Mental Fitness

We hear a lot about fitness these days, mostly relating to physical fitness.  From weight training to jogging and walking, there is a whole array available.  Still, according to statistics, Americans are more unhealthy and physical unfit than ever.  I believe that the reason is that we are too much focusing on the external, physical parts of our lifestyles.  Here, I want to focus more on the internal aspect of fitness, fitness of the mind.  The mind is not just the brain.  The mind has three aspects: intellect, emotion and will.  Mental (inner) fitness has to include all three areas – the brain (thinking), the heart (feeling) and (good) action.


Intellectual Fitness

In regards to the brain we are concerned about our memory, the ability to make good choices, keep focus and concentration, and improve reasoning and cognitive skills.

Some people are hung up on their IQ.  So, how do we keep our brain flexible and alert?

* Play games like puzzles, Sudoku, Trivial Pursuit, Jeopardy, etc.

* Read – Reading inspires the imagination, memory and is just plain fun.

* Learn a new skill.  Learn a new language, play a different sport, learn public speaking.

* Telling stories.  Reflect on your life and share stories that will help with your memory.

* Be curious.  Explore a new way to work, be adventurous, eat new foods, listen to different genres of music, etc.

Emotional Fitness

Emotions are feelings we feel in response to someone or something.  The basic emotions are: acceptance, anger, anticipation, disgust, fear, joy, love, sadness, and surprise.  There are five basic aspects to emotional fitness:

* Awareness – accept your feelings and appreciate yourselves.  Being grateful for what is.  Keep a balance of all aspects of mental fitness and center them on a higher purpose.

* Behaviour (self regulation) – Practice patience and trusting in the process of life.  Practice good habits. Keep a sense of humour in your live.  Taking yourself too serious can be dangerous.

* Motivation – keep hope alive through a religious practice; make reasonable goals and fulfil them. Work hard and then let go of the goal. 

* Empathy – practice kindness and put yourself in other people’s shoes.  Sometimes a smile and a friendly word is all that’s needed.

* Relationship skills – The most important aspect of emotional fitness are relationships.  All relationships start in the family.  It is the school of love and the training ground for emotional wellbeing. Practice giving and receiving and forgiveness and life will become more pleasant.

Willpower Fitness:

What is willpower?  It is the discipline to control yourself.  It is the inner power to make good decisions and carry them out.   It gives you the strength and conviction to take action and perform tasks and plans, despite inner resistance, discomfort, laziness or other difficulties. It puts you in charge of yourself and leads you to self-mastery.

The action part of mental fitness is creating a balance between the intellectual and the emotional.  It takes us into the physical part of life.

* Good nutrition; eating a healthy, balanced diet it crucial.

* Physical exercise and athletic abilities

* Start out with being willing to make better choices

* Helps to exercise self-discipline

* Have a clear focus

* Choose fun things; enjoy your task, and it will be easier to stick to it.

* Use repetition to strengthen your willpower muscles.

* Helps to prevent procrastination

* Prevents negative habits and avoids addictions

* Helps to forgo immediate gratifications and pleasures for the sake of bigger goals.

What it comes down to is this: Take care of you; take control of your life; take care of your mind.  It helps to practice gratitude and keeping a balance between the brain, the heart and the action.

What we are really looking for is the unity of these different functions of the mind.  The real power lies in the synchronicity which can only come when we center ourselves on the heart.  Once we achieve that in our mind, we can translate it into our body, and from there it can transform all aspects of life: the family, society, nation, and the world.  

That’s what practicing mental fitness is all about.

Feed Your Muscles With Protein

Even if you are not interested in bodybuilding you want to consciously feed your muscles. Especially, as we are getting older it is crucial that we keep good muscles strength since they help us keep feeling young and strong.

Strength training and working out are good ideas and exercise is necessary, but what if you have already some health challenges like arthritis, etc.? Check with your physician before you start any kind of exercise program.

We all have had certain times when we were unable to exercise for a while either because of sickness or being too busy. The muscles become weak and we tire easily or even worse, we start to exert ourselves again and feel sore the next day.

Muscle recovery and building happens while we are at rest. The majority of it happens while we are sleeping. While we are performing our daily activities and workouts, we are breaking down our muscles. This is not a bad thing. We break down our muscles, so that our bodies will build them up stronger and better than before. The problem comes when we don't allow our bodies the opportunity to repair the muscles.

