Living healthier as a spiritual triathlete

     They swam, they biked, they ran – but before that, they trained and trained.  Over 1500 people participated in Naperville’s Sprint Triathlon last weekend.

     But is physical training all that is needed?  Nope. Anyone who has ever competed in such an event knows mental training is also required.   In the discussion forum of Beginnertriathlete.com, Mick, a triathlete, offers these thoughts, “Training and racing are as much mental and spiritual as they are physical.  I have found that I need to prepare myself physically, mentally and spiritually to truly reach my full potential each day.”     

     Lately I have been considering the importance of spiritual training - not just for athletes but for everyone.  Training for a spiritual triathlon, if you will.  What would be the events and how would someone prepare? Would there be health benefits?

     For me, a spiritual triathlon would include:

·        Leg 1 = forgiveness

·        Leg 2 = gratitude

·        Leg 3 = love

Why?

    These three are fairly easily defined.  Forgiveness is the pardoning of another and treating the offender as not guilty; gratitude is the giving of thanks; and love is deep affection for another. 

      To train for such a triathlon is to put these qualities into action.  This training can be as demanding as any competitor’s.  And while an athlete’s training includes stretching past limitations and breaking “personal bests” – a spiritual triathlete must stretch his limits also. 

     This may include not just forgiving another, but totally forgetting the offense; being grateful even when it is hard (someone else got the job you wanted, or life seems full of disappointments); and love needs to outgrow just loving those who love us by encompassing also the bully, the unloving, even the “enemy”.

     And while we take for granted the health benefits of running, swimming and biking, what are the actual health benefits of forgiveness, gratitude and love? 

     A growing group of physiological and psychological researchers have found that practicing forgiveness, gratitude and love all have a beneficial effect on a person’s mental and physical well-being.

    For instance, in an article in the Los Angeles Times, health writer, Melissa Healy,  wrote, “Forgiveness – a virtue embraced by almost every religious tradition as a balm for the soul – may be medicine for the body…In less than a decade those preaching and studying forgiveness have amassed an impressive state of findings on its possible health benefits.

     “They have shown that ‘forgiveness interventions’ – often just a couple of short sessions in which the wounded are guided toward positive feeling for an offender – can improve cardiovascular  function, diminish chronic pain, relieve depression and boost quality of life among the very ill.”

     She continues, “Collectively, researchers say, these findings suggest that failure to forgive may, over a lifetime, boost a person’s risk for heart disease, mental illness and other ills – and, conversely, that forgiving others may improve health.  Like proper nutrition and exercise, forgiveness appears to be a behavior that a patient can learn, exercise and repeat as needed to prevent disease and preserve health.”

     WebMD cites similar findings when it comes to gratitude, “It’s no secret that stress can make us sick, particularly when we can’t cope with it.  It’s linked to several leading causes of death…and claims responsibility for up to 90% of all doctor visits.  Gratitude, it turns out, can help us better manage stress.  ‘Gratitude research is beginning to suggest that feelings of thankfulness have tremendous positive value in helping people cope with daily problems, especially stress,’ [University of California Davis psychology professor Robert] Emmons says.”

     The article concludes with these words of Emmons, “I think gratitude is the best approach to life.”

     Like forgiveness and gratitude, research has also shown health benefits from expressing love. In an article for Yahoo!, M. Langton, told how showing affection for loved ones has been effective in slowing the aging process and preventing angina, but also “just showing your care and concern for others in your community can also provide health benefits. The Institute for the Advancement of Health conducted two surveys involving a total of 1746 people who did volunteer work. Results showed that just helping out in the community offered relief from pain related to stress-sensitive conditions like multiple sclerosis, and headaches, and lupus.”

     One of the great things about this kind of mental training is that you don’t have to be engaged in a sporting activity to do it. No special shoes, equipment, a team or a field are needed. You can do it on a regular basis amid a variety of encounters with friends, family, co-workers throughout every day. Now, that’s training – for better health - that we can all get into.

Thomas (Tim) Mitchinson is a self-syndicated columnist writing on the relationship between thought, spirituality and health, and trends in that field.  He is also the media spokesman for Christian Science in Illinois