What do you think of when you think of wellness? For many people, wellness is equated with “extremes” and “sacrifices”. You know…the 6-day gym routine, the diet consisting of chicken, broccoli, and zero carbs, and meditating for an hour every day. The kinds of things that aren’t sustainable for most people.
Unfortunately, most of us are very quick to dismiss small changes that may seem insignificant at first, and lean towards making sweeping proclamations and big promises…then end up under-delivering, and disappointed in ourselves.
Does this cycle sound familiar?
Maybe you promised yourself you would look after your emotional wellness more by cutting off every single toxic relationship in your life. Or told yourself that you needed to nurture your intellectual wellness by cutting out Netflix or reading a book a week. Or maybe you’ve fallen victim to the “I’m going to go to the gym every day starting tomorrow!” delusion when attempting to look after your physical wellness.
Whatever it may be, whether it’s a question of addition into your life or subtraction from your life, you’ve probably made this mistake before. You’ve also probably suffered from the consequences of negative actions that compound over time into bigger problems.
A classic example is losing sleep throughout the week and telling yourself you’ll make it up on the weekend. Let’s say you average 6 hours of sleep every night Monday through Friday, but an average adult needs 8 hours of sleep per night. That would mean you would have to sleep an extra ten hours over two days (26 hours total in two days) to make it up. Are you going to be sleeping 13 hours in one night? Probably not. Will you be feeling the effects of the lack of sleep by the middle of the week, if not sooner? Probably yes.
Positive or negative small changes, as well as small habits, add up over time.
You can harness this rule and use it to your advantage, or you can ignore it and keep making the same mistakes!
Next time you want to make a change in your wellness, start small. For instance, start with committing to just one massage per month like our AIM members do. 😁