Unit 10- Final Post

1.  In Unit 3 I rated my Physical well-being as a 7. Since then, I have participated in Pilates classes and started to read a book on Yoga. I am continuing with my walking and swimming regimen and am buying as much of my fresh produce from local farmers. Because of these steps, I now rate myself with an 8.

In the area of my Spiritual well-being,  I rated myself as a 7. I have not taken much time to follow through with my goals, so I would say my score has not changed since then.

In my Psychological well-being I rated myself as a 7. Since then, I have made more of a conscious effort to practice visualization and positive thinking, so now I would rate myself as an 8.

2 & 3- The physical goal I set for myself was starting a Pilates class in order to strengthen my core and improve my balance and flexibility. Through my Pilates class I feel my strength, balance and flexibility has improved and I have seen this spill over into my massage therapy practice. I have more stamina now and do not have as many aches and pains at the end of a work day.
- My spiritual goal was to spend more time in meditation and prayer. I have not followed through in this area, due to the intensity of my school and work schedule. I am feeling the affects of this as my stress level is getting higher and I feel more drained.
-My Psychological goal was to spend more time reflecting on the positive aspects of my life and spend at least some time practicing positive thinking and visualization, as well as reading at least 15 minutes a day. I have stuck with the reading, even when I had school work looming. I know that I need to give my mind a change from focusing on just academic work. Most days I am making progress toward thinking positively, but if I have a lot of difficult things happen on a particular day, I struggle.

4.  I have seen a lot of growth in my life throughout this class. I am much more aware of where I need to be (a state of flourishing in every area of my life), the challenge is--what do I need to implement in my life to get there. My busy schedule is always a challenge, but I realized through this class that my everyday life gives me lots of opportunities to utilize and apply what I have learned. I can't always be waiting for the "perfect time" to practice these exercises, but I can slowly learn to walk in the truths of these practices throughout my day. I believe that through my awareness and transforming mental fitness I have experienced an improved well-being and I trust this will continue to grow and flourish in the future.  What I have learned will give me more tools to help others and assist them in their journey. Through intent and empathetic listening, I can help them take charge of their healing process and walk with them along the path. I am not the answer to their problems, but I can help them discern what they need, to come to a greater place of health and wellness. I love that this class broadened my thinking beyond just addressing the physical aspect of stress management.  We are all interconnected and if we are out of balance in one area, it affects all the others. This is a truth that needs to be shared with others who are seeking a deeper level of health.

Hi everyone! Since I wasn't sure how to attach my unit 9 project in this blog, I put it in the doc sharing- you can access it there and comment on it here if you'd like.
 Hope everyone is having a great week and that it's not too stressful with end of term final projects. Blessings to you all as you continue on your journey to finding greater health, happiness and wholeness!
Keep in touch!
Steph Greiner

Two effective practices

     The first practice that I feel has been effective for me is visualization. I first became familiar with visualization back in 1994, when a therapist introduced it to me when I was going through a really rough time in my life. Since then I have used it occasionally, but not with any consistency.  Now I feel it is the right time for me to institute this in my life on a regular basis. Throughout our class I have used this technique when I had an upset stomach or headache. I visualized my body being healthy and whole and saw light penetrating it and flowing into every cell. I have also gone to my favorite place, on the beach at the ocean, to relax my mind and body and bring them into balance. I am making a conscious effort to remember this tool when I am feeling overwhelmed. I enter that place of great happiness and contentment and allow it penetrate my whole being. If I do this consistently, this inner experience will flow into my daily life.
     The second practice that I feel has been effective is that of Meditation. I find that Mantra Meditation, where I am saying a word or scripture over and over in my mind, gives me something concrete to focus on. If my mind wanders, I keep bringing it back to that particular phrase. This practice helps halt my wandering persistent random thoughts. After a short time, meditation brings my whole system into a place of rest and peace. Also, if I am meditating on a scripture, that phrase becomes a part of me--it flows from my head to my heart. This is a practice that I can incorporate anywhere I am at any time. I can say the word or phrase internally and no one even knows that I'm doing it. Because of my busy, full life, I need practices that I can incorporate into my routine without a lot of adjustment. 

