You Gotta Fight For Your Right For Wellness

I think one of the biggest mistakes I've made regarding the quest for my own personal wellness is assuming it is something that comes smoothly and naturally -- without effort. "Simply find time during the day and meditate," is the advice commonly given. "Just integrate greater physical activity into your day." "Be happy -- if you be it, you *are* it!"

That isn't terrible advice in-and-of-itself, but it is incomplete. It doesn't speak of the dark nights of the soul one experiences on the way to wellness -- that week *after* you've seen the light and everything is golden. What about when you're stressed at work and have eaten that particular cupcake mostly to feel better and have more energy -- and then feel *horrible,* as if you've destroyed your entire diet?

What about all the excuses we make *not* to have that precious *me* time each day -- rationalizing that it isn't really important, and that we can make it up later? We have to literally *fight* for those moments each day, demanding (usually to ourselves) that they be spent focusing on ourselves and our own wellness.

I wish there were more self-help books that stressed this element. In this world, in this society -- unless we live in the woods in a log cabin -- there are so many demands on us to *not* engage in wellness tactics. And even when wellness initiatives are offered at our workplace or in our immediate neighborhoods, we sometimes feel so bogged down with other stuff that we either ignore them or minimize their importance.


Even the act of simply being positive takes work sometimes -- takes discipline. Needs to be learned and practiced, like every other skill. That needs to be emphasized. It isn't a golden boon that just drifts down to you once you are "enlightened." It is a daily practice.

Please don't take me as an expert on this, though -- I'm still struggling!