Sunday, February 1, 2015

You Don't Know, Until You Know

This seems obvious and like duh, but the reality is you really don't know - what it is like to feel good, to poop well, to identify how certain foods effect you, that medications can be greatly diminished by diet changes, that exercise can fix most any mood problem - until you have actually done these lifestyle shifts and you think "Oh wow, how did I go so long not knowing."

But you can't know or understand until you make a change. Even subtle ones like drinking more water every day could be a baby step to solve perpetual dehydration; which can be masked in hunger pangs, a headache, irritability, mental fog, sugar cravings...

My Man is always confused when I say I am off, I need to get back on track (not that I have deviated all that far, but it happens). He worries, asking how are you so sensitive now? Is there a bigger problem? It is not that I am more sensitive. I am more in tune with what is "off" for me and when something goes off just a tiny bit I notice it instantly. I know I need to eat more brown rice, or juice more, or do more yoga, or get more sleep. And there is no underlying issue, other than I can't believe I lived "off" for so long, so uncomfortable for so long, and I didn't even know it.

I didn't know, and I couldn't have known, without the comparison to then and now. And I think this then will be compared to a future now. I have recently enrolled with the Institute of Integrative Nutrition® to become a Health Coach and I can already feel the shifts of my lifestyle that I know now. So I can only imagine what my future will look like in my lifestyle choices I learn and implement with IIN®.

The thing is, we all know little things we could and should do in our daily life that would be better for us: drink more water, sleep more, eat more vegetables, move more, have more sex, sit still in silence - pick one, just one, even the one that seems the easiest and do it. Take note of how it makes you feel and difference it makes in your day to day. When that easy lifestyle choice becomes second nature and you don't even have to consciously think of it, choose another. Bit by bit, your small baby steps will snowball into continually wanting to make yourself feel better. The feeling better is addictive and sooner or later you will weigh choices based on how they will make you feel. And then one day you will find yourself thinking, "How did I go so long..." and "I didn't know blank would make such a difference," and "How did I used to live like that?" 

"How did I not know, until now that I have this comparison of feeling amazing. I didn't know until, I knew the difference. And wow what a difference it is."