I had a much better experience this week with the Subtle Mind exercise in comparison to last weeks Loving Kindness exercise. The Loving Kindness exercise to me was difficult to focus on and I thought some of the visualizations seemed like work rather than relaxing. The Subtle Mind exercise worked with two areas that I believe to be very important and that is breathing and the witnessing mind. Over the past several years I have worked on both of these areas and have seen a great improvement in my ability to maintain control of my emotions and thoughts but to also reduce stress and see the world through a higher level of consciousness. I have to admit that about halfway through the Subtle Mind exercise I fell asleep and woke up well after the exercise had completed so I did find it very relaxing. I'm not a person who takes naps during the day very often so for that to happen with this exercise is a testament to how well it worked for me. For overall effectiveness I give the Loving Kindness a score of 2 out of 10 and I give the Subtle Mind a score of 8 out of 10.
The connection of spiritual wellness to physical and mental wellness is very important and affects your overall holistic health. I was never very spiritual until several years ago when I got very ill, somewhat recovered, and then was sent overseas to Kuwait for a year in the military. During that year in Kuwait I went through a big change in my spiritual health and conducted extensive studies and research regarding my own belief system. The connection and growth of my spiritual health during that time aided in helping my physical and mental health return to an optimal state. I truly believe that if I had not focused on my spiritual health I would not have fully recovered from that illness and it could have had lasting permanent effects. The mind-body-spiritual connection is very powerful and needs to be taken care of for optimal holistic health.
Saturday, April 26, 2014
Sunday, April 20, 2014
Mental workouts
I participated in the "Loving Kindness" practice this week and had mixed reactions about the experience. I found that I really liked the imagery that the narrator suggests but the amount of time afterwards to hold the image was too long and I found myself getting distracted and thinking about other things. I did however enjoy the ocean waves sounds during the intervals and thought that the overall experience was relaxing. I would recommend this to someone if they were looking for a way to expand their consciousness and open their hearts. One of the parts of the exercise that I particularly liked was the part about visualizing your enemies and taking away their suffering. I think forgiveness is incredibly important in achieving optimal health. When you are holding anger or resentment towards someone and you can't find a way to forgive them you are only hurting yourself. They don't know all of the emotions that are running in your head about that situation and more than likely they don't care. You have to forgive in order to release that anger and breed healthy thoughts and feelings rather than harboring negative emotions.
Mental workouts are exercises that stimulate mental activity and engaging the brain in active ways beyond watching television. The largest controlled clinical trial regarding mental workouts was funded by the National Institute of Health and reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The study found that mental exercises and cognitive training sessions improved the memory, concentration, and problem solving skills of healthy adults age 65 and older. The effects of these exercises were long lasting and erasing as much as 7 to 14 years of normal cognitive decline for at least 2 years. (NFNZ, 2014). There are several ways I can incorporate and implement mental workouts of my own to benefit from this knowledge. Social interactions have been proven to give positive results for healthy brain aging which means I need to continue to remain actively social. I start my new job at a school district working with many people so I think this new job will keep those social interactions very active. Continuing my education is another healthy brain exercise as it has been show that people who challenge their brain and actively gain knowledge are able to maintain healthy brain activity compared to lifestyles lacking in mental activity.
Neurological Foundation of New Zealand, (2014). Mental Workout. Retrieved from http://www.neurological.org.nz/brain-health/mental-workout
Mental workouts are exercises that stimulate mental activity and engaging the brain in active ways beyond watching television. The largest controlled clinical trial regarding mental workouts was funded by the National Institute of Health and reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The study found that mental exercises and cognitive training sessions improved the memory, concentration, and problem solving skills of healthy adults age 65 and older. The effects of these exercises were long lasting and erasing as much as 7 to 14 years of normal cognitive decline for at least 2 years. (NFNZ, 2014). There are several ways I can incorporate and implement mental workouts of my own to benefit from this knowledge. Social interactions have been proven to give positive results for healthy brain aging which means I need to continue to remain actively social. I start my new job at a school district working with many people so I think this new job will keep those social interactions very active. Continuing my education is another healthy brain exercise as it has been show that people who challenge their brain and actively gain knowledge are able to maintain healthy brain activity compared to lifestyles lacking in mental activity.
Neurological Foundation of New Zealand, (2014). Mental Workout. Retrieved from http://www.neurological.org.nz/brain-health/mental-workout
Sunday, April 13, 2014
Overall Wellness
If I were to rate my overall well-being on a scale of 1-10 I would rate my physical well-being at an 8, spiritual well-being at a 9, and my psychological well-being at a 7. Physically I am very healthy however I do have a heart flutter condition that limits my ability to do intense exercise or work. I do eat relatively healthy each day and I drink lots of water so my diet is a positive aspect. I also take vitamin and herbal supplements which I feel attribute to my strong immune system. Since taking vitamins and herbal supplements over the past 3 years I have not gotten sick and I always feel positive and energetic. My goal physically is to establish a routine of activities that I am capable of doing without causing issues with my heart and then make that routine a part of my life. Distractions such as work, school, and other day to day activities can easily derail even the best daily routines so I want to develop a system that works around a busy schedule. I am in a good place spiritually and I have strong spiritual beliefs that keep my day to day attitude very positive. I would say that of the three aspects of health my spiritual aspect is the strongest. My goal for spiritual health is to take more time connecting in a peaceful setting. An exercise I have been working on lately is when I first wake up in the morning I keep my eyes closed and meditate for 3-5 minutes before I open my eyes. I think of peaceful things and also give thanks for all of the blessings I receive each day. This exercise has really made the start of my day so much better and positive. I rated my psychological health the lowest of the three because I still have some control issues in life that I have to work out. When things don't go the way I want them to go I have a bad habit of wanting to control it. That type of behavior can lead to stress and anxiety as most of the time we can't control everything that goes on in our lives. I have been working on present moment awareness to help with this and it has worked great. By staying focused on the present moment I don't put any negative energy into worrying about future "stuff".
