Reaping What We Sow
Many of us have heard the words, "you reap what you sow" many times. And when it comes to the stage of reaping we remember them well. But at the time of our youth when we feel invincible, don't seem to relate that Newtons law of motion, "To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction". We eat as if old age will never arrive, we stay up as if sleep was nothing more than an inconvenient thing except on week day mornings. The Irish have a good saying and I reminded myself of it often when my own children were growing up and did something I thought was a bit foolish, "You can't put a wise head on a young body". In the years when we sow for the future, its hard to see what we might just harvest if we plant without regard for the future.
At my age, middle 50's, you start to see in your peers the result of careless "sowing". Health issues cropping up that we all know is a result of years of living a "it won't happen to me" sort of lifestyle. Heavy drinking and smoking for instance both seem to have a cost that shows up at some point, in some way. If nothing else, your skin sure shows it !
I was thinking recently about how since I was a young teenager I was concerned about the food I put into my body, health conscious, mindful, watchful even and when I met Emery he ate anything and everything, except pork and shellfish. He never smoked and drinking was not to his liking either, but food choices were laden with chemicals, he even had high blood pressure in his late 20's and was not overweight, but quite fit. Right from the start, I took him to the health food store and started introducing him to healthy eating, and by the time we were married a couple months, his blood pressure was normal, and he was feeling so much better. I strongly suspect had he kept eating all those chemicals, he would not be the fit and healthy 63 year old man he is today.
Sad to say, I don't know many people my age that are not on some kind of medication for blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, have digestive problems etc. Now you are smart enough to know I am speaking generally here and there are exceptions on both sides of every rule. Health food fanatics get diseases too and smokers and drinkers can live to be 115. Genetics play a part in our health too, but there is some interesting studies out there about the possibility of our body being able to change some of those pre-programed roads.
I was thinking recently about how since I was a young teenager I was concerned about the food I put into my body, health conscious, mindful, watchful even and when I met Emery he ate anything and everything, except pork and shellfish. He never smoked and drinking was not to his liking either, but food choices were laden with chemicals, he even had high blood pressure in his late 20's and was not overweight, but quite fit. Right from the start, I took him to the health food store and started introducing him to healthy eating, and by the time we were married a couple months, his blood pressure was normal, and he was feeling so much better. I strongly suspect had he kept eating all those chemicals, he would not be the fit and healthy 63 year old man he is today.
Sad to say, I don't know many people my age that are not on some kind of medication for blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, have digestive problems etc. Now you are smart enough to know I am speaking generally here and there are exceptions on both sides of every rule. Health food fanatics get diseases too and smokers and drinkers can live to be 115. Genetics play a part in our health too, but there is some interesting studies out there about the possibility of our body being able to change some of those pre-programed roads.
More than once I have heard a once wild living person, now older and reformed, cry out, "why me Lord?" when they encounter serious health issues that came from years of abuse to the body. You kind of want to quote, "you reap what you sow" but that's not very compassionate to say. We do need to be watchful of our health. We only have one body, you can get a few spare parts now, thanks to transplants but we are what we eat, what we surround ourselves with, and how we do or don't keep our body fit determines a lot about what we are like in our elder years.
Sometimes we catch on a bit too late in life and then it might just be a small drop of water sprinkled on a parched and thirsty body.
I have my own short comings in all this, I am overweight, healthy as a hound but still have too much body fat. I can correct that, eat less.
Pay more attention to what you eat, how many chemicals are in your home, don't eat off of plastic or microwave in plastic, check to see what your clothes, your shampoos and your body lotions are made with. Decide to sow a good field right now, for the future. Ask your Doctor to test you for what nutrients you are lacking in and maybe if you have an extra $100 or so, be tested for the harmful chemicals that they test whales and wildlife for. We ought to at least be as well informed as the whales are as to whats causing some of the illnesses around us.
Pay more attention to what you eat, how many chemicals are in your home, don't eat off of plastic or microwave in plastic, check to see what your clothes, your shampoos and your body lotions are made with. Decide to sow a good field right now, for the future. Ask your Doctor to test you for what nutrients you are lacking in and maybe if you have an extra $100 or so, be tested for the harmful chemicals that they test whales and wildlife for. We ought to at least be as well informed as the whales are as to whats causing some of the illnesses around us.
Yes, we do reap what we sow and maybe we have sown many years already without much care, but if you are like me, you want many more harvests to come, and why not make the most of those.
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