Recently, I seem to meet a lot of people who complain about becoming the stiffening of their bodies. They can’t stretch the way they used to, they don’t manage to touch their toes, or they started doing, f.ex. yoga, to prevent further loss of physical flexibility.
What triggered me was: why is it that some people experience this ‘stiffening’ very consciously and as something quite undesirable whilst others either don’t seem to notice it or don’t’ seem to mind. Or do they not experience it in the first place?
Curious as I am I started doing some research on ‘stiffening’.
Firstly, I consulted one of my favorite books on the matter; what has Louise Hay to say about stiffness. Louise Hay is an author who discovered amazing metaphysical connections between various symptoms, stretching from cysts via depression to misfortune and their underlying causes. Whenever I have something bothering me I consult her book and her explanations are always spot on for me.
Does a flexible mind facilitate a flexible body?
Here’s what she writes about the symptom ‘STIFNESS’:
‘Probable cause: stiff and rigid thinking’
‘New way of thinking to reduce the symptom: I am safe enough to be flexible in my thoughts and to adjust them’
Ah! That is not so astonishing if you consider the fact that it is mostly people who have passed say 40 years of age that I have talked to…
So the increasing of stiffness may have something to do with simply growing older….Old news! you may say, that’s an open door: EVERYBODY knows that you become stiffer when you get older. And there are lots of medical explanations for this, of course. (Which I will not go into now, since my approach is a fresh one (-;)
Therefore, let’s see what Louise has to share with us about aging issues:
‘Probable cause: general beliefs; thinking old; Fear of being yourself; rejection of the Now’
‘New way of thinking to reduce the symptom: I love myself and accept myself at any age; every moment of life is perfect.’
I could go on and explore the problem behind the stiffness of particular parts of the body, most of which are listed in Louise’s book but this extends the scope of this post.
Back to the probable causes of stiffness. This is very interesting. It would mean that flexibility of mind allows us to also be more flexible in our physical movements*. And this entails that instead of fixing our minds on a single thought or solution, the art is to develop flexibility of mind and accept that there may be as many ways of thinking, judging and making decisions as there are people on this planet.
Of course there are many ways of thinking on the planet. The art is how does a single person develop this flexibility of mind for themselves? There must be many schools of thought who took on the task of solving this problem. Or others who aspired to just the opposite, actually, judging by the number of strictly regulated clubs, communities, beliefs or education systems….
What I find most appealing is a simple strategy: learning to appreciate. Learn to truly appreciate what is, what you have, what you experience. To some this may seem logical, to some idiotic. To the later group I can only recommend: try it, truly give it some time and energy before you discard it as nonsense.
For the first group, to whom it sounds logical that appreciation might be the key to a flexible mind, it might yet prove difficult to getting the hang of changing their ways from their well-known ways towards appreciating more. So what can they do to reprogram their minds towards increased flexibility?
In the old days, experience teaches passed on their secrets to their students. All arts and crafts, including medicine and meditation, were once taught in this manner. You might just get the fastest results by finding a teacher or mentor, or find a group with like-minded people who can help you to take your first steps toward change.
Why should the famous glass, which has always been half empty, not be half full for a change?
This is a very exciting subject, so next week I will come back with a fun way to train your mind to become more flexible.
Further subjects for this blog will be:
-> Experience your mind
-> What do you see when you look at yourself?
-> What eats you up? Presenting eating disorders
Reference: Louise Hay: You can heal your life. Hay House.
* I fully comprehend that there may also be other causes for decreased physical flexibility, such as accidents or diseases. Other causes aside, I feel that exploring the effect of the mind always has the potential to truly increase life quality.