In my last article I started a reflexion about being right and wrong. And how believing to be in the right side is reassuring but also creating stress and uneasiness in our body. I would like to continue this reflection sharing with you something more personal: the ping-pong match that sometimes is going on in my brain.

Sometimes, I can experience in myself – and I know that some of my clients do the same – a ping pong match between 2 scenarios or 2 analysis or 2 opposite aspects. I’m not able to stop on one side and to let go the other one. My thinking is continuously moving : on one side I have “this is wrong, but…” and on the other side “this is right, but…”.

When our rational mind is agitated, this agitation also influences the body. The final result is an unclear mind, a sense of insecurity and tension in the body, and a bad mood 🙂
Theses are signs of difficulty in letting go. It is like the brain get stuck in a circuit and doesn’t manage to go out of it.

Very often this mental mechanism has a negative influence on the muscles of the face, neck and shoulders. These consequences are stiffness, hardness and numbness. This mechanism has also a negative influence on our mood, because by focusing on something “problematic”, our attention is distracted and can not enjoy what is happening in the present moment.

To address the ping pong match in our head with the aim to make it stop can be harder than expected, because often we do manage to calm it down, but it tends to start again at the first occasion.
Don’t get discouraged! Humanity didn’t practice meditation for millenniums because controlling our mind is a easy task. Actually it is the opposite: the control of what we think is very demanding and needs practice.
You need to be aware that this will not be something that you can fix once and then forget about. “Unfortunately”, it requires constant care.

Meditation works well: it helps to calm the mind, to gain more clarity and more awareness about the content of our disturbing thoughts. It helps to create mindfulness.

Another technique is to use conscious movement. That helps to create bodyfulness.

• Move the muscles of your face – doing grimaces;
• Move the muscles of your neck – rotating carefully the head so to stretch the neck and throat muscles;
• Move the muscles of your shoulders – up and down slowly.

The combination of calming the mind and moving the body helps me  – and will help you – out of stiff and automatic postures. And it will help also your mood.

I will be happy to play a ping pong match with you at my praxis!

Picture from my holiday in Paris