My body, mind and spirit all need to be fed and all in different ways and I’ve noticed something interesting about each of them.
My body primarily needs food, exercise and sleep, all of which I know how to give it. But sometimes it gets feeling bad and it needs something else. Medicine? Extra hydration? Pants with more stretch? It’s hard to tell sometimes but when it speaks up to tell me it needs something I do everything in my power to figure out what that is and then feed it. Because feeling physical pain or discomfort is no fun and until I remedy it I don’t care about much else. My body is the loudest of the three when it needs something.
My mind needs to be fed also. It likes to learn new things and engage in stimulating conversation. It wants to be stretched in just the right way so that it feels engaged but not stressed. But then sometimes it just gets tired or finds a problem it can’t begin to see a solution to so it wants to give up and shut down. It says things like, “I don’t know,” or “I’ll figure it out later.” My mind is a little more patient than my body but still very bossy and it doesn’t like to be bored or overwhelmed. It wants to stay in its’ happy zone and I mostly oblige it.
And then there is my spirit. It is the quietest of all of them. It absolutely needs to be fed but it quietly stays in the background allowing my overbearing body and mind to dominate me, all the while hoping that I will not forget about it. It wants to be reminded of its’ value, its’ purpose and its’ potential. It wants to feel connected to the world and to other people and to God. It wants to feel that it is making a difference and to give all it can in the name of changing the world for the better. It wants to be fed but it doesn’t shout. It just whispers softly and waits patiently for me to listen.
All three of these parts of me are valuable, necessary and important and I’m doing my best to take better care of each of them. But I don’t always get it right. Sometimes I feed the wrong one or I do something that is totally unrelated when a part of me needs nourishment. Here’s what I mean:
Sometimes when my spirit is really lonely I feed my body a chocolate chip cookie or seven chocolate chip cookies.
Sometimes when my body wants more exercise I feed my mind with more work instead of listening to my body.
Sometimes when my mind doesn’t know where to begin I feed my body with a nap.
Sometimes when I don’t like myself very much I go shopping.
So now I’m asking myself an important question:
I say, “Hey Self, what do you really need?”
Because while I don’t think any of my actions above are overly harmful, they aren’t the right remedy for the problem in these scenarios.
Unless the problem is hunger and low blood sugar, cookies aren’t the cure.
Sitting at a computer does nothing for my physical strength.
When I wake up from my nap I still don’t have an answer to my problem.
Shopping totally DOES make me feel better! But it doesn’t ever last long. Those new clothes become old clothes about two days later and there I am still stuck with me.
The truth is,
I’ll never get enough of what I don’t really need.
And neither will you friend. And knowing this is powerful. It means you can pay attention to what you do need and fill the right void with the right fuel.
Until next week.
xo
PS – Did you miss the free Be Bold webinar I did last week? You can catch the replay HERE for a limited time.
