Starting Over in 2015 – As a holistic senior, I blew it in 2014 and I hope 2015 will be different by starting over. I traveled a lot during 2014, gone for months and weeks, and eating out in restaurants. I gained weight because I did not exercise. I tripped in a hole on a road in Frankfort, Kentucky, and fell onto broken asphalt injuring my right knee. I bruised the bone, making it stiff for two months and using a cane to walk. I gained a lot of weight back too, but no excuses! A senior exercise plan is not enough, starting over is what I need to do so I’m picking myself up and starting over in 2015.
Looking back at 2014, I discovered why I stopped living healthy. When I started out in 2013, it seemed easy to exercise and eat healthy food too. In 2014 when I stopped exercising, and began eating out, I was not able to maintain the weight I lost and I gained it all back, and more. I realized that I was no longer connected mind-body-spirit. Even my thinking was off. I was not able to stay balanced without body-mind-spirit connections. Starting over in 2015 is the only thing I can do to recapture what I achieved in 2013, but lost in 2014.
Starting over can be difficult sometimes. I slide backwards when I have false starts and stops that get in the way. Starting over isn’t always a straight path. I need some boosting up, ideas, and inspiration to get the perspiration needed to lose weight. I read a post, 25 Ways to Get Back on Track Today, which includes some simple ways to start over. If you are struggling to start over, read the article as you may find it helpful too.
Connecting the body-mind-spirit together encompasses holistic living so starting over in 2015 is achievable. The following defines these three connections:
- Body: We can increase health when we move our bodies: Walking, exercising, Yoga, Tai Chi, Qigong. If we have physical limitations, we can do chair exercises. It includes eating healthy food: organic fresh fruit, vegetables and greens; grass fed meat and wild fish. If we have food allergies such as gluten, we must follow any food guidelines about these allergies.
- Mind – This is working on the fitness of our minds by looking at our thought patterns. How we use our minds makes a difference in connecting to our body and spirit. Practice deep breathing to relax our bodies so we can meditate by going within to connect to our higher selves or the divine within. This can be God, Buddha or whatever we call it. We identify any thoughts that we have that limit or block us from achieving our holistic lifestyle. Once we identify our limiting thought patterns, we can re-write them to affirm who we really are, divine beings.
- Spirit – This is working on our spiritual fitness. Spirit is our soul which is the seat of our vital energy force that keeps us alive no matter how we are living our lives. But, if we are not using it right we can shorten our lives through illness and disease. Do we accept and love people, or do we resent and hate them? Are we in jobs that we hate rather than jobs we love? Are we in loveless marriages? What makes us afraid? These are all questions we can answer using spiritual principles for healing our lives. The essence of spirituality is our relationship with the divine within us and our connection to everyone. We determine our spiritual experiences. Others who have developed religious dogma and fundamental views does not determine our spirituality. The spirit is not material, economic or political.
Whenever we focus only on one of these connections or two connections, we are out of balance. We can give ourselves a tune-up by using all three together to re-connect them so we can begin balanced, holistic living again. Sometimes it means starting over again to make the connections.