Healthy Living: Get to Know Me and My Motivation to Change

Have you ever felt like you wanted to change, but knew it'd be hard and knew it would hurt? I'm not going to tell you that it'll be easy, but it's common to make misconceptions about getting healthy.

You may think you'll get into a health kick and in a few months slip back into your old ways. And if you want it bad enough, your motivation is truly something to celebrate. Motivation is the key to beginning something great, whether that great thing is a new novel, a new career, or in my case, your physical and emotional health.

The definition of the world health is "the general condition of the body and/or mind with reference to soundness and vigor." But, to many of us, health means much more. To some of us, health is based on a number or a percentage. And to some, health means that we are constantly improving ourselves.

My great grandmother told me that she has always had a strong urge inside her heart to keep growing intellectually and personally. Her mind is efficient and bright, even after 92 years of life, and because of her I am inspired to keep my journey going. This particular journey that I will be blogging about is my weight loss journey.

A little about me? I am a nineteen-year-old published author, someone who hardly cared for her health in the past and is a true amateur when it comes to fitness. I'm very interested in becoming a civil rights lawyer, and I am currently going for my psychology associate's degree in Mason City, IA. I began this journey weighing 223 lbs, and I am currently 210 lbs, meaning I have lost 13 lbs in 36 days with vigorous exercise and counting calories with an app on my phone.

I am just as new to this as you probably are, but despite my beginner mindset, I have began (just a month ago) to clean up my diet and work out at my local gym. And this mindset is greatly changing in several different ways.

For one, a month ago I believed that numbers were all that mattered. Although, I began to see improvement in many areas other than a simple number on the scale. I stopped breathing so heavily, and it was much easier to take a breath, take a walk, and climb a few stairs. I have also began to believe in self-healing through meditation, yoga, and dialectical behavior psychotherapy.

In the past, I have been diagnosed with anxiety disorders, depression, and borderline personality disorder. Although I do believe that medication helps significantly, there are many things you can do to improve your emotional well-being that are purely anti-medicine. These are fairly obvious; cardiovascular exercise, strength exercise, deep breathing, progressive muscle relaxation, yoga, meditation, clean eating, removing GMO's from your diet, relaxation exercises, aromatherapy, chiropractics, the list goes on. In my case, these things don't solve every problem in my life, but it's damn near close to perfect if you ask me. I am currently on Celexa and Abilify for my depression and anxiety, though my ultimate goal is to live a life of clean-eating, everyday workouts, and mind-body healing without medication. At the moment, I am dependent on my anti-depressants, but someday, I hope to be both happy and progressive without taking them anymore.

As I write over time, I will share my journey with you. I guess you could say that I'm beginning to live my life a different way. I am changing my lifestyle for the better, and if you happen to come along for the ride, that's cool with me! Remember, the first step to becoming healthy is training your mind to think in a positive manner. Take care.

Anna.