The last few weeks have shown you all many of my ideas and have given you an inside look of my inner self. When this course started, I was more concerned with my physical health than my spiritual health. As things have progressed I have become more concious of my spiritual and mental needs and have been developing these areas over the last few weeks.
I have begun training in my meditations again and have also been focused more on my energy as I practice my martial arts. These are not the last changes I will make and will focus on new things all the time. We are fluid beings, always in motion. Like water, we must adapt our selves and change as our environment does.
Do not allow yourself to become stagnant. Pursue personal growth and change so that you can improve your life and live to your fullest potential!
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
Monday, October 1, 2012
Plan to Flourish
Over the past few weeks, I have discussed the concepts related to promoting physical, spiritual, and psychological health. These three areas are all required if one wishes to flourish. So now I will share with you where I stand in each of these areas, and what I plan to do to improve them. I do this, in part, with the hope that my plan may give you incentive to look at your own life and look for ways you can improve your wellness. Hopefully my plan of action can give you ideas that you can implement in your own plans.
So lets start by looking at my physical wellness. I need to start by assessing it and finding out where I stand on a scale of 1-10; one being lowest, 10 being highest. But of course we have to look at a couple of areas and average the scores out because physical wellness includes quite a bit of things. I would rate my fitness at an 8. I am at a healthy body fat percentage and am very active. My lifestyle habits I would put at a 5 and quickly increasing. This is because my diet is rather poor (not compared to most people but compared to what it should be for me), and I do not get enough sleep at night. Then there comes my health, as in illness or lack there of. This I would rate a 9 as I rarely get sick and am able to eliminate illness quickly when it does pop up. So if we average those 3 numbers together we have roughly 7.5 which would be above average.
Next we must set a goal. My goal is to drop from 17 to 12% body fat in the next 6 months. How am I going to accomplish this? I need to take my nutrition and sleep seriously. No matter how active I am, I cannot eat pizza 3 days a week. I cannot drink more than once per week. I cannot eat sugar more than one day a week (to reset my metabolism). I need to get at least 7 hours of sleep a night. 5 hours and a 2 hour nap later that day does not cut it. Part of taking this seriously is making sure that there is no room for error. I can not let one cheat day turn into two. I cant let going out to dinner with my friends turn into a binge meal. The most important part is that I need to keep this up for more than a month. It needs to be a long term commitment to myself if I really want results.
So after physical, I will look at psychological wellness. This area may be much more difficult to evaluate by yourself but we are going to try, using the same 1-10 scale as before. We will look at self esteem, self understanding, and feeling of purpose. As far as my self esteem is concerned, I would rate it as a 6. I like myself but battle with the constant feeling that I should be better. This came from growing up as a overweight and socially awkward individual. I am now in much better shape and am extremely social, however my self image has not changed from that of an overweight, shy young person. This leads to self understanding. Here I would rate myself a 9.5 (I will never give myself a 10). I am able to understand exactly why I do what I do from a psychological standpoint. I can break down all of my idiosyncrasies and feelings and know exactly where they stem from. This doesn’t necessarily make it easier to fix however. Then there is my feeling of purpose. Here I will give myself a 7.5 because overall, I know what I am supposed to do with my life. I am meant to be a healer and a teacher. I am meant to guide others. That being said, I often get side tracked on exactly how I am going to do it. It is common for me to want to add new and different things to my resume instead of focus on one path and walk it completely. Lately I have found the path I feel best able to walk, however I still catch myself looking down different paths but as of yet have not strayed. Averaging up these numbers would leave me with a score of nearly 8 (7.8). I see this as being pretty good but of course there is always room for improvement.
So here we will set a goal. My goal at this point is to improve my self esteem. I need to stop viewing myself as simply adequate and see myself how I want others to see me. This will take a great deal of visualization and affirmation practices. I need to constantly remind myself that I am awesome. I will also have to challenge myself socially and override any fear I or hesitation that I might have. Basically I need to ignore the sense of inadequacy that creeps us during social situations.
