Do you ever catch yourself looking at someone else, wishing your life looked like theirs? It is so easy to fall into thought patterns where we tell ourselves someone else has it easier than us. Life is not that black and white, and nothing is ever as good or as bad as it seems from the outside.

We are all given a different hand to play in this life. We all are born into different families in different socioeconomic classes, have different amounts of money and resources, and have different family backgrounds. We all live in different parts of the world, grew up in different times in history, and our parents have different careers, which all shape not only the hand we have been given, but also our perspective of the world. 

When it comes to our health, it is easy to look at someone who is skinny and think “it must be nice.” It’s also easy to look at someone who has excess body fat and think they’re doing it all wrong. But how can we jump to such conclusions from the outside? How can we wish we had someone else’s life just from the little bit we can see and the assumptions we make?

Living a healthy life requires us to play the hand that we have been given. Every moment we spend wishing we had someone else’s life is time spent remaining stuck where we are. On the other hand, every moment we invest in focusing on ourselves and choosing the hard option now gives us the return of a better life in the future. 

Practically, this looks like us taking time for serious self-reflection, acknowledging where we currently are and how this compares to our ideal version of health for ourselves. From there, we can reverse engineer our goal to lay out the steps we need to take to get there. (Refer to my previous article titled “How to pick the best health plan for you” from 8/9/22). But remember, sitting back, playing the victim, and wishing we were someone else will never be included in one of these steps. 

Our circumstances are perfectly suited to bring out our unique strengths in this life, and it requires work to be able to see our situations as a blessing rather than a curse. We always have the option to make the most of our lives, and we also have the free will to let life happen to us. Living a healthy life, whatever that means to you, requires us to take control of our actions and do the work of investing in the hard option now rather than spending time hoping we get the outcome we desire. What we focus on in our life is what grows, so take time to embody gratitude for what you have and where you are so you can then use that momentum to keep moving toward the state of health you desire. 

If you received any value from this article please share it with someone you love. The world becomes a better place every time we deeply connect with one another.

Xoxo

Coach Maggi