Balanced life – Seite 5 – Food for thoughts

Holding anger only harms the angry person

The quote of the week comes from Buddha: ‘Holding on to anger is like picking up a red-hot coal to throw at someone.’

Our anger is an important driving force of change. It prepares the body to defend itself and fight back. Anger is intended to protect us from a perceived attack and activates the autonomic nervous system accordingly. As soon as the nervous system is activated, we can no longer think clearly, we can no longer fully develop our creativity and compassion, as the social engagement system can no longer work when the autonomic nervous system is activated. (Polyvagal Theory of Stephen W. Porges)

By holding on to anger, we harm ourselves more than the person who triggered the anger in us. Anger also makes us age faster and changes our facial features. We appear haggard, disappointed and embittered.

The person who provoked our anger has long since forgotten the incident. We harm ourselves, when we hold on to anger. Like the glowing coal we hold in the own hand. The person holding the coal burns themselves. If you throw it at the person who has annoyed you, the coal cools down on the throwing path and only reaches the recipient when it has cooled down, if at all it will reach the person.

Holding on to anger and waiting for the opportunity for revenge only harms the one who has anger and not the one who receives the revenge. The time of anger is disproportionate to the time of revenge.

The side effects of anger, such as premature ageing, loss of creativity and hardening, are much more serious than waiting for an opportunity to repay it, which may never come.

Anger has its justification. You decide whether you want to get involved or let the anger fade away.

Mistakes have the potential for greater

The quote of the week comes from James Joyce: ‘Mistakes are the gateway to new discoveries.’

This quote is wonderful. Recognising mistakes as learning opportunities is something we all know. It is certainly one of the most frequently used quotes in education. The quote is a simplified form of John Wooden’s

‘Mistakes are only mistakes if you learn nothing from them.’

There is much more to James Joyce’s quote. He says in his quote, in my opinion, that there are new discoveries in mistakes. Some inventions have come about because of mistakes, including the rubber in car tyres, dynamite, Teflon, self-adhesive notes, vaccinations, pacemakers, Viagra, etc. (15 Erfindungen, die nur dank Fehlern gemacht wurden | Beobachter)

Mistakes therefore have great potential to result in something extraordinary.

It is therefore necessary to see mistakes as an opportunity and not as something negative. Everything has its positive and negative side, it depends on your perspective and your own attitude. So it is with mistakes.

Mistakes can hide treasures, you just need an alert and open eye.

When have you made a mistake that was more of an opportunity?

What is your belief?

The quote of the week comes from the Bhagavad Gita: „All actions, all works, all karma belong to nature, not to the divine. It is man who determines his earthly fate. People seal their fate themselves.“

These quote reminds me on „locus of control“ according to J.B. Rotter. A distinction is made between two control beliefs.

One is the internal locus of control, which is based on a high level of self-efficacy. The above quote refers to this locus of control belief.

The other is the external locus of control, which is based on low self-efficacy. People with an internal locus of control assume that they can influence events and are responsible for how something develops. People with external locus of control assume that they are controlled by higher powers, fate or given circumstances.

Control beliefs are formed through experiences and social circumstances, which then become entrenched and lead to fixed assumptions and attitudes. This changes behaviour and the experience of situations, as every situation is evaluated and interpreted by one’s own unconscious control beliefs.

Typical characteristics are as follows

Internal locus of control:

Takes responsibility for own actions
Is less influenced by other opinions
Work hard to achieve their goals or visions
Feels able to face challenges with confidence
Feels independent and happier

External locus of control:

Holds outsiders / powers responsible for own circumstances / experiences
Success is attributed to luck or an external change
Do not believe they can change their own situation through effort
Feels hopeless or powerless when faced with difficult situations
Tends to learnt helplessness

To find out for yourself which control belief you tend to belong to, this test can give you a little clue: Locus of Control (studylib.net )

With you starts the better world

The quote of the week that inspired me this time is: “We cannot change this world until individuals change.” (Marie Curie)

Marie Curie lived from 1867 to 1934. She was the only woman to be awarded the Nobel Prize several times. She works manly in natural science. Some of these fields were and still are male-dominated.

Marie Curie changed the world in her own way, because she did not succumb to the stigmas that were and sometimes still are attributed to women. Marie Curie dared to question the prejudices and pigeonholing of others and devoted herself to her urge and desire to research, single-mindedly without allowing herself to be dissuaded. In my eyes, she is a pioneer in showing that change at an individual level can have a big impact and make a difference.

What does that mean for the individual? It doesn’t have to be the Nobel Prize or being the first to do something. In my opinion, it’s small things like asking yourself:

What stereotypes, prejudices and premature assumptions do I consciously or unconsciously make about individuals?

