the groundwork - part II our mental body (and yes, my mental body totally looks like Pink's physical body - you will just have to take my word for this though)

New locket by Yael Frankel and Polarity
Mental balance takes practice.

Getting out of balance mentally affects all the other areas of our lives, too (the physical, emotional and spiritual) - just as getting back into balance mentally can help these other areas - often a lot. This is great news because it gives us many more tools in our toolbox to work with.

(Speaking of tools I forgot to mention that hubs drilled into his finger last week with his drill press; the drill press I had switched his drill bit out of and my drill bit into hours before and neglected to switch back, so the length was not what he was used to - ouch - when he called me from the shop I thought he was having a heart attack he sounded so ragged. Luckily it seems ok although we are watching it. I really need a teeny, tiny ray gun for this stuff ... and a flying car, I need that, too)

Our physical body needs sleep and hydration and nourishment and sweating and exercise; our mental body needs the same things.

When we sleep our mental body gets to play, this is totally necessary since we spend so many of our daytime hours mentally stressed - a daily vaca for it is a must.

For hydration and nourishment think about what we are putting in.

Are we around negative people? Watching negative, violent television?

(For years my mother loved Stephen King and horror novels, all those V.C. Andrews kids in attics - she was voracious. Later on when she got sick she couldn't read this stuff anymore - she moved on to romances. When she died we donated 600 paperback romances to our local library. We even made a little gold plaque with her name that they glued to one of the shelves. I was sad to see recently that it was gone, but I guess since romances are so hot right now, they have plenty of new ones to fill the shelves.)

Too much news? The news stations search the world for stuff guaranteed to freak us out - remember stuff like this has always been going on - we just didn't know about it.

Take a break from it.

Many artists are very empathic (think opposite of psychopathic, although an opposite isn't really an opposite - we may be closer to a hedgefund manager than we think we are) - artists tend to absorb the moods and emotions of others more easily than most people. This does not make us special (anymore than a psychopath's ability to be so overwhelmed by other people that nothing gets absorbed is). It is not a good thing if we can't turn it off. We need to be able to set boundaries and until we can do this, some stuff should just be avoided.

So we need to be putting good stuff in - poetry, books, positive information and affirmations, stuff that interests us, stuff that makes our heart sing.

We need to think about what we are thinking about.

Sweating and exercise for our mind is about what we are mentally putting out.

Mental activity is the seeds of all creation. Keep a journal of your ideas - make it a point to come up with 5 new ideas every single day. Do something creative everyday - in a perfect world creating is all we would be doing. Make your time on this planet count

Read books that challenge you. Always be learning something new. Do puzzles. Reason things through. Take pictures. Write something (I set my counter and write at least 1500 words a day. Yes, I'm sorry, I know you wish I'd set that counter at 500. I can't help it - I'm in training).

Build mastery. This may seem like a physical thing, and it can be, but physical mastery involves alot of muscle memory - it's our focused mind that does the work first.

Mastery creates freedom. When you master your craft, you can make a life with it anywhere. When one road winds down to briars and sticker bushes you can merge into a new one. When you master making a business, when one road ends, you can just build yourself another business.

And maybe because while our body is sleeping our mind is playing (a medical doctor might disagree with this, I don't know, I am not a doctor obviously, although I do wash my hands a lot so I am kind of a doctor - it just feels true to me) - our mind needs stillness through meditation. Practiced meditation, walks in nature, long baths, practiced focus on the task at hand - quiet and solitude.

next up- part III, our emotional body

4 comments

KJ said...

The move I made this winter was stressful, the new workplace moreso. I was glad to get home every night to my quiet apartment where I could be alone. Weekends were a relief.

Off on a tangent: I cringe every time I hear someone comment- I will be fine when Friday comes; or it is Monday and that is a bad thing. Why do people wish away so much of their life? Working is not what we would do if we won the big lottery but why so negative? Why not embrace the commute where you can watch the world around you? Why not enjoy the tasks set before you for the day? Why not greet your co-workers with genuine warmth? Why not take solace in your routines? Why not celebrate the mere fact that you are able to work?

I was under a lot of stress for the past four months and it did not take much to bring out my worst emotions. Things have improved. I was surprised at how my environment threw me out of m y normal balance.

Catherine Ivins said...

moreso? Kathy, you are sending me off to google again!

I agree about wishing our life away. This is exactly my thinking with this series and going back to our foundation- building a stronger base so when our outer circumstances change or are stressful we have the tools in place to hold out center.

If we lived in a monestary it would be easy to maintain our balance - the world is constantly throwing us for a loop. Stress showing up in your emotions is a good thing, the best place to work with them - before they get into the mental and physical. I think it's always interior foundation changes that get us back on track. We may think we hate our boss and then our boss leaves and we breathe a sigh of relief, for a second, because if we haven't released that energy from ourselves, we will just draw another situation that brings out the same emotions, etc in us for our higher self to try again to get us to release.

I'm so glad things have improved!

DancingMooney said...

"When you master making a business, when one road ends, you can just build yourself another business."

I like your way of thinking Cat, but you already knew that. :)

I ran out of coral cardstock recently and found out it's been discontinued from the maker, and I haven't been able to find a comparable replacement either, so now I'm thinking it's time to just let it go and focus letting the others shine... so small in comparison to what you were saying, but it makes me feel a bit stronger, knowing that I don't have this feeling of loss, just because one of my best selling colors is no longer available. Kind of comforting in a way actually...

Catherine Ivins said...

Stuff like the cardstock being discontinued will end up a blessing since you are treating it like one - little spaces need to be created sometimes I think - either we do it or life finds a away. I could see how that is kind of comforting...