Humans, a Reflection of Mother Nature

Is it a coincidence that we have similar traits to the very earth we walk on? Is it coincidence that there is a reflective trend in the incidence of human ill health and the degradation and damage of our planet?

It is all too easy to get caught up in the materialist, workaholic human world and forget to stop and look where we have come from and what we are actually part of. As humans, we contain the same amount of water as there is on the surface of planet earth*. We rise and sleep with the sun, females have the same length of menstrual cycle as the moons cycle, we are the same salinity as the sea and growth comes from good nourishment. Just like our planet we are delicate and fragile when we add chemicals and foreign objects to the system. In essence we are a mirror image of the very environment we call home. Yet we forget to look outside our materialistic work and think of the consequences of our behaviours and to varying degrees we are killing of both the human race and the planet that houses us.

So what does this have to do with anything? Well, that depends on you. This can be just passing information or it can help you to see that we are part of something very large and exciting and you can start to make choices that reflect your health and in return the health of your home, the earth.

The less chemicals we consume and spray the healthier we can be, the more we nourish our body and earth the stronger we can grow and the more we have respect for ourselves, others and our planet the more we can get out of life. The steps to achieve this can be as simple as, stepping of the rat race once in a while and see the beauty around you and treat your body, mind and environment as you would treat a small child.

*The exact numbers may vary depending on the book or review you have read.

Stout but fit, just like Pooh Bear

First impressions are powerful thoughts that cause us to judge people in an instant. What do we base these judgments on and how do we know if they are the truth/reality?

If you met a slim gentleman (A) and a gentleman that was stout (B) what would your first impressions of their fitness and health be? Most people would assume gentleman A to be fitter and healthier due to their visual look. Society amongst other things, has taught us to believe that slimmer is fitter but is this the truth. Firstly we must ask ourselves what is fitness and health and is size and shape the only measure of it?

If you asked a group of people what health and fitness was to them and asked how they would measure it, you would get many different answers. Health and fitness is subjective and as such can only be defined by the individual and their personal parameters. Therefore, one persons perception of fitness (I can walk to work and not get out of breath) can be totally different to another’s (I can bench press 100kg) and therefore their body shape will look nothing alike. Who is right and who is wrong?

Is Pooh Bear fit? He is stout and cuddly yet he walks every day and plays lots! Does that make him fitter than a model who eats little nutrition, hardly trains due to lack of energy yet has little if any body fat and fits societies “healthy” shape. There are plenty of people I know who on first impressions would be perceived to be “overweight” and “unfit” due to their size yet I would not like to take them on in the gym. And I am not talking about the big muscle men just Joe Blogs.

So when we judge on first impressions what are we actually doing? When we have information presented to us, in this case in the form of an “overweight” person, we delete, distort and generalise the information and base our reality on past experienced, personal values and beliefs. Our own belief about people and situations are not reality only our own reality. Reality exists but is never experienced by anybody. All we known is our own reality created by years of experience, deep routed beliefs and learnt truths. What you perceive in people is merely a reflection of your own deep values.

Why Bother?

Why do we bother working all the hours we do, what is the point of it all? What is the point in making money when there is little to no time to spend it? It is all too easy to lose sight of why we work so hard and spend so much time away from our friends, families and loved ones. Do you ever feel you’re on a treadmill and just want to step off and enjoy life?

When was the last time you went out and did something you really enjoyed that made you happy? It is important to make yourself feel good in this world not just others. If we are happy we can then give more to others, it is not a selfish act to put your feelings first sometimes. Today so many of us have lost sight of what life is about. We simply work 8 till late and then come home eat, telly, bed and then start all over again. What has happened to doing the things that make us happy, laugh or relaxed. Why are we spending all this time working and not choosing to make time to play?

If you had to plan your perfect day would you be able to do it now? Could you list 10 things that you love to do? These can be anything from having a drink at your favourite watering hole with a friend to skiing in the Alpes. What makes all the hard work worthwhile for you?

For most of us, the possibility of not working due to winning the lottery is not that high, some may say lightning chance, so we have to accept that we will need to work to maintain our present lifestyles. However, what can we do so that we are not just following the rat race and loosing life one day at a time?

What are some of the things we can do to get a balance and make time to do the things that make us happy? The starting point has to be knowing what it is that makes you happy, so make a list of your favourite day and all those things you want to do and love to do. Then start to do, begin to schedule in your activities in to your weekend and evenings and make life what you want it to be. Stay off the rat race and make life worth living.

Sully - The Dream Catcher

Not long ago my friends four year old daughter, Lilly, started to have bad nightmares. So much so she did not want to go to bed. Her fast thinking father, Dan, rushed out and brought Sully the dream catching monster from the film Monsters Inc, one of Lilly’s favourite films. Dan explained how Sully would catch her nightmares before she had them and she would have no more bad dreams just happy ones. To all our amazement from that night on, as long as Sully is there, she never has bad dreams.
 
This got me thinking. If a blue cuddly monster can cause a child to believe so strongly that they are not going to have nightmares that they don’t, surly anything we believe strongly enough can be true.
 
