It sounds like a strange thing, “to exercise your heart and your
mind.” Who would have ever thought that that was possible.
What was the first thing that you thought of when you were
reading the title to this article? Did it make you curious to
find out what that meant or did you think oh boy the writer
of this article is crazy?
Well I want to let you know that I don’t think I’m crazy but,
my family might think I am! So I hope that you are curious
to find out what I’m talking about as I mentioned above.
You know, health experts talk a lot about exercising our body to
keep it healthy. I’m pretty sure you have heard it more times than
you’d like to think about that you need to be doing some sort of
exercise at least 3 times a week for at least an hour at a time. It’s
important that we oxygenate our bodies because all of our
organs need a lot of fresh oxygen in order to stay healthy and
working properly.
So it’s safe to say that when you do some sort of physical exercise
that you are literally exercising your heart because your heart is
working harder to pump the blood in and out a lot faster.
And your mind/brain is having to work harder to make sure that your
body is functioning properly while you are exercising. The mind,
it’s such a wonderful thing!
But, what about the other kind of exercising, the kind that is not
something physical that you do. It’s the emotional kind of exercising
that you would do each and every single day, not just 3 times a week.
Your heart is at the center of your emotions and vice versa, your
emotions is where your heart is.
It’s so easy to exercise your mind at any given moment by reading,
writing, doing cross word puzzles, doing math problems and the
list goes on. There’s no shortage of the things that you can do.
With all that being said about physically exercising your heart and
your mind, did you know that your heart and your mind are connected?
Some people don’t think about that or know that to be true and yet
there are research and studies done by major organizations that
have proven that to be true.
You might be wondering – what are some of the ways that you could
exercise your heart and your mind for optimal emotional health?
Or why would I even want to do exercises for your emotional health.
What I know to be the case after working with dozens and dozens of
women over the last 20 years is that there seems to be a ‘one or the
other’ kind of thinking and believing when you talk about the heart
and mind. And when they have to make a decision about something
of significance it usually is done with their mind using logic for fear
of making the wrong decision. Now contrast that with women making
a decision that is not of any great significance and the decision making
is typically made using their emotions or in other words, their heart.
It is possible to be able to use both your heart and your mind at the same
time, It just takes some practice to get there. You need to start exercising
that elusive heart and mind muscle.
To start off with one of the first things that you can do is:
1. Do a self-assessment to determine what kind of decision maker you are.
Do you usually make all of your decisions from your mind or do you usually
make heartfelt decisions?
2. Once you’ve determined what kind of decision maker you are, you
can then begin to focus on the other one part of you that is not being
utilized as much in your decision making. Write down on a piece
of paper that other part that needs help, just seeing it written on paper
will have a big impact on you. In most cases you didn’t even
realize certain things until you think about it and write it down.
3. Ask yourself-what is one thing that I can do to strengthen my weaker
area of the two(heart or mind)?
Steps to take for Heart People
– If you use your heart all the time to make decisions, what you can start
doing is to think about being logical – it’s like having no emotion at all
when you’re thinking about something. Does it make sense or not,
is it black or white?
– Write down all of the things that come to your mind when you are doing
these exercises. You’ll be amazed at what you find out when you
write things on paper.
– Do this at least once a day and you will start to recognize how your
mind works as compared to your heart.
Steps to take for Mind People
– If you use your minds analytical or logical side, start giving your heart
a lot more attention by putting your right hand over your heart and
start asking yourself questions like: what do I really care about,
what is important to you (something that makes you feel all warm
and fuzzy inside, your emotions), who do you really care about?
Start listening to what your heart is saying, even if you can’t see with
your logical mind how it’s supposed to work.
– You want to write down on paper all of the feelings that you experience
while doing this exercise, even if it makes you uncomfortable.
– Do this at least once a day and you will start to recognize how your
heart works as compared to your mind.
All of these exercises could possibly make you uncomfortable or frustrated,
but just stick with it. Doing these exercises will strengthen your heart and
your mind muscle when you do them consistently.
You will get to a point in your life where your heart and mind will start working
together and be connected without you even having to think about it. This is
what should happen in order for you to make better decisions at any given
moment of the day and have that optimal emotional health. You will be
grateful that you have it, each and every day of your life.
I want to encourage you to take action and do the exercises in the steps listed
above. You will be glad you did!
Happy Valentine’s Day!
Designing and Creating
Aloha, Janin
