5 questions to transform your health journey

In the busy blur of your daily life, as you seem to be thrown from one week to the next, it’s easy to overlook the importance of your wellbeing. As you navigate through the myriad of responsibilities and commitments, how often do you actually stop to consider how well you really are?

In this blog we are going to be looking at just how important this really is and the positive effects this has on your overall health. If you would rather listen to this blog, you will find it on the Pocket Power app which you can download on the App Store and Google Play.

Taking a moment to pause and reflect, is a great habit to include in your routine. As our comprehension of health evolves and we learn to understand that our health includes our mental and emotional state as well as our physical and nutritional habits, it is important for each of us to survey our wellness holistically, to ensure we are headed in the right direction in our entirety.

To understand your health and wellness, means asking yourself a range of questions on topics that society is only just beginning to understand; It wasn’t too long ago that health and wellness focused exclusively on nutrition and exercise and on a societal level, weight loss was the only concrete measure of our health. As a result of this, or maybe because of this, we have endured almost a century of diet crazes, dangerous FADS and expensive exercise classes.

Thankfully, the UK’s health and fitness industry has come a long way since this. Although there is still a long way to go with many fitness trainers and organisations still overlooking fundamental aspects of health and wellness. The health and fitness industry is now beginning to acknowledge that there is so much more to understanding our personal health.

Being healthy still includes exercising and eating nutritional food, but those measures alone are not enough to ensure our overall wellness. Our bodies are a series of complex integrated systems that do not stand alone. Science has opened the door to a greater understanding of the importance of stress management, hormonal balance, depth of sleep, food choices and mental and emotional health. Singular approaches to health do not work. So it is important that we ask ourselves questions from multiple angles to determine if we are in balance and therefore, truly well.

To help you to understand your current wellbeing, ask yourself these 5 wellness questions;

ONE! DO YOU EVER STOP AND TAKE A MOMENT TO REFLECT? Do you ever just stop what you are doing and take a breath? To take a moment to notice what emotions you are feeling? To acknowledge the thoughts you are thinking? To see where your energy level is? To check that your posture is good? How many times can you honestly say that you are truly in the moment and really enjoying the task you are doing? Do you ever stop to ask yourself, are you doing what you want to be doing at this very moment?

In our fast paced day-to-day regime of ‘doing’, it is easy to forget to check-in with ourselves. Our minds are hard-wired to create routines and habitual behaviours that we grew up with and continue to cement into our daily lives and before we realise what has happened, we are living the same routine, day after day, after day, completely oblivious to the repetition of our routine. We mindlessly perform our tasks without a second thought to any dreams or aspirations we have about what we really want to be doing.

This state of mind will cause a sense of being ‘stuck in place’ as you continue in a loop while your to-do list doubles. At this point, your anxieties will generally dictate your life and blind you to the fact that you do have choices and that every morning when you wake up, you have the ability to choose what you do with your day. Some choices come with higher consequences than others but that doesn’t mean the choice isn’t there. It just means it is for you to weigh up the consequence of choosing what you want to do over the consequence of ignoring what you want to do and continuing with a routine you feel stuck in.

Each time you stop and reflect, it allows you that moment to remind yourself that you do have these choices. We all do!

By stopping periodically to take a moment to yourself, to look at what you are doing versus what you want to be doing, you will find yourself better placed to identify what it is that you really want out of your life overall. By mindfully invoking these pauses and encouraging your curiosity, eventually as your realisation grows, you will start to take steps towards realising your dreams.

TWO! ARE YOU HAPPY WITH YOUR LIFE AT THIS VERY MOMENT? The word happiness’ is often associated with fleeting moments of pleasure. It is often a misunderstood emotion, believed to be felt because of the actions of another towards us. The problem with this is that, if you have placed the responsibility of your happiness in the hands of another to fulfil, not only have you unfairly burdened someone with something that is not theirs to carry, but you will ultimately be chasing a feeling that will never truly be quenched.

We have been led to believe that happiness is something to chase and that we will find happiness through materialistic objects. That we will be happy if we buy that perfect new outfit, or own that sports car, or once we have lost some weight or moved into the dream house. It is the classic, ‘the grass is always greener’ syndrome. The fact is, the grass will be greener on the side that is tended to the most. No amount of items purchased or weight loss, will change the person we are within and until you are truly happy with yourself and who you are, you will not find happiness through any other attempts.

