Our Health and Wellness is in OUR Hands

Health and wellness. The degree with which these things are present in our bodies is in direct relation to what we put into the body. The other things that affect our health and wellness are our moods, emotions, thoughts, and spoken words.

If you eat lousy food, you will, sooner or later, experience lousy health. If you hold onto lousy moods, then you will feel lousy, emotionally and mentally. If you speak lousy, cruel words, then that energy will return to you in one form or another.

There is, in much of the developed world, a problem with obesity. A New Zealand writer and comedian put it well when he wrote about his own problem with being overweight as a child: he was overweight because he ate too much. Simple. It had nothing to do with the government, or schools, or anyone else, he just ate too much, and he admitted that.

As parents we have to take responsibility for the foods we make available to our children. If they come home from school hungry, what is there for them to eat? Have you taught them to come home and have an apple, or a banana? Or do they launch into bread, chips, cakes and biscuits? Do they drink water, or coca-cola? The habits we set in motion when they are children stay in place their whole lives, unless they are strong enough to embrace a new habit.

Healthy eating really is a habit. It is one that I embrace and teach to my children.

On Saturday we went out to a function and the main course (the vegetarian option) was a circle of pasta topped with a slice of grilled eggplant, then roasted capsicum, then cooked spinach, and the layers were repeated once more and topped with a mount of feta cheese. Well...I don't like eggplant (ugh!) or capsicum but I couldn't just eat the spinach, feta and pasta, so I ate the capsicum with the feta. This was a meal from a very good restaurant, but I didn't enjoy it at all. I like basic simple food. Last night I sliced bagels in half, toasted them, and then put that in the centre of the plate, pilled it high with roasted pumpkin, potato, kumara, and then topped it off with cooked green beans and grilled asparagus, then scattered cooked red kidney beans and almonds (the protein part of the meal) around the plate, and topped it all off with a generous drizzle of dressing (a mixture of the flavors I like). It was a fantastic meal, far far better than the restaurant food! My point here is, a great meal was prepared very easily. It looked good, it tasted great. I could eat that every night and be a very happy person!

The difficulty in eating right rests upon: availability. If you feel peckish and there are only biscuits, crackers or bread in the cupboards, then that is what you will eat. Try to have healthy options available at all times.

How about this: Commit to one month of healthy eating, replacing all the rubbish foods with healthy foods - and no coca-cola, pepsi or any other such thing. One month, and then try to keep those habits going. Don't let yourself fall back into bad old habits.

Keep control of your weight. If you know you have gained weight, try to shed it before it piles on so much it's too hard to get rid of. Much easier to get rid of a pound or two than ten or twenty pounds. Monitor your weight.

Food is something to be enjoyed. For that reason perhaps make your mealtimes a celebration of color and flavors. Make the meals special, go to extra effort with presentation. Eat healthier, more attractive meals.

And try to be positive, happy and peaceful in your life. When you eat your meals, enjoy it, for that will affect the way your body is able to digest the food. Our attitudes and emotions are important, and it is only us who choose them. They are not forced on to us. We cannot blame them on anyone else. Choose your mood carefully. And choose the words you speak carefully. If you speak kindly then you will attract that energy back to yourself, but if you speak harshly and cruelly then you will attract that energy back to yourself. The same applies to your thoughts. Think kindly, and speak kindly, for thoughts and words are an energy which goes out into the universe, and what you give out is what you attract back to yourself. And that is going to have an effect on your health and wellness.

I am happy and peaceful, because that is what I choose. If someone around me chooses to be moody and bad tempered, then I will simply give them their space, but I will not buy into it. I will not live in fear of another person's moods and outrages.

My life. My choices. My attitudes and emotions. My choice of diet.

Mine.