Thought for the day:

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished. ~Lao Tzu

Damien Tougas, of www.AdventureInProgress.com made a great comment in another blogpost the other day…

We all have only 24 hours in a day, and can only devote so much thought and time to any given thing. That is why we are looking for the quick fix, because we don’t have time for anything more than that. We want to do it all, have our cake and eat it too. What we really need to do is simplify our lives. Let go of the things that are not important so that we can have more time, thought, and energy to spend on the things that really are important.

I think that philosophy is perfected in nature. Nature is the paramount example of necessity, and nothing in nature is superfluous. Everything serves a specific purpose in order for life to continue – and it works very well, I might add. Some would say that nature works perfectly.

It makes sense that we would do well to model our own lives after this simple idea of living only out of necessity – only doing what is necessary for survival. Of course, this isn’t merely an issue of survival, it’s an issue of quality of life, too.

We tend to carry around much more than we need, and I don’t just mean material possessions. We carry various responsibilities and obligations that command our attention almost every moment of every day. Some of these are higher priority than others, and each person will have a different value hierarchy. But the truth is that we’re so busy living, that we neglect or ignore what is truly important to us. Things like health and family priorities get shoveled under work and business responsibilities. Leisure and education get cut out for the purpose of providing more time to pay the bills. What if we got rid of some of the bills? What if we got rid of the cell phone plan, the satellite TV, the luxury car payment (and when I say luxury, a Toyota Camry would be luxury based on what I’m driving now, LOL).

If you compared the average American lifestyle with the basic needs of human survival, you would find a gross overabundance of resources. So, that’s not the problem. The problem is our perspective. We feel like we have to do XYZ in order for our life to be fulfilled. I’ve found it to be quite the opposite. Most of the time, it’s not an issue of DOING something extra – it’s an issue of doing less, or not doing some things at all. Just as Damien said, the more we can cut out of our lives, the more time and energy we’ll have to focus on what truly matters.

I chased after the quick fixes for health and fitness, among other things, and I have found them severely lacking in many respects. If you want to truly enjoy abundant physical health, then you need to simplify your life. The first step is getting rid of the garbage that doesn’t really matter. The next step is to devote yourself entirely to accomplishing that which is important to you.

Simple, right?

To your health and success,

Fitness Professional