not so perfect after all...

I am kind of wishing that I might have done my loving kindness exercise after my integral assessment.  I find that my mind is filled with things that I need to change, and things that are difficult for me to realize.  This week I have caught my sons cold and have been feeling under the weather, which has lead me to put off homework and makes me quite anxious.  I feel satisfied with how I approach my life to a point.  I do not take enough time for personal relaxation and reflection to work on development.  I am starting to wonder if not taking this time is affecting my family.  My son is growing up and needs to have more independent time to himself and his friends.  My husband and I have been learning this and providing this for him, but to a point.  He has been struggle greatly with school, but feels more pressure when he is getting assistance from me.  I need to reevaluate how I help him.  I have been allowing my way of doing homework and studies are the way I teach him….and personally it isn’t working.  Instead of insisting what he has to do, I need to be more aware of his needs for improving his life.  I guess I was always afraid that he didn’t care, but after deep assessment, I am realizing that he has cared the whole time; I was too closed off to notice.  My frustration with his school work issues has caused me to be more ridged and present less love and kindness.  And what child doesn’t need love and kindness…all of them do!!  I have known this forever, and I am the one that has been failing at providing motivation for him through love and kindness.  As for many of you..this week’s assessments and love-kindness practice has left us a little disturbed with our evaluations.  But I really do believe that through the love-kindness exercise, we can focus on those parts of our life that are struggling or need change and approach them with love.  We can accept the past and move forward to a better future, because all of us had the guts to face our life and focus our minds on the changes that needed to be made!

Presentation malfunction

So i tried to upload my presentation on the google docs page: https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B9DmFfl0QiFSYWQ2ZGM5M2EtYmY1NS00MzkwLWI1MDAtNTdiOGM0ZjE5MDUw&hl=en
and lets just say it was completely unsuccessful.  First, my presentation was rejected and then it couldn't load up my entire presentation, just bits and pieces. 

Dr. Deepak Chopra Guided Meditation

Zzzzzzzzz

I’m not entirely sure why every time I try to relax there seems to be some kind of great force preventing me from doing so!  As I am about 3 minutes into track #3, my ear loops are blown away with this zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzhhhhhhhhhffffffffffffffffsssssssssss sound of white noise.  This happened on track #1…not on track #2…but now on track #3!  Anyway…I decided to re-read the exercise described in our book and follow it with one of those nifty little sound makers that have a dozen different choices for your particular preference.   By the way…I choose the rain forest. 

I know we have been reading about how each step paves the way for others steps to reveal themselves.  After dealing with the love and kindness mediation, it really put my heart and mind in the right state to welcome the subtle mind.  Although I had difficulties directing my attention to the task of love and kindness, I found subtle mind more difficult since my mind rushes through thoughts and gives little time to quite down.  I really believe this is my fault.  Interestingly enough, I have always thought that I think before I act and observe myself.  I didn’t realize that I allow myself to be so caught up with my daily activities that I had stopped observing.  My physical wellness seems to be what keeps my mind and spirit going. From physical workouts, I am focusing my mental energy on something and manipulating my thoughts to focus and accomplish my goals…this also allows me rest and reflect after workouts on all aspects of life, which in turn returns me to me.  If it wasn’t for my avid workout regimen, I think my mental and spiritual status would be struggling and my current struggles with spirituality would be worse than what it is.  I do allow myself to get swept away with my TTD list (things to do) as wife and mother, my new objective is to take my time to evaluate my choices and actions throughout the day prior and long after I have worked out.  It almost has been an on/off switch.  As soon as I check my daughter into the child center at the gym, my mind switches on to focus mentally and physically which gives me my connection to myself. Then after I have finished my cool down-stretch regime/ (my version of meditative state), I proceed to the showers and once I leave the locker room…there goes the off switch.  I think I should try to stretch that time of mental-spirit-body connection during those two hours to last the entire day.  I think I will start those efforts on Monday…

Clickty clunky clumping!!

 “That was actually a good one”, my son says to me.  First of let me explain how my son become involved in this week’s love and kindness exercise. As I began to start my exercise, the house was quiet, my daughter was in bed and my son was out playing with friends.  I started listening to tracks, now somewhere 5 minutes into the audio my computer start screeching at me having a hard time reading the cd.  Not only did I have a heart attack, but I was finally starting to relax!  After re-entering the cd and beginning the love-kindness track I returned to my state of relaxation until my son enters our home and begins clickty clunky clumping in the kitchen.  I finally was so distracted by the noise that I asked what he was doing.  After he pointed to the icy pops he was cutting open, I acknowledge his answer and was able to block him out.  This is until he walks his way in the room and stares at me waiting to ask if he can watch t.v.  I told him I was busy doing my homework, and instead of politely walking out of the room, he decides to sit in a chair across from me and mocks my position of relaxation.  Finally, I stood up and said, “Fine, do you want to try something new?  Come with me…get comfortable...You’re doing this exercise with me.” 

Finally, after all the efforts of trying to relax and focus on myself I was able to take in what was being said on the audio and follow it.  My mind was consumed by the waves that I immediately began to rest my mind by focusing on my breathing.  I like how they directed you to focus on your breathing anytime your mind started to wonder.  This helped me more than anything since my mind is in constant state of to do lists.  I loved the part in the audio when they were making you aware of your surroundings/ current state and needed to accept things the way they are.  This of course was mentioned just as my two year hold started jumping on her bed like a trampoline and singing…even though I thought she was sleeping.  Due to the timing of the audio, I was able to smile at her quite personality and love to jump and continue on with the rest of the session.  By the end of session, I didn’t hear her anymore therefore making me think she went back to sleep.   Keep your fingers crossed.
I believe the mental workout of this exercise is providing oneself with an overall feeling in reaching to the inner love and kindness emotions and applying them to the difficult parts of our lives and ourselves.  Especially when there are issues that are so big they can emotionally wipe you out.  If you allow yourself to feel love and kindness and accept those things in your life the state of processing the issues can be much smoother and cause or prevent unnecessary stress.  I believe this is an exercise I will be re-visiting, or at least seeking more exercises like this to use for 15 minutes every day to expanding times in the future.  These can be done primarily during quiet moments of one’s life especially in the morning before the brain begins to circulate with thoughts of daily activities.   I truly think the idea behind all these mental workouts is providing people with the direction to focus one’s mind and open up to all aspects of life, creating a healthy psychological self due to the time to reflect and process all that life throws at us.

