Unit 6 Blog Post

As with the first time around with the loving-kindness exercise, I had a hard time with it, for the same reason as before- it made me want to sleep and is also too “out there”.  I know these things take time, but I don’t think these exercises will come together for me because they are not something that interest me. 

For the assessment portion, I feel that the area in my life that is ready for development is biological. I chose this because I am in my 30s and not married, and lately I have been feeling like there is a piece of the puzzle missing, and has been causing me to feel bouts of loneliness. I think it is finally time to start focusing on finding love and starting a family. I have shut this part of my life out in recent years because I just haven’t had the time between work and school, but I am almost done with school, and can devote some time and effort in completing my own personal puzzle.  Specific activities I can do is to start signing up for community events and activities that interest me, and start joining social groups. Since starting school, I haven’t had much time to go out and do things, so I think getting exposure to people other than my family and friends will be a huge step in this area.

Unit 5 Blog

The subtle mind practice to me seems much more like meditation than the loving-kindness exercise. In the subtle mind, breathing is the focal point, and most of the exercise seems to be concentrating on your breath, either the chest moving with each breath, or the breath moving in and out of nostrils. In addition, this exercise teaches to let go of any thoughts that enter the mind as they are distracting to the exercise. Once you reach stillness, the focal point then turns to the stillness. While doing this and concentrating on my stillness, I found it difficult to continue, but only because I wanted to sleep- those ocean waves again! I must already have a Zen mind, because I don’t seem to have trouble relaxing. I think my mind is reverse as I have a hard time concentrating on things that do not interest me, but have no problem concentrating on the things that do interest me, and no problem concentrating on relaxing as the relaxation comes fast and easy, and just makes me want to sleep. By the way, I love to sleep. If I didn't have any responsibilities, I’d probably sleep more hours each night because it just feels so good!

The loving-kindness exercise is similar to the subtle mind as they both focus on stillness. It differs from the subtle mind exercise as it is a bit more spiritual, focusing on a loved one, and taking their pain and suffering by breathing it in. To me this is a bit like praying, and so the loving kindness exercise borders on prayer.

Spiritual wellness is a way of establishing our beliefs into our daily lives and a way of balancing our inner peace. Balancing our inner peace is also a way of creating a healthy mind thus giving us strong mental health. A strong healthy mind can then lead to a strong healthy body for physical health. I am not a spiritual person, so I can’t say that spiritual wellness has been integrated into my life. But I feel that my mind is pretty strong, and I take care of my body with diet and exercise. 

Unit 4 Blog Entry

I am beginning to think this class is not for me as I found the exercise to be difficult. This was yet another exercise that made me want to go to sleep before it was over. Anytime I hear sounds such as the ocean as in this video, I get really relaxed and sleepy. I even feel a little sleepy when I go on vacation and get near the ocean and hear the waves in person. I got a pretty bad suntan one time because the ocean waves made me fall asleep while lying out in the sun.

Concentrating on a loved one was not hard, but I found it difficult to take in their suffering, as I just don’t know how to do it, other than following the breathing instructions given. I can think these thoughts, but I’m not sure if they are actually helping.

The flute music that was added, and even though it was faint, it made me even sleepier. I had a hard time getting through it without drifting to sleep. With that said, the exercise is not for me, because I clearly do not have trouble relaxing, but I do know of a few people who have trouble in that department, and I just may recommend this to them. This exercise seemed a bit too “hippy-ish” (if that’s a word) for me.

From what I understand about the mental workout is that we have to perform exercises with our mind to make is stronger and healthier, and that a strong and healthy mind leads to happiness and better physical health. Research has shown that like other exercise, we have to start out slowly until our minds get used to it, and as time goes by, we can increase the intensity. And just like any other exercise, if we stop for a period of time, the mind will begin to weaken again. Implementing the mental workouts may be hard for me, since all the exercises this far has made me want to sleep. I guess I will have to do some research and find other relaxation exercises to incorporate into my life.

Until next time.....

Unit 3 Post

I think my all around health is pretty average. On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being optimal, I would rate my health as follows:

Physical- I’d say my physical health is at 8. I am not the healthiest person, but I am not sickly either, and I exercise and eat right most of the time. My goal in this area would be to make sure I maintain a schedule of regular exercising, and to incorporate more healthy meals into my diet.

Spiritual- for this I’d say 7, only because some days I am happy with my life and where it is going, and other days I feel like I don’t know what is going on, and I feel  little down. For the times that I feel like I don’t know what is going on with my life, I will remind myself that everything will be revealed in due time, and to be patient.

Psychological- 9- I have always been strong mentally. Well, I shouldn't say "always". Having three older brothers taught me a thing or two about becoming tough mentally. They would tease me to the point of tears when I was younger, and then one day I decided that they weren't going to make me cry anymore, and I vowed to never let them see me cry again. I found ways of dealing with my emotions and learning to control them. Now I only cry when I'm really stressed, and the tears are such a release of pressure. When things go wrong, I always tell myself that the problem cannot last forever which helps me cope with it. I have noticed throughout the years that bad things make me stronger and more determined to surpass the things that try to keep me down. Because I feel that I am mentally strong, I don’t know what goal to set here.

For the relaxation exercise, I found it, for the most part, to be a little ridiculous. The slow, dreamy music, and the instructions to relax made me want to sleep, but other parts were just annoying, like imagining colors and beams. It made me feel like I should have taken some LSD before listening to it. Because I am mentally strong, I felt that it was ridiculous to say “my life has a meaningful purpose”. I already know this, and know how precious life is, and I don’t feel the need to have to reassure myself of it. This exercise made me think of the hippies of the 1960s.

Donna