Unit 6

The exercise is about teaching ourselves how to love. One can expand their mind and heart by repeating over and over for 10 straight minutes, “may all individuals gain freedom from suffering; may all individuals find sustained health, happiness, and wholeness; may i assist all individuals in gaining freedom from suffering; and may i assist all individuals in finding health, happiness, and wholeness.” This exercise is based on the hope that one can have universal love.

The assessment is trying to help one figure out their source of difficulty and suffering and try to help fix it. In order to do this exercise one must first relax their mind. When quiet ask yourself,” what aspect of life is the source of difficulty and suffering?” then ask yourself, “what line of development is most essential for me at this time? And what is my current level of development and what can i aim for?” After accomplishing that, the next step is focusing on promoting integral development. To do this, ask yourself, “what area of my life is ready for growth and development?, Is it the same area that also needs healing or is it another area?, And what would the next level of development look like?”

I never really discovered anything new about myself; I pretty much know who I am. I may be stressed out and be suffering all the time but I know why and my problems can’t be fixed with exercises like these. When it comes to loving people I have always been the type of guy that will give the shirt off my back if someone needed it. I have given my last $5 to a homeless man before when I was hungry because I knew he was hungrier.

The areas I have chosen to focus on is just waiting out time because I know by the first half of next year everything will go back to the way they use to be and I will once again be stress free. So until then I just have to keep reminding myself that this stress is just temporary and things will get better.

In order to keep myself sane until this time arrives I can do activities to keep my mind off of things such as work some puzzles, watch some movies, Christmas shop, and spend time with my newborn. I know how to keep my mind off of my problems and so far I feel like I’m doing a pretty good job.       

Reference:
Dacher, Elliott S. (2006). Integral Health: The Path to Human Flourishing. Laguna Beach: Basic Health Publications.

Unit 5

It seems as though these exercises are getting better however I still have yet to find one that really works for me. The only thing I liked about this one was that it is a lot like what I do when I get upset. I want everyone to leave me alone while I calm down and then I can go back and continue my conversation. I’m wondering if these are not working on me because I am full of stress and hopefully when I lose some of this I can go back, try them again, and hopefully they will work.

To me this was a very hard to do because I am so not physically fit and with all my stress I am not mentally fit either. These are however goals of mine starting the first of the year. I want to relieve some stress, see a chiropractor to fix my back, and start eating healthier. Once all of these start occurring then perhaps I will then be able to explain how the connection is manifested in my personal life.  

UNIT 4

I tried the experience but unfortunately it didn’t have much of an impact on me. I even tried it three times and still I didn’t get anything from it. I believe it didn’t work on me because I’m not really the type of guy that meditates. I do however think that this could work on someone else because there are people in this world that swears on exercises like these. I guess I’m not a very affectionate enough person for relaxing exercises to work which I believe may be  one reason why I didn’t get anything from it.

The concept of mental workout is to strengthen the mind. The proven benefits is that by strengthening the mind it makes it easier to train which makes it better to become happier and more relaxed. I can implement this to foster my psychological health by learning to work on my inner peace to reduce my stress.