Mind, Heart, Body & Soul

MIND, HEART, BODY & SOUL

³⁰ Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ Mark 12:30 (NIV)

 - Some thoughts here on the four main areas of human health. I leave it to you to decide your own path to God, life-force, or raison de la vie

MIND:  There is greater awareness of mental health issues in the 21^st Century. It is surprising how long that it took given that psychological practice and psychiatry have been well established in the centuries preceding. A depressing hopelessness can set in with mental conditions, exacerbated by the pressures of modern life. Income, having a car, house, social status, can all contribute to a person’s sense of self-worth.  It is a problem of society as much as individuals, in that more caring plans to build a social strategy are required.

HEART:  Emotional health is related to the mind. Not just simply in physiological terms terms, but also in condition.  A broken heart, for instance, can have repercussions in depressed tenencies. The individual may feel worthless alone: incapable of carrying on. It is to be hoped that emotional health will be the next step in seriously understanding the human condition, with help given where it is needed, for instance in couselling.

BODY: Physical health takes dedication. Keeping in touch with GP, while aiming for a better lifestyle with control of substances like alcohol and tobacco.  Moderation of the former, while encouragement of e-cigarettes are the way.  Walking can be a joy, as can jogging, or any kind of sport. Perhaps moderation of tv and use of mobile phones as a fitness app may be answers here.

SOUL: Spiritual awareness and discipline can work wonders. The rituals of the monotheistic religions, and the meditative practices of the eastern belief system can help in this. Elsewhere, a person can look at the wonder of nature, or the complexity of the universe in order to realize how vast existence is.  It all comes down to what is right for the individual. Either a gathering each week, or solitude in meditation, prayer and mindfulness within their own room. 

Alan Ewing, October 2017

Rear Window, Movie, 1954,

REAR WINDOW,  MOVIE 1954

Rear Window is a 1954 Alfred Hitchcock movie, starring James Stewart as a wheel chair bound professional photographer, following a work accident, with Grace Kelly playing the girlfriend. I’ve always counted it as one of my favourites. Quite obviously the golden haired Miss Kelly is like a moving painting of class as she changes costume in every scene. Then the compulsive nature of Jimmy Stewart’s acting at its finest.

The movie though resounds beyond even its stars, as it reached into the 21^st Century. Miss Kelly remarks “Have…we all become voyeurs ..I’m not much on rear window ethics, as boyfriend Stewart watches every move that his neighbours make in their lives.  Is social media not the same, as we watch people living their lives online, with entrance to their homes?  Are we not voyeurs too?

We share so much of our lives without even thinking about it these days. The computer screen and mouse have replaced the twitching of curtains, and, yes, the rear window itself.  We follow others lives on a daily basis sharing their meals, family life, moods, music and social life.  People fall in love through this “rear window” and bonded friendships are formed over many years. In this sense, the new rear window is just as real as the old one was.

For Grace Kelly, we have numerous photographs of new dresses and outfits online. For Jimmy Stewart we have people acting out their lives online.  It may well be the case that the means change as in an actual window, though the end remains the same: our longing to peer into the lives of other people, seeing how it is different for them.  In this way social media has become a magnet of attraction and addiction to the common human experience.

Alan Ewing, October 2017

Links 

Watch movie ...  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X-9OHkRiryw

Wikipedia ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rear_Window