A vital step towards extended and healthy longevity is taking responsibility for your fitness and health. If you have not done so yet, it is time to change that. Failure to do so will mean a life that is wracked by illness and disease and a future that is not very bright. We all must do what is necessary to preserve our health and live for as long as possible.
You alone are responsible for how healthy and fit you are. It is your sole decision making that has landed you where you are today in terms of general health and fitness. You cannot blame your family or friends, your physician or even personal trainer if you are fortunate enough to have one. The responsibility for your health and wellness rests solely on you.
These folks who surround you are only there as trusted advisors and motivators, available to prescribe and direct your training so the other people mentioned, your family and friends, will have the benefit of your presence in their lives for years to come. You need to understand that any level of fitness and health you attain at any given time is a result of the choices you make.
Your health and well being now and in the future is not something that happens through any source of luck or probability, but by outcomes that you have predetermined because of action or inaction on your part. Were you aware of the fact that choices such as smoking, improper diet and not exercising will lower your average life span by as much as ten years? Simply not getting any physical activity or doing calisthenics for about a half hour daily will decrease your average life span by roughly five years.
By choosing to smoke, consuming a lousy diet and choosing not to get any exercise, you are choosing to perish ten years sooner than you normally would. Think about all you would be missing out on in those ten years, perhaps grandchildren, maybe their graduations or even your own child’s wedding day. Therefore, simply choosing not to smoke tobacco, choosing to eat healthier food and by getting a half hour of exercise each day, you will be choosing to live a decade longer.
Think of it as depositing money in a 401k plan, you do what is responsible today so that you can live a better life when you are older. You will accumulate savings for your retirement years and all the while you will be living your life today knowing that the small sacrifice you are making – healthier choices – will be accumulating for your benefit years down the road.
The choices we make for better health and fitness are never going to be easy, they take dedication and some work. But quitting smoking will be worth the effort as will any exercise you start getting now. The impact of everything you do to enhance your health and fitness levels will be felt immediately and will be displayed in many ways through a healthier you. In your mind’s eye you can see what may happen to you if you continue living with the poor life choices you are currently making, your conscious will see to that and guilt will reveal an unpleasant picture.
It is when this kind of negative thinking regarding your lifestyle choices begins occurring that you can more easily make the responsible choices to alter your lifestyle. Knowing full well as you get older and continue on the destructive and irresponsible health path your life will be shortened dramatically and only you have the power to change that inevitable outcome. Remember it is no one else’s fault that you are in the place you are at today where your health and wellness are concerned. You are where you want to be until you make the changes necessary to change it. YOU are responsible.
Now I will show you how your irresponsibility makes you weak and how you can become empowered by taking up the challenge of responsibility for your health and fitness.
Admitting to a lack of responsibility for your health and fitness steals these to most precious life enhancers from you and yet so many people can be heard joking about their poor dietary choices, lack of fitness when they get winded doing simple activities. Of course, conversely, when responsibility is accepted for these deficiencies you immediately feel committed to changing the situation. You are empowering yourself.
Not taking responsibility for better health and fitness is denying yourself from your power over these life choices. When you state that “I am overweight because of my metabolism†or “my parents were fat as were there parents, so it’s a genetic thingâ€. You certainly cannot argue with genetics or metabolism, right? You have no authority over these physical aspects of your life so you are giving away any chance of responsibility acceptance and the future is dire indeed, right? The world is a bad and scary place and your place in it is quite tenuous.
Of course on the contrary, if you stated “genetics and metabolism only influence me and the definitive responsibility for my health and fitness rests with meâ€, you are reclaiming your strength and authority. Suddenly the world around you is brighter and far less foreboding, allowing you much more freedom to choose your path and where you are going along with a capability to achieve!
It is not difficult to see the people who have firmly grasped responsibility for their personal health and fitness. These people are the star athletes and sports players that many look up to. They are the people who are fit and that everyone seems to take notice of and think highly of. Each one of these folks has learned how to take personal responsibility for their own health and fitness.
When you are finally able to seize responsibility for your own health and fitness, finally able to work around those outside influences such as genetics and metabolism, old sports injury from junior high or an illness that lingers, it is time to make that leap.
What leap is that you ask?
I am talking about beginning to acquire the knowledge and education you will require to attain health and fitness. The majority of us had our last bit of health and fitness instruction when we were in high school or college. In reality you should never stop learning about things affecting your health and fitness. Once again, rather than laying responsibility for your health and fitness education on outsiders, pick up the challenge yourself and continue your fitness and health instruction.
Learn what it takes to become healthy again and to stay that way from now on. Learn how why the foods you are currently eating are going to kill you. Understand why a lack of exercise will mean a huge risk of heart disease. This tutoring for health and longevity is the easy part. Learning a little at a time throughout your life is all it takes to understand is importance and impact ON your life. We are surrounded by resources thanks to the media and the internet. Offline and online resources for health and fitness are everywhere so start reading and learning. Once you make a conscious decision to learn more, you are well on your way to remembering and applying what you learn to your own life. We are creatures of habit so make a habit of reading and then re reading each bit of health and fitness text you find interesting. The result will be stimulating to say the least!
Do not be frightened by the incredible amount of information available and whether or not it is all reliable. You will soon find your knowledge increasing as will your development of radar for the truth. You have the ability to change the person you are today. It is never too late to take responsibility for your health and fitness. Start by taking that first step and begin to get educated about health and fitness and do so like your life depended on it, your longevity certainly does.
