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I interrupt my new series because this message popped into my mind and I wanted to get it down and in a blog post before I lost the thought into wherever it is that senior’s thoughts go when they don’t stay on top of them.

This post is a result of something I heard during a twenty minute video interview with Joe Polish and Joel Weldon. Joe Polish is a marketing ‘guru’, and Joel Weldon is a professional speaker who started off as a salesman who got involved with Earl Nightingale products. He talked about advice that he was given about selling. The moral of the story was that you should be marketing to people who are already on board with the mindset of what you are selling. This rang true with me because who always shows up at my talks and workshops? People who are on board with the mindset of fitness and health and want to add to what they are already aware of.

Most of the people who read this post are also already on board with the Health, Fitness and Personal Energy mindset. They want ideas that will help them improve, or to reinforce what they already believe or think.

My message is for active seniors who in most cases already know their own personal energy comes from moving their bodies, fueling their bodies with high octane fuel, and having a positive attitude that will carry them through the ups and thedownsides of their lives. Many are already doing some kind of exercise or are at least thinking that they should, and would like to know a better way or an improved way from what they are already doing. These are people like J and MA H. who are already in their eighties and look and act like they are a lot younger. They both have attended my seminar and they both have acted on the information. and they both say they have had positive results. They were in pretty good shape when they started. Another example is G.S., who in her 70s is starting to do new things with her life. I wrote about her in a recent blog post about howshe started learning to play the piano and performed at a church talent show. She has attended my workshop and when she recently read the blog post about some simple core exercises and read the ebook that came with the post, she performed all the movements right away and was able do every one of them in one session.

The people who attend workshops and seminars are not usually the people who really need it, whatever the subject. They are the people who want to add to their existing knowledge base and are willing to actually carry out the advice given in the program. This is true for anything from a Tony Robbins seminar, to financial planning workshops, to many of the other personal development seminars and workshops which are available to attend. Good advice is good advice, even if it only improves your attitude or outlook, or even your physical well being by just ten percent. I just read a book with the title, 10% Happier. The concept was that by meditating, the author could become a ten percent happier person. Of course the actual outcome was greater than ten percent, but when you think about it, ten percent is a pretty good increase to promise.

What if you could start off by being just ten percent healthier? What if you could feel ten percent better? What if you could be ten percent fitter? Most people realize that it may take a little while to gain that ten percent. The reality is actually that you will get some immediate gratification from an exercise session, just by activating the chemical reaction in your body. This is an immediate reaction to exercise. But all too often people dwell on the physical soreness and short term pain they will get when they overdo the exercise at first – as usually happens. Then they stop.

Active people, and people who are already on board with the mindset, understand that there will be some soreness involved physically, and some habit changing mentally and even some emotional change as the body’s own feel good chemicals course through the body during and after an exercise session. The participants in any exercise program must be cautioned that overdoing any fitness program at the beginning can cause your body to wear down rather than build up. Even the active senior who starts an exercise program often is a bit aggressive at first must realize that even an already active person must start slowly and build up as their body adapts – and it won’t happen overnight.

Too many people don’t really understand the personal power and personal energy that being healthy and fit gives you. If they did there would be more people exercising and eating right. A healthy and fit person can do more, do it longer and have more fun with life. So what’s the overall message? The same as always. Move your body the way nature intended, fuel your body with the things nature intended as fuel, and develop and maintain a Come Alive Attitude toward life. Keep it up you active seniors, and ifyou’re not active now, get on board, you’ll enjoy life more.

Thanks for reading.

This is the first in a short series on the things that energize us in life. Gratitude is a nearly “universal” topic and is one of the most important energizing characteristics we can adopt, so I’ll start the series with it.

Zig Ziglar, the late motivational speaker and Baptist Preacher used to emphasis that a successful person always had an Attitude of Gratitude. Gratitude is a precept taught by most churches and spiritual leaders.

A grateful person is usually a high energy person. A grateful person normally has a positive mindset. You can’t help but have a positive mindset if you are thinking about the things in your life that you’re grateful for.

As we get older, we tend to think back and look at the people, places and things that have affected us over the course of our lives. When we do that, we can look at our past in several ways. One, of course is to go back and dwell on the “should ofs” and the “could ofs” and spend our time sadly reviewing our past inactions and shortcomings. Or we can accept the past for what it is – GONE – and be grateful for the positive things that have made us the person we are today – and then say “I’m grateful for all that was, I am mindful for all that is, and . . . On with my life”. Of course we all tend to do a little of the former and review “what could have been” in our minds. Even though we may be happy and successful now, sometimes we continue to do the “what ifs” in our mind. “What if I had joined the Peace Corps back in the sixties and seventies instead of going to work for General Motors? What if “whatever”. I think that’s a force of human nature. But is there any benefit to dwelling on the “what ifs”? A lot of people spend their senior years doing just that – dwelling on the “what ifs” instead of being grateful for those positive things in their past and moving on with a positive and healthy future.

