Medals
Did you ever have one of those ‘Track and Field’ days at your elementary school? Everyone has to participate in the sweaty, out-of-breath chaos, running a series of halfway lame games designed to wear out all the kids. Then there is the presenting of awards or trophies for everything from ‘Best Bunny Hopper’ to ‘Best Helper’. Even the kids who hated competing liked getting an award, and loved the drama of what I'm sure the teachers called ‘hades day’ among other things, even after an hour or two of the inevitable scorching heat.
As adults, we don't get a lot of acknowledgements or awards. But what if we did? And what if there were awards for what isn't easily seen, like mindset, resilience, or managing our emotions in a healthy way? What do you think? Would you win any of those awards?
So often we get stuck in the day-to-day slog & the demands everyone else has on our time and energy. Our minds (and the coping skills we know - healthy or unhealthy) tend to keep us surviving or responding to the world, but maybe not doing anything that we would call success or thriving. We are existing the way we know how, day after day. And what we rehearse most, we become. If your thoughts were made visible to people, what would they see? What mental medal would they award you? Anxiety Driven? Sad Eeyore? Judgey? Insecure?
But if you decided to train for a different award, I'm guessing that would change things. Think about it for a second, what medal would you want around your neck? Resilient? Peacemaker? Solution Finder? The Great Communicator? Or let’s get really fun, Ninja of Confidence or the Go-Go-Gadget Fear Squasher??
The bottom line is, what we think about and what we do, we become. You are rehearsing for your future. So our mental habits tend to keep us in emotional cycles that feel stagnant or painful. But what if you changed what you are rehearsing, and aimed for a mental health medal? If you really focused on that, what could you do differently? I wonder how it would change your thinking or emotions, your relationships, and how you feel about yourself. I wonder how it would change your habits and how it would change you.
And I would love to see it.
Go-go-gadget…….
~Angie
