How we manage physical, mental, and emotional enhance our information gathering and sharing capability. Both in an internal and external sense. To the internal sense I refer to the constant dialogue that we are having with the self about our capabilities, capacity and or understanding. I wanted to highlight this because most often we fail in our objectives before we even start. Due to believe and dialogue we are having with ourselves about what is and is not possible. You may have not used these exact words in dialogue with yourself, but have you ever told yourself - this is not possible. Once our believe concludes towards an outcome, then we have already reduced our odds to ever rise above. It is like that quote that says the one who says they can and the one who say they cannot, are both right. So, in this chapter I wanted to cover approaches to manage your physical, mental, and emotional states.

Let us start by looking at the physical. Before I elaborate further, I understand that these three elements, being physical, mental, and emotional. They all interact closely with each other and on instances complement each other. At the end of the day, it is the one body. They are a functioning unit but for the purpose of exploration we will attempt to dissect them individually. What I will refer to as the physical will relate to the parts of you that you associate with movement and sensory mechanism. I don’t know if mechanism is the right word to describe the physical but because it's associated with movement and for a lack of a better word; we will go with it. Sitting, running, sleeping (lying down) all this shifts in posture constantly alter our beings into different states. So, movement plays such a critical part in the functionality of our body. Where we restrict parts of our body from motion, changes start to occur within the compartment associate with that part of the body. You can think about motion from the element of muscle and how it would begin to atrophy if no movement over a period is exerted onto a certain limb or body part. Transfer of information neurologically will also start to get affected because of decrease in the flexibility in the nerves.

Our body has certain physical characteristic; it’s made up of muscles, bones, ligaments, cartilages, nerves, and various types of fluids, skin, hair and many others. The question then becomes how these elements develop, grow, and repair themselves. Then equally on the other spectrum, one must ask at what points would one be in, where they would result in damages, deterioration, and destruction of the system.

While I am sitting here writing this notes life, growth and death simultaneously are taking shape inside my body. Clearly, I am not even relating this to the sense that we associate with baby’s development in pregnancy. But right now, my skin, cells inside my body are reforming, growing, and dying; new nerves are being developed and certain connection are being severed. Changes in neural networks could simply be because my understanding or viewpoint relating to certain stimuli has evolved or has been completely changed and that requires a new pathway to be created to associate with that new thinking. To visualise that, think of it as running water from the rain pouring onto dry earth. Upon landing it will branch and create new path depending on the volume or the speed at the rate the rain is pouring. High volume of rain needs larger pathways to be created so that it can be managed and guided to areas where it can accumulate. Then ones that storage reaches capacity and it’s full, the cycle will continue again creating new branches where it will need larger areas to pool.

So, from this process or visualisation I wanted you to only grasp these two principles relating to the physical. One, your body needs to constantly be redirected in a way that aligns with your movement because naturally our system is at a constant state of change. Where those changes occur intentionally and with a certain degree of awareness one becomes empowered in their decisions and actions. Two, when our body reaches a certain capacity, it appears to stagnate until we make new connection with other parts to reinforce its capability. Example could be someone overloading their muscle to the point it reaches capacity. What you would need to do then is you add more weight, speed, frequency or whatever in your training to further maximise its potential. You keep going but each time to increase potential you would need to recruit from other parts of your system; nerves; joints; nutrient; oxygen; will. Eventually you will reach a point no more can be possible. This is where new external connection would need enforcing. New connection that is external, it could be mechanical or biologically adding new potential, to be able to carry more as our physical character contains within it limited capability.

Emotional discipline I have not yet touched on much but at the start of this chapter I mentioned how the physical, mental, and emotional are closely related. Our emotional starts at the chemical level or deeper. Imagine your body like a factory that is constantly producing all types of chemical reactions. Chemical reaction ignited based on the input that you provide consciously and what you don’t provide consciously. If you give too little of something the chemical in that space may deplete. If you put in too much the system will overload and you need to find ways to exercise to regulate and replenish. So, what sort of things affects our emotion? The simple answer is that there are infinite possibilities. However, let us try to focus on scenarios that we may have a chance to manage or at least align ourselves in accordance with its output.

First area we have control and greater ability to manage is our nutrition. What we consume in turn gets broken down in our body for use of energy, repair, growth, and other things. So, what we put in through our mouth, it is important to give thoughts about its effect on the system. Do they provide nourishment or are they going to cause chemical reactions in the body that will end up breaking down composition of the system. A great guide to use is the closer the foods are to its original state, meaning from its natural environment. The more likely they will complement the body. However, I realise this will not always be the case because foods also have their own chemical reaction. They may induce states that are not aligned with our bodies. So that would require research on the individual’s needs. The second part is that it’s become more difficult to determine which food came from its natural state because us as human are enhancing and manipulating so much in our environment. Now in saying all that, it will also come down to us as individuals demanding more from our food providers, growers, and contributors at all point of the interaction of the food chain. We should push to provide food with high nutrient rather than food that are rushed in development for a faster trade. We are all responsible for this decision both consumers, providers, and regulators. I may expand on food at a later chapter but for now we move on.

