Our Personal Responsibility for Our Personal Health

Hey friends!!

So last week, we talked about giving our bodies some love, giving ourselves some body love. I wanted to take that one step farther…

“As a society, we don’t want to fat shame, but we are getting comfortable with being sick.” - Dr. Garth Davis

We all want to love our bodies, and it’s important to love yourself! Curves and dimples included! The problem is that we completely succumb to the idea that however our body looks when we wake up is how it's going to look and we should love our body. This idea that we just wake up in our bodies, however they look today, that I just happened to wake up in a “good body” today and other people didn’t takes away the personal responsibility that we have. We set ourselves up for our tomorrow. Health doesn’t just happen. Fitness doesn’t just happen.

Let me repeat that because that’s how important it is… The idea that our body just is how it is takes away the personal responsibility we have to take care of our own bodies.

Let’s be real though. Taking our personal responsibility out of keeping ourselves healthy and fit is a lot harder. It’s much easier to just wake up with the body you have each day and not be worried about how today affects tomorrow. It’s much less work to plan for your meals and just eat what’s available. Its much easier to just eat the temptation that is staring you in the face and making your mouth water than to wait to enjoy a specific reward.

It’s important to take an honest look at the instant gratification versus rewards that we are convincing ourselves we are entitled to you. It’s important to look at the pros and cons of doing what’s easier and doing what’s right. Furthermore, it’s important to look at ourselves and where we’re at with regard for readiness to change.

Even now, I’m writing this in a cafe next to two women discussing their dietary habits, easily and unprompted giving the weaknesses and poor choices that they continually make. They have no problem knowing what the evil is and where the challenges lie. By giving in to the temptations, we think that we are doing ourselves a service but the truth is that we are just putting ourselves further behind.

If you are becoming more obese, you are not loving yourself. If you are giving yourself cancer, Diabetes Type 2, COPD, etc. you are not loving yourself. If you are clogging your arteries, you are not loving yourself. So even if we act like we love ourselves so much on Instagram, the health choices we make are a direct demonstration of how much we love ourselves.

It’s kind of like parenting… letting a child break rules without reprimand is not doing them any service. It’s actually teaching them where boundaries are and how to behave for success.

That’s not to say that we can never have sweets, or bread, or whatever the temptation is!! It just means that we need to understand and respect a reward system. We can’t have it whenever we see it, or whenever we have a “bad day”. An action can reap a reward, not a circumstance. Earning a reward for having a bad day really only encourages more bad days. Rewards are wonderful (and taste better) when they are earned and well-deserved.

When we stop thinking that health is some unstoppable force, we will be able to take accountability for our own health. We have so much more control over our own health than many of us realize. Any lifestyle related disease is dependent on just that… lifestyle. Change your habits to change your life.

Here is a great article that I read today that discusses the idea that Genes do not determine your health. Let this help you take more accountability for your health and how you feel. Our health is constantly evolving and we need to monitor it constantly. So just because I was very mindful of my health last week doesn’t mean that I’m done and I just have to tell other people how to be healthy.

https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/891244?src=soc_tw_share

I need to practice good health just like every one else, if not more so. I must be an example to my family, friends, clients, and community that you can maintain a healthy and active lifestyle no matter what the challenges. Like in The Princess Bride, Count Rugen says “If you haven’t got your health, you haven’t got anything.”

Try to remember this when you are faced up against a challenge: Is this really going to serve you? Is this a reward or are you justifying a bad behavior? How will this affect YOU?

Let me know where you find difficulty and what are your evils and temptations?? Have a great week and check back soon for more!