Saturday, January 5, 2013

Unit 4 "Mental Workout"

Hello Health and Wellness Enthusiasts,
This blog is in response to the questions on “Mental Workout.”  I look at a mental workout a lot like a physical workout.  It may take time out of our day, be a bother but is so beneficial to our health.  Being a Physical Education teacher I work with students every day and am always addressing physical fitness.  I get to see the students from year to year and I can see the ones who have done nothing over the summer come back in the fall and I have to start all over to build back to when they left.  When we stop practicing/training we see a drop in our conditioning.  That is true for mental as well.
Research shows that training the mind leads to many benefits.  “Research studies and personal reports have also demonstrated that mental training can transform the mind by reducing disturbing emotions that cause anger, hatred, fear, worry, confusion and doubt while enhancing positive emotions such as patience, loving-kindness, openness, acceptance, and happiness” (Dacher, 2006, p. 63).  Based on this research it shows that this mental training can lead to improved defense to mental suffering and physical disease.  These mental workouts can help to reduce several emotional challenges that we may face during the day.  These mental exercises are important to bring our mental condition back up.  Just like physical training there are exercises that help certain parts of the body; mental exercises help deal with certain emotional distresses we may be feeling.  Just this week has anyone had an emotional distress occur?  If yes, how did you deal with it?  I would love to hear all your strategies to a better mental fitness.
Thanks, Emily
Reference:
Dacher, E.S., (2006). Integral Health. The Path to Human Flourishing. Basic Health

5 comments:

  1. Thank you for sharing all of this important information. I can imagine how hard that would be to look at the progress your students make throughout the year then have them come back like they were never worked with. I think it is so important for kids to be active all year long so that their bodies stay healthy. I also believe that it is so important for us to excercise our minds as well as our bodies because if our minds are healthy then our bodies can be healthy. I also agree that you will have a more positive outlook on life and me more happy all around if you exercise your mind.

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  2. Hi Emily,

    I do need to get disciplined to exercise my mind, I do just fine with physical exercise but I have to get over thinking I am wasting my time and have many things to do. I find that concentrating on my breathing helps me calm down, it only takes a few minutes and you can do it anywhere. Deep breathing is great for the body.

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  3. I think this blog post was so very well written and I liked how you incorporated the items and topics from our reading from class. Mentla workouts are so very important for a better cognitive well-being and I am glad to hear that you benefited from it. I have foudn great use with these types of techniques in my daily life and can say that my stress level has dimished greatly thanks to mental training.

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  4. Hi Emily
    It does seem mental training and physical training are the same type of workout, you just do them differently. I like how you compare the two. We can benefit greatly from mental workouts. What a good way to benefit our health. We all know that challenging our mind is good in helping to deter aging difficulties with the mind, this really is no different.

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  5. I love your style of writing and just had to comment on your blogs I know it is a littel late and you probably wont even see this, but your writing is very easy to understand and pleasant to fallow. Thank you for your hard work. have you ever seen this website for a mental work out http://www.lumosity.com/landing_pages/188?gclid=CLjvt5eFrbUCFcdxQgodj3sAbQ It is really incredible if you get a chance check it out.

    Rob

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