Adjust Attitude / Emotional Health
Attitude: manner, disposition, feeling, position, etc. with regard to a person or thing; tendency or orientation, especially of the mind, a cheerful attitude.
This is the Webster’s Dictionary definition of attitude and I would like to explore and expand on that somewhat, as this is an important component of the Emotional/Physical Health connection to the 8 Wonders of Integrated Living.
Consider the following questions as you read. Your answers will determine how valuable the following concepts and exercises might be to improving your life:
1. Are you happy with your life?
2. Are you happy with yourself, the way you are this moment?
3. Do you have a clear vision of your future and how to get there?
4. Do you feel that, to the best of your ability, you are in control of your future?
5. Do you feel at odds with yourself or the people around you, coworkers, friends,family?
6. Are you easily irritated by events occurring around you?
A new light on Attitude
If you will indulge me, I am going to coin two new terms, at least I think they’re new; micro-attitude and macro-attitude. A micro-attitude is the way we relate to friends, family, coworkers, our extended nuclear community if you will. Macro-attitude is the way we relate to the world as a whole, which includes our community, but extends beyond to our relationships with nature, our inner universe and humanity in general. We will be focusing on the macro-attitude, for an adjustment on that level will affect every other level of interaction as well. Though it is important to understand the distinction between the micro and macro, the macro reality originates in the higher functioning realms of the subconscious, where the codes to our behavior and attitudes are formed and stored.
Because the realm of the subconscious is not tangible, like a car or house, we cannot presume to understand or connect with it in conventional ways. We must gain access to these codes through specific pathways or activities that open the subconscious to transformation. These would include, but are not limited to: meditation, walking (especially in a natural environment) reading and writing (we will explore these individually later). Viewing evocative art is also marvelous way to unlock the subconscious. The visual queues stimulate the mind as would a physical experience. For an example, have you ever felt yourself being drawn to a painting or photograph as you pass a gallery or while waiting in the doctor’s office? Did you feel yourself being transported somehow into the imagined world represented by the art? This is because experiencial centers of the brain are stimulated by certain visual triggers. These triggers are different for each of us, depending on our personalities and unique events which shaped the view of our world. The surreal nature of the work gives us pause as we take the time to contemplate its meaning for us on a deeper level. This is what it feels like to have the subconscious open and available for transformation. For that moment, we are reminded that there is a larger world beyond whatever little problem we might have been thinking about. That is when the shift from micro to macro-attitude occurs. The challenge is to retain the macro-perspective even when the vortex of details in our immediate lives compels us to condense our existence to the head of a pin. How is this accomplished?
Most of us operate on the micro-attitudinal level throughout the day, indeed throughout our lives. With such a myopic view of the world, it is understandable that small changes in our environment would be unsettling, leading to one being in a constant state of perturbation: hence, a bad attitude. However, when we routinely expose ourselves to the experience of the macro world, slowly, subtly, these perturbations diminish in the same way a stone creates less disturbance when thrown into a large body of water than a small one. But this ‘open-minded’ view, it would seem, is not automatic in most people, perhaps one might assume because the infinite number of small details with which we must grapple on a daily basis requires a sort of focused micro-management. While that may be true, I submit that the micro and macro perspectives are not mutually exclusive, they can exist in the mind simultaneously, but it takes work and repetition to mold the mind to this new paradigm.
Is religion the answer?
Ritual plays an important role in the transformation of our minds and our lives. Certainly when one thinks of ritual, the natural inclination is to presume a religious context. While ritual is intrinsic to religion, the goals of religion are often focused on the spiritual realm, improving the odds of a blissful existence in the afterlife. Whereas the shaping of attitude is more akin to behavior modification, a more practical application of ritual that can be applied today with the potential of a cause and effect result. However some of the really valuable aspects of religion are belief and faith: a strong conviction about one’s relationship to a spiritual constant, a sturdy anchor when the storms of change conspire to rip us from our underpinnings. How can we harness the galvanizing forces of belief and faith into our daily lives, without the dogma so often associated with a religious life?
