6 Steps to a Philosophy of Well-Being

We want to be happy. We want to be happy and we want to live healthy. We want to be happy, healthy, attractive and fit. While living a happy, healthy, attractive and fit life, we want to live in wealth. While living a happy, healthy, attractive, fit and rich life, we want to love, be loved and admired. While all this is going on, we also want to live a long life.

And can we tell you something? There is nothing wrong with wanting all these things and no, we are definitely not greedy.

Because these desires fulfil our basic needs as Homo Sapiens:

The desire to feel good is a very basic need of our nervous system. Even our bodily reflexes are designed to avoid pain and keep us safe.

Another basic need, to be accepted by the society in which we live, is fulfilled by our desire to be found attractive and admired.

Underlying our desire to be rich is a concrete need: our need for security.

Living a long life is perhaps our most basic need:

We are the only creatures in nature who live knowing that they are mortal.

If we go back to the beginning, we need to be happy, to leave a mark and to feel secure.

All the research actually tells us similar things. The human structure is very complex and everything is interconnected. Our physical health determines our mental health, and our mental health determines our physical health.

As homo sapiens, we need both the material and the spiritual equally.

Specifically, we want to feel secure, but that alone is not enough, we also need to live a meaningful life.

The concept of wellbeing that we have heard so much about recently suggests that we think of all these needs as musical instruments, and that we build an orchestra by bringing them all together. And manage them like a conductor.

It is not right to focus only on physical health, to work only on spirituality, to think only about money, or not to value money at all. Working on all these areas separately and in a balanced way will improve our wellbeing.

Let’s take a look at how we can attract the state of wellbeing to our own existence in 6 steps:

 

Eat Clean

One of the greatest recent discoveries in the medical world is undoubtedly the importance of gut health in human life. The state of our gut flora affects not only our physical health but also our mental state.

Sweets, poor quality flours, trans fats, processed foods, coffee that we cannot digest because it is foreign to our body, excessive alcohol consumption are factors that exhaust all the systems of our body and invite disease.

Make sure that everything you eat is as natural as possible.

Imagine you are a small child and ask yourself this question:

-Would I give this food to this little child?

Recommended reading: Mindful Eating

 

Move

The emergence of modern humans as Homo sapiens dates back 250,000 years.

Although there are mountains of difference between the daily lives of our first ancestors and our daily lives today, when we compare the two body types, we see that there is not that much difference.

There is no such thing as sitting in the historical tradition of the human body. Not long ago, in the last quarter of the 20th century, humanity sank into a morass of immobility. Our legs, spine, arms, neck, fascial structure, intestines, nervous system, internal organs, brain, sensory organs, hormones, blood flow need movement. This is not a need that can be met by doing fitness exercises three days a week. In addition to a routine exercise plan that strengthens the body, we should not neglect stretching, stretching and walking throughout our daily lives. Not only our physical body, but also our emotional body needs exercise deeply.

The more we move, the better we feel.

Rest assured.

 

Connect with Yourself

Jon Kabat Zinn, one of the scientists who created the concept of mindfulness that we have been hearing about lately, says, “Get involved in your own life.

Do you know what that means?

It means to stop living by rote, as if on autopilot. Asking yourself ‘How do I feel’ from time to time during the day, spending time with yourself to understand what each emotion you feel is trying to tell you, making an effort to notice the situations that trigger these emotions rather than suppressing them, such as anger, jealousy, fear, and taking care of your physical and spiritual needs are very, very valuable works.

Do not spend your energy constantly in the outer world. Focus your energy, interest and attention on yourself and ask:

-How do I feel?

This question is the first step in connecting with ourselves.

 

Create Your Own Tribe

Every creature needs a community to survive. It is through social bonds that we are able to prepare for life. Although the beliefs and way of life of the family we were born into in the early stages of our lives determine our beliefs and way of life, it is very important that we leave all this behind somewhere and set out on the path of creating ourselves and finding our own truth.

So we embark on the Hero’s Journey…

While our biological family remains an important part of our lives, finding like-minded people with whom we enjoy being together, creating, producing and feeding, and building our alternative family with them will be one of the most valuable things we will do in this lifetime.

True friendships that we build by giving work and value make us feel safe and valuable.

 

Learn Financial Literacy

The first rule of adulthood is to be able to provide for your own needs.  The biggest step on this path is earning money and learning financial management. Learning how to manage your money, how to make the necessary savings, how to manage your spending, in other words, taking responsibility for your finances, will make you feel strong, adult and secure. In order to feel good and secure in life, it is very valuable to create a healthy relationship with money, which is an important tool of the outside world. How about making an income and expenditure statement right now? And to make concrete, realistic and functional plans to improve your financial resources?

 

Care About Pleasure

We realise how many things we say need to be done.

Of course, switching to a healthy diet, learning financial management, being part of a warm, trustworthy social environment, and connecting with ourselves are not things that can be done in a snap.

It is necessary to make efforts for each of them, with support from time to time. There is a point for wellbeing, that is, feeling good, transitioning to a good state of being, which is perhaps the most important!

And what is that?

Enjoying life.

Imagine that you do all the things above not by saying ‘I have to do it’ with a sense of duty, but by creating pleasure areas for yourself.

Feeling a light breeze or sunshine on your face when you go for a walk, feeling the flow in your body after a strong Pilates class, living without getting into a financial bottleneck with money management, participating in life with a healthy body are actually great areas of pleasure. The most important thing is to turn our faces towards enjoyment and pleasure, no matter what happens in our lives.

In fact, getting pleasure from life does not start by being lucky or having good things happen to us, but by consciously and voluntarily choosing to make ourselves happy.

How?

Spend time with yourself and your favourite activities.

Be with people who make you laugh, who cheer you up, who make you feel good.

Do not underestimate your simple pleasures; satisfy them.

It is that simple.