Now what sorts of stimuli alters our or influence our mental. I left this point last because the last two topics all influence our mental. Our physical movement contributes to our mental state; our consumption habit or nutrition contributes to our emotion in turn influencing our mental. However, the point that I wanted cover specifically for this topic was, will. The mental capacity to rise above difficult, challenging or degraded mental focus is what I wanted to explore in this context. How do you move from a mental slump or from a day, week, month with certain lapse or mental challenge? This may sound really dis-heartening to someone reading this bit, but you start with a question. I will expand on some more practical things of course but a question must first be asked about your mental state. What are the questions? What? Why? How? You can refer to our earlier chapter on habits to clarify more around this.

Now, after we ask the question or while in the moment of asking the question. There may be practical steps one can take to get the most from our intent. The first one is regarding our proximate environment; is it contributing or exhausting us mentally. Environment can be your physical or natural environment, people and other external stimuli that interacts with you. If you live in an area that is noisy, polluted, hot, cold, wet. These will have degree of influence to your mental state. Now certain environmental factors we can manage to an extent; like in a cold environment you look for warmth or you wear heavier garments. In noisy environment you may have houses built in a way that can reduce the noise coming from outside. If the noise is coming from inside, you could limit your exposure to that environment by finding places with less noise outside. So, the ability to manage certain areas of your environment must be determined by you. I mentioned also before that people could contribute to the environment and impact your mental state.

Let’s explore a bit on people, it is a little bit different how we manage interaction that may not be contributing in a way that is ideal for us. These 3 areas are great to look at, time, distant and space. Time refers to how much of an interaction we have with that person or people. If a single interaction leaves you drained for a full day, then you should consider cutting down the amount of time you dedicate to such interaction. Until you master a way to manage its influence on your system. How could you do that you ask? After every positive or negative interaction make time to reflect on what took place. Think, at what point did your system start to feel discomfort? Pay attention to that and look at previous patterns if you had similar ones in the past.

When you understand that, you could do one of two things. The first at future conversation when you see the conversation is leading to that same state (we are creatures of habits, we repeat ourselves more than we realise) create a mental starting line. Then internally start to ask – “is this information being provided to me within my capacity to accomplish? are they asking me to personally act upon this?” If the answer is yes to both, during your reflection try finding solutions to these questions. To the parts you cannot find solution try to also note them down. Now when this conversation reoccurs again (we are very forgetful). This time you directly ask them to pause and acknowledge their concerns and pain. It could be something as simple as “I hear you” (be aware sometimes they are not looking for solutions) or “thank you for sharing these details with me.” Then make them aware of the point why you stopped the conversation and highlight past interaction that this exact topic came up (how we do this is important, ‘be kind’).

Remember those questions that you previously asked internally? now you can ask them aloud. Seek clarification to determine if they were asking for enactment of you from the interaction or topic. Your response could be “This information you are providing did you need me to personally act upon them?” If they are not within your capability to complete you also state this on this interaction. Ask them directly who they feel could help them with this information or pain point. If they do not know either, then now you both have created a tangent of exploration from previous dialogues. If you feel you can assist you further help them on route to finding assistance for that concern. Where it is not something you feel comfortable assisting with, you must make them aware of how it makes you feel. If you are comfortable saying it. How people react to feedback is determined by their level of emotional awareness, hopefully they also reflect and observe that you had no malice in your intent. For you to grow you need to be able to express your emotion without fear. Always where possible do it in a way that is kind and empathetic.

So, in that interaction I mentioned there possibly three things you could introduce to manage scenarios going forward. If after you went through that scenario and could not find any way to assist with the individual’s pain point and the conversation could not evolve from the initial first stage. Based on decision you decide to make there you could introduce distant and space. Distant means you move yourself away from the person. Your interaction could use a different medium like phone, text or different form of communication accomplished from afar. If you leave in the same place, then space is what you could use to help better manage interaction. Space means to set up or position yourself in area where you have the option to be involved in the dialogue or not. When you are interacting with the person, have the room and space set up in a way that makes you feel comfortable and relaxed. All these three principles could be applied in combination to make the most from those interactions. So, to summarise on interaction where you are feeling overwhelmed, and you don’t feel comfortable. You listen, you reflect, and you ask internally then externally if the request is being at you or to you. If that does not produce better dialogue after the questions, we introduce time, distant and space to help us collect information from this individual(s) in a way that we are able to process for ourselves.