Finally we come to spiritual wellness. This will be an interesting area to assess. I will only be looking at 2 pieces of spiritual wellness using the above 1-10 scale. Spiritual belief of knowledge and spiritual practice. When it comes to spiritual belief and knowledge I will give myself a 9.8. I have studied all of the worlds major religions and many of the minor and obscure faiths. I know how to perform some very advanced meditation techniques and am acutely aware of peoples spiritual energy. I even have access to some very skilled spiritual mentors. This, however, leads me to spiritual practice in which I give myself a 3. I may know quite a bit but I simply do not practice it. I rarely meditate or pray, nor have I studied spiritual maters in some months. The only thing keeping me tapped in is my martial arts training (though I took several months off from that as well). I have become too tied into the physical world (work, school, money, friends) and have neglected my spiritual health. Averaging everything out I am left with about a 6. Sure its ok I guess but I feel it needs a great deal of improvement.
Now I must set a goal. My goal, after reading the above, should be obvious. I need to greatly increase my spiritual practices. I have no reason not too. It is not that I am too busy, it is simply that I allow other things to distract me from where my focus needs to lie. I am going to blame technology for this one. I need to stop watching TV when I have time to relax. There’s nothing worth while on anyways. I should take time to meditate and draw and practice my martial arts before I waste time with media. My time needs to be spent meaningfully and it is going to take quite a bit of effort to get me back on track. This effort, I feel will be more than worth while.
Now here we get to the hardest part of all. How will we assess our progress six months from now? I feel that assessing our progress may be actually pretty easy. All we need to do is look at that scale (1-10) in each area we already evaluated above and look at how they have improved. List specific things you feel have improved. This is not the time for generalities. The really hard part is not actually measuring our improvement. The hard part is sticking with our plan long enough to see results. Even remembering to re-assess ourselves six months from now will be a very difficult task. For those who stick it out, re-assessing will be easy, as we like to see results while we work on something and therefore constantly look for improvements along the way.
So here is the real question: will you stick it out? Is wellness that important to you that you will put the effort into improving all areas of your life? As always these examples are based on myself and the suggestions and steps I take may not work for you. Continue to look for ways in which you can improve yourself. No body’s perfect…but we sure can try.
So lets start by looking at my physical wellness. I need to start by assessing it and finding out where I stand on a scale of 1-10; one being lowest, 10 being highest. But of course we have to look at a couple of areas and average the scores out because physical wellness includes quite a bit of things. I would rate my fitness at an 8. I am at a healthy body fat percentage and am very active. My lifestyle habits I would put at a 5 and quickly increasing. This is because my diet is rather poor (not compared to most people but compared to what it should be for me), and I do not get enough sleep at night. Then there comes my health, as in illness or lack there of. This I would rate a 9 as I rarely get sick and am able to eliminate illness quickly when it does pop up. So if we average those 3 numbers together we have roughly 7.5 which would be above average.
Next we must set a goal. My goal is to drop from 17 to 12% body fat in the next 6 months. How am I going to accomplish this? I need to take my nutrition and sleep seriously. No matter how active I am, I cannot eat pizza 3 days a week. I cannot drink more than once per week. I cannot eat sugar more than one day a week (to reset my metabolism). I need to get at least 7 hours of sleep a night. 5 hours and a 2 hour nap later that day does not cut it. Part of taking this seriously is making sure that there is no room for error. I can not let one cheat day turn into two. I cant let going out to dinner with my friends turn into a binge meal. The most important part is that I need to keep this up for more than a month. It needs to be a long term commitment to myself if I really want results.
So after physical, I will look at psychological wellness. This area may be much more difficult to evaluate by yourself but we are going to try, using the same 1-10 scale as before. We will look at self esteem, self understanding, and feeling of purpose. As far as my self esteem is concerned, I would rate it as a 6. I like myself but battle with the constant feeling that I should be better. This came from growing up as a overweight and socially awkward individual. I am now in much better shape and am extremely social, however my self image has not changed from that of an overweight, shy young person. This leads to self understanding. Here I would rate myself a 9.5 (I will never give myself a 10). I am able to understand exactly why I do what I do from a psychological standpoint. I can break down all of my idiosyncrasies and feelings and know exactly where they stem from. This doesn’t necessarily make it easier to fix however. Then there is my feeling of purpose. Here I will give myself a 7.5 because overall, I know what I am supposed to do with my life. I am meant to be a healer and a teacher. I am meant to guide others. That being said, I often get side tracked on exactly how I am going to do it. It is common for me to want to add new and different things to my resume instead of focus on one path and walk it completely. Lately I have found the path I feel best able to walk, however I still catch myself looking down different paths but as of yet have not strayed. Averaging up these numbers would leave me with a score of nearly 8 (7.8). I see this as being pretty good but of course there is always room for improvement.
