This is where I want to summarize my thoughts on the good health of body and mind.
Now comes the mind - what are dimensions of mental fitness. Let's start with the definition -According to the WHO (World Health Organization), mental health is: "... a state of well-being in which the individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to his or her community."
How does one realize his or her own abilities? What good is a skill if it is not put to use productively and fruitfully? What good is a life if months and years that have passed by don't give a sense of life well spent. "Life well spent" has personal definitions that can obviously change from person to person but also along the time axis for the same person. Essentially, this looks broadly in line with the self actualization needs in Maslow's hierarchy.
Maslow's Hierarchy of needs [Ref: https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html]
There are several studies happening under Cognitive NeuroScience to figure out the differences in neural activity for sensory responses vs thoughts / moral judgments. One interesting video on the topic by Rebecca Saxe is here: link.
As I think through it, it seems the three dimensions of mental health would be Intellect, Memory and Focus. If you belong to the school of thought that the mind actions (thoughts, moral judgments etc) all occur in the brain - it would be easy to infer that the strong body is fundamental for a solid mind. Meditation has been found to help people with improving both memory and focus.
I hope to continue to work further on this topic to figure out further means to improve mental health.
Body
There are three dimensions of body health, I read several years ago. Strength, Flexibility, and Endurance. Easy and obvious examples: Strength allows one to lift more weights, Flexibility allows one to touch one's tows without bending knees and Endurance to run for miles. If one is good at all three dimensions he can clearly be seen as having good physical health. I was told an hour of physical activity is needed for all. But we have to qualify it better. Say, gentle strolling for an hour does only burn calories - one can argue that it would improve endurance, but it does nothing for strength and Flexibility. Then comes the workout for focussed muscle groups interspersed with Cardio. This covers Strength and Endurance but leaves out endurance. Likewise playing any racquet sport is more of endurance a bit of strength and not much of flexibility. It gets tougher when you can't even spare an hour. After toying with various forms of workout - I realized Surya Namaskaras (in Yoga) is the one that covers all three. Just 30 mins, non-stop Surya Namaskaras (Sun Salutations) gave me the same effect as 20 mins each of strength, flexibility and endurance exercises.Mind
Now comes the mind - what are dimensions of mental fitness. Let's start with the definition -According to the WHO (World Health Organization), mental health is: "... a state of well-being in which the individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to his or her community."
How does one realize his or her own abilities? What good is a skill if it is not put to use productively and fruitfully? What good is a life if months and years that have passed by don't give a sense of life well spent. "Life well spent" has personal definitions that can obviously change from person to person but also along the time axis for the same person. Essentially, this looks broadly in line with the self actualization needs in Maslow's hierarchy.
Maslow's Hierarchy of needs [Ref: https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html]
There are several studies happening under Cognitive NeuroScience to figure out the differences in neural activity for sensory responses vs thoughts / moral judgments. One interesting video on the topic by Rebecca Saxe is here: link.
As I think through it, it seems the three dimensions of mental health would be Intellect, Memory and Focus. If you belong to the school of thought that the mind actions (thoughts, moral judgments etc) all occur in the brain - it would be easy to infer that the strong body is fundamental for a solid mind. Meditation has been found to help people with improving both memory and focus.
I hope to continue to work further on this topic to figure out further means to improve mental health.
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