An important part of your health is your mind. You grow your mind’s capacity by learning new things and challenging yourself mentally.
Mental stimulation is important and helps improve your memory, prevent Alzheimer’s, dementia and a multitude of many other mental illnesses. This is because by exercising your mental muscle you stimulate growth of new blood vessels and keeps existing vessels open and functional.
Strengthening your intellect can take many forms. From watching a good movie, reading a book or having a good conversation with friends.
If you do not maintain your mind, you’re mental state will become ill, weaken and wither.
Quality Of Thought
The quality of your thoughts directly effects the quality of your mental health and your overall health. Do you see the bright side of things? Or are you constantly seeing the flaws and negativity in people?
Holding limiting, negative thought patterns will affect your health in many ways – it can directly affect your levels of happiness, your sleep and your immune system to name a few.
You can maintain your mental health by developing high thought quality through actively replacing negative thoughts with positive, resourceful thoughts.
We all feel down, angry or fearful at times, but its important to recognize this behavior and stop it. Sometimes it may be all too easy to slip into a negative thought process. Its important to be consciously aware of this and stop it in its tracks before it becomes a habit.
There are some negative thought patterns though, that are a bit more subtle. We can be guilty of these thoughts, sayings and mannerisms without even realizing it.
A simple test it to ask yourself if you ever say the following:
- That drives me crazy
- That really burns me up
- He really pushes my buttons
- I can’t stand it when……
These are examples of some of the few small statements that can make a big difference on our quality of thought.
The next time you notice saying any of these negative sayings or thought, just stop and tell yourself “cancel”. It may seem silly at first but over time it will form into a habit. Only through regular meditation will you be able to grow and maintain your mind.
If you do not maintain your mind, you’re mental state will become ill, weaken and wither.