So here we will set a goal. My goal at this point is to improve my self esteem. I need to stop viewing myself as simply adequate and see myself how I want others to see me. This will take a great deal of visualization and affirmation practices. I need to constantly remind myself that I am awesome. I will also have to challenge myself socially and override any fear I or hesitation that I might have. Basically I need to ignore the sense of inadequacy that creeps us during social situations.
Finally we come to spiritual wellness. This will be an interesting area to assess. I will only be looking at 2 pieces of spiritual wellness using the above 1-10 scale. Spiritual belief of knowledge and spiritual practice. When it comes to spiritual belief and knowledge I will give myself a 9.8. I have studied all of the worlds major religions and many of the minor and obscure faiths. I know how to perform some very advanced meditation techniques and am acutely aware of peoples spiritual energy. I even have access to some very skilled spiritual mentors. This, however, leads me to spiritual practice in which I give myself a 3. I may know quite a bit but I simply do not practice it. I rarely meditate or pray, nor have I studied spiritual maters in some months. The only thing keeping me tapped in is my martial arts training (though I took several months off from that as well). I have become too tied into the physical world (work, school, money, friends) and have neglected my spiritual health. Averaging everything out I am left with about a 6. Sure its ok I guess but I feel it needs a great deal of improvement.
Now I must set a goal. My goal, after reading the above, should be obvious. I need to greatly increase my spiritual practices. I have no reason not too. It is not that I am too busy, it is simply that I allow other things to distract me from where my focus needs to lie. I am going to blame technology for this one. I need to stop watching TV when I have time to relax. There’s nothing worth while on anyways. I should take time to meditate and draw and practice my martial arts before I waste time with media. My time needs to be spent meaningfully and it is going to take quite a bit of effort to get me back on track. This effort, I feel will be more than worth while.
Now here we get to the hardest part of all. How will we assess our progress six months from now? I feel that assessing our progress may be actually pretty easy. All we need to do is look at that scale (1-10) in each area we already evaluated above and look at how they have improved. List specific things you feel have improved. This is not the time for generalities. The really hard part is not actually measuring our improvement. The hard part is sticking with our plan long enough to see results. Even remembering to re-assess ourselves six months from now will be a very difficult task. For those who stick it out, re-assessing will be easy, as we like to see results while we work on something and therefore constantly look for improvements along the way.
So here is the real question: will you stick it out? Is wellness that important to you that you will put the effort into improving all areas of your life? As always these examples are based on myself and the suggestions and steps I take may not work for you. Continue to look for ways in which you can improve yourself. No body’s perfect…but we sure can try.
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Find out whats best for YOU!
Over the past few weeks, I have talked about various techniques of meditation and visualization and how each one worked and affected me. At this point, I feel its time to decide on which ones are the most affective and why.
For me, the subtle mind and visualization practices seem to be the most beneficial. I find them to be beneficial because I can actually do them. This may seem like a poor reason but I have experience with these already...I just didn't know it. My martial arts training has taught me how to focus my mind and block out invasive thoughts. When I so chose, I can completely empty my mind and concentrate on one thing. In the martial arts, that focus tends to be destructive and outwardly focused. However, I learned I can turn that focus inward, and concentrate on anything I so choose...at least for a little while. This makes practicing the subtle mind much easier for me than some of the other practices.
