A Life Created through Breathing
How many of you desire to speed up your metabolism for the New Year? How many of you have cleaned up your nutrition and not seen the results you anticipated? And, how many of you perceive that you experience good digestion.
Well, what if I told you that your mood and habitual eating habits effect your metabolism...
Whether you have studied, learned about, or really don't care to learn more about your digestive system, the answer lies within you!
Growing up, I always felt really drawn to and have remained very inquisitive about our Central Nervous System. Gratefully, my journey through my health obstacles and choice of careers has led me to obtaining more and more wisdom about the functions of our body, mind, and spirit.
I have my strong faith and belief that everything happens for a reason, and paths are crossed with purpose. So, as I teach my students about our body systems in health and continue with my own educational experience, my heart smiles and my mind expands with my new found clarity about Mindful Eating!
On Facebook recently, I discovered this amazing educational opportunity that speaks volumes to me in my past and present. You can review my shared post from The Psychology of Eating. This is where it all ignited...
You see through my high school years, I suffered four long years through an eating disorder. Miraculously one day I woke up and stopped actively practicing my bulimic habits. I honestly cannot explain it. What I can say now, "my mind can still play tricks on me." I knew in my heart that one day I could share my experience with others and hopefully give hope to those that still suffer with food addiction.
You see... A very real experience to me, and one to which I wish the wall could be broken between me and you; is that just because I am a fitness trainer, accomplished athlete, and practice decent healthy nutritional habits, my experience is such that most people put me on a pedestal or think that I make perfect choices.
Well let me tell you..."No one is perfect, I still have mind chatter about my food habits and body image, I have diseases I live with, and I enjoy food. I am far from perfect! I make mistakes, I do binge on food every now and then, I don't have all the answers, I am an open book, I am on my journey, I am constantly seeking and learning, I am passionate about sharing my wisdom and experiences, I am strong and I am soft, and I promise I won't bite!"
So... amazingly enough and as I mentioned earlier, everything happens for a reason. My degree in Philosophy and Psychology, liking of Neurology, and career paths have led me straight to this wealth of wisdom in Psychology of Eating. Not having the finances to seek their certification, I have been viewing, listening, and reading their enlightenment. You should check them out! They have a lot of free resources.
So, over my winter break I committed to learning as much as I could and purchased a book through one of the coaches called, The Slow Down Diet By Marc David. Then, as a Christmas gift from my sister I was blessed with another book called, A Life Worth Breathing By Max Strom. And of course... reading both books together here and there, my excitement climbs and my desire to share with others increases.
So I have these tendencies to start something and not finish it, and to get excited about something and then get distracted...so to perhaps to be less distracted and not too overwhelming, I decided that I would approach my blog in strides. I will invite you all along with me through my journey of self-awareness, opening of my heart, mindful eating, metabolic changes, and more. I will do my best to share my journey through my blog post after I have read and gathered my thoughts periodically.
Oh' and hopefully you can follow along my ride with ADHD, because when I am excited about something my mind is flooded with ideas and I bounce around...
So, come along into my introduction and clarity of how our body works and exist here in America!
Okay, so let's begin! Here in America most of us have created a life of desperation. We are being emotionally wounded, physically unhealthy, mentally stressed, and stuck in a rut not taking action towards creating our meaningful life. (Max Strom)
Here in America the word metabolism is thrown around excessively, especially around New Years, but few know what the word actually means. You may have said or heard people saying that they want to speed up and/or increase their metabolism. Also, here in America we live on such a fast-pace lifestyle, where we rush through our meals, we multi-task as we eat,and we create a rapid-fire eating habit which locks our bodies into stress mode. (Marc David)
"So I said it...there is the key factor...STRESS." And Gandhi once said, "There is more to life than increasing its speed."
Okay, so I will try not to get super scientific on you and try to keep it simple...."We can achieve more by doing less." Now, let's go all the way back to my topic of our central nervous system (CNS). We experience our world around through our five senses and into our CNS. There is scientific research to explain clearly that our metabolism is the sum total of all the chemical reactions in the body, plus the sum total of all our thoughts, feelings, beliefs, and experiences. (Marc David)
The key link to help us understand the relationship between stress and our metabolism lies within us all...our CNS. Here goes the science...The portion of the CNS that greatest influences our digestion function is called the autonomic nervous system (ANS). Then, within our ANS there are two subdivisions to help accomplish the dual task to digestion. Trying to keep it simple... 1. sympathetic: activates the stress response and suppresses digestive activity. 2. parasympathetic: relaxes the body and activates digestion. (Marc David)
So, I encourage you to now imagine your rapid-fire eating. Imagine chewing your food as your mind is racing about what is next, or perhaps you are even eating and moving simultaneously. As you are anxiously rushing through your food, you are thinking about everything but food. The instant your body receives stress, it does not have a clue whether or not you are having a life threatening experience.
Let's now imagine you have had a really bad day, everything seems to being going wrong for you. You are feeling frustrated, defeated, maybe even sad or angered. As you eat, your mind is occupied with images of all your bad experiences. And once again, you are now eating in an anxious state. So, your brain perceives through your CNS stress and immediately goes into fight-or-flight response.
The crazy and most enlightening thing about both these scenarios is this...there is and always will be physiological changes that occur when your body goes into fight-or-flight. Some of those changes include some degree of digestive shutdown, heart rate speeds up, blood pressure increases, respiration quickens, cortisol is released, and your circulatory system begins to reroute your blood flow away from the midsection and toward the head for quick thinking.
What all of this means is...Eating healthy and having good nutrition is only part of the story. One must create time to slow down with food and their life. Breathing deeply before, during, and after your meals is a good place to start. When you are in a relaxed state, your metabolism will increase and the assimilation of your digestion will occur. (Marc David)
As I lead you through my journey, I will share how to reclaim your metabolic power through practice of eight universal metabolizes: relaxation, quality, awareness, rhythm, pleasure, thought, story, and The Sacred. We will also dive deeper into our self-exploration to find your true purpose.
Stay tuned... and sorry this ended up being super long!
The only exercise I share and encourage to practice is...Deep Breathing!
