Dancing, talking and eating healthy

10 Jun Dancing, talking and eating healthy

As important as food and drink are to our health, I do not believe that they are everything. To take care of ourselves is to move our bodies, get out, and engage in social life. It doesn’t take long for the effects of being indoors and being isolated to catch up with us!

I have barely left the house since lunchtime on Monday. Mainly because I wanted to save money and eat lunch at home rather than walking up the street. But also because in the mornings, work and study scream the loudest, and so, I haven’t been getting out to the park for a walk or to do a dance class.

My goodness, I am feeling it now! It started with an ache to connect with someone socially after dinner. Because I was knee-deep in a side project, I ignored this urge, and now my body aches inside with days of sitting at my desk and only talking to a few people on the phone.

Work is not everything

Work may be important, but I need to learn the lesson, that work is not as important as my health. I take such care to put healthy food into my body, but when it comes to some of the other aspects of health, I tend to push them aside, so that I can squeeze every last drop out of my work life.

And so, I feel sick. And it is telling me that this is not a healthy way to live. I need to move. And I need people.

Tonight, I put some tunes on and danced around my living room for a good 20 minutes. It did some good actually, and it was good to become breathless, but to be honest, it is not enough.

The mindfulness of dancing

It is nice to dance freestyle, with no kind of choreography or guidance. It seems to me that dancing is like drawing in many ways, and there is a kind of mindfulness to the way we choose to move our bodies if we allow ourselves the creative freedom to be ourselves. I prefer it actually, so maybe I will take a playlist rather than an app to the park with me in the morning, and get OUT of the house.

Tomorrow, I hope to call a friend or ask someone if they want to meet up for a coffee tomorrow. Social life is perhaps one of the most important factors. We humans need it, or I think we perish. That is what it feels like.

Image credits:

“Dance With Me III” by BrightStarPhoto21 is licensed under CC BY 2.0