Wednesday, June 19, 2013

Unit 3 - Journey of Self-reflection


Hello Everyone,

This week’s exercise of self-reflection is not a real “eye-opener” for me, but it is a chance for you all to get to know the real me.  Perhaps I should take this blog with me to my health care professional so that he can read about my, self-perceived deficits that are most likely attributing to my health.

A – Physical wellbeing – I would rate that somewhere around a 7.  My physiological tests of blood, bone and tissue are all optimal and within normal limits, but I am overweight and have hypertension.  These lend negative energy to my feeling of being tired a lot of the time.

B – Spiritual wellbeing – I would rate that at about an 8.  I have always been very spiritual and try very hard to stay spiritually grounded but there are occasions in which I lose my grounding and feel that I am drifting lost in the world.  I am actually experiencing that feeling today, but will find grounding here shortly.  I hope!

C – Psychological wellbeing – Oh this one stinks!  I would say its somewhere around a 2-3.  I am stressed, depressed, overworked and feel like my world is in a holding pattern at the moment.  I am in the process of selling my home and I feel that I am at the mercy and whim of everyone in my world.  I am thinking this is adding to my sense of losing my grounding as well.  I definitely need to learn the technique to taking back my world and my sanity. 

My Goals are as follows:

A – Physical – Exercise more, Take my BP meds on a daily (regular) basis.  One would think as a nurse, this should not be a big problem, but I always seem to forget to take care of me.  Maybe that should be my goal, all rolled up into one.  TAKE CARE OF ME (Sorry for the shouting), it was only so I could hear myself through all of the noise inside my head :-).

B – Spiritual – Take time for me to relax more.  Also to work on exercises that will finally help me to believe that I do have self-worth and I need to be better to myself.

C – Psychological – Stop letting other people control my feelings.  I know that I allow this to happen due to low self-esteem. If I can increase my self-esteem and I should be able to  regain a modicum of psychological control over my life. 

Through practicing exercises designed to discover loving myself, I will begin the journey toward meeting each goal.  If I can learn to love and nurture myself, I can easily achieve or at least begin the process of transforming myself to be a healthier individual. 

Listening to the “Crime of the Century” exercise while relaxing, I found it rather enlightening and it helped create a self-awareness of my need to value and appreciate myself.  It was the 5th Chakra, The throat (Aqua Blue) that I had the most trouble visualizing and holding on to.  I found it quite difficult to visualize the instructions because I do have such low will power.  This exercise quite literally ties all of the other questions above, together.  It is my lack of will power that will keep me from obtaining Integral Health and a balance of Spirit, Mind and Body.  I guess I better work on that.

Thoughts? 

Thanks,

Rufus J.

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Reflection - "Journey On Relaxation Exercise"

Hello Everyone,

Well,  I have always been a skeptic when it comes to relaxation exercises.  I tend to think of them, as my mother always called them, "Hippie Voodoo".  I have tried several of techniques throughout the years but have always found them to be too time consuming.  I do not have the time to relax, I am too busy being uptight and stressed ;-).

But, seriously, when reflecting on this one, I have to admit.  It relaxed me.  Just a few minutes into the exercise, I fell asleep.  You can't get much more relaxed than that.  So, after my little power nap, I started it over and listened to the exercise and I was able to follow the rather soothing voice as it guided me into a state of relaxation and an attempt to control my autonomic nervous system and shunt blood to my arms.  The technique did not work for me because at this stage of the game, I am not relaxed enough nor do I have the mental control needed to shunt blood from one place to the other.  Perhaps as I progress through the exercises in this course I will begin to master this task.

As relaxation techniques go, I do not think this one is practical enough use as a relaxation technique unless you are some place safe like your home or another safe, private place.  I would not begin to take off my watch, kick off my shoes and begin to make myself comfortable enough to use the exercise in, say, my doctors office, work or the grocery store all of which are places where I am the most stressed and need to practice relaxation exercises.

But if rating it for it's overall relaxation potential, I would give it an 7 out of 10, just for the music and the intonation and pitch of the voice.  It did after all, make me fall asleep.

Thoughts anyone ????

Rufus J.

Welcome to My Blog

Hello Professor and Classmates,

I welcome you to my first blogging experience.   I hope that through my musings I can help enlighten each of you in a small way.  I am truly a person who needs to learn the lessons of this course.  I go through each day feeling like there is a black hole in the center of my body that is sucking the life out of me.  I have had this explained by Western medical practitioners as a response to stress.  This is definitely NOT (yes, I shouted) a feeling that I want to live with the rest of my life. 

I have already gained pearls of wisdom from the first few chapters of Integral Health: The Path to Human Flourishing by Elliot S. Dacher that have opened my eyes to what a waist of time these stressful feelings and negative emotions are.  Dacher's telling of the story of the fisherman casting away diamonds because he did not have an awakened enough awareness of know there were diamonds in the bag (Dacher, 2006).  Just as all was not lost to the fisherman who did not throw away the last diamond (Dacher, 2006), I hope this course is to me.  I hope I am able to discover a "diamond" within myself and learn to acquire the skills to take control of my mind and subsequently learn to bridge my mind, my spirit and my body. 


Again, welcome to my journey.
Rufus J.

Reference

Dacher, E. (2006). Integral Health: The Path to Human Flourishing. Laguna Beach: Basic Health Publications Inc.