We all understand how good it feels to do something that helps another person feel good but this is not to be confused with thinking that any one person can make any other person happy. You are not responsible for anybody else’s happiness and nobody else is responsible for yours. Happiness is something that only you can create within you.

Once you have accepted your past and made peace with it, are confident and joyful with who you are now and are excited about who you are growing into, then you will start to feel happiness within you. You will learn that you are not reliant on anybody else for happiness and you will understand that, while a sports car may be nice to have, your happiness doesn’t depend on it.

THREE! DOES YOUR ENERGY-IN MATCH YOUR ENERGY-OUT? Think of yourself as a rechargeable battery. Every day, you perform actions that both charge your energy and drain your energy. Eating nutritional food at the right times, drinking enough water, physical activity and getting enough sleep are all fundamental for your overall wellness.

Your brain and your body are constantly working, even while you sleep, they are using energy, lots of energy. Your energy comes from the food you eat and your energy levels will be at their optimum if you are being fuelled with complex carbohydrates, proteins and fats at the correct quantities.

Your energy is used by the activities you perform throughout the day. The more active you are, the more energy you use.

This sounds like a simple calculation but it is very common to get the balance between energy-in and energy-out completely wrong, in either direction. Whether you are taking in too much energy by eating too much compared to the activity level you perform each day, or are not taking in enough energy by not eating enough, either imbalance can be devastating on your health both physically and mentally.

Your body uses the energy from the food you feed it to function and to perform the tasks you ask of it. The more active you are, the more calories you will use. So to put simply, if you eat more calories than you use each day, you will gain body fat. If done excessively, overtime this can lead to health problems such as heart disease, diabetes and high cholesterol. If you eat the wrong foods on a regular basis, your health will be affected with inflammation, increased risk of heart disease and high cholesterol, to name a few. On the flip-side, if you are not consuming enough calories to support the activities you are performing each day, you will lose body fat. This too can lead to health issues if continued over a period of time, such as malnutrition leading to anaemia and weakened immune function, thyroid dysfunction and fatigue, again naming just a few. In either case, your mental health will also be greatly affected as you will be prone to anxiety, low moods and depression.

FOUR! ARE YOU WORKING TOWARDS A BETTER VERSION OF YOURSELF? Do you have a plan for your future? This could be anything that is important to you. Whether you want to learn a new skill, visit a new country, travel the world, build your own house, grow your own vegetables or publish your own book, it is a very good idea to harvest and nurture these dreams. It is all too easy to allow each day to pass by in a flurry of repetitive tasks and before you know it the weeks, months and years have passed by and you are no closer to achieving your dream.

If you have anything that you have had a desire to do ‘for years’ it would be a good idea to ask yourself why you haven’t done it yet and then ask yourself when you intend to do it. Make a plan!

Without a plan, how are you to know where you want to go and if you don’t know where you want to go, how will you ever get there? Any goal can be achieved successfully with a series of small, incremental steps. Each step, no matter how small or seemingly trivial, will be a step closer to your goal.

If you do not have any goals, perhaps now is a good time to review your passions. Write yourself a list of five things that you would love to do each day. Then write yourself a list of five things that you do everyday. Compare the two lists. If they do not match, perhaps it is time to start considering what you want from your life.

FIVE! DO YOU FEEL ABLE TO ASK FOR HELP? Asking for help can often be the bravest thing you can do? It can also be the one thing you do that could accelerate you to progress further than you had even imagined.

Sometimes the smartest way of getting to where you want to go is by asking someone who knows how to get there. This isn’t a sign of weakness. It is an acknowledgement of your own growth and the recognition that someone can assist in your development without diminishing your efforts.

We each have our strengths and weaknesses and the world is a better place for it as it allows people to grow by both sharing and accepting knowledge, skills, passions and expertise with and from others. If you can benefit from somebody else’s experience, you will be better placed to achieve your goals and in turn, you will then be able to help others who go on to follow in your footsteps.

So these are the five thought provoking questions which, if you ask yourself on a regular basis, could be the difference in you living a life you want, or simply existing within a routine that drains you. We all have choices and what you do with your life is your choice!