What despair does to your human body (part 2): Spiritual Fuel
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In times of uncertainty, and whereas you feel you've done all you can, maybe you're feeling as despairing as I've been feeling: where life just feels like a limbo -- it doesn't seem to get any better and really, you've been doing the best you can to live a life that compliments what you feel would give you a sense of purpose. If things aren't working work, and the overall picture of life doesn't seem to look like it's getting any better -- I mean, look around; all the negativity between people over ideologies just seems to never get resolved. Maybe the landscapes around you themselves are draining you of feeling any sense of inspiration. If you've been feeling this way too lately, maybe you've been feeling some sort of despair. In times like this, I have to remind myself one thing: we can control how we take in despair. We can cut it off and not give into it for whatever reason that it pops up into our lives.
In the spirit of a previous that I just posted a few weeks ago, one of the main realizations that a reader (in theory) should have gotten out of that was that despair is bad. Even if it is very plausible, very real, and the odds seem nigh impossible to overcome, nature seems to reinforce the idea of maintaining some dignity, even when you proverbially go down with the ship. A spirit of wisdom may help us avoid pitfalls.The whole concept of despair then seems at odds with the human body’s ideal tendency to want to be in a state of homeostasis.
If we have been able to strongly suggest that such a metaphysical argument for having a positive attitude seems so practical; logistics are everything to truly getting out of the physical conundrums we face, but I’ve come to realize that the attitude is the spiritual fuel that gives us the edge. The more I’ve seen this manifest in physical reality, the more I realize how powerful this ‘spiritual fuel’ is. This is the same thing that gives me visualization to go the extra mile when there is nothing there to motivate me; and if I’m wise enough, calm myself despite when things seem chaotic all around me.
What ultimately is the source of this type of spiritual fuel? That would require a more esoteric discussion for another time, but the point is, even modern medicine gives us the hints as to what’s going on; how we want to feel centered and back in alignment. Even if you are a hardcore rationalist who bases your only proof of truth from empirical methods testing, this idea doesn’t seem so irrational.
It seems this very axiom of truth about what despair does to our bodies can be applied on an even more sociological macroscale. If the truth is that in our optimal body’s state we were not meant to live in such constant states of turmoil, burnout, and therefore in despair, then a civilization that strives its best to keep its citizens in a state of mental health and wellness would be the ultimate utopia for any society, no matter how technologically advanced it gets. I would add in an argument that if we have enough scientific proof now, as to how much healthier life is when we are symbiotic with the environment around us. If we had jobs that allowed us the freedom to move around more outside, instead sitting at a desk, this would make it easier to exist in our optimal state. This should give us a clue that the natural use of our bodies is to be doing activities that allow us to stay physically animated. No matter what delusions the rat race’s pursuit of glorifying the achievement of human technological advancement seems to bring, it can never shake reality about how we are biologically built as a species; but that is a topic that would deserve another article onto itself.
The point is that if we develop a rational way of looking at problem solving and apply this to anything in our lives, we can really start to change the perception of misery all around us once and for all. Positive thinking is really the most functional methodology and seems the quickest way for us to get out of whatever ruts we fairly (or unfairly) have founded our fates stuck in. If this is true, then this would mean that, there is no room for us to linger any more in any kind of mental state that enables victimhood -- not because we wish to downplay how much mistreatment we might have suffered in our lives in one way or another – but simply because the basic proofs of chemistry as displayed in Dr. Kane’s article, and similar research done on staying positive, shows that it’s just not functional. If we for whatever reason decide to wallow in a state of despair, it robs us of the added ‘spiritual fuel’ that is needed to perform any tasks that get us out of our ruts in the first place. So what does this really say about ourselves? Should we really be so self-deprecating? For a full glimpse of Dr. Emily Kane’s article on what despair does to the human body, click on the following link:
http://dremilykane.com/2005/10/03/the-%E2%80%9Cmind-body-connection%E2%80%9D-changing-despair-to-hope/