A grateful person reflects a healthy and energetic mind. A grateful person is normally a happy person. A person with an Attitude of Gratitude is pleasant to be around. A grateful person can’t help but exude energy and positivity and seldom will draw a negative breath. A grateful person can turn a negative past into a positive past by drawing from the positive aspects of their past and eliminating the negative from their upfront thoughts. Gratitude is one of the tenants of Twelve Step Programs. One of the promises of the grandaddy of all twelve step programs says that “We will not regret the past, nor wish to shut the door on it”, and stresses Gratitude as a means to success in their struggles.

There are few stronger energizers on earth than Gratitude. We all have so many people, places and things to be grateful for. If we can focus on those with that Attitude of Gratitude that Zig Ziglar so eloquently proposed, then we can’t help but be a high energy, mentally healthy human being. We are energy givers rather than energy drainers.

Many personal improvement and spiritual leaders suggest that you write out a Gratitude List every morning or night and consider the things you are grateful for. What a great idea. Talk about a way to energize yourself mentally – think gratitude!

Thank you for reading.

* Cartoon source from various posts on FaceBook.  Original source unknown.

Most of us like to eat meat. After all we are omnivores by nature; we have the teeth for it. But a lot of people don’t eat meat for any variety of reasons. Many are vegetarians, many are vegans, many are lacto-vegetarians/vegans. Some won’t eat meat but will eat cheese and drink milk. Some will eat yogurt but won’t drink milk. Some will drink milk, just not cow’s milk. Some eat their veggies raw with no cooking at all.  I thought it might be interesting to explore the origins of some of the various health and eating disciplines and how they evolved.

Paul Bragg was one of the first health food advocates in this country.  He created our first health food store. He traveled the country evangelizing the benefits of exercise and nutrition. He demonstrated and wrote about the necessity for quality exercise and the value of eating a plant based diet, as well as fasting. He talked about the importance of breathing clean air, drinking clean water, getting outside in the sunshine, eating healthy foods, moving the body, having good posture and getting plenty of rest and sleep. His “daughter” Patricia is still the spokesperson for the company he founded and Braggs Apple Cider Vinegar is a staple of the health food advocate. A couple of tablespoons of Bragg’s Apple Cider Vinegar, mixed with water, honey, ginger, and cayenne pepper, has been my “health drink” of choice for many years. Paul Bragg’s influence has been a major legacy in the health food industry. As a side note, Jack LaLanne started his own personal health regimen after hearing Paul Bragg speak at a lecture his mother dragged him to as a sickly youth. Jack LaLanne stuck with the regimen and was selling “juicers” and exercising right up until he died at age 96.

Ever hear of Don Tolman? Don Tolman is a modern evangalist for healthy living who lectures throughout the world. He is somewhat of an “alternative” thinker about nutrition but his thinking makes sense. He too speaks about air, water, sunshine, plant based food, exercise, and lots of sleep. He claims his inspiration came from ancient texts discovered in caves and old archives, including the Vatican itself. He tells the story of Daniel, from the first chapter of The Book of Daniel in the Old Testament, where Daniel and his buddies refused to eat the King’s food and instead chose to eat what they called “Pulse” for a while to prove that it was better for you. At the end of the “while”, Daniel and his three friends turned out to be healthier and stronger than the others in his group who went along with the king and ate his food. “Pulse” has been defined as anything from legumes to “vegetables” depending on the translator or interpreter. I had never heard the story so while Edie and I were on our recent trip to New York’s Hudson Valley, I checked a motel Bible, and “lo and behold”, there it was, just as Tolman described, right in the very first chapter of Daniel.

Don Tolman also makes reference to the Essene Gospels and the book, The Essene Gospel of Peace, by Edmond Bordeaux Szekely, published in 1927 or 1931, depending on where you get your information. Szekely claims to have discovered the original manuscript in the Vatican Library, then translated and published it.  It is purported to be about the healing miracles of Jesus of Nazareth, who supposedly got his start with the Essenes, a Jewish sect, and learned to heal people using, guess what: Air, Water, Sunshine, natural foods (basically plant based, but including milk from mammals, but not their flesh – no lacto-vegetarian Him). Some claim the text to be part of the Dead Sea Scrolls. There is disagreement among theologians about whether the book is really about only Jesus or whether the techniques were used by others, too. I found the book online and  copied and pasted it’s 33 pages in MS-Word. It was an easy read. But the point is that even the old-timers in the desert believed in the power of the basic natural elements of air, water, food, sunshine, and sleep, as the way to healing and health. Of course other places in the biblical texts say it’s OK to eat meat as long as it’s the right kind.

The point of all this is that most health and fitness information today stresses the importance of the same natural elements of air, water, food, sunshine and sleep as the key to health and healing. The Essenes didn’t leave out exercise and movement, they disguised it as physical labor. They did a lot of walking in those days too.

When I first researched all this, I thought it might make an interesting, and perhaps, useful article. I hope you found it interesting too.  Just remember the importance of deep breathing, drinking plenty of water, eating healthful food, getting a little sunshine, getting plenty of exercise and then topping it all off with plenty of rest and sleep. That should keep you Healthy, Fit and Filled with Personal Energy for the rest of your life.

“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.”
 –  Hippocrates, 460-370  BC (Before the Essenes)

Thank you for reading.