“The body is your temple. Keep it pure and clean for the soul to reside in.” – B.K.S. Iyengar
This is a not only a beautiful quote, it is also something very true and important to apply to your own life. Your body really is your temple and the way you treat it represents the way you think of yourself.
WHY IS IT SO IMPORTANT TO KEEP YOUR BODY AS PURE AS POSSIBLE:
Physical health impacts not only your body on a physical level, but also on a psychological level. Did you know that by doing some cardio activity your body release many different natural substances that have a great impact on your mood and overall well-being. Below, you fill find a list of a few of them.
BENEFITS OF EXERCISING:
- Release of endorphins produced by the nervous system and the pituitary gland, which gives you a feeling of euphoria and happiness.
- Release of serotonin which helps reducing depression, regulates anxiety and maintains bone health.
- Insulin helps your body to consume sugar and overall energy sources instead of being stored as fat, when you exercise!
- Cortisol is also released after a long period of exercise and helps to rebuild muscle tissues.
- Glucagon which helps to release fatty acids in your system in order to give you more energy to push your workout harder and further.
- Testosterone, which is naturally present both in female and male organisms. This substance helps with skeletal muscle growth.
PSYCHOLOGICAL IMPACTS:
Did ever run for 30 minutes non-stop in nature? How did you feel afterwards? If you ask me the same question, I’d say I felt amazing! you feel energized, relaxed, happy, and all of that is caused by those hormones and natural substances mentioned above that are being released in your body.
Moreover, when you feel good in your skin, you feel beautiful and desirable, it also makes you feel good psychologically. But physical health is not all about exercise, it’s also about food, yes food. No matter how much exercise you do on a daily basis, if your nutrition is not well balanced, you won’t feel as good as you should, generally speaking.
When it comes to food, everyone has their ways and beliefs. It’s basically like religion, everyone has their own way of thinking. I won’t tell you how to eat, or how much you should eat, but I will tell you that it’s important to start getting informed and educated about what you’re fuelling your body with. “We are what we eat” and it is true. Every living organism is different from one to another, and there is no “one size fits all” recipe for nutrition, you need to listen to your body and fuel it with good foods and nutrients.We often think that only doctors, nutritionist and other figures of authority are able to tell us what to eat, but what we forget is that they are humans just like us and they do not necessarily know how all of our different bodies and metabolisms work. Interestingly, during a TED Talk episode in which a doctor was mentioning that in university he barely had one class about nutrition. He was telling his patients to follow some very strict diets as the “Keto” and no carbs diets. Since he had no guidance from school, he had to give his own advice to his patients. He was also saying that years later, he felt really bad for telling this information to people without knowing that what he was preaching wasn’t necessarily good for them. It is really sad that our medical system doesn’t take nutrition more seriously, if you think about it, nature is incredibly well made and we have everything we need from it in order to be healthy. Sometimes, it’s not bad to listen to our guts!
GENERAL BODYCARE:
We talked about hormones, nutrition, physical health, but there is another aspect that is important to take into consideration: Body care.
Your body is your temple, you live in your body 365 days per year and need to be happy in it. You need to be grateful to have this incredible vehicle that transports you everywhere, everyday. This incredible vehicle that allows you to: speak, eat, listen, love and much more. You also need to love yourself physically. Many of us don’t take enough care of our physical envelope. We tend to blame it on “time”, we don’t have enough time to take good care of our physical body. Remember that time is always available, it’s your choice to decide what you desire to do with your time. Take some time to love your body, give it good care and attention. Take a warm bath, massage it with a nice moisturizing cream, pamper it, wear some makeup once in a while if this makes you feel good about yourself, love yourself without makeup as well, put on your favorite dress and feel pretty, fix your hair differently today, give yourself the time you deserve to feel amazing and beautiful. Not only will this make you feel good, but you will also shine and make others around you feel good.