Put Your Action Where Your Mind Is

Reading time: 6 minutes
Summary: This post is about the things we know are good for our mental health, but that we don't always make an effort to do; it can hopefully encourage you to find ways to do the things that you know are helpful for you. 

Last week I read Brené Brown's "The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are. Your Guide to a Wholehearted Life." I admit I cringed when I saw the cheesy cover combined with the cheesy title, BUT the author is Brené Brown, and she has gained both my respect and my interest by her overall approach to mental health. Brené and I seem to share a task-oriented stubborn determination to plough through life, achieving whatever strikes our fancy (and ideally doing so faster and better than everyone else. '...Life is a competitive race, right?' No? Just me..? Ok.) You can get a sense of her research on shame, courage, vulnerability, and wholehearted living, as well as her approach to mental health more generally, by watching her tedtalk. (It's one of my favourites.)

There are many parts of Brené's book which I found striking and helpful, but I'm going to summarize just a few of them here. I should note that, while I've picked up on these from reading her book, there are so many other influences in my life lately that make me hone in on these particular things. Other big influences have been the PhD I'm doing at the University of Cambridge with a supervisor who values and encourages deep learning, attending meditation retreats with Jaya Ashmore, reading poetry (I really love the works of Mary Oliver, Rainer Maria Rilke, Nayyirah Waheed, William Stafford, and Wendell Berry), reading books or listening to podcasts by theologians/philosophers/individuals who grapple with questions of faith and what it means to be human (Paul Knitter, Swami Prabhavananda, Ram Dass, Pema Chödrön, and The Liturgists podcast), as well as having an abundance of conversations with dear friends and colleagues. I'm so grateful for each of these influences. 

Alright, back to some insights gleaned from reading Brené Brown's book. 

1. If we pay attention to our bodies, we can note physical symptoms of anxiety, stress, freak-outs, etc. Recognizing the physical symptoms can "cue us" to respond healthily. 
If you are like me, you might not 'listen to your body' all that often. (This is coming from the girl who rarely takes sick days, who has played basketball with a broken wrist & jumped on a trampoline with a broken ankle---to name a few.) Let's say, for example, you open up an email from someone that says something critical of you, or that for another reason you find troublesome. If you were to notice that your palms are sweating, or that you have a headache, or that your chest feels tight, or that you've just clenched all the muscles in your neck, it might be a good moment to pause, take a deep breath (or a nap) or even wait an entire day before replying. This can be true on much bigger scales, as well.

2. "If we want to live a wholehearted life, we have to become intentional about cultivating sleep and play, and about letting go of exhaustion as a status symbol and productivity as self-worth."
I find that this is especially true of graduate students or early career individuals, or anyone who is still trying to "prove themselves." Sometimes we don't even realize it, but phrases like "I was at the library 12 hours yesterday", or even just feeling exhausted and taking that as indicative of working hard---AND SOMEHOW FEELING PROUD ABOUT IT!?!?!---is very very damaging to our mental (and physical) health! Research by Lynne Twist also shows that we increasingly feel like we have to be busy and productive in order to be good, admirable people. That's kind of messed up.. Sleep and play are both important. Make time for them.

3. There is not only a big difference between the things we achieve and the things that make us joyful but the things that we are trying to achieve do not always allow for the things that make us joyful.
Brown suggests to make a list of the things you are doing when you feel joyful, and to place that side by side with a list of things that you are actively and intentionally trying to achieve. Do they line up? Do the things on the latter list actually allow for / encourage the things on the former? I tried it, and on the "achievement" list I had things like "publish a peer reviewed article", "get a tenure track teaching job." On the "joyful" list I had things like "garden," "play music with friends," "cook and eat good food." Some of the desired achievements did allow space for the things that make me joyful, but many did not---and this certainly made me wonder whether I have my priories straight! (Consider asking yourself the question: 'Why am I spending all this time and energy trying to achieve goals that do not give me nearly as as much joy as the things that I already have within my grasp?' I'm certain there are ways to intentionally focus more on the things that give us joy...)

