When you investigate the literature about stress, you will read about how there is good and not so good stress but that life itself has stress, it is a natural. The changing environment, even if we love the seasons in the Midwestern region in the U.S., show clearly that those changes are still stressful and a prime time for illness due to adaptation, allergies, swings in temperatures. Our mind adapts and then our body works to keep up — not easy. Our body is busy doing all sorts of other activities just to help us walk, talk, digest, and deal the emotional responses we have that elicit physiological reactions. There are changes in our life as we get in the car and drive to our destinations — route changes, different traffic interruptions, they all cause a certain type of stress and depending upon your perceptions, the stress is either good or not so good. Thus road rage versus the laid back driver who just moves along without incident.
For every thought we have, there is an emotion. These pairings release neurotransmitters into our blood stream and, depending upon the dynamic, it is either helpful and soothing for the body or prompts it into high gear and expends energy. If you’re a curious person, Google search “physiology of anxiety” and you can review the technical literature. For my purposes here however, my intent is to invite you to consider that which you already know intuitively — the mind and body are very intertwined. We influence our state of wellness and illness, even unconsciously.
During this period of my voice rest, I am seeing things that are not so viewable when speaking is my primary routine. People around me are all whispering and learning to be adept at reading lips. There is an accommodation to pace that is also observable and it is quite lovely even in a fast paced interaction. I believe there are lessons here.
Someone even labeled me “The People Whisperer“, funny but it has a certain charm to it that we can all benefit from. Imagine if everyone in the media stopped yelling over one another. Imagine if everyone talking took it down a few decibels when talking. There is a calm for our physiology when there is silence, when the noises produced are pleasant, when we allow ourselves the room to relax into our own mind and then allow our body to do same.
Kneipp.com is where you will find what I have discovered — go there, it is a lovely story and you’ll be eager to indulge yourself a bit. Love yourself…….think of 7 fine things you can do to produce beautiful thoughts in your mind which will then produce a relaxed state in your body.
Happy Friday to you……………..celebrate the strength within you.
