MANUFACTURING TIME VS MAINTAINING CONTROL AT ALL COSTS
Overwhelm? “Isn’t that something we should be able to control with our mind? Surely we should be able to override stressful feelings and maintain control at all costs. Stress is seen as a weakness that strong humans do not and WILL NOT succumb to. Getting on with things was my father’s central philosophy. Unfortunately for him and countless others, his approach contributed to his untimely death.
Busy bees keep pushing themselves through tasks and overriding natural inclinations to rest. When faced with piles of work, some of us find ourselves loading even more tasks on our shoulders! When planning for a trip for example, do you sometimes feel as though everything has to done NOW and then a bit more?! Challenging ourselves and setting some deadlines is vital for our overall well being and personal satisfaction, but there is an edge to everything.
So what do we mean by ‘mind’ anyway? In our Western culture we have been told that we are our brains in some ways. We think therefore we are! We have been told a story that our brain reigns supreme over our bodies, protecting us from our less predictable emotional and ‘instinctual’ natures’. Our mind is often compared to a computer that can be programmed. This idea of being able to programme or control our mind is appealing. Having a mind like a captain of a ship has lead to all sorts of common phrases in our culture. Author and International Embodiment practitioner Phillip Shepherd, who I have had the privilege of meeting, writes of how we speak of the head of organizations and how import it is to get ahead or get to the top!
Our understanding of what our mind is and who we are is a cultural thing. In Tibetan culture they speak of heartmind and the idea of the all important ‘brain’ doesnt feature. Remarkably this ancient way of understanding our nature has now been backed up by science. Researchers from The Heartmath institute demonstrate that there are more messages coming from our body, heart and gut to our brains than from our brains to our hearts! It seems after all that it is not our brains but our hearts that are the the guiding captains. So if our posture is slumped, breathing is shallow and our digestion is tight, our brain will release stressful hormonal messages. Messages of lack, fear or anxiety are commonly triggered. So in simple terms this means that physical ailments like tension pains in our digestive system can be partly triggered by our emotional states. Complementary medical practitioners have called these tensions conflicts of the ‘heartmind’.
So the next time that you find yourself grimming holding on to old habits of control at all costs, remember your intelligent heart.
WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU FEEL OVERWHELMED SERIES:
