When I look back on my life growing up as a kid I realized that I didn't eat properly. In fact, I ate horribly. I didn't know anything about nutrition and really didn't care much about what I put into my body.
Of course, nowadays it's a different story. I take very seriously what I feed my body and try my best to nourish it with the correct food to give my body the nourishment and energy it needs to stay healthy.
I can remember when I started to transition to eating healthier food and become more health-conscious. It was in my university days. I joined a gym and really started to concentrate on exactly what I was putting into my body. Making this transition wasn't easy and to be honest, many days I felt like it wasn't worth it.
It felt like eating healthy was becoming a chore. As I started to eat healthier food I actually felt like I had less energy than when I was eating bad food. It was strange. From everything I read, shouldn't I automatically gain all this energy when switching from unhealthy food to healthy food? Many times I felt like quitting and going back to my original way of eating.
However, I stuck it out and continued the journey of eating healthy and trying to take care of my body and something magical happened about week three or four into this process. I started to feel good. I started to gain energy, so much more energy than I had when I was eating unhealthy food. I actually started to crave healthy food and was less attracted to unhealthy food.
Since that time, many years ago, I try my very best to eat as healthy as I possibly can. From time to time I certainly eat not-so-healthy food. After all, I am human. But the vast majority of the food I put into my body is well thought out. It's second nature to me now and comes completely natural.
So, why am I talking about nutrition? I am certainly not an expert (or even close to an expert) in nutrition. The reason why I am talking about food is to give you an analogy that you may relate to.
Many times when people try to calm their minds by meditating or doing other techniques they feel discouraged that results don't occur instantly. Many times they give up trying believing that it just doesn't work.
For instance, the techniques I talk about in my, The Calm Life Method, even though you may see some benefits very quickly, some others take time. It's important to know that very worthwhile things sometimes take time, patience, and commitment.
It's like going to the gym. No one would expect to lose twenty pounds in the first couple of days in a gym. No one would expect to become a great ice hockey skater the first couple of times they tried skating. The same holds true for using techniques that are aimed at calming the mind.
But what's really cool are the hidden benefits that come from sticking to the techniques that can help calm your mind. When we devote time and dedication to getting better at a skill, we don't only get better at a skill, many other hidden benefits come from working on a skill:
- You build a sense of commitment to that task that will inevitably help you consistently build a level of commitment for future tasks.
- When you stick with a task, you overcome obstacles. Overcoming these obstacles help you build a thicker skin and build a level of resilience that will help you overcome future unexpected and expected obstacles.
- You'll also build a level of confidence that will help you tackle hurdles as they arise.
You see, it's not only about getting good at a specific task. It's about building the characteristics that you'll build along the way. These characteristics help you in practically all areas of life.
And remember, what you are thankful for that's in your life right now most likely wouldn't be in your life if you didn't go through exactly what you went through – the good and the not-so-good experiences.
We need to understand that the most worthwhile things in life sometimes don't come easy. In fact, they rarely do. They take time, commitment, passion, and practice. But at the end of the day, it's certainly worth it!
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