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Maintain a healthy balanced diet... cliche? Invest in your health and improve your life holistically!

5/3/2013

Living a holistic balanced healthy life helps us to not only have more fruits of our labor, but helps us to enjoy them more.

Your body is one of your biggest investment, wouldn't you agree?
Our wonderful bodies carry us through our days. When we want to walk to do something our bodies support us. When we want to stand and complete a task or watch an event, our bodies support us. When we want to do activities, fitness, fun stuff, make love, play, etc. our bodies support us.
When we want to give someone a hug or write or email or do art, etc, our bodies support us.
When we want to breath, sleep, think, create, rest, love, give, receive, etc. our bodies support us.

In what ways do you support your body?
Do you invest in your holistic health and well being?
Have you thought about it much?
If you looked at where you invest your time, energy, money and thoughts the most, would your investments match your goals or dreams or your core values?

In all things in life; health and balance are essential for quality living.
We have no way of knowing how long we will live, how or when we will die, but we do have a lot of say and a lot of control in how we will live.
While we do not have absolute control in our lives, we are the ones in the driver seat. Life circumstances or world events may sit in the back seat and add to the navigation so to speak, but ultimately we ourselves are the ones in the driver seat.
We can and do contribute to the ripple effect of the world, but we do not control the world, things do come up and challenges do happen. We do have choices and we do have control over ourselves, our attitudes and our daily investments.

We can invest 10 to 60 minutes a day in our fitness, our fun, our education, our meditation, our spiritual practices and in our goals.
We can make the choice to do less of the things that do not serve us like watching TV, a lot of social media, a lot of video games, movies, eating junk, complaining, etc, and replace them with investments that lead to our quality of living.

We can chose to invest an extra 10 to 30 minutes a day to improve our nutrition and to set ourselves up for success, or we can be lazy and careless now and invest our time later by days, weeks or months in the hospital, nursing home or by ending up 6 feet under far younger from heart disease, lung disease or some other illness that we have caused or mostly contributed to.

Maintaining balance in all areas of your life will help to set you up for success in living a longer more abundant and joyful life.

Nutrition: do the research and find what is best for your body: protein, produce, carbohydrates, water intake, fats, etc... keep them balanced to maintain good health and to avoid getting bored and burned out.

Set yourself up for success by creating your schedule to fit time in to prepare healthy foods so that you will not find the excuses in your day to go eat fast food or to eat junk if you are at a lunch for work and all they offer is junk.
Be willing and prepared to bring your own food.
Learn to reward yourself with healthy foods or a fun event instead of rewarding yourself with junk that is counterproductive.

Fitness: While it is important to practice the same fitness for a few months to get the body into that specific fat and calorie burning routine, you can diversify and maintain balance by alternating your fitness routine within the week, for example:

Two days a week: lift weights or do calisthenics
Two days a week do yoga or piates
Three days a week do Martial Arts, dance, run, play tennis, play basketball or some other cardio work out

Relaxation: find 5 to 20 minutes twice a day to sit in silence. Close your eyes, breath deeply into your abdomen, find a focal point to help you clear your thoughts.

Try using an image of a small candle in a dark room in your mind. Visualize the candle and when your mind drifts to tasks and other thoughts say "thinking" and then go back to seeing the candle in your mind. This helps to bring yourself back into the present moment. This is a great mind training activity that will lead to deeper mediation later.

Visualize & Celebrate: invest 2 to 5 minutes each day to visualize and internally celebrate your successes in all areas of your life. There are many areas of life that create the whole: body, mind (education, etc), social (relationships, etc), Spiritual, financial (money, career, etc.), & emotional.

Pick one area of your life at a time and see yourself experiencing things exactly how they would be as if you have already achieved your goals and feel the gratitude pulse through your body in celebration as if it's happening right now. Stay in this state of living your goals/dreams and in the state of appreciation for a couple of minutes.
Just choose one area per day, or visualize one area daily for a week or for a month and then the next area.
Be sure to stay on the wonderful feeling and do not counter act with a follow up negative comment or sarcasm.
EFT tapping, coaching and inundating yourself with positive people, books, or other sources can help tremendously.

Social: Spend time with loved ones, share intimate moments as well as enjoy a more social settings with a group of friends. Keep a healthy balance so that you are nurturing all areas of yourself and of your loved ones. We are social beings and even intense introverts need to experience connection and support of others.

Also, it is very good for the heart, soul and for the quality of life to do acts of service in balanced and meaningful ways.
Remember to keep your social life as a part of the whole and to not become consumed by it.
Acts of service, gift giving and showing up for folks are amazing ways to show love and support, remember to do what feels good to do and do it free from expectation. When you give freely you free yourself. When you show up because it is yours to do, you feel good about it. When you show up because you "have to" you can cause yourself to feel resentment. Remember, you are the driver and this is your life to enjoy. :)

Finances, Career or business goals: Be sure to differentiate needs from wants. Invest more in needs than wants and allow yourself some wants from time to time.

Invest time, energy and money in that which will enhance your goals.
Look at areas that you get more for your investment. An example is nutrition: fast food cost a lot of money, lowers energy, lowers the immune system and in the long run may cost a lot of your time dealing with health issues. YET Investment in good nutrition may cost a bit more up front and take a bit more time investment up front but yields greater returns down the road: better health, lower medical bills, less time with doctors and in hospitals, more energy to invest in your business and in your relationships, goals and in so much more.

FUN: Don't forget to have fun!

Get out and play! Don't over invest in your fun (such as gambling or other expensive hobbies). Be mindful that you don't end up spending so much time, energy and money on fun that you don't have anything left for goals and a quality long life. BUT do remember to include fun in your life! This is very important to maintaining balance, focus, and in sticking with any goal.
Laugh! Laughter is great for your holistic health & success.
Get your hands dirty! Well not really, but kind of. Get out into nature. Enjoy walks on the beach, hike up some hills or go horse back ridding. Gardening and pottery are other ways to connect back with nature.
While it is important to invest in your holistic health, career goals, education (including continuing education), if we do not take some time to stop and smell the roses so to speak then we lose sight of what life is about.

LOVE: invest in your relationships and enjoy fun times with those you love. Be affectionate and connect with those you love as often and as deeply as possible. Schedule time with loved ones and make them a priority.