I went through a restorative regiment for my leg muscles just recently. The therapist emphasized how important it is to eat good protein. How much do we need? He suggested 1 gram per pound of body weight. I found that very hard to handle since my overall daily activities are still limited. When I passed the 100 gram mark I felt very satisfied. Naturally, for those who body build or do a lot of physical activities should have more.

How to Calculate Your Protein Needs:

1. Weight in pounds divided by 2.2 = weight in kg

2. Weight in kg x 0.8-1.8 gm/kg = protein gm.

Use a lower number if you are in good health and are sedentary (i.e., 0.8). Use a higher number (between 1 and 1.8) if you are under stress, are pregnant, are recovering from an illness, or if you are involved in consistent and intense weight or endurance training.

Example: 154 lb male who is a regular exerciser and lifts weights

154 lbs/2.2 = 70kg

70kg x 1.5 = 105 gm protein/day

What are proteins?

Proteins are the basic building blocks of the human body. They are made up of amino acids and help build muscles, blood, skin, hair, nails and internal organs. Next to water, protein is the most plentiful in the body.

Most experts recommend that your protein intake be somewhere between 15 and 30% of your total calorie consumption.

What are good sources of protein?

Fish

Fish is a great source of lean protein, which will help your muscles since this macronutrient is the building block of life. Fish like wild salmon, tuna, rainbow trout and sardines are all high in omega-3s fatty acids. Some studies suggest that consuming omega-3s could help slow the breakdown of muscle mass that can occur during endurance activities like long-distance running.

Lean Cuts of Red Meat

When eaten in moderation, red meat is no longer the harbinger of health doom. In fact, it is a great source for vitamin B12, and if you eat grass-fed beef it will provide some omega-3 fats too. Be sure to select the leaner cuts like sirloin and tenderloin to keep your intake of unhealthy saturated fats to a minimum.

Eggs

Eggs are considered to be a high-quality protein source. Egg protein helps preserve muscle mass and provides steady and sustained energy. The study recommends eggs as a protein source for endurance athletes since eggs are high in the amino acid leucine, which helps muscles utilize the fuel glucose

Cottage Cheese

Cottage cheese, like other lowfat dairy products, is loaded with protein, potassium, calcium, and vitamin D — all the things necessary for proper muscle function. Cottage cheese just happens to contain more protein than yogurt. To keep your fat intake down, make sure to opt for the lowfat version.

Quinoa

Quinoa is chock-full of protein, making it a healthy carbohydrate that fills you up, provides energy, and is full of all the essential acids your muscles need to grow. Also know that when lacking carbs as fuel, your body will use the protein you consume for energy rather than using it to create new muscle fibers. This whole grain is also full of iron and potassium.

The good news is that many grains, dairy and even vegetables are also good sources of protein, so that we can add fiber at the same time.

Suggestions for breakfast foods are: nuts, peanut butter, eggs, tofu, ham, soy milk, yogurt, cheese.

Suggestions for lunch foods: beans, lentils, chickpeas, tofu, eggs, nuts, seeds, tuna fish, meat, poultry, milk, yogurt, soymilk, cheese.

Other interesting facts about muscles:

Muscles get their signals to contract or relax from the brain. Muscles do important work in the body. They move your body into action.

The only ways for you to express an idea are with the muscles of your larynx, mouth and tongue (spoken words), with the muscles of your fingers (written words or "talking with your hands") or with the skeletal muscles (body language, dancing, running, building or fighting, to name a few).

There are two different types of muscles in the body, voluntary muscles and involuntary muscles.

Voluntary muscles are the ones that we can control. They move our bones around, they help us walk, run, or let us eat our favorite sandwich. The signal to move these muscles have to come from the brain which tell it to contract or relax.

The involuntary muscles don’t need any messages from the brain. They are the heart muscle which pump the blood 24/7, the muscles of the digestive system, and the tiny muscles at the bottom of the hairs on your body, which stand up when you feel cold or when you get scared.

Feed your muscles well and they'll take you whereever you want to go.

