why healthy is the new happy

and being happy is healthy

This is not just about juice-drinking and yoga classes. This is about how and why being happy is healthy, and how being healthy can make us happier than what we may have once perceived as "healthy" [i.e. being thin, lean, defined, looking a certain way, or another one of of those fitness-related words].

I was not always true to my body, nor was I gentle or fearless [per Gandhi's message in the quote above]. My truth was clouded by a fear of gaining weight and I wound up choosing unhealthy practices because of it: I counted calories like a hawk and instead of whole, nourishing foods I opted for trendy diet foods that would supposedly make me skinnier, even though I was not overweight to begin with. 

At that time, I believed that if I were thinner I would be happy as a result. False presumption.

Looking back I would have pressed pause, taken my twenty-something year old face in my thirty-year old hands and said to myself, Why does skinny mean healthy, and how does that equate to being happy?

Being happy and/or healthy is not about scoring an Olympian's abs, Jennifer Aniston's stems, Beyonce's buns or Michelle Obama's guns [not to discount any of these incredible humans and their fabulous bodies]. It is not about being "bikini ready" - to me this used to mean getting rid of a stubborn pooch on my belly, now it means I am ready to go to the beach like yesterday.

Being healthy is more than sculpting our muscles - even though physical health is important for many reasons and does relate to mental health in various ways, it doesn't erase the importance of health and happiness of mind and spirit. 

Click here to read the full post, including a few practices I'm sharing that keep me feeling healthy, regardless of how my body feels on the outside.

What does being healthy mean to you in relation to being happy?

Read the rest of the newsletter for one of my favorite summer dessert recipes, yoga happenings, good music, special discounts and more.