distracted by your five senses)
Ill will (a dislike, a situation, a person etc)
Dullness (non-motivation, tired, find lock in mental and physical cell)
Restlessness (think wrongly about future, about other event)
Sceptical doubt (lost in thought, get disconnected, state of mind)
RAIN
To prevent those obstacles from arising or placing a dark cloud in your mind think of UMBRELLA, an invisible umbrella protecting you from RAIN. I will tell you a story behind RAIN.
“I wanted to cycle to work for many years before the pandemic, firstly to save some money as you know travelling in London is very expensive, secondly to skip public transport as it is crowded and sometimes longer than usual, and thirdly to keep fit. I have seen many cyclists on roads, and I kept telling myself that I want to cycle to work, but again it was a maybe/ maybe not.
When lockdown happened, I told myself that from now on to protect myself, to save money as I will not be earning like I use to, I am going to cycle, and so I did.
I started cycling in summer, then autumn where the weather was changing to colder and rainier. There are days where it was raining heavily, and many people were telling me their experience of bad weather, cold, wet, windy etc. and if I will continue to ride even in severe weather conditions. I said yes as my goal is to try to cycle for the whole one year and will not let any obstacle stop me. People experience with the weather was not the same for me. I am now very pleased that I am reaching this goal and I am going to continue commuting using my bicycle whatever the weather or circumstances”. Cycling has halved my usual commuting time; it’s free and kept me physically well.
Hence, let it RAIN!
Think of rain. Under your own invisible umbrella, it will help you to Recognise (state of mind I find myself in), to Accept the circumstances, to Investigate ways around the circumstances, and lastly Non-identification (the recognition of various emotions, thoughts)
Don’t forget that rain contains vitamin B12
