Taking Your Health for Granted… Or?

I’ve been thinking about how we as humans tend to take many things for granted, until a (sometimes shocking) change causes us to adjust our view.

Maybe you are 87 and you can’t remember various facts anymore, so your kids take away your car keys to prevent you from getting lost on your way to the store. Maybe you are 46 and you injure your leg, so you have to use crutches and running is impossible until you heal. Maybe you are 19 and set to study abroad when a pandemic occurs, so you cannot travel without risking your safety or potentially losing your ability to travel back home.

Whether it’s being able to drive, being able to run, or being able to travel, we might take it for granted that we will always be able to do these things…until we can’t.

Many of us take our health for granted… Some take aging for granted.

But what happens when we start examining the things we have just accepted?

What if we didn’t accept that our health is something static (or set by genetics)? What if we didn’t accept that aging is inevitable?

Instead, what if we were to accept that the actions we take today could positively or negatively impact our future?

That’s pretty empowering, isn’t it? Perhaps a little scary, too? (Especially if you’ve been indulging in desserts 🧁 or wine 🍷 — or both — on a regular basis, right?)

I’m not here to judge or to call out desserts or wine as bad. (I quite enjoy both from time to time, and dessert wine with dessert is excellent. 😉)

I do want to remind you that you have a choice.

We make numerous choices every day. Many of our choices are decided in a split second, so fast that we don’t always recognize that we’re making a choice in a given moment. Regardless of whether your decisions are active or deeply ingrained habits, the daily decisions and resulting actions you take can help you to improve your health, if you wish.

From exercising and sleeping to everything in between, the actions you choose to take on a regular basis are up to you and will have a significant impact (positive or negative) when repeated over time.

Instead of taking your health for granted, you can take action.