Little Adjustments

Youth is fleeting, time is dwindling, and our bodies aren’t built to last forever. I have come to that realization now at the ripe young age of 27. With all the work that must be done to maintain a positive life, and all the activities that require functional movement and your brain to be firing on all cylinders; we can’t afford to not be well rested and rejuvenated ready to conquer the day every single day.

So, this got me thinking. How can I capitalize on my health and the “rest” that I receive daily? It can’t just be limited to 8 hours of sleep per night or going to a massage parlor once a month. There must be little tricks that I can focus on that will boost my energy and overall health!

Here are 7 rest resolutions to give yourself an edge this year:

THE MIND

#1 Forgiving Myself

This one is exceptionally important! I want to forgive myself for not being consistent with the gym, forgive myself for failing to follow through with a diet plan, forgive myself for not knowing the right words to say to people who walked out of my life, forgive myself for not being as devout to my bible studies as I should have been. I want to forgive myself for being a human and for not being perfect! Because it’s okay to do the wrong things, say the wrong things, make mistakes. We have been so hard on ourselves to be better that we have forgotten to appreciate who we are. So everyday at some point in the day I have stopped and looked up in the sky, taken a deep breath, and told myself its okay not to be perfect. You should try it!

#2 Reading More In The Evening

We hear this one a lot, but there is significant truth to it! If the goals we have require changing, the first thing that must change is our mind. In order to change your mind, new information must be uploaded, new ideas, new context to the world around you, new perspectives. I personally have had a bad habit of using my last couple of hours of the night to watch Netflix and scroll on my phone. This year, I’ve embraced stepping away from electronics at a certain time in the evening in order to allow my mind to cool down from the overload of unnecessary information and have instead chosen to focus on one topic at a time. After my evening hygiene I’ll grab a book focusing on a topic I want to learn about and read that in my dimly lit room until my eyes grow heavy. This takes me out of the fast past social media world and into my own world of focused information while simultaneously winding my mind down for the night.

#3 Embracing My Creativity

Most recently I have started cooking more. If you know me you know that I spent the past 10 years cooking in a kitchen, up until I joined the Navy in 2021. Now I have the freedom to cook for myself and express my creative side on my own terms. That is a huge part of rest and relaxation. If we are constantly doing things to reach a financial goal or please others, our minds and bodies will grow weak and lack the desire to do for ourselves. Cooking for me is much like painting for someone else. It gives me time in the kitchen, in my head, being creative and expressing myself in a way that will not only nourish my body but will ultimately free my mind to let go of the stress of the day and grab hold of the joy of conjuring up a sweet, savory, or salty snack! Another form of creating this year for me is writing. I have always journaled, but I never took it to the level of sharing what I wrote about. Using the Vocal platform is allowing me to create written pieces that I can share and bounce off of other minds so that the weight of all these thoughts aren’t trapped in my head alone. There’s something special about sharing, whether it’s a meal or an idea the concept of sharing something with others is refreshing. I challenge you to find something that allows your creative juices to come pouring out,you’re your creative side break free!

THE BODY

#1 My Diet

Now the diet is something people all over are attempting to correct with the dawn of this new year. Some are going vegan, others are going keto, others are fasting for days. For me, I have always enjoyed eating healthy, in fact sometimes I overindulge in fruit bowls and veggie platters. But I do also eat at ungodly hours with no remorse for the imbalance it brings to my life and digestive system. There have been nights where I would come home from the gym around 8:30 in the evening and go straight into the kitchen and make a massive bowl of pasta with meat and veggies or I might go and purchase a whole pizza to demolish in an hour right before I shower and go to sleep. I found that while doing this replenished me and eased the hunger pains, I may have felt that night; it also caused me to avoid waking up at a decent hour and preparing a healthy breakfast to start the day. Instead, I have skipped breakfast, gotten lost in my day, scrambled for some sort of a snack when I’m in the middle of my workday which often was something convenient and lacking nutritional value.

So, a small goal I am implementing is cutting myself off from eating every night after 7pm. This will allow my body to go into a true state of fasting over the course of the night until I wake up and “break my fast” with a nutritious meal in the morning. This one will take a little bit more discipline regarding the scheduling of my day and reprioritizing of my meals but, that’s what true rest is all about. We must prioritize ourselves and what our bodies need in order to be productive and vibrant! Aside from food, I am embracing warm herbal teas with honey in the evening, like chamomile, to ease my nerves and relax my body in preparation for a restful night’s sleep. Drinking water at night has been found to fill you up and stifle those cravings for snacks, and a healthy and warm tea for me has been doing the trick. This is a small task to aim for, but it will compound into the larger goal of eating more healthfully on a more consistent basis.

#2 Reprioritizing Hygiene

This one right here, can change a lot for you. We live in an era where looks can kill, quite literally. The amount of toxins and chemically induced products that we put in our bodies coupled with the products we put on the largest organ we have, can have massive effect on the rejuvenation of our person. This article, https://www.ewg.org/the-toxic-twelve-chemicals-and-contaminants-in-cosmetics, is one of many that breaks down the effects of chemical filled cosmetics on our bodies organ functions and total health. While I am no scientist, I am one for self-preservation and supporting total health.

My recommendation to you and goal for myself is to find and support brands with simple ingredient lists. In my search for products that leave me feeling clean and refreshed, the Native hygiene brand has stood out and honestly hasn’t disappointed. The ingredients list is simple, the company is focused on sustainable packaging, and they have a variety of amazing fragrances that when I get out of the shower not only leave me smelling good for hours but also leave my skin feeling soft and refreshed.

While I’m sure there are other great products in the world, this is one that does it for me currently. As my search continues, ill make sure to update you all on the best products out for your body and the world!

#3 Stretch Stretch Stretch

We aren’t getting any younger. Its honestly that simple. Personally, I am on a mission to become a black Adonis and Hercules mix! That requires a lot of work in the gym.

But, on this journey it is going to be necessary to give my bulging muscles (and aging back) a break! Now that doesn’t mean we have to become elite gymnasts capable of airborne splits, however impressive, but it does mean that being intentional with stretching will prove to be beneficial. In fact, when you stretch it allows your muscle fibers to open and relax thus allowing for more blood flow which ultimately allows for greater expansion of the muscle which provides a greater yield of muscular capacity to lift and grow.

Muscular growth aside, we aren’t robots. We need to stretch our bodies and give them time to relax from the day’s hardships whether you’re a mail deliverer or a chef in a kitchen your muscles will get tighter and your range of motion will become more limited. So, every morning when I wake up I get my blood flowing with a couple pushups or jumping jacks and then I stretch for about 20 minutes. And then in the evening after my shower I stretch again.

I don’t know about you but when I have kids, I want to be able to lift them up and play catch with them until my creator calls me home, so I am going to stretch.

External Factors

Lastly, and I thought about this one long and hard, while we can’t control everything that happens around us, we can control some things. This category is relatively large so in summary, my goal for rest with external factors is to be intentional with who I am around. Simply put, I want to pick up new hobbies, I want to be around new people, and I want to have fun in new places. Instead of just going with flow or sticking to my normal crowds, I intend to be intentional about the things that I set out to do and who I will do them with. In a world that has grown so cold and timid of the people around us do to illness and aggression, its still important for healthy human interaction. We can’t sit behind screens all day. Man was not meant to alone nor meant to sit idly in our cozy homes surrounded by electronics and unnecessary luxuries. So, the external factors that I can control are the adventures that I will go on. The meetup app just so happens to be a great place to find new adventures and vet the people who will be attending such events. And this year, I’m not holding back.