MindHealth by Sara Stevens Sara Stevens

My blog is taking you metaphorically down the rabbit hole, opening you to a whole new world of how we think, feel and operate at the deepest levels of ourselves. This blog will help you gain more understanding of your mind and for some of us, it will help to reduce the fears we have over our minds and what we store in them.

The first step in any change is to come clean with yourself and stop living with the excuses and denial.  I hear so many of these on a daily basis; “I will start tomorrow, I can’t do it, just the one, I lapsed so I just gave in, I am ok, I won’t do it again”. The list is endless, but I am sure we have all at one time or another said some of these things and convinced ourselves into thinking it’s ok to carry on.

We can all probably admit to having the odd obsession or two, I think this is normal and won’t have a massive impact on our lives. For example, if we have to have the certain thing in our home in symmetry or we have to do things in a particular way, maybe we like the tins all in order in our pantry, or the bed made just so, or we can’t relax until the kid’s toys are packed away. This can be a never-ending task with children, as soon as it's packed away, even if they haven’t used it in ages, they seem compelled to want them out again! Maybe we all have this need for the things we haven’t got, and spend our lives craving for those things, instead of enjoying what we have got.

The last blog on Superstition was looking at how superstitions can negatively impact our ability to be safe, secure and worry free. Today we are looking at rituals, which can develop from superstitions but can also be experienced on their own, even if you’re not superstitious. The word rituals can be seen as very religious in its meaning and also can be linked to witchcraft too, as many of our earliest rituals are imbedded in our ancient past. The word ritual means, 'a religious or solemn ceremony consisting of a series of actions, performed according to a prescribed order'.

Most us have a few superstitions, but it doesn’t have a negative impact on our lives, but if we have let these habits get out of control, it can affect our anxiety levels and also stop us from being our true selves. The key to life is balance, not too much or too little; it can be a bit of a tightrope at times, but once we find ourselves and are true to ourselves, it’s easy. Superstitious behaviour links back to our ritualistic heritage, religions, and stereotyped behaviour patterns from the people we lived around.

Control is a confusing issue and for many of us we have got it in the wrong place in our head; if this is the case we can be causing ourselves lots of issues.  Lots of people say to me that they don’t like being out of control - this can be situational, like being on a plane or in a meeting, it can be future based, for example, "Will I get the job?" or "Will I have enough money?", and it can be personal, "Do I have cancer or some deadly illness?", "Can I be myself in this situation, will I feel ok, can I cope?"