Even though things like good health and exercise are key factors in attaining wellness, they must work alongside some other things. Having a healthy body with an unhealthy mind is counter-productive to living an abundant life. The same is true of the opposite. A healthy mind in an unhealthy body is of little benefit. We can live longer happier lives if we know the Ways to Wellness. A combination of lifestyle lessons and the application of scientific principles go a far way in helping us to develop a wellness mindset. Here are a few things to help us thrive and live longer:
Make family your primary focus. Maintaining healthy family ties is crucial to healthy living. Having a healthy, supportive family unit can add years to our lives. Work on keeping parents, grandparents, and other family members close because they ones who will always be in our corner. Our families don’t always have to be blood-related because good friends because research shows good friends and strong social networks are common among the world’s longest-living people. Make the people who show up for you a part of your legacy. Make time for the people who will still be with you when life knocks you down. Spend more time creating strong family ties than you do chasing after success. Successes come and go, but family bonds preserve life and legacy.
Value your friendships. Good friends are better than pocket money, is a phrase I heard frequently growing up. I never fully understood it until I became an adult. In a world of fake people and social media relationships, great friendships are a dime a dozen. We don’t need a lot of friends to survive, but friendships add value to our quality of life. Identify your inner circle; the people who will show up for you and who you will show up for. Be genuine about how you feel about them. Pretending to like someone for any extended period is a waste of time and energy. Make memories together. Friendships are sweeter with splendid memories. Spend at least 30 minutes every day with people in your inner circle building memories.
Relieve your stress. De-stressing is critical to good health and wellness. Knowing when and how to shift gears in our daily activities is important. Stress can have a devastating effect on our bodies, leaving us with a multiplicity of illnesses if not addressed. Learn how to slow down. Life does not have to be a continuous crazy cycle of activities. For stress reduction; reduce the noise and understand the benefits of peace and quiet. Do a social media detox regularly. If your social media activity constantly stressed you out, it means you need a break. Meditate, pull yourself away from the frenzy of the day, and tap into your inner joy. 10-30 minutes each conversing with the creator of the universe works wonderfully for the soul. Don’t strive to live so fast that you miss out on the most important things about living.
Sleep is great. A good day usually begins with having gotten enough rest. Our quality of sleep is often determined by what we allow to bombard our minds. Sleep is not overrated, we underappreciated it. When the body is rested, it puts us in a place to make better decisions about our lives. Some try to sell the fallacy that successful people sleep less, but that depends on how we measure success. You may sleep less and be successful, but are you happy and healthy? It is guaranteed that those who do not get enough sleep will eventually crash and burn. Sleep helps us to recover from the previous day’s activities and gives us the energy to face a new day. Sleep while you can, when you can!
Turn off and tune out. Because of the world we live in, many of us find it very difficult to turn and tune out. We often feel guilty about taking time away from everything to care for ourselves. We cannot be useful to anyone if we are not useful to ourselves. It is very necessary to turn off the switch and tune the world out so we can rejuvenate. Self-care is not selfish is self-preservation. If allowed, people will draw more from us than we can give. They will want to guilt trip us when we cannot deliver on their demands. Wellness requires us to have a mind of our own and to allow guilt to make us commit to more than we can do. Even Jesus had to take time away from meeting the needs of people to replenish his energy (Luke 5: 16; Luke 6: 12-13). Don’t pour into others what you are unwilling to pour into your own well-being.
Wellness is more than a state of mind, it is a lifestyle. Instead of just trying to survive, commit to living life deliberately. Practice healthy habits daily that will lead you to better physical and mental outcomes. Make family your priority; place a high value on your connections; find ways to relieve your stress; get enough sleep and finally find ways to turn off and tune out. Wellness is the key to abundant living.
Recent Comments