Have you ever considered how our mental and spiritual health affects the health of our physical bodies? Do you already know that the stress and worry we stock around with us each day affects every organ and cell in our body? The Bible tells us that we’re mind, body, and spirit. (1 Thessalonians 5:23) We are multi function, and subsequently, every aspect of ourselves affects all others. Let’s explore the toll that poor spiritual and mental health plays on our body, and the way we are able to maintain them to be healthy, mind, body, spirit.
How Does Poor Mental And Spiritual Health Affect Our Physical Health?
Our mental and spiritual health determines our stress levels – including depression, anxiety, headaches, digestion, and hypertension. Stress impacts your thoughts, behavior, and feelings and might result in some pretty severe health conditions if not managed properly, including heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and obesity. Anxiety may cause rapid heart rate, upset stomach, and dizziness. Depression has been found to cause headaches, fatigue, digestive issues, and weight gain, and can even result in more severe conditions, including stroke and heart disease.
Our mental and spiritual health also greatly influences our lifestyle selections. Our lifestyle selections, including food, alcohol, drugs, and exercise, affect our overall immune health. As you may see, our mental and spiritual health play an enormous part in our physical health by dramatically altering our biochemistry. Many Americans come home from a stressful day and pour a drink, have a sweet, eat something they know they shouldn’t, take a medicine or perhaps a drug, all since it temporarily makes them feel higher.
6 Practical Steps To Care Of Your Spiritual And Mental Health
1. Speak Life
Proverbs 18:21 tells us “The tongue has the facility of life and death, and those that love it should eat its fruit.” Our mouth may be very powerful. It brings life and death, literally. This verse encourages us to make use of our words to talk hope, truth, and strength, which is life-giving, unto ourselves and people around us. When we speak words of negativity and defeat, that’s exactly what we’re giving ourselves. Let’s make a shift in how we’re pondering and talking to ourselves and other people in our lives. Let’s speak to ourselves with God’s truth and love and never the lies of the enemy.
“Gracious words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.” – Proverbs 16:24
“The words of the reckless pierce like swords, however the tongue of the clever brings healing.” – Proverbs 12:18
“Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for constructing others up based on their needs, that it could profit those that listen.” – Ephesians 4:29
2. Gratitude
Often, we get caught up in our everyday and forget to be thankful for all that now we have. Part of caring for our mental and spiritual health is being thankful for the blessings we live in and receive day by day. It’s easy to recollect to be thankful on Thanksgiving, special big breaks, major achievements, and anniversaries. But how about those down days, traumas, and losses? Let us be grateful within the on a regular basis, because all the pieces God brings us through, even when it’s not as we expect it, is a great thing.
We will be grateful we slept well, woke as much as an awesome cup of coffee. We can find gratitude in our clean hot shower and an awesome latest podcast to hearken to on the option to work. We can be thankful for our spouse and great friends we get to go to dinner with. We can find gratitude within the work we do and the people we get to assist day-after-day. Let’s make out of the ordinary effort to search out at the least 10 things every day to be thankful for. And I encourage you to search out ten latest things every day, don’t just recycle the identical ones. You can use your notes app in your phone or a special notebook to log all your blessings.
“ Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of 1 body you were called to peace. And be thankful.”- Colossians 3:15
“Rejoice at all times, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for that is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” -1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is correct, whatever is pure, whatever is beautiful, whatever is admirable—if anything is great or praiseworthy—take into consideration such things. Whatever you could have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace shall be with you.” – Philippians 4:4-9
3. Prayer
We are called to wish. This isn’t a latest concept for many. There are a whole lot of other ways that we are able to pray. Scripture calls us to wish in private and in addition in groups. We are called to wish continually and Jesus even gives instruction on how. We are so blessed to have the option to wish to our Heavenly Father. We get to bring all the pieces to Him—all of our stress and worry. We get to bring the hard, painful things that make us offended and sad. We get to share with Him our prayers of praise, joy, and excitement. God wants us to speak with Him at all times. We can pray privately in a prayer closet or room with closed doors. And I often pray while driving for added private time with God.
