Taking a Dip Into the Well

Originally posted by Jhenifer Morfitt
Spring is just around the corner (anyone still dragging from daylight savings, like me?), and it is a natural time to dust off the hibernation funk and think about getting moving again. In January, we often make resolutions around exercise and fitness in an effort to get healthier. For most of us though, the motivation to get moving comes with the onset of sunny skies and warmer weather. The clouds are parting, and the thought of the impeding “swimsuit season” is poking out its silly little head.
Anyone who knows me knows I’m an English geek. I love word play, language, logic puzzles and cryptograms. I find the meaning of words helpful in understanding ourselves. For example, the word “well,” meaning a hole dug for water, and “wellness,” meaning a healthy balance of the mind, body, and spirit, share an important connection.
Since the advent of the faucet, we have distanced ourselves from the well, the source of the nurturing water that is the basis of our existence. The same can be said for wellness. We tend to look for fast solutions for health: choices as simple as taking high energy drinks and pills to drastic measures such as undergoing cosmetic surgery. Did you know it takes about the same amount of time to improve your health as it took to lose it in the first place? It is gradual, and getting healthy feels GOOD the more you do it.
Turning off the faucet and reconnecting to our wells is as simple as taking two main parts of our lives back about 150 years: food and movement. Life 150 years ago was harder in many ways, but in these areas, it excelled. Food came from the ground and people walked everywhere. We are living creatures, and we need to feed ourselves food that was grown and allow our bodies to move using a variety of muscles in natural ways. (I don’t know about you, but I’ve tried to walk down the street using “elliptical” movements, but it was not only silly but perfectly awkward.)  Take a look at the most popular diets and exercise equipment ads, and you’ll see they are all trying to recreate the same experience eating whole foods and taking regular walks offers in and of themselves.
We enjoy our technology and the ease of transportation that makes the world a smaller, more accessible place, but they shouldn’t come at the cost of our health and wellness. I encourage you to eat an apple a day and take a walk with a friend, a pet, or an iPod. You’re getting ready for swimsuit season after all; why not take a dip into the well as a first step?
*Need some FANTASTIC ideas and tools to take more steps forward? Attend ICSEW’s “Spring Into Health and Wellness” Fair from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on May 7, 2013, at the L&I Auditorium in Tumwater. More info is available at www.icsew.wa.gov.*