November, 2013 - Healing Mind N Blog for Mental Health and Self Improvement

Veterans Day may be the best time to address the most deadly issues at hand in our country. After all, U.S. War Vets fought to keep this country safe. My father was a WWII Vet (He was pretty old when he got married). He told me about his tour in New Guinea, showed me his war wounds. He told me about the pain and suffering (in his tour of duty).

As a soldier, his only job was to kill the “enemy.” Isn’t that reasonable? Kill the “enemy.” What’s the problem with that? Part of the problem is that soldiers only know to kill the “enemy,” namely other soldiers fighting for who knows what. In the USA, at least we know our veterans fought to protect our political freedoms.

But what about our health freedoms? What good is political freedom when there are further enemies threatening our bodies in other ways? Who is fighting to protect our health freedoms? Who is the enemy threatening our health freedoms? Here are two examples, big examples:

At a time in human society when social mood is declining because of fear mongering disease, terrorists, threat of famine, and home grown threats, one of the symptoms of declining social mood is impulsive behavior.

Impulsive behavior leads to mindless actions. For example, some people drive as if they are the only ones on the road. Others believe it’s OK to force a low quality system of health care on a people at a high price.

One of the problems is we, as a people, look to our authority figures as examples. When we watch them acting and talking impulsively, we believe it’s OK to do the same. Ironically, we wonder why our kids act so impulsively, because “We were raised good…”

When you talk and act impulsively, what impression do you believe you’re making on your kids?

An article at Medical Express provides information on mindful versus mindless behavior from a clinical study:

Mindful individuals less affected by immediate rewards

.Here are a few excerpts:

“These findings suggest that mindful individuals may be less affected by immediate rewards and fits well with the idea that mindful individuals are typically less impulsive” says Teper…

“Many studies, including our own past work, have shown that people who meditate, and mindful individuals exhibit improved self-control. If mindful individuals are also less affected by immediate rewards, as our study suggests, this may help explain why,” says Teper’s PhD supervisor and UTSC psychology professor Michael Inzlicht.

In the next post, you’re going to see where declining social mood is taking the health and well being of human society. For now, what is your choice? Do you want to have self control as a mindful person? Or do you prefer to be mindless about yourself and the rest of humanity? If you choose to be mindful, I recommend a Christ-Mind Pattern. Here is an excerpt from Unexplainable: