Mind Over Matter

        It´s been a pretty hairy couple of weeks around me. I have had a number of close friends with some serious ailments, a minor ailment of my own, and some excruciatingly painful decisions to be made about my future. I´ve hidden my own troubles to try and be supportive of my friends, and have finally been able to reach out a bit, or maybe allow another to reach in a bit, and help me. I am sure she will read this, so will say a deep, from the heart thank you for listening. *

        I really don´t know when, how or if this editorial will get posted, as our fearless leader, Shan, is currently hospitalized, but recovering from a heart attack. We all wish her well, a speedy and full recovery, and yes, we miss you.

        I know there have been thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of articles printed over the years on taking our health for granted. But sometimes, like the humanoids we are, it takes a close encounter to make us really understand. This has been playing on my mind a fair bit this week, and I thought I might share some of those thoughts.

        My Webster´s dictionary describes health as "1. physical and mental well being; freedom from disease, etc. 2. condition of body or mind" Do we always stop to think of both aspects of health, and how they inter-relate? I found it somewhat ironic, or coincidental that Bonnie had just written her first editorial, and used Depression as the topic, prior to her attack. I can´t say that depression had an impact or was the cause of her ailment, but it does make one think. And my own health concern is a stress related issue that has had a noticeable impact on my physical side.

        Does a healthy body create a healthy mind? Or vice versa? I think they are mutually exclusive, one does not exist without the other, or at least not for any great length of time. We know the major food groups, and the importance of a healthy diet for our bodies, but what constitutes a healthy diet for our minds? I can not answer that, but will try to give you some ideas and thoughts, which may help you decide what is healthy for your mind.

        You can´t take your mind out for a brisk walk, though mine does wander on occasion. You can´t do 30 reps on the weights, but you can make it work through some "weighty" issues. Yes, there are mind exercises, but they have their limitations, and so do our minds. If you over exert a muscle, it can cramp, pull or separate, often causing great pain. The brain can also be over stimulated, and it too can cramp or shut down, causing other sorts of pains. Sometimes, like physical exercise, we need to give our brains a day off to recuperate, too.

        Our mind needs a healthy input of blood flow, of course, but it also needs healthy ideas and challenges along the way to keep it fit and growing. It is said we only use 10% of our potential brain capacity, but like my Windows based computer, it can crash when not even close to being full. Too many tasks would be a common crash mode. Too many conflicting thoughts or ideas, or maybe just too darned many! We are conditioned to the fast paced environment we have created for ourselves, and we think we are weak if we can´t keep up. We continue to push ourselves to the limits. We have added cell phones, pagers, and internet ready mobiles, so that we are never "at rest" from the stresses. I remember the last "family" vacation I took, I was sitting reading a newspaper in a bar, waiting for my sister to finish a staff meeting when the phone rang, and the bartender told me I had a call… It turned out, it was work, some 1400 miles away.

        I have been retired, unemployed partially by choice, for over a year now. The stress and anxiety I have been going through most recently is financially related. It has to do with my separation, and the "court´s" version of support being nothing more than monetary, mounting debts, and a need for the financial capabilities of just the day to day living. The long and arduous road to building a new business venture, the joys, and sometimes hardships of a partner. A nagging back injury that has never been settled or rectified by my insurance company. The anxiety of not being able to perform certain physical activities since that accident. And the list goes on…

        One of my coping tools has always been my sense of humor, my quick wit. I could gain a smile by making someone else smile. Lately, I haven´t been in the right frame of mind to do that, and have been letting the little things pile up, create issues that they shouldn´t, choosing to ignore the more important issues, or just push them further into that 90% of unused capacity. I almost crashed a week ago. Caught myself, and had to make some major decisions. Of course, it would never have been necessary to do it this way, had I just kept my priorities. And the added pressure, stress, anxiety, has created a physical health issue, which has also created a secondary mental issue, and the circle grows. I managed to "let someone in" and see my inner feelings on one issue, which has allowed me to get that issue out of the dark cavern of my brain, and shedding some light, has allowed the circle to be somewhat broken. I am now struggling to pull that broken circle back into a straight line, uphill, towards my future. But, I needed to give my mind a chance to relax, to rejuvenate.

        One of the most difficult tasks we face, is that of knowing our own limitations. Do you really know just how much mental strength you have? Is mental strength the same as emotional strength? Do you know what your breaking point is? And if you feel yourself approaching that point, what do you do? How do you cope?

        Sometimes, it seems the smallest of issues can be that needle that breaks the camels back. But is it not more important to look at the bulk of the weight, which maybe you have been carrying for a long time, and consider how to handle it, once and for all? Is it time to call in a mover, to help with that load, a professional, trained to handle those items with care? And before starting out on that long move, shouldn´t we check that truck for physical fitness?

        Of course, the load is your mind, the truck is your body. We have laws to keep a truck from being overloaded, safe practices on load security, and truck fitness. An improperly placed load can be as adverse to the truck as overloading it. While most machines have developed through studying the working dynamics of the body, the mind has been relegated to the mathematical approach of computers. And while the mind is far more complex than any computer we know, are there not some simple lessons to be learned here? Should we be looking at a regular defrag of the mind? Should we not treat our minds as carefully as we do our trucks and computers?

Jeff Davis
January, 2001