Praying with our spouse and kids can be very vital. This is an awesome time to reflect on what we’ve been grateful for all day. Sometimes we humans are selfish and only come to God when we want something, or life isn’t going how we wish it to. Absolutely God wants to listen to from us then. But He desires to be in relationship with Him. This means we’re sharing the mundane and the amazing with Him.
But what if we don’t know what to wish for? We are comforted on this very situation in Romans 8:26 where we’re promised that if we’re stuck and don’t know what to wish, the Holy Spirit will intercede on our behalf. We can sit alone with God and listen for the prompting of the Holy Spirit, and we shall be led. I often notice this when the Holy Spirit places someone in my mind to wish for. We notice this in stories of individuals woke up within the night and prompted to wish for a selected situation or person.
“But if you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who’s unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is completed in secret, will reward you.” – Matthew 6:6
“Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.” – Philippians 4:6
“Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.” – Colossians 4:2
4. Meditation
Years ago in our clinic, I used to be conversing with a patient, and I suggested that she spend a while in meditation, which I felt would help her in her healing journey. She then told me that Christians weren’t allowed to meditate. This isn’t true pondering. Friends, the Bible may be very clear about meditation. A Christian approach could also be barely different from the worldly approach to meditation. But it is vitally much a Biblical principle, and I encourage you so as to add time each week and even day by day to meditate in your mental and spiritual health. You’ll feel your connection to God grow. Psalm 1:2-3 tells us,
“… who meditates on his law day and night. That person is sort of a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf doesn’t wither— whatever they do prospers.”
And we are able to camp out within the Psalms and find more beautiful, blessed meditation guarantees in Psalms 63, 77, 119 and 143.
“Do not conform to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you’ll have the option to check and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and ideal will.” – Romans 12:2
This renewing of the mind is completed through prayer and meditation. When we spend time praying and meditating, we strengthen ourselves to live in God’s will. We will have the option to listen to Him and receive the discernment that we are able to only receive from Him through the Holy Spirit. Meditation is the practice of clearing your mind and will sometimes include bringing your focus to a selected verse or principle. I like to consider meditation because the listening part. In prayer, we frequently talk, and in meditation, we listen more.
If you bring a verse or principle to meditate on, the main target must be reflecting on God’s word, aligning your mind with the things above and never earthly things. Being in close relationship with God and Jesus, not necessarily a deal with being still. However, I find that I’m often more focused on God and my attention to Him after I am still.
Get into nature – I like to be in nature for prayer and meditation. The most significant part is to make use of this time to grow the connection with the Father. Set time aside in a quiet place. Take some deep breaths and center yourself with the Holy Spirit.
5. Journaling
Even though there aren’t any specific verses about this within the Bible, journaling is a type of meditation and prayer mixed with movement. Journaling, whether you retain your writing or discard it, helps process and heal the mind and spirit by moving through our bodies, our anger, frustrations, emotions, suffering, and the entire other things we experience on this life. Preventing the entire yuck from settling and getting buried deep within us, where it’s sure to come back up at one other time.
6. Service to others
A terrific option to look after your mind and spirit is to serve and love on others. There are some ways to serve others with the gifts, talents, and interests that God has given you. You can serve at church or in a charitable organization. You can serve at a homeless or animal shelter. When we share ourselves through service, you’ll notice that it boosts your self-esteem, improves your mood, and will even reduce stress, which is at all times good for our mental and spiritual health.
“Each of you need to use whatever gift you could have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.” – 1 Peter 4:10
“Serve wholeheartedly, as when you were serving the Lord, not people.” -Ephesians 6:7
Life bombards us with many things that may overwhelm us, resulting in unwanted stress. Stresses aren’t just things that only affect our mental and spiritual health. If left unmanaged, it should likely grow to be a physical illness or disease. I encourage you to implement these steps today to allow you to achieve or maintain a healthy mind, body, and spirit.
Photo Credit: © Getty Images/sam thomas
