No, I am not talking about your place for religious services but your physical well-being, a prerequisite to a fulfilling life. Its importance is evident but not adequately pursued, given our country’s obesity epidemic and sedentary lifestyles.
Since you already know that the better you take care of your body, the better it takes care of you, these messages will not belabor on the obvious but seek to bridge the frequent disconnect between our awareness and our actions. Writing on this subject is challenging when your audience spans the entire spectrum from the Pillsbury Doughboy to Adonis.
I am here to encourage wellness, not to fat-shame the wide-bodied or exalt ripped fitness models. However, “mainstream” society’s glorification of avoidable obesity (i.e., My Big Fat Fabulous Life) in the interest of empowerment and avoiding offense is as disturbing as our previous obsession with emaciated models. We have replaced them in our advertisements with people representative of our population – the unhealthily overweight.
The True Objective
We often think about physical fitness in terms of turning heads at a pool party or generating likes for our Instagram workout photos rather than in terms of contributing to a fulfilling life.
Living independently as long as possible, walking the streets of foreign lands, and playing with your grandchildren is much more fulfilling than Herculean biceps or enduring grueling cardio sessions.
When looking at well-being in relation to fulfillment, your “why” is more relevant, and the desire to attain it increases. The discipline to say yes to exercise and no to calorie-busting foods comes much easier when I view these choices as staying home on the couch instead of climbing the Spanish Steps or joining my granddaughters at the climbing gym.
For those who view grandchildren or retirement activities as too distant, what you do today lays the foundation for what you can do then.
The Roadblocks
Too Much. Our idealized version of well-being is too often too challenging and left unpursued. We should set a high bar, but we must avoid the unnecessary, soul-crushing standard that stifles action. Since you will not (justifiably) put forth the effort to achieve the washboard abs of the fitness influencers promising them in five simple movements, you do not flex your abdominal muscles for a single sit-up.
Too Slow. The negligible, almost imperceptible progress can be so disappointing that you cease working towards your goal. Rather than patiently receiving the cumulative reward from consistent, albeit modest progress, you resign yourself to no improvement or further degradation.
You forsake losing one pound per month and deny yourself the benefit of losing 24 pounds in two years. While jump starts have some virtue, the most worthwhile actions deliver enduring results.
Temporary. Most of us have followed a diet resulting in significant weight loss. Unfortunately, diets are usually temporal programs with equally temporal results instead of sustainable solutions. Once the diet stops or you wean yourself off the Ozempic needle, almost all find the weight they lost and more.
Body weight measures illustrate the roadblocks for all well-being efforts, but weight is unreliable since there are waifs who cannot walk up a flight of stairs and heavy people with low body fat percentages.
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With the right mindset and a decent measure of discipline, you can pursue and obtain good physical well-being.
With a better understanding of well-being’s role in a fulfilling life and awareness of the usual impediments to our success, we will examine the elements of and path to wellness in the coming weeks.
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Personal Note. Last year, I lamented the brutal physical consequences of my mom’s disregard for her well-being. It is now part of her legacy that inspires my wellness lifestyle and writing this series of messages.