Shining bright

Do  your birthdays leave you feeling older?

Mine don't. I've never felt old. And I usually have to think about it to recall how old I am and how old I'll turn on my birthday. My age just isn't really important to me because I feel young.

My last birthday--number 49-- a few months ago showed to me how my perception was really changing for the better.

But first, a little bit about the last year.

Summer 2020 I worked several weeks on building a nice shed in our back yard. It's an 8 ft x 12 ft shed that I designed. The kids did help and it was great to get their help, and to teach them, however I mostly ended up building the shed myself.

It was mostly built after a month of getting up early and spending a couple hours on it before going in to work later in the morning, The COVID scare made it so work was slow anyway.

For the first few weeks I was regularly sore from the work my body wasn't accustomed to. But after a few weeks I felt stronger, and better. My eating habits shifted and I was drinking more water. 

While I'm not tall at 5'9", I was definitely overweight at 176-178 pounds before mid-summer.

Combined with working on the shed I also started biking most days to work. It's a two-mile ride on mostly flat surface.

By September (about 2 months of increased physical activity) I had dropped to about 168-170.

Then the shed was finished. And one October morning I discovered a bike tire was flat. With colder mornings I wasn't motivated enough to get a new tube and replace the flat one.

Well, the weight came back so by the beginning of 2021 I was back where I was, hovering around the 176 pound range.

In February I decided things needed to change. I decided I would go for a walk every morning. Our dog has appreciated that. Since February I think I've missed less than 5 days walking, and there are some days when the walk is short while most days it's about 30 minutes.

On the walk I spend time (usually about 15 minutes) expressing gratitude where I hear myself.

I was already writing some in a gratitude journal, and I continued that habit when I got back after my walk. The gratitude journal actually comes after about 15 minutes of scripture study.

After a couple months I was feeling healthier and started adding more exercise. My diet shifted as well. Not to any extreme, just more healthy eating. More awareness of what I eat and how that may affect how I see myself.

I fixed the flat tire and started riding to work. I even skated a few times to work. 

By the end of this summer I was back to the 168-170 range.

I bumped briefly back into the low 170s before I dropped back and into the high-160s. What I realized when I had that brief bump was that I still had a mental/emotional barrier in that my subconscious hadn't shifted and accepted where I was heading and where I wanted to be.

Something else that came to mind is that I'm the oldest of 6 and as such I'm my siblings' big brother. Two of my brothers are actually taller than I am. But could the term "big brother" be affecting me physically? Could it be possible that subconsciously my body was trying to be bigger--by adding more weight--to fit that identity because it couldn't grow taller?

Without going into mindset and identity stuff, just know that I did drop several more pounds to the low-160s and I'm fully expecting to drop several more pounds into my ideal weight range within the next few months. 

With the end of summer and onset of cold weather my bike riding dropped to non-existent, but as a family we started going to Taekwondo a couple times each week so I've kept up physical activity, drinking lots of water, and awareness of what I eat.

Here's the sum of it. 

I'm in better overall health and physical fitness now than I've ever been. It was before my 20's when I lasted consistently weighed less than 170. And I'm loving that I feel better and look better. I'll have to post something on my Halloween costume because I looked good, and I surprised a lot of people.

Anyway, back to my birthday.

My 49th birthday was celebrated at my parents house. I don't look 49. I can easily pass for late-30's. Some will even think I'm in my early 30's.

My mom was lighting the candles and made a comment about having more candles as we get older.

I surprised myself with my comment. I replied that more candles means my light is shining brighter each year.

Mom really liked that view of it.

As we move towards the end of 2021, and in the northern hemisphere the days get shorter and colder, remember to let your light shine . Be grateful and express gratitude. Look for the good in people and in all things.

With all the craziness of the world, the increasing calamities (both natural and man-caused), the increasing threats on freedoms (often under guise of security, protection, safety, health, etc.) it can be easy to be negative and fearful. But all this will do is make you more negative, more fearful, more stressed, and your more likely to suffer ill effects mentally, emotionally, physically, and even spiritually.

image Ed 2gs, Creative Commons https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Birthday_candles.jpg 

The world has enough darkness in it, along with those who either willingly or unwillingly support and propagate it.

Turn your thinking and feeling to a higher plane. Be more positive, hopeful, and enlightening. The world needs more light, not less.