Exercises and Practices- U8

I found that the visualizations, and the meditations exercises are the best ones for me. They help me focus and regain energy for my tasks. I find they give me time out of my days to enjoy my own self. I find listening to soft music, laying and meditating for a couple minutes a day and mostly quieting my mind helps me move along to my next task. It calms me down and makes everything else less stressful. They also help with my imagination and keeps me psychologically at ease.
Doing the practices and exercises also help in teaching my son how to calm himself down too. Which I think is great since he is already a handful at times and is always energized. I think its great he also learns this early on. It helps him get his emotions out at times and stay healthy in his mind.
I think giving myself a few minutes each morning helps me out with starting my days. It gathers my thoughts and puts me at ease. They also help me think positive and benefit more from my days than anything else. My mental fitness is very important so, starting it off right in the mornings also gives me good judgment on my nutrition. I think this practice will certainly be hard at times when I move forward on to others but, for now I think its best to start out slow.

Aesclepius Exercise- U7

The Aesclepius Exercise was very interesting from the start. When I think of someone wise, I tend to think of my own father. He has always been the person of my life to turn to for help, for love, for patience, and understanding. He also has the hardworking characteristics I always thought made him wise and a leader of my family. Going through the exercise allowed me to go into a more in-depth assessment of who he is as my father. I got a chance to overlook his actions, his way of thinking, his actions and awareness, and also the person he is and how/why he is that person. I have always looked up to him and wanted to be like him. When I have the chance to be like him, I welcome it and feel that as his daughter already, I am taking in the next role as a wise and loving healer. I like this exercise because it helps me regain myself on who I want to be and who my role model is. It brings me back to why I am who I am and who I could be and much more. I can definitely see that going through this exercise and many others, they will help with integral health and help me gain more of my inner being than I thought possible. I can already see an increase in my spiritual and psychological wellness. I find the energy and willfulness through my daily tasks. I find it best to meditate and put my mind at ease to give myself rest daily to improve my judgments and my attitude towards things I can’t change.

“One cannot lead another where one has not gone himself” is a saying that I find true. It simply states that a person cannot just simply give advice/direction/advice on an event or issue without themselves being there first. It’s the same with asking for directions in an unknown territory. A person won’t just go to another traveler and ask for directions. They go to a local person and ask. This is the same for people who need or ask for advice on their health. They want feedback and facts about what they are getting themselves into. They want to talk to someone who really knows and has gone through the same thing. Health and wellness professionals need to know this and understand that their clients need more feedback and reassurance on what they are getting from their professionals.

Integral Assessment - U6

I feel like a new baby soul running wild, free, scared, and yet confident. It's like a peeled back a thick layer of rubber attached over my soul and I let it breathe more cleansing air than ever before.
I find that these meditations and exercises help me gain a piece of myself that I lost from distractions. I enjoy each exercise after repeating them over and over daily. My mind is refreshed and at ease. My breathing is more important to me than anything right now. I feel like gliding along everyday in serenity just letting my stress bounce off me.
Even though I feel this way and it's the only way I can describe it, I find that I still need to grow and form myself more. I find that negativity in my life needs to be pushed away and let my need for life flourish. As, most of you know I am pregnant and just going through these meditations I feel that my child inside me is also benefiting from these too. It's important to me as a mom to provide what's best for my child and I really wish I could have done this sort of relaxation and meditation while I was pregnant with my first child. It helps me appreciate what I have more.

Subtle Mind - U5

I personally love the Subtle Mind exercise more than the Loving Kindness exercise. It gets me focused a lot faster. I relax and I breathe making sure my mind if still. Although, I had to repeat both exercises a couple times to get myself to not listen to the instructor, and listen to myself and sometimes nothing at all. The Subtle Mind exercise is more beneficial for me, I enjoy my mind being at ease and practicing my breathing.

Spiritual wellness is more believing in myself and other things out of this world. It’s having faith in the impossible at times and just knowing something with no concrete evidence. However, even though it is not concrete, it is there just like how my mentality and my physical well-being is. They all help me live and help me further my existence.

I find that my spiritual wellness effect my everyday choices. Whether I want to be at peace and serene or be active and confident. The connection between my spirit with my mentality and physical well-being is a circle. One cannot work without the other. If one is thrown off, then they all become unbalanced and it takes more healthy ways of exercises to bring them back into balance.

I tend to imagine these components as a ball:

The rubber of the ball- physical

The air inside the ball- spiritual

The way the ball moves and rolls along- mental

Loving Kindness & Mental Workout - U4

My experience with the Loving Kindness exercise was interesting. I don’t know how to say anything else about it. I don’t want to be too superficial about it. But as I was listening to the lady, I felt a little awkward; mainly because I didn’t know what to do or think at times. I didn’t know what she meant by certain phrases on how to feel or how to go through the steps.

I tried this exercise twice already. I tried getting relaxed in a chair and laying down, but the start of the exercise was always hard to grasp. It wasn’t as beneficial as I thought it would have been. I guess I expected something different. If I knew anyone that was more in tuned with their inner self, I would recommend this. However, if a person doesn’t meditate or reflect on their thoughts and such, I wouldn’t recommend it for them at first. I would recommend something easier and understandable to undergo.

Mental workouts are exercises to work your brain. To help it think and move along swiftly with ease and at times question and complicate things mentally in order to solve the dilemma. Some mental workout benefits are keeping the mind healthy and working, keeping it guessing and fresh so that it doesn’t get bored or die. The mind is very powerful, therefore to keep it powerful, we must exercise it. Some easy exercises would be spelling, mental imagery, crosswords, puzzles, etc. These all help relax and work the mind to keep it healthy.