When someone says they don’t have time to do exercise, when someone says that they don’t have time to follow a healthy lifestyle, when someone says that they don’t have time to do some physical activity, when some says that they lack energy due to personal obligations – They say because they mainly lack the intention to do it or they don’t want to do it even though they can.
They believe that they do not deserve it and some believe that they do not have what it takes to do it or they believe that it is not worth the effort. They give all excuses to validate their complacency. And most of the times they lack the momentum to keep going with the hard yet valuable habits.
Momentum comes when we stick with the decision we made and stay consistent on our approach till we experience the benefits. Momentum comes only if you overcome laziness, negative self-talks, those mind chatters which forces you to give up or skip the resolution you made. You have to be inspired from within to reach a momentum and for any good habit to stick for a lifetime.
There are many days or rather I would say most of the days where I don’t want to wake up early in the morning and workout. In fact who likes to give up the comfort of bed and get up to put oneself through pain and resistance in the gym. But I force myself and oppose the chatter in mind to do it anyways. And actually those are the days on which you actually have to workout because you strengthen your respect towards yourself by keeping your promises you made to yourself. By doing what is right and what you have decided no matter what, you are telling your mind that you are in control. By standing by your word to yourself, you are showing the you are a person of integrity.
It all comes down to the standards we live by. Standards are the rigid and no-compromise requirements we have for ourselves. I wake up early, I brush twice daily, I exercise, I eat healthy food, I don’t get tempted to eat junk foods, I drink only water when I am fasting, I make sure I spend time with my wife and play with my kid, I do not compromise sleep over petty videos and social media, I read, listen and watch inspiring and positive stuff and so on. These are normal usual things that everybody can do but they are also the ones that are easy to not do rather hard to do. In fact those easy normal daily tasks are not as easy as they seem to be if we ought to do daily without any deviation. We got to stay consistent in our approach to reap the benefits and of course staying consistent is difficult. It is difficult because life throws a lot of variables at us and we have to stay on course despite all the odds.
What we tolerate is what we get in life. It is what we tolerate and not tolerate that defines our wellbeing.
It is my decision to tolerate a mediocre and uninspiring life or not to tolerate it and do something about it. It is my decision to say that I cannot tolerate this low vitality in life and do something to develop myself.
What we allow is what we get in life. Majority of the things in life may not happen unless we allow them to happen.
Things happen in our life due to various choices and decision we made over a coarse of time. A person does not smoke a cigarette randomly unless that person decides to light up a cigarette and smoke. A person does not get obese in a day or a diabetic in a day unless that person allowed certain unhealthy habits to creep into life. It is me who allows myself to binge watch on mind numbing videos online, it is me who allows myself to eat junk foods. These are all the things we allow ourselves to do.
When you have these kind of rules and have the discipline to execute them no matter what, you get stronger physically and mentally. You just feel better to handle difficult situations efficiently.
Most of the times it is not much to do with your physical condition like energy or fitness etc., but it is mainly to do with the mental strength. Many people are mentally weak to do the things that we are supposed to do. We tend to put blame on our physical body when we lack the mental strength to pursue the stuff that is in our best interests.
It is normal to seek challenges, overcoming our self-limitations, putting ourselves through pain and struggle to become stronger.
What is not normal is just waking up when you feel like, then eating whatever you feel like, just drive in the car cursing the traffic and go to office, sit in the office and do enough to keep the job, meanwhile snack 2 to 3 times before lunch and after lunch, again drive through traffic, return home, eat dinner while watching TV, then spend some time on social media, go to bed late getting less sleep to wake up late the next day – This is not normal.
This is not what our body expects out of us evolutionarily. It seeks challenge, do some physical stuff, do something difficult and feel good about overcoming certain odds and get a sense of reward.
Since we may not face these kind of challenging and exciting situations daily, we must find ways to put ourselves in those kind of simulations like a physical activity or a challenging workout in the morning so that we can pamper our reward pathways positively . When you activate your evolutionary reward pathways in brain by doing tough yet stimulating physical stuff, your brain releases a dose of endorphins (feel good hormones). When your brain does not get this daily dose of endorphins, it seeks pleasure by other means and you tend choose the easy and unhealthy stuff that you get hold of.
Diet and what you eat has a huge impact on how you think and take decisions. Now a healthy nutritious diet alone can improve your health to a good extent but exercise and rest do have their role to play. Your body likes to move and needs movement on regular intervals. Later it needs some time to reset to recover and rebuild itself.
It is a mental attitude you have towards healthy lifestyle, your mindset towards diet and exercise has an impact on the quality of life. People give excuses blaming time, work, tiredness, responsibilities etc. They simply justify their inability to stick to a healthy routine using lame excuses and show casualness towards these critical things in life. People are used to sedentary lifestyle instead of putting in some effort for their own well being.
I am not asking you to run marathons or do cross fit or lift heavy and become a body builder or fitness model. Your body has some evolutionary requirements , it needs you to move and do some physical activity. You can choose whatever you want like cycling , walk around, take stairs, play some sport, swim , just do some sit ups at home , do something but do not justify the sedentary lifestyle. You need not do and try a lot of fitness programs or diet programs, just embrace something that you can sustain and gives you enough challenge to keep you excited. But follow some routine and ritual instead of doing nothing.
*Do read the Disclaimer