The martial arts has also taught me visualization. I often visualize myself performing techniques in my mind and run through self defense scenarios when I am not in a place appropriate for practicing. I have found that this visualization provides me with the ability to perform these acts in actuality, despite the lack of physical practice. So when it comes to performing other visualization techniques, I feel comfortable adapting to them...tho I often have to take ownership of them and modify the techniques to fit me better. I rarely visualize what I am told. Instead, I take the idea and modify it, visualizing things I understand and recognize better. Instead of a garden I may visualize a forest or the beach. I also feel that having a very good imagination aids my visualization abilities. I often lose myself in books and become oblivious to the world around me. My imagination creates images as vivid as real life.
BUT!!! This is what works best for me. You are different so things may be different for you. What techniques do you prefer to practice? Do you know why they work for you?
Whatever they are, it doesn't matter so long as it has the right affect.
For me, the subtle mind and visualization practices seem to be the most beneficial. I find them to be beneficial because I can actually do them. This may seem like a poor reason but I have experience with these already...I just didn't know it. My martial arts training has taught me how to focus my mind and block out invasive thoughts. When I so chose, I can completely empty my mind and concentrate on one thing. In the martial arts, that focus tends to be destructive and outwardly focused. However, I learned I can turn that focus inward, and concentrate on anything I so choose...at least for a little while. This makes practicing the subtle mind much easier for me than some of the other practices.
The martial arts has also taught me visualization. I often visualize myself performing techniques in my mind and run through self defense scenarios when I am not in a place appropriate for practicing. I have found that this visualization provides me with the ability to perform these acts in actuality, despite the lack of physical practice. So when it comes to performing other visualization techniques, I feel comfortable adapting to them...tho I often have to take ownership of them and modify the techniques to fit me better. I rarely visualize what I am told. Instead, I take the idea and modify it, visualizing things I understand and recognize better. Instead of a garden I may visualize a forest or the beach. I also feel that having a very good imagination aids my visualization abilities. I often lose myself in books and become oblivious to the world around me. My imagination creates images as vivid as real life.
BUT!!! This is what works best for me. You are different so things may be different for you. What techniques do you prefer to practice? Do you know why they work for you?
Whatever they are, it doesn't matter so long as it has the right affect.
Monday, September 17, 2012
Practice what you preach
This week I have made very little time for myself to meditate. I have only practiced once actually. But the meditation I did do was profound in its effect. I went to beach at night with a group of friends. As they went about their night, I slipped off away down the shore for some quiet time to reflect. I stood ankle deep in the water and looked up into the night sky and cleared my mind and focused on my breath. I became instantly aware of how small I was. I could feel the vastness of the ocean and the infinite of space. This feeling could have been uncomfortable or unnerving were it not for my feet being buried in the sand giving my a feeling of being firmly grounded. It was a truly calming and peaceful experience. My friends came o find me some time later and took a picture that perfectly shows exactly how I felt.
This being said, I do encourage my clients to incorporate meditation of some sorts into their lives. I don't expect them to be perfect with it (as I am not) but I believe that it could help a great many people. I think that all health and wellness practitioners should practice what they preach. One cannot effectively lead others, especially through tasks that may seem unusual to some without being able to perform them and understand what the person is experiencing. If you are helping others develop their mental and spiritual well being than you must constantly strive to improve yours as well. This does not need to be difficult. Simple practice what you preach. Analyze yourself like you would a client. What areas do you still need to develop? Accept the fact that you need to improve these areas and then follow through in some way. You cant expect others to do it if you are not willing to. And that goes for all of your daily tasks.
This being said, I do encourage my clients to incorporate meditation of some sorts into their lives. I don't expect them to be perfect with it (as I am not) but I believe that it could help a great many people. I think that all health and wellness practitioners should practice what they preach. One cannot effectively lead others, especially through tasks that may seem unusual to some without being able to perform them and understand what the person is experiencing. If you are helping others develop their mental and spiritual well being than you must constantly strive to improve yours as well. This does not need to be difficult. Simple practice what you preach. Analyze yourself like you would a client. What areas do you still need to develop? Accept the fact that you need to improve these areas and then follow through in some way. You cant expect others to do it if you are not willing to. And that goes for all of your daily tasks.
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Why do we do what we do?
