Whenever you are down in the dumps about something; be it rejection or failure or whatever, I always return to these simple pleasurable distractions.
1. Smile on waking
2. Laugh often
3. Read more
4. Watch comedy
5. Walk tall
6. Breath deeper
7. Smell flowers
8. Hug your family
9. Call your friends
10. French Kiss your partner, often
11. Pack a picnic
12. Walk barefoot
13. Visit a farm
14. Start a vege patch
15. Eat what’s in season
16. Eat less
17. Ride a bike
18. Live close to work
19. Work from the heart
20. Be passionate
21. Stand for something
22. Know your roots
23. Spend less
24. Save more
25. Trust in God
26. Sit in reflection
27. Love unconditionally
Our relationship with our partner plays a huge role in our wellbeing and engagement at work. In my book, A Higher Branch, I rank love as the second priority you should have in life: health first, love second and family third. The reason for this is simple: love gives us energy: it ignites our passions and makes us happier and more productive both at home and at work. This is because as humans, we all have an innate desire to be attractive and be attracted to someone. So in life you have to pursue love with the same passion and intensity as you would any other goal because love completes us and defines us. Expressing love also awakens a power and energy so strong that it lifts your level of performance in all areas of life to that of extraordinary. It connects the power of your mind with that of your heart and unleashes a source of immense creativity and imagination.
GO ON ROMANTIC DATES
It doesn’t take much to nurture a loving relationship. Here are 5 personal tips that I use in my life. I would love to hear yours.
1. LOVE GOES TO WHERE LOVE IS. Loving another comes from the same part of our heart as loving yourself. If you don’t love yourself, you’re incapable of loving someone else. You love yourself by working on yourself as a person: by eating well, exercising, relaxing, pursuing your ambitions at work, nurturing your friendships, and creating your own wealth. When you love yourself, you’re going to attract someone to you.
2. LOOK AND FEEL ATTRACTIVE. Everyone has an innate desire to be wanted: to be attractive and to be attracted to someone. So look and feel attractive: take pride in your appearance, dress up, and wear clothes that suit your personality and body-shape. You might not always feel good but if you look good, people may compliment you and that will instantly boost your mood.
3. SCHEDULE INTIMACY. We live in a chaotic world where you cannot rely on spontaneity. So if you want a great relationship, schedule intimacy. Send your partner a calendar invite right now! And be cheeky and creative.
4. GO ON DATES. Pack a picnic, spend an afternoon in the park, have lunch together if you work close to home, see a movie, read a book together, it doesn’t need to cost a lot of money but it nurtures your relationship and keeps the love energy alive.
5. DO LIKE ANDRE AGASSI – FOCUS ON YOUR PARTNER’S POSITIVES. A lot of relationships break down because we start to focus on all these things that begin to irritate us about the person, when in reality they were always there. They’re irritating you now because you’re focusing on them and if you have a negative mindset, you focus on what you don’t have instead of what you do have. No one’s perfect, you aren’t perfect, are you? So focus on your partner’s positive qualities.
When tennis player, Andre Agassi married Stephie Graf, whom he loves dearly, they put a blackboard in the kitchen and Andre, who wakes up before the family, writes what he loves about her on that black board. So every morning when Stephie wakes up, she goes down to the kitchen and is greeted with a positive note like: “I love the way your hair falls over your eyes, or I love the way you laugh or the way you ate that mango.” Everyday it’s something different and everyday it reminds them both why they love each other.
Life is about the relationships we keep: the relationship we have with ourselves, our partner, our family, our colleagues at work, our friends and even strangers. These relationships can either be positive and fruitful or negative and toxic.
RELATIONSHIPS AFFECT OUR WELLBEING
You’ve probably heard the adages: “Surround yourself with people who lift you higher,” (Oprah) and, “The people you surround yourself with influence your behaviours, so choose friends who have healthy habits,” (Dan Buettner).
Identifying and eliminating toxic relationships from your life is important because just like particular food can ruin your diet and health, a particular person can also ruin your health and your happiness. So what are the tell tale signs of a toxic relationship?
People who are jealous of you
People who are competitive with you
People who betray your confidence/trust
People who focus on your faults
People who always complain
People who repetitively break their promises
People who are self-absorbed or self-entitled
People who contact you only when they need something.
These types of people will drain your energy and if you can’t avoid them altogether, make sure you only give them your minimal energy and time. Remember, relationships take up a lot of our emotional energy and wellbeing, so when you surround ourselves with toxic people, you are less likely to reach your potential. On the other hand, if you surround yourself with like-minded, positive, caring, honest and interesting people, being happy becomes effortless.
I recently read an interesting article that identifies some toxic and abusive behaviours in relationships and how to better handle them. Here’s the link if you are interested: https://www.facebook.com/louiselhay/posts/10152112891499750.
In A Higher Branch, I show that health should be your number one priority, followed by love, family, work, friendship, learning, wealth and charity: all of which provide us with a complete life and when we live a complete life, we are happy. Recently, I’ve been researching the idea that being happy is more important than being just healthy. I did this research because of something that my 10 year old daughter said to me.
HAPPINESS WILL BOOST YOUR HEALTH
Recently we spent a whole day at Bondi Beach crashing against waves, eating, sunbathing and playing. As we drove home later that day, my wife and I looked at each other and said, “Early dinner, early night.” But Amelia had other ideas. She jumped right out of the car and ran straight to her bike and said, ‘Daddy, Daddy, I want to go for a bike ride!” I must confess with you, I was a little annoyed, and said to her, “Sweetie, aren’t you tired? Honestly, what are you running on?” And she looked at me as though the answer was as clear as day and said, “I’m running on Happiness, Daddy.”
