“Small mindset shifts equal BIG Results, over time.”
Around the time I started running, I also started cleaning up my thoughts through a mindset shift. The running helped, but I was becoming more and more conscious of what I had been telling myself–things that just weren’t true! I started to become friends with my anxiety.
Mindset Shift
The habit of thinking negative thoughts had become an unconscious habit and behavior that was driving everything I did. I was functioning at a low level and not achieving what I knew I was actually capable of.
My mindset shift started with listening to anything positive I could get my hands on and reading many books focused on thinking empowering thoughts.
What truly helped me was being plugged in (with earbuds) to positive speak constantly. Even if I zoned out and wasn’t consciously listening, the positive words were still getting into my subconscious. I’d YouTube talks given by Wayne Dyer. He became my go-to life and spiritual advisor. I was overwriting the negative programming that had gone on for too many years.
Upgrading Nutrition
Of course, when you exercise regularly and begin to get fit, your body has different food needs. So I also began to look at what I was buying, cooking and eating. Around this time, my oldest daughter decided to become a vegetarian. This, combined with my new fitness routine of now running 3-5 miles three to four times a week, required me to rethink our meal planning, especially after my youngest followed suit a year or so later.
Of course, the first thing most people ask when you don’t eat meat is, where do you get your protein. (Same question I was asking myself at that time.) I began to research foods that contained protein and incorporate that as well as more fruits and vegetables.
As I began researching, I started to see that I had become like most others: unaware of the heinous amounts of sugar and unidentifiable ingredients in our foods. I started shopping the perimeter of the supermarket and avoided the aisles, where most of the processed chemical-laden boxed foods are kept.
Now there was a fire lit inside me, like none before. I couldn’t get enough of the information about how simple it is to avoid unhealthy foods and improve one’s diet and nutrition and how there’s an epidemic of poor nutrition, uninformed consumers and many children on their way to Type 2 Diabetes.
Awareness Shifts Mindset
All of this awareness led me to completely turnaround my lifestyle and my purpose. I gave up all medication (do not do this without consulting your doctor). I transitioned from running to yoga, and I participate in a daily practice of meditation. I’m committed to helping others make small shifts that result in big changes. This is how I’ve made what looks like big changes over the past several years: one step at a time.
Have you had a mind over matter experience, where you stopped telling yourself you couldn’t do something and then went ahead and achieved a goal?
