February 23, 2012

Love yourself, or in other words, keep yourself healthy!

As I start to write this current blog article, it is Valentine’s Day and I can’t help but think of love. Love is a wonderful emotion but at times the person we forget to love the most is ourselves. This is common and it’s not often we give ourselves permission to love ourselves and the bodies we have been given. Most (but not all) of the time a person needs permission to do this. So now, I am hereby giving YOU permission to LOVE YOURSELF! There it is done. Now how do we do that? Loving yourself is difficult but may I offer a suggestion? Get healthy or keep moving if you are currently living a healthy lifestyle! One of the easiest but the most difficult ways to achieve this goal is to start exercising! Easy to do because there are so many options available, difficult because the first step is to get started!

At Aviv Centers for Living at Woodbridge, there are many options. You can work out in Goldman’s Gym in the morning with me and/or participate in one or all of our daily exercise classes. Sounds simple right? If you don’t have a fitness class or gym down the hall from where you are – that means you have to go and find one. There are many gyms and fitness classes in our area to choose from but be assured you need to do your homework. First of all, make sure it’s fun and more importantly, safe. Make sure that the exercise instructor has experience and knowledge with instructing seniors. Ask the instructor whatever you need to that assures your confidence in that instructor and in the program. Remember, any instructor or trainer that won’t give you his or her background or education is probably not the one for you – in fact leave that gym immediately and find another one.

Another option to gain this information is to ask other seniors. You can probably pick out the seniors that regularly attend a fitness program or fitness classes. They walk with confidence, usually have a smile on their face and are pretty happy people in general. Yes!! They love themselves and show that love to themselves by taking the time to attend a fitness program that works for them, and as a result, these seniors are usually more than happy to share what they do, where they do it and how much they enjoy it! You just have to ask them and you’ll see! Remember, before you can give love – you have to accept love for yourself, one of the best ways is to take good care of yourself and then you can give to others. Much love and fitness wishes from Aviv Centers for Living!