One year of putting my mental health first

How much can change in a day? A week? A year? How about a lifetime?

Well, it has been one year of following my MERGE60 lifestyle, and I am happy to say things keep getting better and better.

Have you noticed how people describe getting older as synonymous with the body slowing down while enduring the day-to-day suffering from aches and pains?

They make it seem like falling apart as you age is normal.

Well, let me ask you. Why?

As I entered my 45th lap around the sun in 2021, I wondered why we just blindly accept this version of aging and all that comes with it.

Dropping into my experience of becoming another year older, there was a question that kept swimming in my mind. What if I make my mental health my top priority?

What came next was life-changing.

Before diving deeper into that, let me take you back to July 1, 2021.

I had become somewhat complacent in my life. I was in a never-ending cycle of wash, rinse, and repeat. I felt like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day.

With each day blending into the next, over and over again, I felt like I was embodying meh in everything I did.

Relationships felt less connected, foods were a chore, and work felt unfulfilling. What made it worse, I felt burnt out, lost, and disconnected from my health, inside and out.

I would think about all the things I was not doing consistently. Working out, eating healthy, taking daily walks, and connecting with friends and family.

All the rituals I know that if I am doing consistently, I feel and think better. In that place, I find myself thriving, not simply surviving day-to-day.

Sounds bleak, does it not?

It certainly felt that way.

But then, one early morning in July, I locked eyes with my reflection as I found myself shaving.

The eyes looking back at me were faint.

I did not recognize myself.

I was 44 and feeling 64.

An eerie sense of deja vu enveloped me as I started to wash remnants of shaving cream from my face.

I was back at the moment when the morbidly obese 14-year-old me had a life-changing experience. That day long ago, I acknowledged that change is possible if, and when, I allow it.

That fateful morning, the 14-year-old me sobbed as I looked at my reflection in the bathroom mirror, remembering that my state of unhealth did not happen due to one fast food meal. My obesity did not manifest from playing one more video game or watching one more movie.

At 14, my mental and physical state directly resulted from 5 years of compounding habits that aligned with being unhealthy.

That is it. I am a product of what I do and what I often do.

The scariest realization in my teenage brain was that things at that very moment in my life would more than likely never again be as easy as they were right then and there. If I continued down the path I was on, I knew that my mental and physical health would continue to decline, and it would only be harder and harder to believe that change was possible.

Something interesting happens when we find ourselves at a crossroads in life. Crossroads always presents us with a choice. And the choice is ours to make.

But that was a long, long 30 years ago.

Life is anything but a straight path, and over the last 30 years, I have had my fair share of ups and downs.

Amongst all the challenges, plenty of lessons presented themselves.

I remember in those dark moments that the light is right there in front of me in the form of change. But, and it is a big but, it is up to me to turn the lights on.

Thirty years allows a lot of space for life to happen and provides many opportunities to forget the fundamentals that got me to live my life on purpose. The day I chose to follow my bliss and carve out a path that allows me to maximize my experience of happiness, filling my life with joy and fulfillment, was a distant memory.

Returning to the present moment and the reality of my 44-year-old self, another question kept swirling in my mind. What is the healthiest version of me?

How could that look? Is it possible? Can I do this?

All valid questions.

One truth I knew from experience, from watching my own father's passing as a young 72-year-old man, was that longevity without vitality is an endeavor not worth pursuing.

On July 1st, 2021, I revisited everything I believed I knew about whole health.

Starting with my mind, I worked on self-perspective and self-awareness.

Then, I worked on my purpose, passion for life, and my why.

My spirit needed attention too. I began rekindling my desire to make a lasting impact on this planet and the people who call it home.

Lastly, the body needed to adapt to my renewed mindset and spirit. The way I trained, recovered, and fueled myself required an update.

Getting clear on the how and why of the above created a tsunami of confidence, which allowed me to take decisive action. Again. And again. And again.

The crazy thing is that I was expecting things to get hard.

I was expecting a fight to convince myself why I committed to this shift at 44.

I was expecting to stop at the first big obstacle.

But guess what? The opposite happened.

Things were flowing, and it felt like all internal resistance had disappeared.

This is the first time I have ever felt like this. The first time where I understood the importance of resilience in life.

On day 1 of the rest of my life, my focus was simple.

For 60 days, every day, I do something that makes me feel connected to my family, friends, communities, and my life's purpose.

Firstly, I would prioritize mental health and let everything else flow.

And guess what? Day after day, things were feeling better and better. And funny enough, things started to flow and feel easier by the day.

Sometimes the most significant changes in our lives happen when we choose for them.

I documented all that I did over the 60 days. And now, after repeating the 60 days twice more on my own, I am ready to share this with a select group of people to test it out and see if comparable results are achievable modeling the same plan I followed.

I have never been able to get results in all areas of my life while making it feel effortless.

The focus on unlocking positive mental health is the key, and I am excited to share MERGE60 with you.