My Daily Contemplative Practice

1.        Describe your experience. (Did you find it beneficial? Difficult?) Why or Why not? Would you recommend this to others? Why or Why not?

The simplest part was keeping my level of concentration.  The most difficult part was the breathing in of a loved one’s suffering and other people’s suffering and dissolving their sufferings in my heart. As a practicing Christian, I can pray for them and help them in every way I can.  I do not buy in to the idea though that I can help them by breathing in and out their sufferings.  In this regard, I would not recommend this practice to anyone because I do not believe in it.

2.        What is the concept of “Mental Workout? What does the research indicate are the proven benefits of a Mental Work Out? How can you implement mental workouts to foster your psychological health?

The concept of a mental workout is committing to exercise our mind daily to “. . . evolve our psychospiritual life and access its capacities and resources” (Dacher, 2006).  According to Dacher, the proven benefits of contemplative practice are the “. . . progressive development of an expanded consciousness and healing” (Dacher, 2006). 

I engage in mental work out regularly every morning through prayer and meditation. I practice loving-kindness by praying for other people. I also maintain selflessness throughout the rest of my prayer by keeping my mind on God. As I continue to worship and praise, I can feel his abiding presence and peace all over me. As I contemplate on God’s goodness and mercy toward me, I feel renewed each day.  My mind is free of clutter and my awareness of his presence strengthens me each day. 

Unit 3 Exercise

1.         Based on your reflections, and on a scale of 1 to 10 (ten being optimal wellbeing),   where do you rate your A-physical wellbeing, B-spiritual well-being, C-psychological well-being? Why?

I rate myself 10 on all three areas.

2.         Develop a goal for yourself in each area (physical, spiritual, psychological).

Instead of writing my goals, I would write about what I currently do.  For physical well-being, I practice proper nutrition on a daily basis.  I seldom eat out because I am careful about the kinds of food I ingest.  In addition, I engage in a regular exercise regimen of cardiovascular training, strength training and flexibility training.

For my spiritual well-being, I dedicate about an hour every morning to study and meditate on the Word of God.  During this time, I also take the time to pray. 

For my psychological well-being, I keep a journal to write down my thoughts. I am also quite expressive thus I am not good in hiding my emotions.  I also have a wonderful husband that I constantly communicate with and share thoughts with all the time. We just don’t talk about the weather :-) but the deep things in life. 

3.         What activities or exercise can you implement in your life to assist in moving toward each goal? I believe I have reached a level where I am not striving. I am content, conscious of who I am and know where I want to be and become.

4.         Complete the relaxation exercise The Crime of the Century. To hear this exercise, click here. Describe your experience. (What it beneficial? Frustrating? etc.)

I actually fell asleep. As far as I can remember, the beginning part, which was the breathing part, was very relaxing. Then I heard him say about the 7 colors. After that I don’t remember. I woke up when the audio was done.  Was it beneficial? Of course it was. I was very relaxed and enjoyed the short nap.

My relaxation experience

Greetings to everyone!  I trust everyone is having a blessed day! Before I begin, I would like to share with you my blog url address, http://www.melow-foreverfit.blogspot.com/.

I just finished a relaxing experience with the Journey On relaxation exercise.  I am quite familiar with this technique because I use it occasionally with my clients. Nevertheless, I find this technique a very effective way to relax. The power of suggestion is clear.  When the narrator said, "feel the warmth in your arms and hands,"  I actually felt them. Autogenic training is similar to mental imagery where the latter is focused on peaceful imagery and the former on the body.  Frankly, the challenge I face from time to time when I do relaxation techniques is impatience. Oh well, this is exactly the reason why I need this, lol!