Review the exercises and practice sessions you have completed in this
course. (Loving Kindness, Subtle mind, Visualization, meditation etc.)
Choose two practices that you have determined to be most beneficial. How
can you implement these practices in your personal life to foster
“mental fitness”? Provide specific examples.
As I have stated previously, mental fitness in my opinion is the concept of
working your mind daily just as you would your body. In order to evolve or
enhance our psychospiritual life and have access to its capacities and
resources in our daily lives, we need daily practice. All of the exercises we have practiced over the last 9 weeks have been very beneficial. I would have to say the most beneficial for myself was Subtle mind. I am an avid thinker and I have to to think about everything before I can react. I usually bottle up how I am feeling allowing those feelings to create an even bigger issue once I finally do release them. This exercise taught me a better way to deal with all of those negative thoughts by turning them into a positive. I am usually a pretty optimistic person, but I am not perfect and I do have days where I feel the world is against me. I guess we all kind of go through our good and bad, but learning how to better deal with those feelings in a more positive manner is always the best approach. I enjoy doing breathing exercises to calm myself as well, so this was another very helpful aspect of subtle mind exercise. I am still a work in progress and learning the different techniques to quiet all my mind chatter and put things into a better perspective has been awesome and extremely helpful.
The second exercise would be Loving Kindness. Loving Kindness usually comes
very natural to me because I am a people pleaser, but I have been known to hold a grudge or two. When I am feeling those negative feelings, I plan on revisiting the Loving Kindness exercise to continue to work on channeling negativity towards others to more positive feelings. I especially like this exercise because it teaches how to better turn anger towards a person into forgiveness and wishes of well-being. I have always put others before I have myself and I can honestly say it becomes wearing as time goes on. It is very easy to begin feeling as if the same thoughtfulness is not being reciprocated and that then turns into resentment. I have to remember to not be so concerned with what others are or are not doing for me in return and consider their feelings as well. In learning to move beyond all my past hurt and fears surrounding people, learning the Loving Kindness exercise has really accelerated the process. In forgiving my ex-husband for the years of abuse, cheating, etc. and still wishing him a wonderful life was my way of moving forward and past all the hurt. I was practicing Loving Kindness years ago and did not even know it!
I really enjoy meditating first thing in the morning to gain that inner
peace and clarity to begin my day and I also incorporate Yoga or Pilates
for physical exercise to give myself the burst of energy I crave to get
through the day! I need to learn to relax more and stop worrying so much, so I plan on also implementing a lot of the exercises we have learned over the past 9 weeks to better calm my mind and body.
Quote of the day:
“Life is like photography. You need the negatives to develop.” - Unknown
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