How can I manage to be more neutral towards the person I am dealing with?
What do I need to keep being curious about what I can learn from the person I am talking to?
How can I talk to the person even better?
How can I take a step back with my wisdom and understand that my answers only apply to myself?
How can I meet someone at eye level?
How do I manage to take a step back with my wisdom and understand that my answers only apply to myself?
How can I meet someone at eye level, regardless of their status or education?

To know that we are all worth the same and that we are simply human and allowed to be human.

Serenity is wisdom

This week’s quote comes from James Allen: „Calmness of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom. It is the result of long and patient effort in self-control. Its presence is an indication of ripened experience, and of a more than ordinary knowledge of the laws and operations of thought.“

Serenity or calmness is a virtue for a reason. It is particularly difficult to be calm when you have a goal too much in mind, when you want more than you should, are allowed to do less than you could and foresee the end, which is highly likely to happen, and yet have to let it happen. Because everyone must and has the right to make their own experiences.

Serenity also means being in the moment, enjoying the seconds that we can only influence and understanding that the world does not belong to you, but that you have been given the gift of being a guest in order to grow and learn. But this also means that everyone can and should learn and grow at their own pace and on the path that they feel is right for them. Serenity means allowing this to happen and not trying to „pull the grass to make it grow faster“. Understanding that this is not possible and that every thing has and needs its time. Serenity is not factual knowledge, it comes from within and arises from our attitude, interpretation / thinking patterns and attitudes. For me, that is wisdom.

Our inner wealth

This week’s quote comes from Emil Cioran: „Our real wealth: the hours in which we have done nothing. They are what shape us, individualise us, distinguish us.“

I have discovered two possible interpretations of this quote, both of which go in a completely different direction.

The first interpretation I see is that our leisure time, which we don’t spend earning money, is crucial to how we develop. Do we just sit on the couch and let ourselves be entertained or are we active, learning a language, an instrument or going out into nature? Our experiences and adventures shape us and change us. This is how the difference in attitudes, interpretation patterns and attitudes arises. Perhaps this also has an influence on our prejudices and values, for example when we get to know other cultures and / or countries.

The second interpretation I see is that time shapes and changes us when we were simply in our thoughts, i.e. when we are doing nothing from the outside perspective. When we reflect on the day, our behaviour and, even more profoundly, our thoughts. In doing so, we become self-effective, self-aware and reconsider whether we have acted in accordance with our values and desires. We can also include our physical reactions in the reflection: How and what did I feel in the individual situations? How did my body feel? What did my body want to tell me in the situation? This reflection allows us to grow, as we can recognise and perceive a lot about ourselves. Through self-awareness, we can learn, grow and change. The main question is here what and not why, as why is seeking for quilt and is looking back. What is more future orientated and create opportunities (see research from Tasha Eurich).

My second interpretation is more of a mindfulness exercise that has been proven to help us develop. The development is different from that in my first interpretation of the quote. The above development leads to new or improved skills and abilities. The development below develops the mind and character.

Which interpretation do you choose?

Here are some links to meta-analysis of mindfulness:
– Frontiers | A meta-analysis of the association between mindfulness and motivation (frontiersin.org)
– A synthesis of meta-analyses of mindfulness-based interventi… : PAIN (lww.com)
– (4) (PDF) Meditation, Mindfulness, and Attention: a Meta-analysis (researchgate.net)
– (4) (PDF) Mindfulness as Attention Training: Meta-Analyses on the Links Between Attention Performance and Mindfulness Interventions, Long-Term Meditation Practice, and Trait Mindfulness (researchgate.net)

Listen to your inner voice

The quote that has accompanied me this week comes from Bettina von Armin: „Find yourself, be true to yourself, learn to understand yourself, follow your inner voice, only then can you reach the highest.“

This is certainly the path that makes us happy and content. But in all the everyday life we face, the inner voice is very quiet and often barely perceptible, if at all. At times when the hustle and bustle around us is quieter, such as after work or at the weekend, we would have time to listen to our inner voice, become aware of our values and reflect on the day or the week. But instead we distract ourselves with films, news, parties, etc. We allow ourselves to be drawn into the external and stay less in touch with our inner voice. We put off change and reassure ourselves that we can’t change it anyway. Unfortunately, this excuse is too common and too easy, so we like to use it again and again. But each of us can change more than we realise. After all, we should all have free will and use it accordingly to our values and culture in an acceptable.

One exercise is to realise what we can or cannot change. I think the following exercise based on an exercise by Kéré Sylvia Wellensiekand Kirsten Schwarz might be supportive to be more clear about your own influence in the world:

Create a 3-column table. Please change the column headings into: „changeable“ (column 2) and „unchangeable“ (column 3). The rows are labelled with „professional“ (row 2) and „private“ (row 3). Write down the topics that come to mind for each field. Concentrate on the areas that can be changed, and then think about small steps you can take to actually bring about these changes. Then check the unchangeable areas to see whether they are really outside your sphere of influence. If you are able to change parts of it, split the topic into smaller chunks. And think about the changeable pieces. Start with the first steps and plan accordingly with a time limit to reach the set aims.