The Benefits of Rebounding Exercise

Therapeutic rebounding has many different applications. The therapeutic aspect comes into the picture when we are using a rebounder instead of a mini-trampoline which sells in the department stores. The difference is the length of the springs and the legs of the rebounding unit. You have more buoyancy and no jarring on your joints. Rebounding is enjoyable and promotes self-healing. Along with being fun it also improves your posture, increases the vascular system, improves muscle tone and coordination, helps you sleep better and elevates your energy levels.
Here are the various ways to rebound:

· Health Bouncing
Without leaving the mat you just bounce up and down on the mat. The first benefit is that every minute you do that, you strengthen your immune system, fortifying yourself against colds, flu, etc.
This bounce is also good for re-cooperation from any illness, to get your lymphatic system going after being bed-ridden for a while. It helps in the detoxification process of the body and delivers oxygen rich blood into all the parts of your body. NASA astronauts are encouraged to rebound after space flights to counteract the anti-gravity they experienced while in space.
This means benefits for the cardiovascular system, for the digestion and for the cortisone hormone balance which means it is stress reducing.
Start out with 1-3 minutes and build yourselves up, never allowing yourself to get dizzy or straining yourselves.

· Jogging
This is a more vigorous bouncing where you actually leave the mat and do basic jogging. Because we take advantage of the anti-gravity movement there is no jarring or jerking on the joints. Jogging on the rebounder can be done without shoes and to any rhythm. It is actually more beneficial than running on the street while we have all the benefits of building muscle strength and tone, relieve tension, enhancing skills, improving flexibility, creating weight loss and weight management, as well as improve the body’s general physiological condition.
So put on the music and enjoy yourself!

· Aerobic Bouncing
Your rebounding becomes aerobic when you become vigorous on the unit. Leaving the mat, jumping higher and elevating your arms above your heart gives you the aerobic effect. That means that you increase the number and size of your blood vessels that carry the blood around the body. Therefore, more oxygen is carried to the cells of all the tissues and organs. It improves the functions of the heart and the lungs. The longer and faster you train will give you better overall endurance. According to Dr. Kenneth Cooper, who first researched aerobic exercise, you gain greater physical as well as psychological improvement which makes you feel better. You gain a more positive outlook on life as well.

· Strength Training
To increase your upper body strength, in addition to the G-force strength bounce, you can add weights by holding dumbbells or tying weights to your ankles.

· Body Bouncing
For those who can’t bounce themselves you can do the body bounce. Have a wheelchair bound person put their legs on the rebounder and bounce for them to get the benefits of getting circulation to their legs. Or a child could lay on the unit and you put your legs on both sides of the child and give them the benefit of bouncing in case of a fever or other disabilities.
You can also bounce your pet that way. I used to do that with my dog and he really enjoyed it.

· Senior Rebounding with support bar
For those who have trouble with stability, a support bar can be mounted on the unity and you can have them do the same activities on the unit by holding on for greater security.

For quality rebounder, please contact: http://www.needak-rebounders.com/ or call:1-800-232-57621-402-336-4083; Hours: 8:30AM to 5:00PM M-F Central Time and tell them that Jutta Tobkin send you.

Rebounding

Rebounding
Rebounding is the exercise on a mini-trampoline. Bouncing up and down is fun. Children do it naturally when jumping on a bed or sofa. For therapeutic benefits I use a quality rebounder with longer springs, not just the cheap one from the department store. It measures about three and a half foot from side to side and can be easily stored behind a door or under a bed (mine has folding legs).
I first heard of it from Linda Brooks (http://2rebound.com/). She gave a certification workshop I attended back in 1997.
Ever since, I have enjoyed this health beneficial exercise. In only a couple of minutes of bouncing I can stimulate my immune system. The lymph system flashes out toxins and impurities from the body. I bounce as often as I can during the day and never get a cold. The immune system will multiply the white blood cells to strengthen my immune defense and keep viruses and bacteria away.
Rebounding has some other applications. By jogging, jumping, twisting and sprinting I strengthen my bones and create aerobic movements. Along with a healthy diet this can lead to loose weight. Astronauts have been using it after space flight to regain bone mass.
It is very safe for any age, since Needak (http://www.needak-rebounders.com/index.php) has a holding bar available for stabilizing.
Because it is a whole body exercise, every cell of every part is bouncing at once.
One of my favorite aspects is meditating on the rebounder. Along with deep breathing this is invigorating and energizing. More about this in an other blog.
For more detailed information on rebounding, see http://www.rawfoodtalk.com/archive/index.php/t-4801.html.
Our body is a miracle created by God; let’s take care of it well.