In my previous article, I did a brief introduction on the 5 pillars of Health and we also looked at the first 3.
In this article, we will complete the section on Inaction and also I will elaborate more on Energy and Balance.
Table of Contents
3. Inaction
Let me just say first that inaction has nothing to do with laziness. Laziness is like a cancer. Laziness is knowing that you must do something but failing to create the situation to take action. This is a problem that many people have and yet do nothing or little about it.
Inaction is the opposite of action. It includes everything that aims to restore and rebuild the damage of an action.
It consists of the following 5 parts:
a. Sleep
b. Rest
c. Restorative activities
d. Relaxation
e. Meditation
a. Sleep
Believe it or not, sleep is perhaps the most important aspect of your life. We spend ¼ of our lives sleeping and for a good reason. Sleep is responsible for restoring our body, mind, soul and spirit from the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual damages of everyday living.
Its power is often underestimated beyond belief and there is a good reason for it. We live in a hectic world that demands more and more of our personal time and that often time leads to the use of stimulants for better performance.
What most people do not get is, that without sleep, we cannot exist. Our bodies become susceptible to disease and cancer, we become unable to restore our muscular and hormonal systems, we feel weak, powerless and depressed.
We need to sleep. And when we sleep we must sleep well. Quality of sleep is just as important as quantity. I want to emphasize natural sleep because you cannot get good quality sleep from using drugs. You need to optimize melatonin naturally. I go more into detail on the subject of sleep here and here.
b. Rest
Rest is another important aspect of health and is completely ignored today for the same reasons mentioned in the previous section. Some people confuse rest with sleep. They are different sides of the same coin. You need sleep to rest and you need to rest in order to sleep.
The former makes sense. In order to understand the latter, I will use an example: if you are tensed but tired, you cannot sleep. This build up of tension is a result of lack of rest.
Rest often times means taking a break. This can be a vacation or just saying ‘no’ to an extra task when you are already overloaded with work. Knowing where to stop is important to avoid burnout and to preserve hormonal balance and therefore health. Read about the power of NO in one of my earlier articles.
c. Restorative activities
Which brings me to our next point on restorative activities. Restoration after each action is important as it installs balance in our bodies. Allow me to explain by using an example: consider a chef using a tool, for instance, a knife. You use a knife for chopping vegetables or cutting meat (performing an action). After you are done with your work, you need to take the time to wash the knife, dry it off and at a later time sharpen it (and in some cases, seal and apply oil). These are restorative activities.
We have a similar set of activities for our everyday living that are used to revert the damage that was done to our body. Yoga, tai chi and qigong are a few examples of restorative activities that we should be using daily to rebuild our physical body and bring balance to our spiritual, mental and emotional bodies.
d. Meditation
Meditation could be labeled as a restorative activity for the soul but I consider it to be a stand alone aspect of inaction. Meditation is a practice performed to still the mind and silence that inner voice that never stops talking. It is used to undo the damage coming from both the external and internal world. Think of it as a reboot to a computer. It brings the entire system back to its defaults and heals anything that requires repair.
All the aspects mentioned here are interconnected. You need rest in order to sleep just as much as you need meditation.
Your body needs restorative activities in order to balance the effects of stress, which can come from our professional environment or by working out too much as mentioned in one of my other articles.
4. Energy
In Part 1 of this article, we talked about action. Action is not just physical, it can also be mental or it can have other forms such as interaction. Interaction is also part of the flow of energy.
So in order to understand energy, we must talk about interaction as well. When we put energy into anything then you receive something back. This is after all one of the basic laws of physics (For each action, there is an equal and opposite reaction). Also, as you can see, energy and action are closely linked. There can be no energy without action (at some point the energy needs to spread or fade away which is also an action) and there can be no action without a surplus of energy.
Energy can be converted into other things like strength. Strength can be internal or external.
External Strength
External strength usually refers to physical strength, the very same that we use in our everyday lives to perform physical tasks. It can also be used in other contexts like social or professional status in which case, it gets translated into power.
Internal Strength
Internal strength refers to our inner strength. This can be our vital force like the chi/Qi (Chinese) or the Ki (Japanese) or essence which is the reason of our existence. It can also be strength of character, which is part of our personality. Internal strength is part of our ability to grow as a person and is often used to perform tasks that are unique to us or it can be our set of personal values and rules.
Flow of energy or Interaction!
These rules often dictate our way of thinking and the way we live our lives or interact (flow of energy) with other people on a personal, social or professional level.
Interaction can happens on the outside as much as internally. The latter is is what we call inner monologue. Inner monologue is about how we converse with ourselves and what we truly think about ‘us’. This process often dictates the way we carry ourselves and our interactions with others and vice versa.
Our inner strength also dictates the way we handle external influences like change or attacks from our environment (mental, physical or otherwise).
The stronger our essence, the better we handle things, the less stress we have and the more and healthier we grow.
So as you can see, allowing for proper cultivation and flow of energy is important. If the energy cannot flow, then this will have an impact on our physical bodies and our health.
Think of a dam holding back water. Dams are placed in specific areas in order to extract power from water or redirect water to other places to protect nearby establishments and houses. They usually have a system of releasing pressure or allowing for proper flow of water into other parts. If the system of the dam malfunctions and the water cannot be directed where it should, the dam will collapse and both people and the environment will be in danger.
We have a similar powerful energy inside of us and when it is not distributed correctly; it can damage our bodies and others around us. This is why attending matters of internal and external energy is important for optimal health.
A good way to protect ourselves from the accumulation of such energy, is to find ways for healthy release. Meditation, exercise, working on something we love (aka hobbies) or spending time with friends and family are only a few of the ways that we can use to release our pent up energy and protect our health.
5. Balance
Balance is the 5th pillar. As I described earlier, everything we do within our given time on this planet has an impact. It has an impact to our inside world as much as the outside. So we can influence the environment, others or ourselves both individually and as a collective.
Part of action is, that what we give out comes back to us, or what others give to us, make us react in a specific way that may harm or protect us.
This is where balance comes in. Actions and reactions must be balanced in order to maintain peace and order in the greater universe. You cannot have one without the other. Also, if you do more of one thing, you will have less of the other. This is why balance becomes important.
You need a balance between action and inaction in order to be healthy. You need a balanced diet and you need to balance your hormones. You need a balance between internal and external interactions. You need to grow your body as much as your spirit.
Sometimes we must remove something in order to maintain balance and sometimes you need to add something extra. Without balance in place, anything you try to build up, will crumble down.
The Mega Pillar
You can imagine 4 columns standing on a platform. Balance is the platform they stand on. It is the mega-pillar.
These 5 pillars are necessary not just for optimal health but for us to just exist here. They dictate everything we do, say, know or feel, all that is seen and unseen. Whenever you feel that your life is not where it should be, taking the time to check on the status of each one of these pillars will allow you to understand where your focus should be and how you can improve your health and your existence.
Did you ever experience an imbalance among the 5 pillars in your life? What did you experience? Let me know by leaving a comment below.
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by Nick Sigma
CWC, EH, E-YRT200
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