How Do You Stay Healthy?

Here at Little Mountain, we’re growing moustaches and talking health. I didn’t think about my health at all until a few years ago. I had lived my life without noticing how I looked or what I ate, mainly because I had yet to notice any consequences. Then one evening, my wife (girlfriend at the time) and I were celebrating something. I don’t remember what it was, but between us we ate an embarrassing amount of cake. Like a whole cake. It might have been a whole double cake, one stacked on top of the other. Not important.

Because of the overdose sugar, I bounced around the room and acted strangely for the better part of an hour. When I finally calmed down, my wife looked at me and said:

“Mark. Either we eat better, or we go to the gym.”

Instead we did both.

She signed us up for a gym the next day, and for a week I cut sugar from my diet. The change was noticeable almost immediately. I felt better. I looked better. I probably even smelled better. It was the beginning of an important shift in my lifestyle.

Around the same time, I read Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point. If you haven’t read it, the premise is this: small changes can have big effects. Once I started eating better and exercising, I noticed all sorts of other things that I wanted to change. I began dressing well. I was more mindful of the words I chose. I started writing novels. This small change, this simple act of dropping sugar for a short time and going to the gym a few days a week, altered my outlook on life and pushed me towards self-betterment.

Of course, since Hallowe’en has just finished, the weather has been awful, and Christmas is just around the corner, I haven’t been as healthy as I would like to lately. But I now know that I can’t go long without the gym, and there’s only so much junk food I can eat before I don’t like the way I feel. Living healthily is not just an immediate concern; it’s about feeling better for longer.

That’s just me, though. Everyone finds different ways to feel better. What do you do to stay healthy? Or do you regularly eat cake and feel wonderful? If that’s the case, then we can’t be friends.

For more info, go to www.lmacademics.com.