What Did You Take?

That’s the question I get from a lot of people when I come in to work out or to teach a class. I am bouncing around, fully alive, enjoying the moment. I’m happy and energized, ready to give 100%.

Most people look at me like I just downed a gallon of black coffee, and they want some of that energy too.

However, it’s not coffee, an energy drink, or some pre-workout supplement. As I told one of our Kickboxing members recently, it is all up here (pointing to my head).

Most people don’t realize that they have the power of making themselves feel good. If you want it bad enough, you can affect your own mood. But it requires practice.

Being in good health, exercising regularly, and eating well helps greatly. Of course, if you are physically ill (or you simply didn’t get enough sleep the night before) your willpower will have a limited effect on your mood. However, imagine this scenario: If someone woke you up from a deep sleep and gave you some wonderful news, all of a sudden you would be pumped-up, excited, happy and ready to go.

On the other hand, if you were given bad news, everything would seem dark, your mind would be cloudy, and you would only want to go back to sleep. You can make yourself physically ill just with worry. And many people do.

In both of these cases, there was no physical action. No one gave you a happy pill in the first case, and no one struck you over the head with a baseball bat on the second one. Just a few words had the power to instantly bring you up, or push you down.

Now imagine if you could control this yourself. Imagine if you could look at the bright side of things, regardless of the situation and fully enjoy the moment. You could truly be happy here and now.

Life is not perfect for anyone, and we all have our moments, our “lows.” Sometimes we need to experience those valleys. It is all part of the human experience. Just as when we lose a loved one, we must grieve and work through it. But we cannot remain in that grief forever.

As Zig Ziglar commented - and I paraphrase: Sometimes you have to say, “I feel terrible right now, so let me feel terrible. I worked for it, so I’m going to simmer here for a while. But at 3 o’clock, I’m going to feel wonderful again.” And someone might ask, “What is going to happen at 3pm?” And I would say, “At 3 pm I have decided to feel good again. I can move it to 2:30 pm, but that’s it.”

So there you have it. Wherever you are, you can choose to be happy, you can choose to be in a good mood and you can choose to be energized, excited and alive. Learn to see the beautiful side of life, and life will be beautiful to you. Enjoy it!