When someone says: "My New Years Resolution is to get into shape" That usually means getting our bodies into shape/Physical fitness. However, what many do not realize is how important mental fitness is to overall fitness and health.
Mental fitness is just as important as physical fitness and shouldn’t be neglected.
Mental fitness address's our emotional, psychological, and social well-being health. It is how we think, feel, and behave. Having healthy mental fitness helps determine how we handle stress, relate to others, and make positive choices. Mind/Mental Fitness encompasses attitudes that contribute to emotional resilience and cognitive sharpness.
The World Health Organization (WHO) defines mental health as a "state of well-being in which the individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully..." Therefore, in this sense, having a healthy mental/mind fitness equips you with the tools to handle stress, make reasoned, logical decisions, (instead of emotional decisions) and maintain a balanced state as well as have success in achieving your fitness goal.
How Physical Fitness affects our Mental Health
We know that regular physical exercise has many benefits for mental health and well-being:
Physical Fitness can:
· Help reduce anxiety and depression by releasing endorphins, the body’s natural mood elevator.
· Help in reducing stress levels by decreasing cortisol levels in the body.
· Improved Cognitive Function by helping to increase the size of the hippocampus; responsible for memory formation and storage in the brain.
· Improve blood flow to the brain leading to increased oxygen and nutrient delivery which benefits us by improving attention span, concentration and problem solving skills. We know that as we age, our metabolism slows down, so increasing blood flow is extremely beneficial.
· Greater Happiness as we just feel better about ourselves and leads to an overall sense of well being and happiness.
How Mental Fitness affects our Physical Health
Mental Fitnesss can:
· Increase mental resilience and can affect various health outcomes, including recovery from illnesses and overall life expectancy.
· Help us Cope better with stressful physical situations and help us recover more quickly from illness's, studies show.
· Also called: Self Belief: When we value who we are, and think well of ourselves, that positive energy is infused throughout our body and keeps our body efficient in fighting disease and illness. This Self-Belief is crucial to our success in staying disciplined in achieving an overall healthy body.
In this Illness-Wellness Continuum scale, you can see how the energy of what we believe is directly related to our overall health and wellness. Belief in self drives behavior as well as physical health.
When one has a higher belief in who they are, their value in the world and what they can contribute to the world (their natural gifts), they are happier, healthier, and more successful.
This is Wellness; this is Thriving.
Where do you see yourself on the Thriving Scale ?
Most of us pay attention to the health of our body, but don’t realize, the health of our mental fitness/self-beliefs, pay an intricate role in our health, behavior, and connection to others.
Most of us have hidden, subconscious beliefs that were created in childhood that continue to drive our behavior in adulthood, of which we are completely unaware of unless we take the time to question these beliefs.
Here are a few questions to test where you are with your Beliefs:
1. Whatever you believe you deserve is what you get. Look at your life…what do you see?
Do you have everything you want in your life?
If the answer is no, why don’t you have everything in your life that you want?
Pay attention to the answer as a clue to what you believe about yourself. If you get an "I don't know" that's very normal, as your belief is buried by your subconscious brain trying to protect you. The answer is there, we just have to dig a little deeper, and give your subconscious brain permission to receive the answer.
2. Do your beliefs about who you are, what you deserve, what career you work in, how much money you earn, your relationships; everything in your life, serve you?
If what you want is in direct opposition from what you believe, you will struggle to achieve and manifest all that you want/desire.
What new belief do you need to have or create to support what you want to have/be?
These are the core questions in my workbook “Daydreams Come True-Self Coaching Workbook” that we use for my 6 week D.A.R.E. Your Beliefs Workshop:
D- Discover your subconscious limiting beliefs that drive your behavior that you are unaware of
A- Assess these beliefs. Where did they come from? Are they true? What is true about you?
R- Recreate new beliefs to support what you want to have/be in your life
E- Expand on these new beliefs and learn how to integrate them into your new life with new behaviors, new perspectives, and new activities.
I will leave you with one of my favorite writings.
Autobiography in Five Short Chapters
I.
I walk down the street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in. I am lost. I am helpless. It isn't my fault. It takes forever to find a way out.
II.
I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I still don't see it. I fall in again. I can't believe I am in the same place. It isn't my fault. It still takes a long time to get out.
III.
I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I see it there, I still fall in. It's habit. It's my fault. I know where I am. I get out immediately.
IV.
I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I walk around it.
V.
I walk down a different street.
© 1977 Portia Nelson, There’s a Hole in My Sidewalk: The Romance of Self-Discovery
It would be my honor to help you find your new street.
Is 2024 the year you discover the best of who you are and expand thriving in your life?
If you would like to receive our monthly blog such as this, please fill out the Subscription form below, and/or book your FREE Belief Blueprint Exploration call by scheduling below:
Comments