This is a fine goal for anyone, but always after any stumble in this goal I become really distraught, like I've Completely and Utterly Failed and will never achieve Full Health. So I come back to my goal even more committed, perhaps even over-doing it (I get a lot of cool exercise injuries this way) which inevitably means I'm just going to fuck up again, right? This week as I was recommitting myself to Health after a weekend of Way Too Goddamn Much Wine, I started a mental inventory of all the things I have to do to be healthy IMO and I realized how totally exhausting it is.
1. Eat right. Eating right to me means 75/25 - three whole quarters of everything I eat in a week should be legit good food. Salads and shit you make in your kitchen, minimal prepackaged anything, minimal carbs, minimal dairy. The other quarter is inevitably like Taco Bell, frozen pierogies and egg rolls, diner pancakes and whatever trash I buy out of a vending machine at work.
2. Exercise. This means for a lot of people ~30 minutes a day of something that raises your heartbeat for most days of the week. My weekly exercise goal is always some insane number that equates me burning 5,000 calories in total because I've never in my life not wanted to lose 3 pounds. I have yet to lose the mythical 3 pounds and now that I'm aging and also overdoing my workouts to compensate for ~weekend fuck ups~ I can feel my bones scraping against one another.
3. Taking supplements. Like, this is probably bullshit. I know. But I have skin problems and I would rather waste my money than go see a doctor so whatever. I have been told my nails look great, so the Biotin is obv working.
4. Floss. A human could go their whole entire life without flossing and still be a healthy and robust individual but I treat it like this huge failure if I'm not doing it? I think it's because my dentist is always really impressed with my gums and always telling me how "well-formed" my teeth are and I just don't want to disappoint her.
5. Be tidy. This means that floors are swept, things smell good and literally everything is put away. Clutter just unnerves me and if my house isn't right it's impossible for me to relax which means I can't be chill and can't be healthful.
6. Drink 70+oz of water each day. I'm a mermaid who has to pee all the time.
7. Practice good mental health habits/self-care. I really feel like this should be my A#1 priority but I like to think cooking and cleaning and exercising are self-care? I just really like to be in control of things, so doing things that allow me to be in control, like putting shit away and making shit I can put into my body, is a small and satisfying way to do that. A fun control quirk that's been kind of very apparent lately: I have to eat every grain of rice/quinoa or every last noodle or get every last piece of garlic into my body or I just...I don't know, something feels wrong about the meal. Feels incomplete. You guys do I need to see a therapist?
8. Don't drink so much booze. Whatever. I try God dammit. Don't make me so nervous and I won't have to drink.As you can see this is fucking ridiculous. Why do we make these terrible goals for ourselves? Health is honestly such an ephemeral, abstract concept that even saying things like "I am just trying to make healthier choices" is so loaded. Like sure, maybe that's not a diet, maybe you're not getting down on your body, maybe you're doing only exercise that you love and enjoy and maybe you honest to God just want to feel better and live longer but holy fuck what the Hell is a "healthy choice"? What's an unhealthy choice? What happens when you make an unhealthy choice?
Making Health a goal for yourself is like making Being Happy a goal. Good fucking luck. Like, you will be happy, I'm sure, happiness is not an unattainable sort of thing, but it's not sustainable. Bad shit is going to happen to you. And if it doesn't, some days it's just going to be fucking wet and gloomy and you're going to hear the wrong Cure song and you're going to feel crummy. Just like some days you're going to eat 3 fucking Totino's Party Pizzas loaded with Cholula and it's going to run your ~goals~ into the damn trash, just like where I'm going to throw this shitty destined-to-fail mortal ass body. I want a hot ass robot body that runs on chocolate oils and random gems and in 70 years it gracefully and painlessly powers down because who the fuck wants to live that long anyway?
