Vitality – A Life Force
― H.E. Davey, Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation
This week I will be writing about vitality. As you work on getting your mind, body and soul aligned and work on becoming the best you you can be, the concept of vitality and the strength of vitality is centrally important to the well being of not only your body or physical self, but also of your mind and soul.
In the physical and mental sense, vitality refers to a feeling of aliveness–of feeling healthy, capable and energetic. In the mental or emotional sense, this “aliveness” brings a feeling that your actions have meaning and purpose. It indicates an infusion of positive energy into your being. 
For most of us we think of vitality as being healthy and active, and think of people with vitality being upbeat, energetic and positive. Good health is a vitality enhancer and healthy choices lead more directly to vitality. Vitality is also impacted by your mind set and attitude–and your ability to embrace where you are today and to work toward your intentions.
Mental vitality is having the mental energy to think clearly. It means that you are in good mental shape and have thinking stamina to handle problems or what life throws your way. It is about being mentally alert and effective. Mental vitality does require physical vitality, since good blood flow and nutrients are important for the brain to function and for healthy mental processes. You can think about your brain like a muscle in that exercise and continuous use of it will push you to learn new things and to have new or different experiences. This will make it stronger and improve your endurance and stamina. Just like muscles, gaining mental strength is helped by good mental workouts.
Emotional vitality is more about having a positive or up-beat attitude that helps you with being grounded, content and enthusiastic. The better the state of your emotional vitality the better you will be positioned to deal with challenges and stress that come your way. Working on your emotional vitality will help increase your emotional endurance and stamina and maintain a positive outlook.
When we think about emotional vitality in terms of good mental and emotional health, this is about keeping yourself free of mental “toxins” that can impact the way you think. Mental toxins include such things as opinions and criticisms that affect your motivation, esteem, confidence and courage. You can gain emotional vitality from feeding your emotions positive thoughts. It’s about reinforcing and embracing all your emotions, even those that you consider negative, such as sadness, hurt, anger and loss.
These need to be positively accepted as part of you and it’s OK to go through the process of experiencing them, but with a positive mindset that they are part of you, they are real and you need to process them. This is related to reflection (Reflections) and allowing yourself to fully experience your emotions. Try not to suppress them.
You can think of vitality as being the “connective tissue” or the outcome of a balanced body, mind and soul–where you are in good physical condition by taking care of your body with good nutrition and exercise. Your mind and emotional state is being nurtured and you are centered and grounded. And your soul or spiritual self is at peace and fulfilled. Paying attention to these aspects of you, how they are connected and how when aligned bring to you vitality will help you experience a passion for and joy in living, physical endurance (Warrior Rx and Warrior DAX for Vitality) and mental alertness.