Colorado Springs Chiropractor 80903: The Power of Your Thoughts

Understanding the Impact of Thoughts on Health

What you think and feel has the most positive or negative impact on your health than anything else you can do!

“What you think about affects your body. Think about a lemon and your mouth fills with saliva. If you are angry or in fear, your body is as uptight as if you were fighting a tiger. If you worry, your nervous system triggers more acid in your stomach even if you have nothing in your stomach — producing indigestion and ulcers. And most of these physically harmful feelings come from replaying the past.” - M T Morter

The Importance of Your Thoughts and Feelings

What you think and feel are more important than all the other actions that impact your health combined. Most illnesses in all the “civilized” countries stem from mental and emotional stress. The truth is that there are only two things you can control in your life:

• Your actions: (no one else’s)

• Your thoughts and feelings: (again, no one else’s)

  
  

This means you cannot control:

• Other people

• Circumstances

• Situations

• Events

• Weather

• Traffic

• Stupid things public officials and entertainers say and do (I know!... other people)

  
  

The best thing we can do is focus on the “here and now.” This is also known as the present. Living in the past leads to depression, while living in the future leads to anxiety. We can never change the past, no matter how we recreate it in our minds. It’s like nailing one foot to the floor and trying to walk. You keep ending up in the same place.

Embracing Forgiveness

The only way to move into the present (where it all really matters) is to forgive the past and everything in it. Merriam-Webster defines forgiveness as “to give up resentment of or claim to requital for.” The unwillingness to forgive is the shackles that imprison you in despair. (I saw that in a fortune cookie!)

The Four-Step Process to Forgiveness

There is a four-step process to forgiveness:

1. Forgive anyone who has done you wrong.

2. Forgive yourself for any wrong you have done to someone else.

3. Allow the opportunity for others to forgive you for what you have done to them.

   
   

We have now completed 20% of the forgiveness process. “Ok Dr. Rob, what the heck is so important that it takes up 80% of this process?”

1. See the good in whatever happened.

   
   

“Aw man! What kind of nonsense is this?” “What if there is no good?” Actually, there is good in everything if you are willing to look for it. The truth is that if you do not forgive even the most heinous of acts, the other person has control over you. In essence, you are their prisoner. Use the forgiveness process to break the chains and set yourself free. You don’t have to excuse the act; just forgive it.

Finding the Good in Every Experience

Seeing the good could be:

• What did I learn from this experience?

• How can this experience help me and others?

• How can I do things differently next time?

• What strengths has this experience brought out?

• I challenge you to come up with your own.

  
  

I believe it is possible to be joyful and happy most of the time by using these principles. Practice being an optimist.

The Optimist's Perspective

Optimist Limerick

The optimist fell from the 10th story bar.

When he reached the 2nd story,

He yelled out to the crowd, “Okay so far!”

Words for Thought

"A man is about as happy as he makes up his mind to be." - Abe Lincoln

"Look for the good in every person and every situation. You'll almost always find it." – Brian Tracy.

My name is Dr. Rob Gottesman, Colorado Springs Gentle Chiropractor. If you have any questions, please email me at www.dcinthesprings@yahoo.com or call (719) 600-1926.