I completed the relaxation exercise The Crime of the Century and found it to be an interesting method of meditation but not the most effective. I found the process of imagining windows on my body and then visualizing colored beams coming out of them to be a bit taxing and not very relaxing. It almost seemed like work by the time I was working on my 4th beam of light. In addition by using the colors of the rainbow I found it hard to think up what the colors should look like such as aqua-blue and emerald-green. I think the whole process could have been simpler to make it an effective relaxation technique. I'm pretty confident I wouldn't use that method again.
I completed the relaxation exercise The Crime of the Century and found it to be an interesting method of meditation but not the most effective. I found the process of imagining windows on my body and then visualizing colored beams coming out of them to be a bit taxing and not very relaxing. It almost seemed like work by the time I was working on my 4th beam of light. In addition by using the colors of the rainbow I found it hard to think up what the colors should look like such as aqua-blue and emerald-green. I think the whole process could have been simpler to make it an effective relaxation technique. I'm pretty confident I wouldn't use that method again.
Sunday, April 6, 2014
Welcome to my blog!
Welcome to my blog!
Hello,
My name is James and I currently live in North Idaho with my wife and 2 children. I retired from the Army in 2012 after 20 years of service and I am now a full time student at Kaplan University and I work at the local elementary school as a custodian in the evenings. I have really learned a lot over the past couple of years about taking care of my health, the mind-body connection, and how to achieve a sense of balance in my health and my life. My hobbies include snowboarding and hunting in the winter and motorcycles and fishing in the summer.
The experience I had with a Journey on Relaxation exercise turned out to be quite comical to me. I was getting ready to put on my headphones and listen to the exercise but decided to use the bathroom first. When I flushed I saw that the toilet was plugged so I knocked on my 12 year old daughter's bedroom door and asked if she clogged it. She told me she did clog the toilet so I told her I wanted her to get a plunger and unclog the toilet. She went downstairs and told my wife that she "couldn't" unclog a toilet and for whatever reason my wife decided to defend her decision and tell me that unclogging a toilet was something an adult should do and it would be demeaning to have a 12 year old girl do it. ....WHAT!...I grabbed the plunger from the bathroom and gave my almost teenage daughter a class on how to unclog a toilet and I will tell you that I was not pleased that I was the "bad guy" in this scenario for wanting my daughter to take responsibility for something that she messed up. I finally get back upstairs and close the bedroom door to listen to the Journey on Relaxation and I can feel my heart beating rapidly, my blood pressure was up, and all I can concentrate on is the fact that I became the bad guy because my daughter clogged the toilet. GRRRRRRR!!!! So I listened to the exercise and by the end of it I was nice and calm and had a good laugh about the fact that I was very upset because my daughter clogs toilets.
Hello,
My name is James and I currently live in North Idaho with my wife and 2 children. I retired from the Army in 2012 after 20 years of service and I am now a full time student at Kaplan University and I work at the local elementary school as a custodian in the evenings. I have really learned a lot over the past couple of years about taking care of my health, the mind-body connection, and how to achieve a sense of balance in my health and my life. My hobbies include snowboarding and hunting in the winter and motorcycles and fishing in the summer.
The experience I had with a Journey on Relaxation exercise turned out to be quite comical to me. I was getting ready to put on my headphones and listen to the exercise but decided to use the bathroom first. When I flushed I saw that the toilet was plugged so I knocked on my 12 year old daughter's bedroom door and asked if she clogged it. She told me she did clog the toilet so I told her I wanted her to get a plunger and unclog the toilet. She went downstairs and told my wife that she "couldn't" unclog a toilet and for whatever reason my wife decided to defend her decision and tell me that unclogging a toilet was something an adult should do and it would be demeaning to have a 12 year old girl do it. ....WHAT!...I grabbed the plunger from the bathroom and gave my almost teenage daughter a class on how to unclog a toilet and I will tell you that I was not pleased that I was the "bad guy" in this scenario for wanting my daughter to take responsibility for something that she messed up. I finally get back upstairs and close the bedroom door to listen to the Journey on Relaxation and I can feel my heart beating rapidly, my blood pressure was up, and all I can concentrate on is the fact that I became the bad guy because my daughter clogged the toilet. GRRRRRRR!!!! So I listened to the exercise and by the end of it I was nice and calm and had a good laugh about the fact that I was very upset because my daughter clogs toilets.
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