This leads us to the next and last one:
4. There is a difference between theoretically agreeing with something, and acting upon it. So often, we become theoretical advocates for things that improve mental health, but we rarely follow through ourselves.
Reflecting upon this made me come up with the phrase "put your action where your mind is" (from 'put your money where your mouth is'). There are so many things that I advocate for and/or theoretically agree are valuable, but it is rare for me to prioritize them into my busy schedule. I love lists, so of course I made a list of these, too. For me, they included: spiritual practice, community and relationships, reading, exercise, tidiness, deep rest and relaxation, intentional creativity (art, music, writing), being outside. But, when I look at how I spend my time, it is mostly: PhD reading/writing, other academic side projects, applying for future academic projects, scarfing down food, going to the gym simply to check off 'exercise' from my to do list, and Netflix. (Of course, I sometimes do make some time for the other things, but they are rarely a priority. I'm not proud of it, but if I feel short on time, it is always the "extra mental health stuff" that is the first to get cut from my daily rhythm.) 

I wonder what might life look like if we didn't view those 'good for mental health things' as extras, that could be fit in if and when we finished all the 'real' stuff? What if, instead, we were to recognize them as important pillars for the rest of life? For one, I suspect that our self-worth, our relationships with others, and even our work ethic/creativity output would all improve...

Why 2016 Wasn't The #WorstYearEver

2016 was difficult but it was also good. Some shitty, horrible, heart-breaking things happened but it was not the infamous "#worstyearever." 

I've learned a lot about myself as an individual (and a small amount about executing self-care), a lot about what it means to exist relationally/ with intentionality, and a lot about what I value in myself and others, who I want to surround myself with, and who I want to strive to become.

I think our broader communities and societies have learned a lot about what it means to fight for justice, to give voice to the oppressed and to show our support, to protect what is sacred, to stand up against what we believe to be wrong, to amplify love in the midst of hate, to choose to live vulnerably and to admit our brokenness to each other even when it’s tempting to appear like we’re self-sufficient and totally fine, to act selflessly and care for those who are in need, to persevere when things look rough, and to find ways to make positive changes even when they are small and may seem insignificant. This year had bad things (all years do) but it also had loads of good come from it. And I think history has shown that times of significant difficulty open us up to being more loving than we were before; we are often not challenged to step up when we are in our comfort zone. A ‘the stars shine best in the darkness’ sort of thing. 

So, yes, I am welcoming 2017 with open arms: the liminal space offered by the change of calendar years provides us with a sort of clean slate, and with new energy. We can use this to become better versions of ourselves and to work together to create better (move loving, more inclusive, less selfish) communities. But I’m not running away from 2016 as if I want nothing to do with it, or as if I want to pretend it didn’t leave a mark on me. It did. It has shaped me. It was not always sunshine and rainbows, and yet I have reason to smile. (Wouldn't you say the same?)

Least I seem overly-optimistic, let me reveal my stoic/realist-tendencies via this photo.

Also: not totally related, but I am really appreciating this excerpt from Seneca's letters. 

Let's not fear what we don't need to.

"There are more things, Lucilius, likely to frighten us than there are to crush us; we suffer more often in imagination than in reality. [...] What I advise you to do is, not to be unhappy before the crisis comes; since it may be that the dangers before which you paled as if they were threatening you, will never come upon you; they certainly have not yet come. Accordingly, some things torment us more than they ought; some torment us before they ought; and some torment us when they ought not to torment us at all. We are in the habit of exaggerating, or imagining, or anticipating, sorrow.

[...] Do me the favour, when men surround you and try to talk you into believing that you are unhappy, to consider not what you hear but what you yourself feel, and to take counsel with your feelings and question yourself independently, because you know your own affairs better than anyone else does.

[...] It is likely that some troubles will befall us; but it is not a present fact. How often has the unexpected happened! How often has the expected never come to pass!

[...]The mind at times fashions for itself false shapes of evil when there are no signs that point to any evil; it twists into the worst construction some word of doubtful meaning; or it fancies some personal grudge to be more serious than it really is[...]. But life is not worth living, and there is no limit to our sorrows, if we indulge our fears to the greatest possible extent[...]There is nothing so certain among these objects of fear that it is not more certain still that things we dread sink into nothing[...]."

Love vs. Loss: Having the [global] world at our fingertips while also holding dearly onto 'home.'

You’ve probably heard that cliché saying that it is better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all. I’ve contemplated this saying over the past few months for a number of different reasons, and I think I do believe that it speaks truthfully and wisely. And I think it can apply to the more general sort of love associated with good friends and a community—certainly it feels that way for me. I’m “home” in Ottawa right now visiting with friends and family, but between Canada, India, and the UK, I feel like I am torn between a few different “homes” lately. (Certainly, the USA border guard who clarified with me “so you’re a student in the UK…but you’re living in India…and you came here for a conference…but you’re going now to Canada?” seemed just as flustered/confused by my high rate of international travels.)

