Unit 8 Blog Post

1.               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.

Class,

The two practices in this course that I determined were the most beneficial to me were “The Crime of the Century” relaxation exercise we did in Unit 3 and the Meeting Aesclepius mp3 in Unit 7. Both of these exercises relaxed and energized me at the same time. I was grateful for the way I was able to relax my body, release my anxiety and focus on what the narrator was saying.

I would start by doing The Crime of the Century once a day--when I come home from work. I know that doing the exercise at night will help bring me down from the busy atmosphere at work, relax me and help me have a good night’s sleep. Having a good night’s sleep will help me wake up easier and be more relaxed in the morning. I would also use it to calm me down if I find myself in any stressful situations. I would have to download it to my BlackBerry so I could have access to it anytime I needed it.

I would do the Aesclepius mp3 exercise on the weekends; Saturday morning and Sunday night. (I usually try to do something entertaining on Saturday night so I know I wouldn’t come home and meditate. I usually attend church Sunday morning and there’s usually a time in the service where the congregation engages in a mini-meditation.) I really like this exercise because it takes the focus off of me and onto someone that I love and respect. This exercise will do two things: 1) give me a different meditation to do 2) help me have more compassion for human kind.

Unit 7 Blog Post

1.                Complete the Meeting Aesclepius mp3 (located in the Doc Sharing area). Describe your meditative practices for the week and discuss the experience. Explain how mindfulness or meditation has fostered an increase in your psychological or spiritual wellness. How can you continue to apply these practices in your life to foster greater health and wellness?

2.                Describe the saying: "One cannot lead another where one has not gone himself" (p.477). How does this apply to the health and wellness professional? Do you have an obligation to your clients to be developing your health psychologically, physically, and spiritually? Why or why not? How can you implement psychological and spiritual growth in your personal life?

QUESTION 1

I realize that I need to do a “dry run listen” on any guided meditation. I get caught up in how long it’s going to be or what’s going to be said which takes away my ability to concentrate and focus on what’s actually being said. Despite my inability to concentrate and focus initially, I enjoyed this practice the most (so far) mostly because it was different from the others. It asked me to imagine someone else besides myself. I found myself more at peace with this practice. It helped me be more aware of my breathing and I found myself breathing deeper than I have in a long time. I give credit to the practice taking my mind off of myself and placing my thoughts, heart and speech with a person whom I love and respect. I also believed that I was in complete and perfect health during this practice. I have to be willing to commit to a daily practice to foster greater health and wellness. With each practice, the outcomes have been favorable in all three aspects of my being: mind, body and spirit. I was more at peace; I could breath deeper; I felt more relaxed and felt compassion for people that I normally wouldn’t have (like my co-workers).

QUESTION 2

"One cannot lead another where one has not gone himself.” This saying means that a person who hasn’t experienced or done something can effectively lead them to experience or do it. For example, if I want people to work on their integral health, I have to walk the talk and do the things to achieve integral health. Otherwise, a person might say to me “what do you know about it?” And an opportunity to be the change I want to see (Mahatma Gandhi) is lost.

Health care professionals need to be transparent to their patients/clients in order to be the most effective. I wouldn’t trust the care of my lung doctor, if she smoked cigarettes, my pulmonary rehabilitation specialist if he did not exercise or my nutritionist if she was overweight.

I believe I have an obligation to my clients to develop my health psychologically, physically, and spiritually for two reasons. A) If I believe we’re all connected, then I’m not doing my part to keep the collective consciousness whole, perfect and complete. B) I want my clients to see me ‘walk the talk’ as stated above so that they can see that I believe and practice what I want them to. If I achieve optimum health, then they can too.

Christine W.

Unit 6 Blog Post

Good evening class!

1. Practice the universal Loving Kindness (meditation) exercise on p. 93.
2. Complete the Integral Assessment discussed in chapter 11 (p.115).
3. Describe the exercise and assessment process. What did you discover about yourself? What area have you chosen to be a focus of growth and development? Why? What are some specific exercises or activities that you can implement to foster greater wellness in this area?

1. I could not get into the universal loving kindness exercise because I had to keep my eyes open to read the statements over and over. I even tried to have someone read them to me and there was too much audio going on with my friend saying the statement and me repeating it. However, the statements are very powerful because they were bigger than me; they offered loving kindness to the entire world--the entire planet! I think I would be able to concentrate on the statements more and have the desired outcome of expanding my mind and heart if I were listening to them from  CD or other audio method.
2. I found the integral assessment confusing; not clear at all. While I like guided meditation, I'm a visual person and I needed clear cut instructions and a copy of the assessment map that the author used. I wasn't sure what image to use.
3. Despite the fact that I didn't connect with the loving kindness exercise or use the integral assessment, I would like to focus on biological flourishing (fitness, nutrition and self-regulation) right now. Fitness and nutrition will directly impact my health and assist me with managing my lung disease. Self regulation will also help me progress to homeostasis and other mind/body practices. This level seems to be the most important to me now.

Eating right, exercising and having a daily spiritual practice are ways that I can foster greater wellness in this area. Eating right means choosing foods that will nourish my body and that are environmentally safe. Exercising means to manage my weight, increase flexibility and increase lung capacity. Having my daily spiritual practice means praying, meditating, reading scripture and/or inspirational readings and listening to positive music.

Unit 5 PowerPoint Presentation on Mental Fitness

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B-cf-xEfNpfQeTNZMXVTdGxLaUk/edit

Unit 5 Blog Post

1. Compare and contrast the Loving Kindness exercise and the Subtle mind exercise. Explain your experience including the benefits, frustrations etc.
2. Discuss the connection of the spiritual wellness to mental and physical wellness. Explain how the connection is manifested in your personal life.

1. I liked the sublte mind exercise much better. I was able to connect with the narrator's voice and follow the instructions even though the pauses were long like the loving-kindness exercise. I'm also challenged with taking deep breaths. Since I have diminished lung capacity, I often cough when I try to inhale deeply which interrupts whatever I'm trying to do. Despite this challenge, I found myself relaxing more with this exercise. I think at one point I was concentrating on my breath too much because I felt the muscles in my eyes tighten up! LOL So I brought my attention to my eyes and breathed "through" them so I could relax my eyes (which were closed).

I have A LOT of chatter going on in my head! I have difficulty staying in the moment. I found myself anticipating when the silence would be over and the next instruction to come. I'm not sure I achieved the witnessing mind though. I would be willing to continue with this practice and definitely recommend it to others.

2. There are many definitions of wellness but I like this one: "Wellness is much more than merely physical health, exercise or nutrition. It is the full integration of states of physical, mental, and spiritual well-being" (University of California, Riverside, 2009). The mind-body-spirit wellness connection takes care of the whole person not just one part. Practicing wellness for any part of the paradigm, positively affects the wellness of the other(s). In order for me to have complete wellness, I have to achieve it in all three areas. This connection is manifested in my life by doing something for all three aspects; it can be something as simple as saying "Thank you God" when I wake up in the morning (spirit), to sitting in my truck in the parking lot for five minutes after work to calm myself down (mind) or walking the 500+ feet both ways back and forth from the parking lot at work (body).

Reference

Wellness. (2009). Retrieved from http://wellness.ucr.edu/seven_dimensions.html