Starting a New Movement - a healthy mind in a healthy body

This morning, I woke up feeling extremely tired and with an upset stomach. My plan had been to rise around sunrise ( 6.10am ). To make this happen I had gone to bed early, but my night was a restless one. I woke up several times and when I finally woke up around 6:30, I felt too tired and fell asleep again, twice. Eventually, I managed to drag myself out of bed just before 9am.

Long story short: I'm fine now. It's 11:30am. I just came back from my local restaurant, where I had dois cafés cheios ( strong, small coffees ) and uma tosta mista com ovo ( grilled ham and cheese sandwich, with a fried egg added to the mix )

Keep Moving!

Today I realized for the umptieth time ( why does umptieth always make me think of Humpty Dumpty? Talking about eggs, haha! ) that getting enough movement is the trick to feeling healthy.

I should probably also stop drinking alcohol. The latter is something that I've been considering for a long time now, for several reasons. There's a serious chance that I'm quitting ( at least for several months ) somewhere in November.

No More Alcohol?

In fact, I am talking about embarking on this healthy challenge with my buddy @yangyanje , a vegan who has stopped drinking alcohol for prolonged periods, several times. If we're gonna do this, he and I will probably stop drinking around full moon ( the 12th of November ). He talked about an 11 month alcohol break. That would be something I haven't done since I first started drinking alcohol as a teenager, over 20 years ago. Crazy, right?

Alright, Vincent, get to the point!

If I want to feel good, I need to move enough throughout the day and that usually means moving around outdoor, preferably in nature. I didn't do this yesterday. My only outdoor time was spent chilling on my balcony. That, combined with the two beers that I had in the late afternoon/ early morning, made me wake up feeling drained.

Disappointed in Circadian Diet

I have tried, for the last 8 months or so, to stick to a so-called circadian diet, some might call it intermittent fasting. The idea was to not have anything besides water outside a set eating window. My eating window varied, throughout the months, from 9am to 7pm to 10am to 6pm or even 8pm ). In short, I fasted for about 14 hours every 24 hours. I really tried, but after almost 8 months I haven't really seen my health improve much. Reason for me to try some more drastic things in the coming months and to take it a little easier on these eating hours.

Although, I like the idea of not having any food or drink after sunset or before sunrise. That shouldn't been too difficult, especially in Summer.

Daily Meditation

I have also been meditating daily for over a year now. This is something that I feel I've benefited from the most and I plan to continue doing this. As a matter of fact, I might take it a step further: I am planning to go to India late October / early November and it looks like I'll be going on a Vipasanna meditation retreat with @yangyanje there. Now that's some serious meditation. If you've never heard of it, I invite you to look it up.

As I mentioned in my latest post, there's so much more exciting stuff to share but I don't want to overload you with information, so I'll conclude by saying the thing that I wanted to say from the start:

Life is all about movement. If we don't move, we stop living. We aren't trees but human beings. Sitting still too much isn't healthy. In fact, it's the cause for many diseases. Whenever I sit still for too long a time, I'm reminded of that, of the urge to move, the natural thing to do.

I am becoming more and more aware of the fact that this is a metaphor for life in general and I am excited to start moving with a purpose ( traveling to do awesome things ) very soon.

Most people tend to move less and less, as they get older. I intend to do the opposite. It might look like I train myself in sitting still ( meditating ) but I'm not doing that to be better at sitting still. Among many other things, I'm meditating to feel better, to improve my overall health, to improve my focus, stretch my attention span, practice my responses to others, work on how I react to things and people and so on and so forth.

How important is movement to you? How do you feel when you don't move or exercise enough? I am looking forward to hearing your story :>)

I am part of the #naturalmedicine group and #mindfullife community. There's usually two weekly sessions of guided group meditation, hosted by @bewithbreath For more info on these sessions - taking place on Wednesdays and Saturdays - feel free to go here. If you like what you see and want to be part of the #mindfullife community on Discord, click HERE