Acting your age

Acting your age is a wise old saying that seems to have fallen by the roadside. What does it mean actually? Does it mean that at certain ages one has to stop having fun, stop associating with younger people, and be seventy when you feel more like fifty? Absolutely not, The younger you feel,the better; thats how you apply the truth of that old saying is to more carefully pick and choose your actions.

Teenagers can get by with a lot more when they and goofy and seem out of bounds than the 30 or 40-year-old person. The reason for that is that people know teenagers still have a lot to learn, and they have rightly or wrongly assumed that those who have lived longer have already learned this lesson.

Regular breaks from daily routine

Allowing yourself to get into a rut is not what mental wellness is all about. It is easy to program your time so effectively there's no time for fun, adventure, and a different viewpoint. Vacations take care of this annually, but setting aside a few minutes here and there and deliberately changing routine keeps the brain cells active and awake.

When you catch yourself being overly critical of the younger set, as an example, stop and take a second look at why they do what they do, and as stated in the last Mental Health Viewpoint, give them the benefit of the doubt. Or if you find your older friends are likewise too critical, suggest that maybe when you were young, you too were problematic to the more adult groups.

Whatever, changing your habits on a regular basis, is good for your mental health. Thinking new thoughts is exercise for the brain, as physical action is exercise for the physical body.

Giving others the benefit of doubt

When thinking internally, listening into our own thoughts we think we know so well, we often forget that others may be seeing those same thoughts we are thinking upon in a different light. They see them through their own personal made-to-order lenses presented to them at birth and equipped for their own use. Not to say this is right or wrong, but it is the way it is.

How then can we expect them to readily understand what we pitch to them through conversation and everyday chitchat at home or at the office, in the classroom, at the doctor's office or where ever? We can't really. The best we can do is to talk to them as intelligently as possible and ask questions and learn from them as they also will learn form us.

Most people try to be on the safe side and keep their verbal quips to areas that are safe and commonly held. That is understandable, but it does little toward better understanding of mental health topics that need a wider audience, and also is in dire need of a more accepting audience.

One in particular, and is the topic of this brief observation about mental health viewpoints, is giving others the benefit of the doubt. How do we actually know what their thoughts and feelings unless they tell us outright?

The mistake often made is assuming they think this way about us or our beliefs, when in actuality, they often don't think much about it one way or another. They, like us, are taken up with their own thoughts and ideas and unless others' ideas get in their way, are seldom thought upon.

Furthering that topic, giving them the benefit of the doubt, we might assume they are doing one thing or saying one thing, when we don't know. Until we know for sure they are backbiting and talking behind our backs and in general, doing us harm, it is best to believe they are not. This is the mental health way of giving them the benefit of the doubt!

In a world where assumptions are a dime a dozen, who can afford to buy into their shoddy deals? Know the facts—if they are worth knowing— before we go off the deep end and make fools of ourselves. Most of us are big enough fools without heaping more trash on ourselves. Therefore the caution is, look before you leap; think we act.

Art as a healing aid

Art as a healing mechanism.

Art is a great way to deal with those troubling thoughts and problems of life. Yet art need not be an all out affair where we paint, or sculpt, or take up dancing professionally, or join a singing group, unless of course we are so specially talented we must; but the kind of art that is healing is the kind that gets us in contact with our better natures. As an example, yesterday I wrote an article for Helium "Christian parables in art" and while writing it I somehow renewed my own lagging sense of art as a way to life one above the mundane and routine matters that we face daily. gave me a lot to think about as I was writing it

"This type of art can is common today and artists who are closely tuned in to the world of God find numerous ways of sharing their work. All types of art can be dedicated to Christian principles and each will have their own unique idea, or parable. That special nature of art — of whatever source — is to penetrate to the depth of the psyche and elicit feelings and thoughts. Genuine art, contrary to popular belief, is not necessarily pretty nor should it always be pleasing; genuine art brings to the forefront deeply felt feelings held the artist."

The Image: Confession time: It was borrowed from Flickr. Yet, I somehow felt it had something to say about life in this world as it is being tossed about by the weather. That must have lots to say about how the wayward life we are now living, since every action, good or bad, has a reaction.