Our body posture subconsciously reflects our mindstate, if someone gives you a compliment on your looks, your chest puffs out, your shoulders fall back and your chin is held high.
Conversely if somebody puts us down and we believe their criticism, then our shoulders slump, our feet drag and our eyes are cast downwards.
Thus we can see that the mind communicates with our bodies on many subtle subconscious levels. However it is not a one-way channel, we can reverse the polarity and use our bodies to tell our mind how to feel.
Body Faking
When we watch golfers walking up the 18th fairway [the last part of a golf course], it's not hard to tell which ones are playing well and which ones are playing poorly.
The golfers who are playing well have a bounce in their step. They walk tall, shoulders back, head up looking
straight ahead, maybe even whistling to themselves.- Zen Golf
In the book Zen Golf Dr Joseph Parent talks about how we shouldn't be too critical on ourselves when we make a poor shot.
He goes onto tell us that even the professionals make poor shots, and sometimes have entire days where they are making plenty of mistakes.
As we continue our journey attempting to seek wisdom through golf, we can pause upon this brief lesson and explore how this advice can help us in our general lives.
The advice for golfers when they take a poor shot is to remind themselves of the points above, that even the pros have off days and so it doesn't make sense to get down on yourself for making a poor shot.
Next he talks about the feedback loop between mind and body and says that it is best to behave like somebody who is having a cracking round of golf, than to get down on yourself and mooch around the place.
It can be as simple as pulling the shoulders back and taking some deep and full breaths. Lifting your eyes to the treetops or even clouds and perhaps whistling or humming a tune to yourself.
Using Neuroscience To Enhance Mood
We can see that the above advice isn't some kind of esoteric message, only relevant to golfers. Rather it is a habit that we can carry through to real life.
Let me ask you this; the last time you were sad or down about something; did you start whistling?
Maybe you hummed a tune and started to smile?
I didn't think so, that is because whistling and smiling are things we do when we are happy, not when we are sad. Therefore if you use that knowledge and whistle, sing, and generally smile when you don't feel like doing those things, then your mind will simply assume you are happy.
So the next time you make a mistake at work, or something happens to you whether it's within your control or not, simply smile.
As you smile become aware of your body, if your shoulders are slumped forwards pull them back. Imagine an invisible cord gently pulling you up by the centre of your head and straightening out your spine.
Take deep full breaths and lift your eyes up to the top of the horizon and even the clouds. This is because when we're sad we tend to focus on the little details rather than seeing the bigger picture.
Exercise Your Body Train Your Mind
All in all we need to take regular exercise, whatever mental state we are in. This is because exercise releases lots of feelgood hormones, and we generally do not feel like exercising if we are depressed.
If you carry on 'body faking' until you are mentally making it, you will notice a huge difference in how you approach problems, and how you deal with disappointment/hardship.
After a while you will no longer be faking it, you'll simply be making it, whereby the it will be your own reality.
There is a simple joyous wonder to realising that to a large extent, you can create your own reality and living the life that you want and deserve.
HAVE YOU EVER USED BODY LANGUAGE IN THIS WAY? DO YOU PAY ATTENTION TO THE CHANGES IN YOUR POSTURE WHEN YOU ARE IN DIFFERENT MOODS? OR PERHAPS YOU HAVE TRIED SMILING WHEN YOU'RE SAD AND SEEN SOME TREMENDOUS RESULTS?
AS EVER, LET ME KNOW BELOW!
Title image: Olia Gozha on Unsplash