Mind

Mind your mind. This is a mantra I employ when I am feeling frustrated or fatigued. There in my mind I find the direction I need to take to renew and revive. I reach it through my daily meditation. Sometimes I reach it through writing my daily essay for this blog. I laugh aloud some mornings when my homepage horoscope beats me to the current stream of thought in my own mind.  Funny how that happens.

Minding my mind is a health-promoting exercise. My mind knows its vehicle, my body, on many levels that are not readily observable to my working consciousness. I must stop and listen to that information. I cannot readily access it while watching TV, surfing the Web or answering emails. Quiet meditation and subsequent reflection on that meditation yields revelations of great value to my health and general sense of well being.

The mind, like muscle, responds best to regular stimulation and challenge. Crossword puzzles have their value, but the type of stimulation and challenge which I mean entails communication within my own levels of consciousness. I pay attention to my remembered dreams. I meditate daily for at least twenty minutes. I reflect on the status of my mind-body connection each day. This is preventative mental health care. It does not require psychopharmacology. It does not require psychotherapy, even though psychotherapy could possibly add to its effectiveness.

Don't take your mind for granted. It changes with your body as both age. Managing your own mental health is as important is managing diet and skeletal-muscular exercise on a daily basis. This is all part of a humanist practice.