Saturday, March 6, 2010

Health = physical happiness

I've been thinking in the last couple days about happiness and our bodies. And I came accross this article in the New York Times.

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/01/in-obesity-epidemic-whats-one-cookie/?ex=1283144400&en=943eb4260d1cb839&ei=5087&WT.mc_id=HL-D-I-NYT-MOD-MOD-M139-ROS-0310-HDR&WT.mc_ev=click

It's about childhood obesity theories and how little changes in our lifestyle could affect weight loss or weight gain, but ultimately big weight changes require big life changes due to the compensatory abilities that our bodies have.

Read the article it's short and good. But my main observation about it is that what I've noticed for myself is that when I focus on the adjustment of a habit rather than the out come of that adjustment, and the choice to change is motivated by a desire to do something that will make me happy, the adjustment is much easier, and the outcome happens naturally without me trying. For example if I focus on "get skinny get skinny get skinny" I'm not going to- I'll just be thinking about how fat I am and get depressed and have "the last cookie" before I "really kick it into gear and eat better"- except that last cookie starts calling out everyday until a week's gone by and I've had a sugar headache every night when I go to bed because I hate my body.

BUT if I focus on choosing to excercise and eat well because it makes me feel good and whole and I'm able to expend my energy and not feel guilty all the time, but feel balanced and well and RESTED...that weight is gone before you know it and I'm in a state of mind and health where I can emjoy it, and not resent all the good food I've been missing.

Being "healthy" is really just an adjective for having physical happiness. I like that. That's my new attitude about THAT. If you read this and see me on a regular basis, try to remind me of that :)

1 comment:

Kelly Jean said...

Great attitude. Awesome insight. Love you!!