Rating my wellness

A-Physical Well-being:

When it comes to my physical well-being, I would rate myself at a seven.  Physical activity is something I have been involved with and dedicated to from birth.  Lately I am trying to reach a higher elite level of fitness to see how fit I can become.  I manage to complete 3 miles of running, 9 miles of cycling, and a ½ mile of swimming for my cardio workouts 3x a week and intense lifting for core/arms/legs on the alternating days.  This all started when I was tired of carrying the extra weight I had gained from being pregnant.  I have achieved my weight goal and in doing so I have started to indulged in the old unhealthier food habits that had when I was heavier.  Thankfully I have not gained since I am staying active, but I would like to not feel rough through my workouts due to the food.  Therefore I rate myself at a 7 due to my eating habits that need to become more health so it can help me increase my energy level and maintain the fitness training I have become accustom to.

B-Spiritual Well-being

This subject is a little difficult for me to discuss since I have always been in tune with my spirituality and now face complete blockages at times.  Right now I would rate myself between a one and a two.  I am someone that is completely connected to her spirituality through my emotions.  Most would say I am empathic.  These feelings give me that ability to connect within myself and others, which includes the feelings I have for my beliefs.  Since I became pregnant with my daughter, her energy prevented me from picking up on a lot of emotions from others, which also of kiltered my own emotions.  I used to take time in contemplation within nature to center myself back to my inner senses.  Usually this reconnection would take mere seconds.  Simply looking at the moon would prompt a smile and a rush of emotions through my blood.  Now, I have difficulty breaking through the mental blocks I have of motherhood and the long list of things I have to do for school.  I am hoping that learning about these new techniques, they might help me go deeper within myself, clear my head, and bring me back to my center.  Until then, my spirituality will remain what I know I believe inside my head instead of what I believe because of how I feel.  L

C-Psychological Well-being

I believe psychologically I would be rated at a six or seven.  I usually would be a little more on top of my game towards a nine, but I have been having difficulties mentally through everyday activities communication issues with my son. My son is twelve years old and facing difficult times with school due to his ADHD and the new sense of responsibility that is put on his head. Because of his struggles, I find myself keeping myself and he organized over our school work and activities.  He doesn’t realize it, but I spend a lot of time interacting with his teacher, checking his school work, and keeping track of his assignments.  To him I just make sure he has checked of his chores, and help him with homework when he needs assistance.  This way he feels he is being more responsible and I am observing to make sure when he slips at something at school he isn’t digging himself out of a gigantic hole.  My husband and I have devised a new plan to help keep him on track and keep me less psychologically involved.  We have bought the tools we need to make a detailed chart for all his responsibilities so he can mark them and keep track on a day to day basis.  This way, I will check in with his school grades once a week to verify if missing assignments are present.  If he succeeds at his tasks he will acquire a certain level of points for the week, which will direct him to the prize he can earn.  I believe this will eliminate tension within the house and keep us all organized ending with a better state of psychological well-being on all parts.

Audio Reflection:

I found myself little frustrated with the random thoughts the man brought you too.  I do understand why the voice directed you to think about each subject, but I found it make my mind shuffle through thoughts more.  Since there was more talking from him, I was having more thoughts than the audio last week.  I personally like to decrease my thoughts and focus them on a particular point so that I may learn to control my thought filled head and relax through centering those thoughts.  On a positive note, I did like the picturing of the colors and the music in the background.

Journey On

Lets just stat that there are different kinds of techniques for relaxation out there.  This audio form of relaxation started to aggregation me at the beginning.  I know the instructor is trying to prepare a person to become comfortable so they are able to release their tension and relax.  I personally do not like hearing someone tell me how to rest in a comfortable position.  Also, hearing the word relax never really actually accomplishes that goal.  It actually raises my heart rate. 
On a positive note, I very much enjoyed the process in which the instructor directed our focus on different areas of the body.  That is my favorite type of mind focus, being able to control your thoughts to refocus on certain areas of the body and actually feel the blood flowing through your body.  There is also that amazing feeling of allowing your body to do what it wants rather your are trying to lift your arms.  You can feel the need for your body to stay where it is and take the time to enjoy the moment of complete relaxation.

Welcome Blog viewers!!

Welcome to my page and thanks for taking the time to view my reflections on HW-420.  I am looking forward in exploring the possibilities that are out their to reestablish the mind-body-spirit connection that some of us may have lost. I have always been in touch with all aspects of my inner being, but lately I struggle to make the connections between each category with everyday life taking its toll.  Although being in a family and having your wonder husband and children to take care is so rewarding and a blessed experience, there are times needed for independent self reflection that gets pushed aside.  To me cutting my time for myself so that I can be there for my family is an important and takes very little effort.  My responsibilities as a wife and mother come first, unfortunately, sometimes that comes with a lack of connection between mind-body-spirit.  I hope to find ways to reestablish that connection.  I feel that in doing this, I can achieve higher levels of individual expectations I have for myself, parenting, and wival support.