Healthy, Wealthy, & Wise

On this beautiful day of OCTOBER (can you believe it?), the saying: "Early to bed, early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, & wise" came to my mind. I have NO idea why, but alas, it did. So I pondered the thought. Those are really three things we all want to have an abundance of in our lives, yet many of us lack even the fundamentals for such a basis. Why? What can we do to change?

I'll put my thoughts on here, and you can decide what you think.

Since I could post a novel about all three subjects, I'll post about each one separately on different days, but I will absolutely begin today with the discussion on being "Healthy" (especially in America).

We've all heard the stats on the percentages of Americans who are overweight. Mostly everyone you know chows down on junk food like potato chips, pizza, or burgers. We consume red meat as if it were a primary staple and soda is the "new" H20 in our culture. Then, the flip side comes in when we all complain about the weight we want to loose and how we're often tired.

Over $30 Billion is spent PER YEAR on weight loss products alone in the U.S. Anything from diet pills, books on weight loss, and gym memberships. That is a HUGE industry (no pun intended). Think of the economic boost we get because people are fat. The irony comes in when we spend all that time researching, then all that money on purchasing products to help us loose weight so we can feel better about ourselves, yet we eat a triple portion lunch, slug down a 32 or 44 oz coke, and splurge for desert. To make matters worse, after a long, grueling day of work (aka playing on the Internet all day) we come home, plop in front of the big black box and watch shows for the rest of the night.

"Oh but you don't understand! I have a thyroid problem!"

"You're just insensitive."

"Easy for you to say, everything I eat goes to my hips!"

ETC. ETC. ETC....

The excuses begin to pile on. I can speak this directly, because I am speaking from personal experience. Growing up I was always thin. I did eat whatever I wanted in any quantity I wanted and I looked great. It was a gift...or was it? Then I got married. Since I didn't gain the freshman 15 in college, I made up for it during my first few years of marital bliss. I gained about 45 pounds. Sure, I noticed the weight creeping on. Occasionally I acted like I cared and went to the gym now and again for a 20 minute walk on the treadmill and 30 minutes of weight training, just in time to come home to spaghetti and meatballs and brownies and ice cream. The weight was slow to come on, but boy did it STAY on!

One day as I was changing my husband pointed out a new addition to my body. A new STRETCH MARK! Oh, no no no no...this will not do! Absolutely unacceptable! So that was the starting point to losing the weight, right? Wrong! It would be another 18 months before I really committed to doing something about it. When I finally had ENOUGH, I made a change.

The biggest change was to take away any and all excuse. I got rid of them all! EVERYTHING was my responsibility and I was going to make sure that I would lose all that I attached.

First thing I did was monitor my self talk. I stopped saying things that were contrary to my goals. I.E. : "I'm always hungry," "Everything I eat sticks to me," "I wish I could be skinny again," etc. I replaced those thoughts with, "No matter what I eat, not a pound sticks to me," "I really LOVE exercising, " or "I feel so good about myself."

Second thing I did was really feel good about who I am, and loved myself from where I stood. I am me, no matter what the scale says, I will always be me and if I don't feel good about who I am, no one else ever could. I knew that the way I looked at the time was the sole result of the way I internally felt, so I began to reshape my view of who I was from the inside and began to love myself all over again, just the way I was.

Third: Here comes the fun part. I exercised! I went to the gym EVERY DAY! I ran or did the elliptical until I burned 300-400 calories and then I would focus on one area of muscle to train on for the day (like abs, legs, arms, etc.) My time at the gym ranged from 1 hour to 1 hour and 15 minutes. The more I went, the more I loved going. When the weather warmed up, I started jogging outside and going for random walks around my office building here and there. Those random bursts of exercise really add up.

Finally: I ate less! OH THE HORROR! How dare I say I eliminated the one activity that brings most people their only life-ly pleasure. Yes! I counted my calories and I was obsessed with it! I knew that the only reason we gain weight and become unhealthy is because we consume more calories than we burn! So, if I burn about 2000 gross calories per day, and I only ate about 1300, then I would be burning about 700 net calories per day. About 4900 calories per week. If I loose 3500 calories, I lose a pound...so ta daaaa...I now had a formula.

It was tough. It was mentally draining. However, at the end of the day I knew what I wanted. I wanted "ME" back again. I was at 165 pounds and my goal was to reach 130. I made all the way down to 138 and now it's just a dog fight. Now I'm still working on my conditioning and telling myself the things that would be suitable for my mind to take in so that it can AID me in my goal rather than HINDER me.

I feel much better, I look much better, and I love myself again. That's why the results show what they do. The nasty stretch mark visitor went away also, thank goodness! So if you have a goal to be healthy, just make it happen. How much longer do we need to wait or how many other reasons do we need to hear about why we need to start? Let's do it for ourselves!

My strongest resource was: http://www.caloriecount.about.com/ it is a great site, I set up an account and managed my calorie intake. The trick is to be faithful to your calorie intake. Monitor it every day. If you say you are too busy you are lying and simply avoiding. Do it! The more you monitor how many calories you take in daily, the more you'll see how much "extra" you stuff into your body. It will motivate you.

ON TO YOUR JOURNEY OF HEALTH!