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Lifestyle

This Not That || Three Words We Need to Use in 2022

Yes it is indeed that time of the year when we make promises to ourselves, for a healthier and happier year ahead.  The way I see it, these changes do not always happen, not for lack of commitment per sei but because we haven’t changed the way we look at things..

Most change happens with consistency, and to become consistent we much be reasonable in our expectations.  We tend to have an all or nothing approach when it comes to change and unfortunately this is the crux of our failure to stick to our promises.

The point of this article is to change the way we see things, instead of exercise we need movement, instead of diet we need nourishment and instead of sleep we need rest.

Exercise

Lifestyle

A lot of us adopt an American lifestyle, which is; let’s be honest a very all-or-nothing approach.  We tend to adopt things religiously and then drop then just as suddenly.  The human body, according to CNN’s Sanjay Gupta was not meant to be sedentary for 23 hours, only to exercise for an hour at the gym.  Which is why the European way of life sees to be that much healthier.  Movement is incorporated into the lifestyle; exercise is an activity, movement however is a verb and is part of every day life.  If we focus on movement instead of exercise, we may get more in the way of physical activity, perhaps lower impact but much more sustainable and manageable.  Perhaps determine trips during the day that you can walk to instead of drive…. Is there anything more romantic than walking your child to school, yes you.. not the housekeeper..  Gardening, cleaning and home organizing are all activities that are part of real life, and lead to a healthy and steady stream of management.  Food for thought…

Food

Lifestyle

Speaking of food, what would happen if we changed the word diet, to the word nourishment.  Is there a more beautiful word?  You can almost see the goodness seeping into cells, your brain, your blood stream and of course your heart.  Again, we have a very American attitude towards food; the good and the bad.  We discipline ourselves with food that is good for us, it’s like a punishment, and then when we have been very very good, we can reward ourselves with bad food…. I hope you see how warped that sounds..  Perhaps the first thing we need to change is the concept of calories, at the end of the day, there are more calories in an avocado than there are in an Oreo cookie.  But what does that really mean?? If we are able to start seeing things as nourishment, a goodness that comes from food, that enriches our insides.  Scientifically it has been said that food is the single thing that we control that goes from the outside to our insides, and our bodies are receiving signals from these choices of foods.  Are they ‘good’ for us, or do they disrupt the natural process already going on in our bodies.. If we were to change our attitudes to food, and of course our portions… Thing of the words ‘pigged out’ and ‘binged’ they are actually things that express freedom.. and really there is little truth to that..

Rest

Lifestyle

Rest instead of sleep.  Don’t get me wrong, sleep is very important to our bodies and our minds.  Sleep allows us not only to eat less and be in higher spirits, but sleep actually consolidates our memories, changing them from short term to long term memories.  If you sleep better, you have better memory of your experiences.  Additionally sleep is a time when the body rids itself of metabolic waste, so it is indeed important to sleep well.  However, you don’t need to put your pajamas on and call it a day, in order to rest.  Rest is an important element as well, and helps with our livelihood.  We need to sit down and do nothing a couple of times a day.  An opportunity to slow down, gain more clarity, and turn that turbo, wonder-woman mode off, if just for a little while.  As we go about our very busy days we are in ‘urgent’ mode.  The only thoughts we have are those pertinent to the Now.  When we have a chance to just sit down and do nothing, we are able to dig deeper into the less urgent yet just as important parts of our thoughts.  Go on, give it a try.