My health mindset is what guides me when dealing with challenging issues for myself and my clients. However, the same mindset permeates into other areas of my life too. In this post (and the video below), I share with you the five aspects of this mindset and how it can help you take charge of your health and master it by the end of the year!
Also be sure to grab this free health mastery blueprint that will help you flesh out your own health mindset!
How to Take Charge of Your Health
I do not have perfect health (few people do), but I am healthier than many. What helps me stay well is a constant movement toward health mastery. The health challenges that I’ve overcome are what make me successful as a wellness practitioner too.
The major challenges that stick out as I reflect on them are my healing journeys around Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, emergency Cesarean birth, and my son’s eczema and gut health issue as a baby.
The following are aspects of my health mindset when working toward healing , which is the goal of any health challenge. As I introduce these, I’ll share how I applied them to putting my thyroid disease into remission.
1. Holistic View
In order to heal completely, it’s important to look at your situation with a holistic view. Holistic means that you’re embracing the physical, mental, emotional, mental, and spiritual aspects that may be contributing to un-wellness. It also means that you’re looking at the situation from all angles.
I knew that there was much more to my Hashimoto’s diagnosis than what my doctor was telling me. I wanted to know the underlying cause and how my lifestyle might have contributed to the outcome, not just take medication for the rest of my life while my thyroid was quickly destroyed.
Branching out from this narrow Western view is what led me to approach healing from many different angles: whole food organic diet, detoxing, energetic clearing with acupuncture & essential oils, and meditation to manage my stress. Without this broach approach, healing may not have been possible.
2. Natural Approach and Support
I’ve come to realize over time that much of the health issues we deal with in this country are due to us being far removed from nature. We have unnatural sleep/work habits, and unnatural diet of franken-foods, we dope up on medications that are highly purified that the body has a hard time recognizing and processing.
Whenever I’ve taken a natural approach to health, things have fallen in place. I’m not just talking about using natural therapeutics, though they are also key. But even beyond that, I feel like I’ve always been offered the best wisdom from nature and practitioners who are aligned with it.
Of course this is what we learn in Traditional Chinese Medicine, that we’re microcosms of nature. So when I started this thyroid healing journey quickly after I starting TCM school, I was set up with both a natural approach, but also teachers who saw me as a whole person. All aspects of me were embraced as a patient. That, on top of the self love I was already experiencing, was deeply healing.
3. Take Responsibility as You Take Charge of Your Health
I know this is a tough one for people.
When you are unwell, or especially if you’re a parent of an unwell child, it is upsetting to think that something you did or did not do is contributing to the situation. But it is important to take responsibility for where you are now because that means that you also have the power to get yourself out of most health challenges.
When I was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s, I knew I had been burning the candle at both ends. I was extremely stressed out, my sleep was messed up, I lived on coffee, I was getting lots of sinus infections with rounds of antibiotics, my diet was not the best, and I worked around toxic chemicals in my lab.
There was no way I could just turn a blind eye to this disease and continue living as I had. I took responsibility and changed what I could. Those simple actions, built over time, are what helped me heal.
4. Adjust Expectations and Take Action
Quite often people delay their self healing work because it doesn’t seem like the right time, or they feel they don’t have enough money or resources. Truly, there is no perfect time and if you really want to heal, you shouldn’t delay. Our time here on this planet is uncertain, so everyday is precious! Embrace life and work toward wellness now!
It’s really important that you have realistic expectations. Be open to stalled progress. Be open to pleasant surprises like the perfect blood work I eventually received after years of lifestyle changes. Just keep moving forward.
Trust that your body is constantly working toward balance and want you to survive and works in it’s own timing.
5. Prioritize and Focus on Your Health and Healing
If it’s really important for you to manage your health issue, you will prioritize the work needed to do so. You’ll also
I started working to heal my thyroid immediately. It was so important to me, that I didn’t care how long it would take or if it would even work at all. I just had to do whatever I could, not just for myself, but as a wellness practitioner I wanted to understand this disease for others too.
This drive for health mastery is what has made me stick to a gluten free diet for 6 years, to put filters on our water supply, and to remove our home of toxic products. So prioritizing and focusing on your health also means to remove the things that are distracting you or keeping you from healing completely.
I hope my health mindset is giving you something to think about if you’re wanting to commit to mastering your health. It has worked for me and my clients time and time again, so I know it can help you too.
If you need more help, get my Health Mastery Blueprint below which has prompts that can help you flesh out what needs to be done to promote self-healing. Please let me know how it works out for you and if there’s anything you’d change. You can share in the comments below.
Well wishes!
If you like this blueprint, then you’ll love my new 6 week course I’m offering: Yoga and Self Healing Practices for Holistic Health. I’ll teach you traditional healing practices that are both practical and deep.