If you follow, you will live a blissful life.
I discovered it at 50, when I decided to live the third and last innings of life a little differently. Though I have been practicing most of the tips since 2018, there was still a feeling of incompleteness, all the time and that is when I realized I need to rework on my strategies. So let's begin with the top three health tips :
- Know your appetite and consume food that you can digest, and its you and only you who can do that. There are thousands or even more articles in the internet that would tell you about several varieties of healthy food, but at the end, it depends on what you can digest. Even doctors advise lots of good stuff, but at the end it's your craving or appetite that matters and only you can feel that and control as well. So know your body, feel the signs it shows you and choose your food accordingly, you are the best doctor for your body, if you can do that. Otherwise, if you go to doctors, they will write stories and make you believe in them. One such story recently came in front of me - a friend came and said the doctor has advised him to take less sugar at this age and I asked, did you ask why ? Do you have diabetes ? He said, nothing specific, he said, in general, its good to take less sugar at this age. This is not completely right, because your body will reduce insulin production, if it feels you don't need them. White Sugar has components which are bad for health, but there are better alternatives like Date Sugar, Honey, Jaggery etc. So don't stop consuming sweet things, if your body is capable of digesting them. It will show you warnings, feel it. I love sweets and as you know in my place, we have so many choices that it's hard to resist. But my body tells me to not take them after evening, so I eat them in day time. Similarly I am not comfortable taking red meat often, so I take weekly once or quarterly or even more. So the idea is let your body tell you what goes well.
- Do some form of exercise consistently, be it walking, running, cycling or any other sports. The key here is discipline, I know, it's difficult, but not impossible. At this age, it needs dedication because excuses quickly takes over otherwise. We all have so many things to do, but to do them most efficiently, you have to be the best version of yourself. And this is directly related to your appetite, you will start enjoying the food and good food and exercise helps you retain strength. There is no other valuable asset than physical strength. If you are not physically fit, then whatever amount of money or luxury you may have, you can't enjoy them.
- Control your desires, emotions and have good sleep. This is the master blaster of all the tips, but the hardest as well. I remember I loved to sleep and could sleep for 9-10 hours in the night at one go. But then with growing responsibilities, level of stress drastically affects sleep quality. And there is no medicine to help you to control your stress level ( though there are alternative seductive that can help you sleep but that becomes addictions). I believe, naturally controlling stress is the most difficult job in this world, and those who can, are the happiest people. I have very few people around me who never are stressed and lead a healthy and happy life. But that's just very few, if you are one of them, then never give up being like that. But the negative side of these people are that, they are not serious about anything - that's their nature. So see, their wives still complain about them. So the point I am trying to make is nothing is perfect and I am trying to accept that of late. If you question, then you start building dissatisfaction and drink the poison yourself even though you think, you are showing the anger / frustration to someone else. Instead follow a LET-GO attitude, which I have been following for last few months, and the result is amazing. Everything comes in a package, having both good and bad. Divine touch helps a lot to heal the inner self and stick to the LET-GO attitude, I guess, it will take a while for it to become a habit.
It's said Happiness comes from within but for that to happen, everything surrounding you should be as you expect, and that's the hard part. It's easy to be a saint and be happy, but its difficult when you have a family. The only way it is practically possible is that you live like a saint in your own house (Damn difficult, isn't it ?). For that, we will have to accept things as they are - Acceptance is key to a healthy and happy life. As taught by Bhagavad Gita, one quote that heals us quickly in every situation - This time will also pass.
BG 2.14: O son of Kunti, the contact between the senses and the sense objects gives rise to fleeting perceptions of happiness and distress. These are non-permanent, and come and go like the winter and summer seasons. O descendent of Bharat, one must learn to tolerate them without being disturbed.
So enjoy the ride, that you have got. Look around for things, that makes you happy, enjoy the food that you eat ( never eat in haste). Most people realize late and by the time we start living, the major part of life is gone. But hey, at least let's make the rest memorable and have a lovely finish ?
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