Mind Exercises to Help You Zip Through Life

Are you an enabler? Do let yucky stuff hang around a little too long? Do you let people and things get you down? Do you beat yourself up unnecessarily after you make mistakes? Maybe you do even worse and dive into self-destruction when life gets tough.

Did you know you have more control over yourself than you think? You do! You may not be able to help what happens to you, but you sure as heck can change the way you respond to it.

Leap of Faith
Let’s look at my recent Zip-lining experience for a second. First, you should know I’m scared of heights. I don’t like them at all. I also am not very fond of trying new things. I’m a one of those girls who likes to take things slowly. I prefer to test the waters before I take the plunge, if you know what I mean.

Well, with Zip-lining there was no “testing the waters” first. My first experience was hooking in and taking a leap off a 30 foot platform and zipping across a mountain top to another 30 foot platform 100 feet away.

Not only was I anxious about the leap of faith I was about to take, but the guides chose me to go first. Go figure! As tough as I’d like to pretend to be, I am definitely a “go last” kinda girl. This day was different. It was a day I decided to react differently to my situation and it really opened my eyes to how I treat a lot of stuff in life.

Don’t Look Down
How often do we focus on looking down, instead of looking ahead? Normally I would ALLOW myself to stress out and let my fears boss me around, focusing on the negative. I would think of all the “what ifs” and leave no time to think about the fun part. I would be consumed with wondering how I can get out of it or how I could get everyone else to go first to buy me some more time. Of course, during this extra time, it would just allow me more time to worry, stress out, and be more afraid. Stupid! Stupid!

Practice Makes Perfect
Instead of reacting like I have “practiced” reacting in the past, I decided to practice a new reaction. I decided to just hook in, take a deep breath, and let the rational side of me lead the irrational me. I chose to  just take the plunge without allowing myself to stress out for one more minute. I focused on the landing (goal) and told myself I am fully capable of doing this – and doing it well. And you know what? I did it, and I didn’t allow my fear to ruin my fun.

I pushed doubt and fear aside and CHOSE to focus on the fun part. Zipping through the trees, enjoying amazing views, feeling the wind through my hair, and completely relying on my zipline to carry me without one single doubt.

Zipping Through Life
Not everyone goes zip-lining everyday, but zipping through life is no different. So often we let our fears ruin our fun. We live life focusing on the “what ifs” instead of just enjoying the moment. We let the forecast of tomorrows clouds ruin today’s sunshine.

You can choose to stress about all that COULD possibly go wrong or you can focus on everything that IS going right. No matter how bad life gets, there are so many things to be thankful for. Even something as simple as love. There are rich people who would die to have someone to love them. Or maybe you stress about your weight, yet there is someone who just dreams of being healthy.

Fitness is not just about lifting weights and burning fat. Like GNC says, it’s about”Living Well“. It’s about learning how to train your physical body, your mental body and your spiritual body to be as fit as it can possibly be.

Just Let Go 
Holding on to stress, fears, resentment, depression and other bad feelings is not healthy – and it doesn’t help a single thing. Whatever is going on in your life right now that’s stressing you out, maybe you are holding on too tightly to it and you just need to let go – and KEEP letting it go.

It’s not just enough to let go once. Believe me, you’ll keep taking it right back. You will find yourself being sucked right back into fears and stress, so you will have to consciously and repeatedly let it go until it becomes a natural response.

Take your fitness to a new level and reshape your mind too – and zip through life with more ease!