Unit 7- Meeting Aesclepius

1. This week's meditative practice used visualization which I found more of a challenge. I visualized Jesus standing in front of me, and noticed that His eyes were loving yet piercing.  The beam that flowed from His heart to mine was more expansive and all-encompassing than the first two, which helped show me His capacity to love the unlovely, something I am also called to do.
It seems I do much better when I am following a more consistent train of though however. When there is too much time between verbal directions I find my mind wandering too much. All this after a full day with quite a few "monkey wrenches" thrown in - my son's car died, our dog regurgitated her breakfast all over, our printer quit working... just another day... So perhaps things would flow a little more if I practiced these things in the morning before life decided to happen. But isn't that point of all this- to get to the place where no matter what happens we can "ride the waves of adversity" and go with the flow with peace and grace. I guess I'm not there yet, but I'm farther than I was before this class started :)
I do know that I am much quicker to catch myself when I am in the midst of a stressful situation. I have always been someone who talked to herself, but now my self talk sounds much different and is constantly bringing my mind back in line, rather than letting it just lead me where ever it wants to go. Those random thoughts are no longer ruling--I am!  I am still challenged everyday with making the time to enter into these times of meditation- exercising my mind and spirit, not just my physical body. When I do take the time, my day seems so much more relaxed and satisfying. I need to cultivate my inner knowing and trust in that inner voice.

2.  As for developing my own health, I feel this is very important for me as a wellness professional. It reminds me of how single "experts" tell you all about how to parent, but they have never been parents themselves. I am much more likely to listen to someone who has been there and has personally passed through the valleys and over the mountains.  It's one thing to have all the right words, but when they are backed by experience, now that's when they have power behind them. I think my clients will know when I speak out of experience and conviction, not just put out theories to them. I want to strive to continue to grow in every aspect of my life- psychologically, spiritually, relationally, and physically. When we stop growing we begin to die on the inside. Life is all about change and adaptation and stretching us out of our comfort zone. I am beginning to accept change more in my life and am trying to embrace it rather than fight it. So much energy can be consumed in resisting and holding back, when that same energy could be utilized a hundred fold in running towards and embracing the challenge. This is a different mind set for me and one I am attempting to get a hold of.

Unit 6 assessment post

It appears that we are finally at the point where what we have learned has to go from our heads to our hearts to our feet-- it's time to put it into practice!

I liked the short but powerful Longing Kindness exercise. It is simple enough to remember, you don't need a CD or your computer to guide you through, it can be done anywhere and it definitely takes the focus off ourselves and put it where it belongs-- consciously living as a channel of blessing and focusing on others.  

After doing a personal assessment to determine which of the four aspects of my life I need to focus on, I believe the interpersonal area is the one that I struggle with the most and that needs the most attention.  This area causes me the most pain, especially when I am thinking about my own needs and how they are or are not being met. I am not always a good listener, but inject my thoughts and the direction I think the person should take, rather than challenge him/her to continue to seek his/her own direction. I was tested in this last night as I had the opportunity to sit and talk to one of my sons about some personal issues. In the past I would've been more direct in telling him what I thought and how he should proceed.  This time however, I purposely gave him more time to talk and asked questions to encourage him to look deeper inside himself. It was amazing, and I didn't even care about him understanding my side, I just wanted him to be free from his own personal suffering. On the other hand, I did not feel responsible to make that happen. How liberating! This to me was a perfect example of how I can be more conscious of my reaction to other people, and how I can try to exude loving kindness in each situation, rather than allow my emotions and instinctual reactions to guide me.  In order to do this, I need to keep practicing mental fitness and meditating on scripture and the loving kindness practice.  I am so excited to see what opportunities lie ahead for me to walk out what I am learning!

