Of course, I'm not a doctor or nutritionist, and certainly don't purport to be, so always be careful, do your research, and find what works for you.
I also acknowledge that being a single, child-free woman gives me the time and freedom to take good care of myself (that, and my body hasn't gone through the stress and changes that come with bearing children)... BUT I also believe that excuses are simply excuses, and if a person really wants to make a change and do good for themselves, they will find ways to do so.
SO, this all being said...
1. Take responsibility for your own health and happiness. If you truly want to make a change, just fucking do it. If you're anything like me, you're a creature of habit - I know how hard it is break out of bad habits and form new ones. The key is to just get going on whatever change you want to make, forgive yourself when you slip backwards, but keep at it. After awhile, it will simply become an easy part of your routine.
2. Start listening to what makes your body feel good and what makes it feel not so good. This has been my #1 lesson. If I let my exercise regime go for a week, I can feel it in my body; I feel sluggish and sore, and not quite right. As soon as I exercise again I feel those endorphins pumping and my body thanking me. When I eat certain foods (deep fried or sugary stuff, for example... or deep fried sugary stuff!!!), my body complains afterward, because it's not used to these things anymore. When I fuel my body properly, I feel satiated and strong.
The challenge here is that if your body is already used to feeling sluggish all the time, it may take a bit to figure out what is going to make it happy; if you're used to feeling constantly crappy you may just think that's how it is and how you're always going to feel - I promise you, it's not! Our bodies are built to move, to be strong and capable of whatever we need them to do... we just need to fuel them properly!
Now, this is not to say I don't still occasionally eat the things that make my body feel less-than-healthy - who doesn't love pizza, poutine and cupcakes?! But whenever I eat these things, I prepare myself with the knowledge that I'm probably going to feel crappy afterward... which brings me to my next point.
3. The Worth It Scale. This is something a good friend of mine introduced me to several years ago (shoutout to Looooo!) regarding how much bullshit a person is willing to put up with in an unfulfilling relationship before they figure out the relationship isn't worth it. On one side of the scale: bullshit. On the other: the good stuff. If the bullshit outweighs the goodness, GTFO. This can be applied to anything, including what you put in your body.
For example, I fucking love cupcakes. I know that if I eat a whole cupcake, my body will probably complain a bit. But the delightful yumminess a cupcake gives me outweighs the crappiness I feel after eating one. Donuts, on the other hand, I'm not a huge fan of (I know, I'm a terrible Canadian), so I don't mindlessly partake in a donut every time it's available to me. The ickiness I feel after eating it is not worth the donutiness (because I simply won't enjoy it enough to warrant feeling icky afterward).
Once you've learned what makes your body feel good or not so good, start using that Worth It Scale!
4. Don't eat until you're full. The fullness you feel means you've eaten too much; your body probably doesn't actually need as much as you're eating. Maybe start by cutting the size of your meals down a bit and waiting 15-20 minutes after eating to see how you feel (it takes about this long for the stomach to send the signal to the brain saying it's had enough). If you're still hungry after this wait, have some more, but take it easy and again, listen to your body! Eventually you'll figure out when enough is enough for you, and it will become much easier to avoid overeating.
Also, think about why you are eating. Are you sad? Bored? Hungry? Thinking about why you're eating is another step toward paying attention to yourself and why you make the choices you make - or, in hippy-dippy terms, mindfulness. Once you figure out why you're eating (or overeating), it becomes easier to distinguish between eating because your body needs it and eating for the sake of eating.
5. Quit it with the guilt. Mindful health is about feeling good, and nothing about guilt feels good. So you ate an entire pizza today. Did you enjoy that pizza? Did you feel happy while eating it? Did it fill your heart with greasy, delicious joy? Good!
As long as I'm making mostly healthy choices for my body on a mostly regular basis (sort of an 80/20 rule), I don't let myself feel guilty about the occasional deviation.
I'm also trying really hard to stop using words like should, shouldn't, bad, good etc. when talking about food. In my experience, women are especially guilty of this (it's ok ladies - we've been socialized in this way. Fight the patriarchy! Eat a cupcake! Or whatever food delights you!) As soon as we start labeling our dietary behaviour in such inherently judgey terms we are setting ourselves up for guilt and self-defeat. Life is too short to not eat what we want, and as long as we're balancing it with things that fuel us and doing things that make us feel healthy and strong, the occasional pizza binge isn't going to kill us. Be kinder to yourself. It's not your fault pizza is fucking delicious.
6. DRINK TONS OF WATER. All day, every day. Water water water. Anyone who knows me knows how much I freaking love water - it's my go-to prescription for everything that ails. Got a headache? Drink water. Feeling sluggish? Drink water. Feeling peckish? Drink water (thirst is often mistaken for hunger). Feeling a cold coming on? Flush that shit out with some agua. Sunburn? Indigestion? Hydrate yo damn self. Forget Gatorade, Vitamin Water, and whatever else consumer culture wants you to believe you need. You don't need to spend money on artificially sugary liquid seeped with BPA from its plastic bottle in order to be healthy and hydrated. H2O is the way to go!
7. Cut back on pop, or stop drinking it completely. I'm not one to make a blanket statement about what to put in your body and what not to *exceptforwaterahem* (see my above point about negative words pertaining to food, and also my love for poutine and cupcakes), but I will with this one. There is absolutely no nutritional value in pop, and SO MANY documented scientific benefits to not drinking it. And it's such an easy change to make! (Ahemdrinkwaterinstead)
8. Move your body in as many different ways as you enjoy. I'm cheap as hell (I actually prefer to see it as "not easily swayed by consumerist bullshit into spending money on something I can do for free"), so I've never been one for a gym membership or other costly exercise trends. I mean, you do you, obviously - as long as that hot bod is moving, it's all good.
Walking has been the most effective and enjoyable form of exercise for me. I feel my strongest when I do yoga regularly. I recently started hula hooping, which is harder than it seems and an awesome core workout. I dance. I laugh (it fucking counts, man - have you ever woken up the morning after a night with your best friends with serious ab soreness?) I move!
There are so many ways to get your body moving, you're sure to find something that you enjoy doing! Because enjoying it is key. Of course you're not going to want to get off your ass every day to do something you don't enjoy - that's what our jobs are for (BADUM TSSSSS). And if you don't enjoy moving your body, maybe you'll enjoy the way your body feels afterward, which might spur you to keep oooooon movin.
9. Trick yourself into health. Take the stairs. Walk to the store. Tweak recipes to include more healthful components. (Black bean brownies and Greek yogurt pancakes are. my. JAM.)
10. Treat yourself! I'm one of those luxury-loving Libras (there's that hippy-dippy flakyness again...), so I enjoy the occasional massage and more than occasional acupuncture treatment (I could go on and ON about how acupuncture changed my life - I will save it for another post).
If you have health benefits, why aren't you using that shit?! Taking an hour to lay down and have a specialist magic away the tension that has been building for who knows how long is SO NICE and SO GOOD FOR YOU! There are also plenty of community massage and acupuncture places for those on a tight budget, if this type of self-care is something you're interested in.
You'll notice that most of these things actually take a lot more brainpower than bodypower. This is probably the biggest challenge; the mental barriers we put up for ourselves are much harder to move than the physical ones. You'll also notice that not once have I mentioned weight or appearance - this is also a necessary mental shift: away from the appearance-based results mentality and toward the keeping yourself healthy mentality.
Anyway, these are all things that have made a huge difference in my own health and wellness - it's going to be different for everybody. So, what makes you feel healthy and happy?
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