All of our actions and thoughts are not without motive. Whether we are aware of those motives or not can make a dramatic difference in the way we live or lives. We need to ask ourselves do we really care about others? Are we helping them only for our own sense of satisfaction? To practice Universal Loving Kindness requires that we understand what we do and why we do it. We need to look within ourselves and identify what we are striving for. We are always trying to improve ourselves; such is the nature of being human. The question we must ask ourselves is how?
There are four areas in which we can strive to improve. Biological, worldly, interpersonal, and psychospiritual. Everyone is striving to improve something in their lives and most everything can fall into these 4 categories. Personally I tend to bounce between a few every so often. I am going through a shift as we speak. I have recently improved the "Worldly" aspects of my life and now feel as if I need to focus more on the biological aspects of my life. Though my career and lifestyle have improved, I have neglected my fitness. This is something that is not like me! I am now returning my focus on making my body healthy... sheding fat and improving my athleticism. It is difficult for people to focus on more than one aspect of their lives but i feel that perhaps we should try. It has been my experience that focusing too much on one area tends to alienate the others, causing them to stagnate or even regress. We exist within all for realms simultaneously and therefore should have our minds in all four realms simultaneously as well. I encourage all of you to pick something from each area of wellness to improve upon and strive to slowly improve them all. This would help create or restore balance. Wouldn't that be nice?
There are four areas in which we can strive to improve. Biological, worldly, interpersonal, and psychospiritual. Everyone is striving to improve something in their lives and most everything can fall into these 4 categories. Personally I tend to bounce between a few every so often. I am going through a shift as we speak. I have recently improved the "Worldly" aspects of my life and now feel as if I need to focus more on the biological aspects of my life. Though my career and lifestyle have improved, I have neglected my fitness. This is something that is not like me! I am now returning my focus on making my body healthy... sheding fat and improving my athleticism. It is difficult for people to focus on more than one aspect of their lives but i feel that perhaps we should try. It has been my experience that focusing too much on one area tends to alienate the others, causing them to stagnate or even regress. We exist within all for realms simultaneously and therefore should have our minds in all four realms simultaneously as well. I encourage all of you to pick something from each area of wellness to improve upon and strive to slowly improve them all. This would help create or restore balance. Wouldn't that be nice?
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
The Subtle Mind
http://docsharing.next.ecollege.com/(NEXT(ec882937f3))/Main/CourseMode/DocSharing/ListCategoriesAndFilesView.ed#
The above link is yet another guided meditation practice but it is FAR superior the one I posted last week. The purpose of this is to develop what is known as a Subtle Mind. You are forcing your mind to ignore extraneous thoughts and distractions by focusing entirely on your breath.
This is a form of meditation that I not only understand more than last weeks but it is something I have been practicing your a couple years now (though not as often as I should). It is far simpler than the practice of loving kindness. Instead of focusing on, and embracing your thoughts (good and bad), you simply acknowledge and then dismiss them. The explanation is simpler and so is the practice. Just focus on the breath.
All of these guided meditation posts bring me to a point. Spiritual wellness is just as important as physical wellness. This is partly due to the fact that spiritual health has a serious impact on your physical health. It can decrease your health and boost your immune system. It has nothing to do with religion. It is important to explore and learn to understand your inner consciousness. Take control of your thoughts. I do it all the time and it pays dividends. I simply dismiss stress from my mind as much as I can. Negative emotions pop up (road rage) and I quickly get rid of it. It important to be aware of your emotions because you can control them!
Take control of your mind and be happier!
The above link is yet another guided meditation practice but it is FAR superior the one I posted last week. The purpose of this is to develop what is known as a Subtle Mind. You are forcing your mind to ignore extraneous thoughts and distractions by focusing entirely on your breath.
This is a form of meditation that I not only understand more than last weeks but it is something I have been practicing your a couple years now (though not as often as I should). It is far simpler than the practice of loving kindness. Instead of focusing on, and embracing your thoughts (good and bad), you simply acknowledge and then dismiss them. The explanation is simpler and so is the practice. Just focus on the breath.
