November has been the month of a medical health review. Blood pressure steady.With controlling my diet, weight loss has been just over a stone in the last year. A recent blood test declared my health to be - satisfactory. (What a non-specific, vaguely disappointed by my lack of ambition, that term is, reminds me of my school reports ) The reading that diagnosed Pre-Diabetic last year, has dropped back to what is considered within the Normal range. Though because of the HA!, my own past confectionery consumption, and my family history of diabetes, I'm still considered 'at risk' of developing diabetes. I've therefore to maintain a gentle watchfulness. I saw how diabetes compromised the health and enjoyment of my Mum's later life, and I'd rather not have that, if I can prevent it. At the same time, I am a Lumb, brought up on sweet things for breakfast, dinner, tea and supper, so its a strong habitual sugar dependency that has been nurtured in me.
Maintaining any healthy diet, can become a health risk in itself. One has to ask what type of health you are aiming at cultivating - medical, psychological, spiritual, financial, social even. To do 'healthier' well, requires a degree in self-knowledge and then to acquire the altogether subtler art of self management. I started this year with controlling consumption of full on confectionery and sweet things in general. A couple of specially chosen exemptions being made. I didn't aim for completely forboden. When we went out for coffee I tried to replace cake with a tea cake whenever available. But as the year has progressed the boundaries of those few exemptions has become quite permeable, shall we say. Any practice asks you to routinely monitor where you are at with it all, simply to keep it within 'healthy' parameters.
It certainly means applying a gentle self-discipline, when you become aware of the undertones of 'mission creep' beginning. Stopping eating highly processed, high carbohydrate sweet things entirely might draw a firm clear line, but I wouldn't stick to such a high bar. Occasional enjoyment has to be OK however finely delineated, but I have to admit that even this is not an easy position to hold myself steady on. I am reminded of Stephen Covey's analogy, that an airplane's course is never straight and direct, it always requires constant course corrections. Maintaining a diet, apparently, is like that too, its the general direction you are heading in that is important. On the spectrum of Obese Glutton - Dad Bod - to Svelte where am I currently? I'm walking down the low hills of Bod, with a misty eyed vision of the Svelte valleys ahead
My other related daily routines, that might come under the broad and vacuously trendy banner of 'well being' such as morning meditation, Tai chi, journaling, resistance band exercises, these I'm keeping up with. Because they are things I largely enjoy and feel the benefit from. Alert to my tendency to freeze practices like these into rigidly enforced commitments. Having to acknowledge that I can have too much of even a good thing.
At present, I'm actively coaching myself in taking a more balanced relaxed approach. To feel more at ease with moderating any practice whenever that feels appropriate, without berating myself for being this weak willed failure at self discipline. To have an open hearted and receptive response to what I decide to do each day. So the nature of my days doesn't feel entirely prescribed or pre-ordained. In the past I have succumbed deeply to doubt, and been completely on, or completely off, with any daily practice. Being happy to modulate them in this manner, actually feels quite a step forward.
The weather in November has been so damned unpredictable, more often stormy and wet, than sunny but chilly. I've been forced to spend more time indoors than perhaps I'd have liked. Though I have finally finished prepping the gardens for winter, which took some consistency in re applying effort, given the persistent interruptions from the turbulent nature of the weather. This present week is relatively calm, I've made the most of it by taking a daily walk in Sheringham Park, or schlepping back from town after my Tai-chi class. A walk every day is the ideal, but that isn't always practically feasible.
I now have an app on my smart phone that monitors the number of steps I walk, and rewards me with fatuous 'Heart Points' when I raise my heart beats sufficiently. Whether I achieve this comes down. I have found, to the difference between a gentle stroll and a brisk walk. You get a report each day and a weekly aim. Used as a guide this is fine, but I can see that if I did raise my ardency to fully adopt this, how it could easily become another form of health tyranny. Belting up any steep incline I encounter. Luckily there aren't many of those in Norfolk.
On our one and only pre-Christmas visit into Norwich, on the Park & Ride Bus, travelling into town we passed a Sandwich Cubicle with the simple, yet innuendo packed name of Hazel's Big Baps. As we proceeded down the scuzzy alternative delights of Magdalen Street, I spotted a cafe window which professed on its window decal that it served Coffee and Inappropriate Conversation. Or did I misread that?
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