You may ask – what does pilgrimage have to do with the Mental Diet? I would answer – Everything!
We all know how important it is to maintain a nutritious diet of food, especially when walking the Camino! We need to feed our bodies with healthy foods so we have the strength to continue our journey! Ask me about those awesome pilgrim menus – 4 course dinner for 10 Euro!
The Mental Diet, just as important, is all about maintaining a Positive Mental Attitude. What could be more important during your pilgrimage, whether that is on the Camino de Santiago, or the Master Key Experience, or life in general!
Emmet Fox talks about the importance of the Mental Diet:
The most important of all factors in your life is the mental diet on which you live. It is the food, which you furnish to your mind, that determines the whole character of your life. It is the thoughts you allow yourself to think, the subjects that you allow your mind to dwell upon, which make you and your surroundings what they are. As thy days, so shall thy strength be.
In other words, you choose your life. That is to say, you choose all the conditions of your life, when you choose the thoughts upon which you allow your mind to dwell. This then is the real key to life: if you change your mind, your conditions must change too. Emmet Fox
During the Camino, it can be easy to become discouraged, as you trudge along the path, your progress painstakingly slow. You might see a town on the horizon and it takes FOREVER to get there. Or you might have an endless hill to climb, as the one in the photo above. (by the way, all my feature graphics this year are from my pilgrimage in Spain) You might be feeling tired because you didn’t sleep well due to snoring or coughing pilgrims. Maybe the weather is harsh. Perhaps your feet hurt, or your shoulders, or your legs, or perhaps EVERYHING hurts!
But… remember why you are there. You are walking in Spain! How wonderful! Take a moment, look around, see how far you have come. Think about how strong you are becoming. Admire the view. Enjoy the flowers at the side of the trail. Take a deep breath, breathe in the wonder of it all.
Is this different from the Master Key Experience? Not really. It can be easy to become discouraged, as you trudge along the path, your progress painstakingly slow. You might see a glimmer of hope towards your DMP on the horizon and it takes FOREVER to get there. Or you might have an endless hill to climb, as you are making such big changes in your life. You might be feeling tired because you didn’t sleep well with the insomnia of the restless mind. Maybe you feel overwhelmed, with too much to do. Perhaps you just feel like EVERYTHING is TOO MUCH!
But… remember why you are there. You are on the journey of self-discovery! How wonderful! Take a moment, look around, see how far you have come. Think about how strong you are becoming. Admire the view. Take a look at your Movie Poster, revel in the discovery of more shapes and colours, link that to your PPNs and your DMP (wow, you have a whole new vocabulary!). Take a deep breath, breathe in the wonder of it all.
And now the directions for the 7-Day Mental Diet (for more details, fill in the request for the Mind Shift on the side) :
Make up your mind to devote one week solely to the task of building a new habit of thought, and during that week let everything in life be unimportant as compared with that. If you will do so, it is safe to say that your whole life will change for the better. In fact, nothing can possibly remain the same. This does not simply mean that you will be able to face your present difficulties in a better spirit; it means that the difficulties will go.
What happens is that you apply the Law, and then the conditions change spontaneously. The new way of life will be so attractive and so much easier than the old way that you will find your mentality aligning itself almost automatically. Emmet Fox
I challenge you and encourage you to make your own test of the Mental Diet. One thing I found the first time I did this (yes, it is an ongoing challenge), was that suddenly, other people’s problems did not have to be mine – it was MY CHOICE! And yesterday, as I was muttering at a mess someone left, I had another thought – “Oh, goody, I get to clean this up and it becomes a chance for me to do a Random Act of Kindness!” Wow, that actually made me feel loads better!
Buen Camino, fellow pilgrims!
L.O.V.E
Thanks Angelica!
This is great!
Thank you Kim!