All of these guided meditation posts bring me to a point. Spiritual wellness is just as important as physical wellness. This is partly due to the fact that spiritual health has a serious impact on your physical health. It can decrease your health and boost your immune system. It has nothing to do with religion. It is important to explore and learn to understand your inner consciousness. Take control of your thoughts. I do it all the time and it pays dividends. I simply dismiss stress from my mind as much as I can. Negative emotions pop up (road rage) and I quickly get rid of it. It important to be aware of your emotions because you can control them!
Take control of your mind and be happier!
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
The practice of loving kindness
http://docsharing.next.ecollege.com/(NEXT(b1e262f046))/Main/CourseMode/DocSharing/ListCategoriesAndFilesView.ed#
The above link is a guided session to help induce a greater ability to practice and experience loving kindness. Previous guided imagery and relaxation sessions have been simple and easily accessible to most people, but I found this one particularly aggravating. The concepts were difficult for even me to grasp. I am very good at meditative practice and controlling my mental and spiritual state but the instructions for this particular exercise were far to vague to follow effectively. The exercise instructed the listener to acknowledge negative feelings and thoughts and give them your loving kindness...isn't the point of the exercise to teach you how to develop that in the first place?
And I disagree with that practice! Do not acknowledge negative feelings and thoughts. Do not put love into negativity. Instead I believe it must be dismissed quickly and completely. Do not let negativity linger. Acknowledge it yes, and understand it for what it is but then remove it from your mind!
Loving kindness starts with yourself. If you do not love yourself for who you are, then you cannot love others for who they are. To practice loving kindness, you do not need guided training. You simply need to remove negativity from your life. Do not let it affect you. Surround yourself with a barrier of positivity and love.
This is where the idea of a mental workout comes in. You have to train your mind to focus on the positive, just like you have to train your body for a sport. It needs to be a daily task and does require conscious effort. Research shows that, in time, you can control your mind and your feelings.
I've personally done this with my life although I did not know what I was doing at the time. I have practiced dismissing negativity and focusing on the positive for the majority of my adult life after being a pretty negative and emotional child. I learned how to not just internalize (because that alone is unhealthy) but dismiss my negative feelings. It is not always easy to do and at first you may agitate people (not expressing negative emotions tends to make people think you don't express any), but in the long run the emotional and spiritual payoffs are fantastic. Imagine being able to brush aside anger, sadness, and disappointment. It just takes time, patience, and practice.
The above link is a guided session to help induce a greater ability to practice and experience loving kindness. Previous guided imagery and relaxation sessions have been simple and easily accessible to most people, but I found this one particularly aggravating. The concepts were difficult for even me to grasp. I am very good at meditative practice and controlling my mental and spiritual state but the instructions for this particular exercise were far to vague to follow effectively. The exercise instructed the listener to acknowledge negative feelings and thoughts and give them your loving kindness...isn't the point of the exercise to teach you how to develop that in the first place?
And I disagree with that practice! Do not acknowledge negative feelings and thoughts. Do not put love into negativity. Instead I believe it must be dismissed quickly and completely. Do not let negativity linger. Acknowledge it yes, and understand it for what it is but then remove it from your mind!
Loving kindness starts with yourself. If you do not love yourself for who you are, then you cannot love others for who they are. To practice loving kindness, you do not need guided training. You simply need to remove negativity from your life. Do not let it affect you. Surround yourself with a barrier of positivity and love.
This is where the idea of a mental workout comes in. You have to train your mind to focus on the positive, just like you have to train your body for a sport. It needs to be a daily task and does require conscious effort. Research shows that, in time, you can control your mind and your feelings.
I've personally done this with my life although I did not know what I was doing at the time. I have practiced dismissing negativity and focusing on the positive for the majority of my adult life after being a pretty negative and emotional child. I learned how to not just internalize (because that alone is unhealthy) but dismiss my negative feelings. It is not always easy to do and at first you may agitate people (not expressing negative emotions tends to make people think you don't express any), but in the long run the emotional and spiritual payoffs are fantastic. Imagine being able to brush aside anger, sadness, and disappointment. It just takes time, patience, and practice.
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