The key to understanding this as a possibility is that no one see’s the real world, just their interpretation of the world based on their own values, past experiences and beliefs. If a bald headed, tattooed man walked into the room in biker kit, people would respond very differently. For example, if someone had been mugged by a man that matched that description, they are going to treat the man differently than someone who has a best friend that looks like that. We assess the world on what we have experienced before, what we think we know and believe.
 
This opens the floor to debate as to what is actually true and what is not. In fact, no one can ever say something is absolutely right, only their take on it from their past experiences, values and beliefs. Of course, there are something’s that are more likely to be common knowledge as we have all experienced them, be it in a slightly different way. For example too much chocolate will make you fat!
 
The question then has to be asked, if we personally believe something to be true and we get feedback confirming this (as we have looked for it), then surly it’s now true. Magic football socks for example. Many people have a pair of luck socks they wear under the football socks. Do we really believe they are lucky/magic or have we worn them enough times when the team has won to believe they bring luck?
 
The question I would like to ask is don’t we all need a Sully? Not just for dream catching but one that can allow us all to believe again in what we can be, achieve and do if only we believe. Can Sully be the creator of belief in adulthood?

Societal expectations are killing us!

Is it not time we started to realise the negative effect we are having on ourselves with the latest diet, exercise regime and you must be….expectations?

What are some of these ‘societal expectations’?

• Be slim and fit into the BMI range (to be discussed in a later blog)
• Keep up with the latest fashion and look (at work and/or social)
• Eat only this… (depends what you have read or latest fad)
• Exercise at least 3 times a week for an hour
• Use the latest gimmick to exercise it will definitely work
• Remember your British, stiff upper lip and tell people everything is good
• Been tanned or white, depending on the latest look
• Work hard and long hours to be successful
• Spend lots of time with your family or you’re not a good parent/husband/wife

These are a selection of societal expectations and they vary across cultures and families.

We are all brought up in a world that is dictated by unwritten expectations, we are never actually given a list about these farcical rules, nor do we consciously sign up to them. But, whether we are aware of them or not they are there and have been for years. Many expectations are instilled in us from an early age and they become part of our reality. We then live by these ‘rules’ and feel guilty or bad if we do not maintain them and believe we have let people down or failed. How can we have failed or been bad if what we have broken are only expectations created over time that hold no more truth or absolute fact than teddy bears talk (which most of us believed at some point!).

In addition to this how many hours do we truly believe we have in a day to achieve and reach all these expectations. We have set ourselves up to fail before we have even started. But hey, let’s get on with them and try and then prove to ourselves we are not good enough.

If only society could step back and look at what it’s creating. We (as we all follow and feed into these nonsense) are creating extremes in many aspect of our lives such as; body size, eating disorders of all types are increasing both gaining and losing weight and working hours are extreme, more unemployed and at the same time, more people working crazy hours. The amount of people that you speak to who are having weight or work challenges is countless. Yes we need to work to live and have a ‘healthy’ lifestyle but at what cost must we have these. It seems only to apt, that depression is at an all time high. There must be a middle ground and not the extreme we find ourselves in today.

What would it take to have values, rather than expectations, that allow people to accept themselves more easily and not be judged in a heartbeat on what we (society) expects of them? What would our values have to be for this to exist?

Spectrums not black and white

It seems that in the world of health, fitness and wellbeing everything is black and white and we have lost sight of spectrums. At a time when there are more diet and exercise clubs and gimmicks than ever before, we have a growing obesity epidemic on our hands, talk about extreme opposites. Why then is this multi million pound health and fitness industry not getting success in the war against ill health and obesity.

I believe the number one reason to this problem is the extreme approach the industry uses. You are either on a diet or presumably eating junk. If you’re not training hard and every day, you must be doing nothing, whatever happened to ‘anything is better than nothing’.

In our hectic lifestyles we are expected to commit 100% to whatever diet or exercise plan we are given and if you don’t well you may as well start again next week or, well, just give up. Surly if you are moving more than you were last week you are doing better?! We have to start asking ourselves better questions and change what is currently been done as its clearly not working. A new approach needs to be implemented. Ask yourself, if diets worked why there is not just one and why are people not on it for life. Clearly then they don’t for life, they are just a quick fix. The question therefore should be ‘what can I personally do to get to my results taking into account my current lifestyle?’

I do not advocate counting calories but to demonstrate my point I will use them here. They say that on average adults put on 2 pounds every year of their adult life. Not much you say, but over the years that soon adds up. However, for our example, say currently you eat 3 mars bars per week and you decide to cut back and have only two a week from now on, what difference would it really make?

1 mars = approx 300cals
So in a month you would have had 4×300=1200cals less (the equivalent of almost a day’s worth of food)
In a year that’s 1200×12=14,400cals less (the equivalent of approx 8 days worth of food.

Counting calories does not make your diet/eating plan healthy but this highlights how you can still enjoy life and make a substantial difference to your waist line and well being. If you want to change for life you need to move away from societal black and white views and find your place on the spectrum. Any time you do better than yesterday, you are working towards your goals.