Subtle Mind

This weeks activity introduced us to the subtle mind. The three levels of the subtle mind are witnessing, calm-abiding, and unity consciousness. Through out this week I have tried to incorporate the practice of witnessing mind and unfortunately this was not as easy for me as I had hoped.

The first time I listened to the exercise in a completely quit room with no distractions. I was able to keep a focus, but I fell asleep. Seriously! I tried the exercise again the next day but I found myself not being able to focus again because it was too long and I was distracted because this time I was not able to isolate myself.

In my case the witnessing mind exercise was not as effective as the loving kindness exercise for me. They both require you to be focused on your thoughts but for me since I chose my thought in the loving kindness activity it was easier for me to benefit from this.  Both of the exercises had a focus on breathing, but the witnessing mind exercise seemed to have a bit more focus on breathing to me.

Regardless of which exercise is better, they both incorporate the point of mental wellness affecting our physical wellness. We all need to have good mental health because it effects everything else in the body. When we think negative thoughts or have stress and too much on our minds we seem to feel bad. On the opposite hand when we have good positive thoughts we seem to fair better physically and feel better about ourselves. Just yesterday I was having a very stressful morning and it made me physically sick. I had the shakes and couldn't eat or concentrate. My co-workers were very concerned because they had never seem me in such a state and believe me I don't like being in that state either. I had to take a moment and calm myself and pray about the situation to get my focus back. I felt better as the day went on and the stress decreased. This is the perfect example of how our mental can affect our physical whether it be in a negative or positive way.

Angelleka