Perhaps this little exercise on the subject of resilience will help you to reflect and give your inner voice more strength and volume.

Breathing is living and feeling alive.

This Sunday I found the following quote from B.K.S. Tyengar: „The mind is the king of the senses. The breath is the king of the mind.“

Considering Stephen W. Porges findings on the Polyvagal Theory, this quote is biologically verifiable. Porges found that the autonomic nervous system is co-regulated by the vagus nerve in mammals. The autonomic can be co-regulated by the SMART vagus, a part of the vagus nerve. The SMART vagus is influenced for example by facial expressions, gestures and tone of voice of the conversational partner. It can have a calming effect on the autonomic nervous system. The autonomic nervous system determines breathing and heart rate, among other things. Consciously calm and even breathing has a correspondingly calming effect on the autonomic nervous system. This also calms the heart rate. Porges refers to this as neuroception.

Relaxation techniques that influence the breath, mindfulness exercises that focus on the here and now, have a calming effect on breathing and thus on the thoughts in our head and restlessness in the body.

A simple exercise is to draw attention to the breath in order to become aware of its vital function. Life only exists through breathing. Focussing on the breath means concentrating on life and allowing the spirits of life to become conscious.

To calm the breath, the rule of thumb is to breathe out twice as long as you breathe in.

Exercise: At the beginning, count to two for inhaling and to four for exhaling. The speed of counting should be the same. After a few breaths, increase the count by one, i.e. count to three for inhaling and six for exhaling. You should notice that you become calmer, your voice becomes more relaxed and your shoulders lower.

Breathing is living and feeling alive.

What we think matters

Last week’s quote was from Andrew Carnegie. He said: „Remember, happiness does not depend on what you are or what you have, it depends on what you think.“

Andrew Carnegie was one of the richest people of his time. He certainly had few money worries and was able to occupy himself with other matters than meeting his basic needs. He was certainly respected and socialised with the most influential people of his time. He himself emigrated to the USA with his family as a child, as his father, a weaver in Scotland, had less and less to do due to industrialisation.

Carnegie got to know all kinds of personalities in his life, from ordinary people to aristocrats and high-ranking personalities. This enabled him to compare the different cultures and milieus. That’s why I find this quote so fantastic. He learnt the intrinsic value, in my interpretation, of the people who surrounded him. This led him to the conclusion that thinking, i.e. the inner processes of being, are more important than external factors such as status, rank and hierarchies.

Carnegie recognised that the only thing that counts is the inner world of the individual. Because what we think is visible in our attitude and this in turn determines our actions.

Our thoughts lead us to attract people into our lives who think similarly, as they have a similar attitude and their actions are similar. Through our thoughts, we have the power to be who we want to be and thus attract those we want to surround ourselves with.

Life goal: Reach your own inner summit

The quote of the last week from my calendar is from Edmund Hillary: „It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves.“

This reminded me of many hikes and some climbing routes that I have done in the past and will probably do in the future. I like to hike, even cross-country, as long as it’s allowed. The hikes that I personally found the most enjoyable were the ones where I had to force myself to keep going. Either because my body thought it can’t take any more, even though there were only a few hundred metres to go to reach the destination, the weather conditions were extreme, such as hiking at minus 20 degrees in the Elbe Sandstone Mountains, or hikes where I overcame my fear of heights, such as the climbing trail we took to the summit in Schladming.

Each time I overcame a fear, a limit within myself, and had a wonderful feeling after I had made it. Maybe my knees were still shaking a little, or I had unspeakable sore muscles the next day, but conquering myself brought me feelings of pride, confidence and self-assurance. The belief in the sentence „I can do it if I believe in myself, want to achieve it and have (trained) the skills to do so.“ In the context of others, the following dimension of what is allowed and desired in order to reach the set goal, the mountain top, also belongs.

This corresponds to Lutz von Rosenstiel’s behavioural model. (source: Rosenstiel, L. von 1998). Wertewandel und Kooperation. In E. Spieß (Hrsg.), Formen der Kooperation. Bedingungen und Perspektiven (S. 279-294). Göttingen: Verlag für angewandte Psychologie)

The model states that behaviour is influenced by:

Individual volition, such as motivation and personal values,
Social permissions and requirements, such as the norms and rules of the context/environment in which we find ourselves
Situational facilitation, i.e. the conditions that can be conducive or inhibiting
Personal ability, which includes skills and abilities. The four factors influence each other and together form the behaviour shown.

We conquer ourselves when we consider whether we want to try something different that we haven’t tried before, acquire the missing skills, abilities, and then actually put them into practice.

It doesn’t have to be a mountain. It could be also learning to play a musical instrument and then giving a concert, trying out a new sport in a competition or climbing a mountain summit.