And that got me thinking, we do run on happiness! If we eat unhealthy and fail to exercise it will eventually (sometimes over many years) lead to low energy and illness. But if you are unhappy for even just a week, it will impact your energy and vitality very quickly. So my advice is that if you can’t live a 100% healthy lifestyle, aim to at least live a happy one by surrounding yourself with family, positive friends, laughter and a rewarding job. My bigger advice is to aim to be healthy and happy!
Sugars are especially toxic to the human body. They clog up the body and have little nutritional value. There are four types of sugars: glucose, fructose, sucrose and lactose. Worst of them all is fructose. It is not produced by our body and can only be digested in small amounts, like the amounts found in fruits. Any fructose that is not digested gets stored as fat, blocks many bodily functions and causes a myriad of diseases. And it is highly addictive, as our bodies do not have an off switch for it.
I guarantee you if you eliminate the above four sugars (especially fructose) from your diet, in 7 days time, you will experience an energy explosion. I’ve witnessed this not just with myself, but also with all my work colleagues. And be aware that flour and sugar are found in many things, not just biscuits, cakes, ice cream and the usual sweet spots like confectionary and pastries. Sugars can be disguised on labels as agave nectar, brown sugar, cane crystals, corn sweetener, corn syrup, crystalline fructose, dextrose, evaporated cane juice, fructose, fruit juice concentrates and many other. Sugars can also be found in many pre-made sauces, cereals, juices and snacks (especially anything that has ‘low-fat’ written on it). For anyone who is serious about removing sugar from his or her diet, I highly recommend investing in Sarah Wilson’s book, “I quit sugar” for inspiration.
“But what about fruit?” I hear you ask. High fructose fruits include all dried fruits, and the following fresh fruits: apples, pears, cherries, and grapes. My advice is that unless you are training to be a body builder, it is ok to eat all fruits providing you consume fruits 30 minutes before any protein meal or 2 hours after. I would also recommend you limit eating fruits twice a day for breakfast and mid-afternoon.
Salt is a vital nutrient for our body: it helps fight fungus, bacteria and viruses, it’s important in regulating blood pressure, proper functioning of the nervous system and brain cells, metabolism, digestion, and many other important functions. However, with the increased use of refined salts (table salts), our bodies are becoming depleted of the essential nutrients found in natural salt. This is because refined salts are dried at over 1,200 degrees, bleached and chemically cleaned leaving them void of any minerals and essential nutrients such as magnesium, copper, potassium, iron, zinc and calcium. As our body cannot use this salt, it builds up as deposits in our organs and tissues causing severe health issues, the most devastating being high blood pressure, the number one cause of heart disease and stroke; even greater than smoking! So take my advice and limit the use of salt considerably. Easy enough when you cook at home right? Be wary when eating out because restaurants use a lot of refined salt to make food taste great. I always ask the waiter to tell the chef ‘no added salt please’. When cooking at home, use herbs and spices in addition to a little healthy salt, to get flavour. Unrefined Celtic sea salt is the healthiest.
Vegetable oils – are highly refined and heated at very high temperatures which kills any semblance of minerals and nutrients that were once present in the oils. In the USA, the FDA has finally banned hydrogenated vegetable oils. 50 years too late! Vegetable oils cause inflammation in your body, which raises risk of heart disease, diabetes, stroke and arthritis. Aim to use Extra Virgin or Cold Pressed oils. ‘Virgin’ or ‘Extra Virgin’ means that the olive or grape seed or whatever it is, was squeezed only once to derive the oil extract. Cold pressed means that the oil wasn’t heated and so its natural essential minerals and nutrients are still alive. But remember that oils are still oils and high in fat. So use them sparingly, even on salads. Avoid deep fried food at all cost. But if you have to lightly shallow fry, best to use one table spoon of rice bran oil, grape seed oil or better yet, coconut oil which has a very high heating point so its structure doesn’t change when heated.
Gluten. For the past few years, there has been much debate and conversation on the subject of gluten and the more I research it, I am convinced that it is the contributing cause to many modern diseases. Gluten is the protein that plants build into their seeds (grains) to support the next generation of plants. While all grains contain gluten, our bodies cannot break down the gluten contained in wheat, rye and barley because their composition is too tight. Over time, because our digestive system cannot break down the bacteria from gluten, it builds up in our system, causes inflammation of the intestines and eventually erodes the lining of the stomach. This can lead to a loss of immune tolerance and trigger autoimmune diseases like celiac disease (where the stomach attacks itself). If gluten intolerance or sensitivity doesn’t affect the stomach or intestines, it can affect your skin, gallbladder, liver, or any other living tissue on the body. The reason gluten is affecting us more is because the wheat we are eating is hybridised to the point where all vitamins, minerals and fibre is taken out of it (especially in white flour and white bread). Because the wheat is so refined through the processing, the gluten in it is stickier, thicker, stretchier and more elastic. It is a good marketable product to use but the human digestive system simply cannot break it down. Effectively ‘gluten’ means ‘glue’ and unless you would eat glue, then I urge you to cut out gluten from your diet. Like any intolerance to food, pay special attention to your fatigue levels after eating bread, pasta or anything with wheat in it. If you feel tired, that’s the first sign that gluten is doing damage to your body. If you continue eating it, eventually you will start to cause permanent damage. It might not be in your stomach, it might be chronic fatigue or headaches or arthritis. If you’re interested in finding out more about gluten, I highly recommend visiting Dr Thomas O’Bryan’s website: www.thedr.com. He is a doctor who specialises in the topics of gluten sensitivity and celiac disease.
