Do you rely on circumstance to tell you what you do and don't need? Whether it be influential advertising, or reactions from others or just doing whatever everyone else is doing at the time? I'm here to tell you that many many many of the answers you need for a rich and happy life are all within yourself and are most definitely within your reach.
We all have intuition to listen to, and signals being passed to us every day. I am a firm believer that if we ignore warning signals we're being given - life will give us one big whopping lesson because we NEED it, and we're inadvertently faced with a big whinging "WHYYYY!" when the lesson hits us. I have learnt the hard way many times :) but I have also come to realise that life only does it because it loves you, so I am only ever grateful for these lessons. Once we get over our self pity and look back, we can see that had have we just listened to the initial warning signals, gotten out of auto pilot and taken some time to listen to ourselves, many many problems we feel and face could have been avoided.
Few people know that I had an arrythmia of the heart from a young age. The start of my SVT (supaventricular tachi cardia - the name of my arrythmia) came on at 14. I was sitting there in class as a year 9-er and all of a sudden I got light headed and my heart skipped into the arrythmia which felt like a fluttering whirr rather than a normal beat. The dr's gave me a monitor to wear which found out when I slipped into an attack my heart was beating at 250 beats per minute! This went on and off randomly for about 8 years until I got a procedure done in 2009 to burn out the extra circuit in my heart that was causing it. It was Dave who started talking to me about the possibility that the start of this ailment could have been related to other things going on at that time in my life, and attacks which occurred were in line with when the problem needed to be addressed.
Alternative health studies from the likes of Louise Hay, author of "How to Heal Your Life" and Brandon Bays, author of "The Journey" place emphasis on looking at the diagnosis of health issues by looking at the human as a WHOLE - your ailment is just a symptom of something in you that is much much deeper. To treat only the ailment and with perscription drugs is sort of like scraping the surface of an ice berg. It's likely if the deeper issue isn't addressed it will just manifest itself some other way. Are you holding onto resentment of any sort? How much self worth do you place on yourself? How much do you love what you are doing? Are you living your life's purpose? At times the physical issues we are facing are the symptom of something much deeper which is in need of resolve.
Going on to looking at our country and it's health as a whole, there are a few statistics and findings regarding Australian health I'd like to share:
- 75% of the Australian population reported in the 2007-2008 National Health Survey that they had one or more long term medical condition. EVEN THOUGH A MAJORITY OF AUSTRALIANS REPORTED THAT THEY WERE IN GOOD HEALTH OR BETTER (abs.gov.au).
- AIHW analysis of the 04-05 National Health Survey showed that just over 7 million people have at least 1 chronic condition, and the proportions having a condition increase with age, as do the proportions of people reporting more than one chronic condition http://www.aihw.gov.au/chronic-diseases/
- Ischaemic heart diseases were the leading cause of death for both males and females in 2009, with 12,047 and 10,476 deaths respectively (abs.gov.au). Cancers, lower respiratory problems and strokes followed not far after. Cardiovascular disease, including stroke and high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes and many cancers could be delayed or prevented through attention to the foods we eat and how we live (www.csiro.au)
- 55 per cent of adults are overweight or obese and older Australians (55 years plus) have gained 6-7 kg over the last 20 years. (www.csiro.au)
The above is quite baffling given that we live in a country of rich resources, an advanced medical care system, fresh food available and regulated EVERYTHING for the general public - don't you think? So if we have everything in place to support our fair country and it's people, why are our preventable illness numbers so high? If we could individually make the choices that would prevent illness occurring, just why wouldn't we?
I want to show you that you know a heck of a lot more about looking after yourself than you might realise. Take this little questionnaire as taken from "Wellness Workbook" by Regina Sara Ryan and John W.Travis (MD):
REMEMBERING WHAT YOU ALREADY KNOW
1.1 As quickly as you can, list the words, phrases or images that come to mind when you think of illness. ILLNESS IS:
1.2 Now do the same for wellness. WELLNESS IS:
Look back at what you have recorded
2. Go on now to recall what you know about encouraging wellness
2.1 What I would like to eliminate, do less, use less etc. to be more well:
2.2 What I would like to encourage, do more, use more etc, to be more well
Look back over what you have written
3. Make one small choice for change
3.1 What is one step you can take today to eliminate what you don't like?
3.2 What is one step you can take today to encourage what you feel good about?
4. Congratulate yourself
Let's celebrate living a little by being proactive with our health. It's not ALL about weight loss, it's about being the best we were born to be and living this life to the fullest.
From here you might want to start the ball rolling with some more deeper questions for yourself - have a go at answering them and see what you come up with. You might be surprised :)
Trust yourself and your intuition.
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