Words to Ponder: Stress Part ll

So, here we are wondering what to do with the ever-present obstacle of stress. It’s like a gnawing, vague feeling in the back of our minds. It darkens and dims our dreams at night and fuels insomnia. Suddenly our back and shoulders get stiff and prone to injury. Time off from work increases the already financially burdened home and may even lead to losing a job. Divorce occurs, as dearly held relations slowly erode.

How do we put a stop to this degradation of our lives? As your Newtrition consultant, I would ask, What has been your first response to any stressors? Have you been avoiding that conversation with your significant other, your child, your employer or employee? If you are having financial debt issues, has your bank been alerted?

If you have directly addressed these or similar situations and doing so has not eased your problems, then I would direct your attention to looking at your day-to-day and moment-to-moment behaviors. Are you eating well, and what does this mean for you? I ask clients and they often say their diet is good, or that they are eating clean. I prefer to know the details.

So many of us think that eating everything organic is a good thing. That is understandable, and it lays a good foundation for all foods that we consume. However, eating that bag of chips or box of crackers along with the occasional cookies and cakes needs to be looked at more thoroughly. What newtrition is being obtained, if anything at all? I would bet there is no newtrition. Perhaps looking at the diets of our grandparents and those before them would provide a basis for comparison.

Mentioning our grandparents and moving further back and calling it our “ancestry” or lineage, we might find a very different nutritional basis, a different food consumption profile. I think it would then be important to look at all the constituents of our ancestors’ lifestyles.

So, I invite you to look into the reaches of your family’s past and learn how they lived. What spiritual or religious models did they follow? How did they get their exercise? What was work for them? How many hours a day and days of the week did they work? Were their families large or small? Did they feel safe and secure in their homes? Any other considerations might be helpful to everyone here. We can take steps toward knowing what we need in order to be more whole and complete Newtrition followers.