Saba 25 December 2009 Breezy Body No Comment Print This Post  Email This Post

IMAGE © Sam Diephuis/Corbis

A walk under the wintry sun, a fast jump up the stairs,  dips and laps in the warm pool.

Two readers on morningwind.org will see these words and one will think pain, torture, agony while the second will imagine pleasure, fun, alive.

Same activities, different perception. It’s all because of an organ I call the mind.

You can make your brain believe anything.

Research (trying to remember where I read this) shows our minds can’t tell the difference between an actual feeling of pain and an imagined one.

So building on this logic, you can choose to lose weight with tons of fun or tons of frustration. It really is YOUR choice.

And being a practicing Muslim gives you the leading-edge, forget cutting-edge, on keeping your motivation high when living a healthy lifestyle.

Now ask yourself:

1. Who are you losing weight for?

It’s okay to lose weight for yourself and spouse and better also to worship Allah with ihsaan.

2. What will exercising give you?

It’s okay to exercise to fit into your ideal jeans and better also to show Allah your appreciation for the great bod He’s lending you.

3. Why is living healthy a must for you?

It’s okay to make healthy living a must so you don’t get clogged arteries, thunder thighs and disgust err…love handles.

And it’s better make this a must to also earn mountains of rewards from Allah.

You get the idea…the bigger your purpose, the bolder your results.

Have your cake n’ samosa and eat it too. Just combine your worldly intention with the heavenly one and blissful results are yours to keep…in this life and the next.

Allah is the Al-Adl, The Utterly Just and Ar-Rahim, the Most Merciful.

I know some of us might play the “but I have a mood disorder-don’t feel like it” card.

But use that Depression and Bipolar to your advantage. Because you have this condition, you’re so in touch with your thoughts that you can choose what to feel.

Your spectrum of emotions and feelings is greater than the average person. That gives you greater flexibility to feel what you want to feel.

And now you’ll feel like sharing this article on Facebook.

More in the Living Lean n’ Lovely series, check this out:

- Hmm…there seems to be more of you this year.