Unit 5- Subtle Mind Exercise

I found this exercise even more challenging that the Loving Kindness exercise. With the Loving Kindness exercise my mind had a direction to follow and it was easy to focus on the directions. With the Subtle Mind, it was challenging bringing my mind back to my breathing and learning to just "observe" my thoughts rather than ruminate over them. There were a few times I realized after the fact that I had indeed been "thinking:" about something, only to discover it a few minutes later.  I find it is easier for me to focus on my chest rising and falling. I was keenly aware of my surroundings, the hum of the refrigerator, my dog's breathing, the cool air in the basement. My senses were heightened. 

Every time I sit down to practice one of these exercises I almost have to give myself permission as I am a "doer" my nature.  Different times during the exercise I almost feel my mind looking around for something to think about, just like a junkie looks around for another fix. This became really apparent after about ten minutes.  At that point I imagined my mind as a Teflon pan and began to allow the thoughts to slide off my mind.  A few times I started to jump ahead in my day and think about the things I needed to do later.
I could not relate to the end of the practice where it talked about Unity Consciousness. I am a long way from entering into this phase.

Since every part of our being is inter-related, you cannot separate spiritual health from  physical and mental health. Dis-ease in one area will affect the others.  Neglect in one area will cause an unbalance in the other two. Health must be all encompassing, reaching to the depths of every aspect of our being.  Exercising our mind and spirit is just as important as exercising our body.  We seem to be obsessed with our bodies in our culture. But many times this is with the neglect of our inner selves.  I love the list of virtues that Dr. D posted. I am going to make a commitment to learn about and practice one of these every week, and encourage my grandchildren to do the same.  This will help to develop my mental and spiritual self and help transform me into a more compassionate, spiritual person.

I found the Loving Kindness practice challenging in that I had to focus completely on other people. It caused me to lay down my personal feelings towards the people whom I know that have wronged me in the past.  I had to draw from my inner resources in order to do this.  It felt good to focus on others instead of myself and cultivate those life-giving thoughts of goodness and blessing.  This is something I will need to practice regularly, especially when I struggle relationally. It would be easy to just give in to negative feelings towards that person, and wallow in self-pity and anger. These emotions are all self-centered and bring me no real benefit-- they accomplish nothing except to make me feel more miserable!  
I would recommend this practice to others, but I am not sure everyone would be open to it. People tend to be steeped in their way of dealing with things, and this is a radical new approach. You have to want to change. I can at least share this option with them; then the choice is up to them.

The concept of "mental workout" involves taking time daily to practice contemplatively.  Even as we become stronger physically when we work-out and exercise, our spiritual and psychological muscles will develop as we put into practice Loving Kindness and the Subtle Mind. Research has shown that we can benefit greatly through regular meditative practices.  A well trained mind can influence our physiology, hormonal system, and immune system.  Our brain circuitry can be altered so that we can dwell in a sense of well-being and peace.  Our memory, attention, perception, and imagery can even be enhanced.  This causes not only short-term change, but also long term structural change.  Through constant mental training, negative emotions can be reduced that cause worry, fear, anger, confusion and doubt.  The positive emotions of love, patience, kindness, openness and honesty can be enhanced. Ultimately our goal is decreased mental distress and greater resistance to physical disease.  Our healing capacities can enlarge and we can dwell in a sense of well-being. Isn't this what everyone is longing for? 

The only way I can foster this type of mental workout is to make time for it in my schedule the same way I make time for my physical workout.  I need to make and keep it a priority!  They say it takes three weeks of an activity to make it a habit, so this is my goal. When I start to reap the great benefits from these contemplative practices in my life, I won't have to force myself to practice them, I will want to "dwell" here more and more.  Hopefully it will become a part of who I am and the fruit that results will touch those around me and make my little part of the world a better place! :)