One of the things that lockdown has reminded us of, is that everything in our external world is totally out of our control. That’s a pretty scary thought, and one of the reason that has left so many people feeling over-whelmed and uncertain.
And when we feel over-whelmed and uncertain, we tend to turn to things like alcohol, comfort eating, scrolling on our phone and staying up late.
Have you ever noticed that exactly at the point in time that you need healthy habits to help you feel good, it’s the exact time you tend to drop them and go for all the unhealthy things? We scroll when we’re stressed, we over-eat when we’re stressed, we get out of our routine when we’re stressed. You might buy things when you’re stressed.
All the bad stuff we do does nothing for us, unfortunately, in the long run. Although it feels good to let loose and forget about everything for a moment in time, when you drink too much over a long period of time, you feel fat, and even more anxious and uncertain.
Getting overweight just compounds the problem of how we’re already feeling, out of control.
Whether you live in Monaco or Cork, whether you’re a multi-millionaire or hard up, the same things applies to us all.
When you’re healthy, you feel good. When you have routine and structure, you feel good. You can feel certain, but only if you focus on your internal world. Trying to get certainty from your external world brings more and more uncertainty.
You can’t get certainty from money, people, things, alcohol, the world, the news, food.
You can get feelings of certainty from exercise, fresh air, good food, early nights, a good structure, drinking water, being out in nature and turning INWARD.
Your inner world, your internal world. Peace comes from within, certainly not from spending money, drinking too much or over-eating at night on the couch.
These are my top tips, based on my experience, for living a healthy, feel good life.
- Find a really good structure for Monday- Friday;
- Eat 3 meals and 2 small snacks at the same time every day;
- Avoid eating after 6pm;
- Walk most days of the week;
- Workout for 30 minutes 4-5 days per week;
- Drink 2 litres of water every day, hot or cold, it doesn’t matter;
- Really and truly try and not complain about stuff. Be solution focused.
- Keep the alcohol and treats to Friday and Saturday nights.
- Make Sunday a lovely day of rest, food prep and healthy food that makes you feel good;
- Lift weights in your workouts;
- Do interval training and core work in your workouts;
- Be really grateful for everything you have;
- Don’t buy things in pursuit of happiness. It doesn’t work;
- Be silly, laugh as much as you can and dance around the kitchen;
- Focus on one thing at a time;
- When you’re talking to someone, give them your undivided attention;
- Get to know what you look like and love yourself for what you look like and who you are. Not when when you’re at your ‘all the planets colliding, perfect self’, but the in between months.
I hope you found this helpful. Let me know by getting back to me in the comments. You can download my free 30 day Fast-track to #FEELGOOD here
To your success,
Jessica Cooke
