Celebrate the Successes

What’s on my plate this month?

This past weekend I attended a conference where I felt humbled by thoughts of all that I still need to accomplish to realize my dreams.

I’m quite good at rolling the snowball ahead of me, putting one foot in front of the other to further my goals and set new ones, growing and learning with each stride. Yet I often forget to look up. It can be difficult to pay attention to all that’s around me and sometimes what lies beyond the horizon. I was reminded of the importance of retaining what is actually driving me. For me, that is a real desire to change the role of nutrition in our understanding of health, especially when it comes to more advanced states of imbalance or illness; cancer, mental health issues, and endocrine disturbances among them.

I sometimes also forget to recognize or even admit what might be standing between me and those dreams. Some of them are real obstacles and it may be a blessing that I see through or around them. Yet others are obstacles that I’ve created for myself ~ belief systems and patterns that might have me walking 20 miles to the left instead of seeing that I can plow straight ahead.

Yet even while sitting in the stew of my challenges, I was reminded to celebrate my successes.
success

When I look up the word in my Oxford English Dictionary, more definitions than not are related to taking one step after another. It made me wonder what would happen ~ to self-confidence, to productivity ~ if we were to allow ourselves to celebrate more of these in a day.

Each success deserves recognition. Getting the kids out the door with breakfast in their bellies and packed lunches in their sacks is a success. Accomplishing a workout in a day is a success. Avoiding the foods or substances that you know are not benefiting your overall health is a success each day, each meal, and even each hour that its achieved.

As I put my son to bed last night, I decided to share with him the things that I appreciated about him that day: seeing him at the airport running toward me, the sign he made for me that said “Wellcome Home Mama”, and especially the way he admitted and articulated that he needed to take a walki-talki outside to play with the kids down the street because he felt awkward just asking if they’d play with him.

And then, when it was time to brush my teeth and tuck myself into bed, I resolved to appreciate myself, to commend myself for the successes of my own day. I wonder if you’d care to join me in a week of celebration of our successes, big and little, and to see how that might affect our mindsets. In the mirror at night or in the morning, put aside the flaws in favor of the strengths. May the force of your successes be with you!

While we’re at it, please join me in celebrating one of my big successes of the last week. . . the launch of the Replenish PDX website.

What else is on my plate this month?
Palak Dal from 101 Cookbooks

I made double to last the week!
Grain-Free, Sugar-Free Muffins

Yum. Stay tuned for more as I continue to experiment.

By: Andrea Nakayama, FxNA Founder & Functional Medicine Nutritionist

Functional Nutrition Alliance provides the comprehensive online Functional Nutrition training in the Science & Art of the Functional Nutrition practice. Learn to address the roots of your clients’ suffering with client education, diet & lifestyle modifications.