Perhaps the answer is best expressed by the following poem by Rudyard Kipling :
If
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!
More later
This is the Webster’s Dictionary definition of attitude and I would like to explore and expand on that somewhat, as this is an important component of the Emotional/Physical Health connection to the 8 Wonders of Integrated Living.
Consider the following questions as you read. Your answers will determine how valuable the following concepts and exercises might be to improving your life:
1. Are you happy with your life?
2. Are you happy with yourself, the way you are this moment?
3. Do you have a clear vision of your future and how to get there?
4. Do you feel that, to the best of your ability, you are in control of your future?
5. Do you feel at odds with yourself or the people around you, coworkers, friends,family?
6. Are you easily irritated by events occurring around you?
A new light on Attitude
If you will indulge me, I am going to coin two new terms, at least I think they’re new; micro-attitude and macro-attitude. A micro-attitude is the way we relate to friends, family, coworkers, our extended nuclear community if you will. Macro-attitude is the way we relate to the world as a whole, which includes our community, but extends beyond to our relationships with nature, our inner universe and humanity in general. We will be focusing on the macro-attitude, for an adjustment on that level will affect every other level of interaction as well. Though it is important to understand the distinction between the micro and macro, the macro reality originates in the higher functioning realms of the subconscious, where the codes to our behavior and attitudes are formed and stored.
Because the realm of the subconscious is not tangible, like a car or house, we cannot presume to understand or connect with it in conventional ways. We must gain access to these codes through specific pathways or activities that open the subconscious to transformation. These would include, but are not limited to: meditation, walking (especially in a natural environment) reading and writing (we will explore these individually later). Viewing evocative art is also marvelous way to unlock the subconscious. The visual queues stimulate the mind as would a physical experience. For an example, have you ever felt yourself being drawn to a painting or photograph as you pass a gallery or while waiting in the doctor’s office? Did you feel yourself being transported somehow into the imagined world represented by the art? This is because experiencial centers of the brain are stimulated by certain visual triggers. These triggers are different for each of us, depending on our personalities and unique events which shaped the view of our world. The surreal nature of the work gives us pause as we take the time to contemplate its meaning for us on a deeper level. This is what it feels like to have the subconscious open and available for transformation. For that moment, we are reminded that there is a larger world beyond whatever little problem we might have been thinking about. That is when the shift from micro to macro-attitude occurs. The challenge is to retain the macro-perspective even when the vortex of details in our immediate lives compels us to condense our existence to the head of a pin. How is this accomplished?
Most of us operate on the micro-attitudinal level throughout the day, indeed throughout our lives. With such a myopic view of the world, it is understandable that small changes in our environment would be unsettling, leading to one being in a constant state of perturbation: hence, a bad attitude. However, when we routinely expose ourselves to the experience of the macro world, slowly, subtly, these perturbations diminish in the same way a stone creates less disturbance when thrown into a large body of water than a small one. But this ‘open-minded’ view, it would seem, is not automatic in most people, perhaps one might assume because the infinite number of small details with which we must grapple on a daily basis requires a sort of focused micro-management. While that may be true, I submit that the micro and macro perspectives are not mutually exclusive, they can exist in the mind simultaneously, but it takes work and repetition to mold the mind to this new paradigm.
Is religion the answer?
Ritual plays an important role in the transformation of our minds and our lives. Certainly when one thinks of ritual, the natural inclination is to presume a religious context. While ritual is intrinsic to religion, the goals of religion are often focused on the spiritual realm, improving the odds of a blissful existence in the afterlife. Whereas the shaping of attitude is more akin to behavior modification, a more practical application of ritual that can be applied today with the potential of a cause and effect result. However some of the really valuable aspects of religion are belief and faith: a strong conviction about one’s relationship to a spiritual constant, a sturdy anchor when the storms of change conspire to rip us from our underpinnings. How can we harness the galvanizing forces of belief and faith into our daily lives, without the dogma so often associated with a religious life?
Perhaps the answer is best expressed by the following poem by Rudyard Kipling :
If
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!
More later
posted by Mark Reynolds at 10:03 AM
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