When training there are three areas you must work to reach your maximum potential, they are Mental, Physical, and Spiritual. I will touch on ways to exercise these points, please realize that all these points tie into each other in someway or another and working one can and will work the others.
Balance must be maintained throughout training for many reasons. The foremost of these being the fact you are only as strong as your weakest area, the second is, I've said this before and I will say it again because this is very important, without balance you will fall.
Mental and physical training are relative, meaning that what you can actually do and what your body can do are two different things. You must push yourself to reach your body’s maximum potential, how much you lift or how smart you are doesn't matter as long as you let go and push yourself.
"That which cannot kill me can only make me stronger"
Physical training is about the easiest of the three. Aerobic or anaerobic, high impact or no impact it doesn't matter just keep yourself in good shape. Stay active, get out and see the world, find your limits and exceed them, you will be amazed at what will be revealed to you when you get out and become active.
Working out increases muscle awareness. As you become more aware of your body you will be able to feel the Force flow through your body in areas you weren't even aware of. There is a relaxed "state" your muscles go into after a work-out that lowers the heart rate, and allows for a deeper meditative state. That same "state" can be reached just prior to meditation by doing isometric exercises.
"There is no knowledge that is not power"
Pick something that interests you, and read all you can about it, learn it, and know it. My two personal favorites are science and religion. To defeat the enemy you must know them, that is what the study of Science gives you. A thorough study of Religion gives you a broad based look at economics, law, customs, philosophy, and the after life; not to mention much more. I can't tell you that must study these but this is the path I chose, you will choose your own, but keep in mind that a study of on the effects of sunscreen on bald gerbils will get you nowhere quickly. So choose your areas of study wisely, it will reflect in your development. Also maintain an open mind, current views you have may be wrong, and in keeping an open mind you will realize this and change them as necessary.
"This is not the beginning of the end, nor the end of the beginning. This is the journey of Mankind, a journey that is the Circle of Life. A journey that reveals the meaning of life, and culminates in becoming one."
This is what it all comes down to, all the work that you put into your studies will pay off here. Meditation is the key to opening your mind, the meditative state is where you will break down all the years of conditioning. Meditating opens the sixth and seventh senses, to see without eyes and feel without touching, with these senses sharp you will see things, these things will evoke all human emotions. A word of warning, you will face your fears at some point in time, but facing them and defeating them will make you stronger. As you see things, both in life and in the spirit, for lack of a better word, you will see things that interest and confuse you, meditate on these, they will explain themselves; as a last point in this section meditate on the Force itself it will explain itself to you.
An exercise I found that is not listed here is a straight focusing exercise that will assist you with most of the practical uses of the Force. Take a piece of tape, put a dot on it, and put it on the wall, now go into a meditative state with your eyes open and focus on that dot. When you are doing it right everything around the dot will disappear, as you get better at it focus on a point with distractions around it.
I can’t go into all I would like to here, this lecture would not end as there is just too much to discuss. This is a journey of self-discovery, I can only show you where the door is you must find your own path there and then walk through it.
A word on release, to those of you who don't know I had eye surgery a week and a half ago. The retina fell off of my left eye, and they had to manually reattach it. There is a small chance I will be blind in that eye for the rest of my life, I'm 21, which would, well, suck. Except I was put here for a purpose, and one purpose alone, if I can fulfill my destiny being blind in one eye, then, that is something I can live with.
Things happen in life, both good and bad, and sometimes there will be very little or nothing you can do about it. So let it go, don't let a problem rule your life, it will upset a delicate emotional balance and cause you to fall.