A screenshot of the major cities I've traveled to since August

I have seen a LOT of the world in the past 5 years and I’m really glad I’ve been able to live and travel in a lot of different cities and countries.

(I tried making a map that pointed to all the places I've traveled to but frankly it got a bit overwhelming..!)

But I must admit: the shittiest thing about having done part of my undergrad in New Brunswick, going to India regularly enough to develop a solid community of friends there, and now studying in the UK (at a uni that attracts people from all over the world at that) is that now there's all these people I love who are absolutely not in the same city ../country../timezone../continent. So we're not talking a 3 hour drive to visit someone, but like, multiple hours in an airplane across various oceans. And even though I've been fortunate (?careless?) enough to spend the time and money to fly over said bodies of water on a somewhat regular basis, I'm still never able to be with all my loved ones at once. 

You see, I used to live in this tiny little house with lovely little people and we did little things like grow tomatoes and wash dishes and laugh loudly and rescue spiders and and write poetry on the communal chalk board and play 'keep it up' at the neighbourhood swimming pool and record music in our living room. 'Twas a good simple little life. Now I live oceans away from all of them. 

This is the thing that no one warns you about when they encourage you to be adventurous, to spread your wings and see the world. People warned me about missing home (check), about the difficulties of meeting new people and feeling connected (check), about culture shock (check), about traveler’s sickness (check check), and about various other things typically associated with travelling/moving abroad…and I think I’ve dealt with all of these things pretty well, all things considered… but few people warned me of the danger of establishing relational ties across a number of different cities/continents. 

I call this photo: "The danger of establishing relational ties" ft. my Cambridge friend Rebekah. (Now Rebekah and I are far away and we very well might never see each other again. WHAT!?!? Horrible.)

Don’t get me wrong—I couldn’t have it any other way. That is to say, there’s no way that I could be happy living in a city or country where I don’t make an effort at establishing roots and forming/joining a community of loving people. I would shrivel up and die without such things. But sometimes I wonder how wise it is to have placed roots in so many different places. Because now, wherever I am, there’s a significant portion of my loved ones who will always be miles and miles and oceans away from me. And to be honest that’s not always the best feeling.

Sunset streets in Dubrovnik, Croatia

I consider it a wonderful privilege and blessing to have been able to not only visit a number of cities but to actually feel connected and become a part of a community there. In many ways, there is something incredibly amazing and beautiful about this. But there’s something to be said for simplicity. This is the same simplicity that many people of my generation quickly brush off because “it’s not adventurous enough,” or the same simplicity that some people of my parent’s and grandparent’s generation encourage me (with nothing but the best of intentions) to rise above / go beyond. This is the simplicity of staying put, and choosing the wild and crazy adventure of deeply loving the people and places who are already in your midst. (And, certainly, this need not be dull or boring in the slightest!)

This is my Babcia (grandmother). Her family moved from Poland to Canada when she was a young child and she grew up in Toronto and some surrounding areas. At risk of romanticising my grandparents' era, I sometimes wonder if my life would be simpler if I still sewed my own clothes and grew my own food and walked down the street to say hi to my family and friends who lived there.

But, despite all these reflections, I readily admit there is still something within me that yearns for radical adventure, and that wishes to cover large distances in an airplane so to see something or someone I’ve never seen before. I like being thrown into new and unfamiliar situations. I enjoy going periods where I don’t hear a word of English, and where I have to navigate through social customs and cultural cues. I enjoy the beauty and challenge of being out of my comfort zone, and I find that these are the sorts of experiences which most stretch and push me into becoming a more thoughtful, accepting, and loving person. I’m glad for these experiences.

Back in Gujarat, 2014 (?) when I was doing research on Jain panjrapols. In this photo, a Jain monk was blessing animals that had been rescued from a slaughter house.

This might be where the saying “all things in moderation” comes into play. I’m not sure. I think I’m still struggling to find my own balance in this regard. What are your thoughts? Do you crave adventure? Do you think adventure can be had within a familiar (maybe even mundane) environment? Is adventure more important than your existing communities/relationships? As always, would love to hear your thoughts below or by PM.