I was thinking about it, if I had to give one piece of advice, just one, that would make the biggest impact on someone’s health journey, what would I say?

I know exactly what I’d say. 

I know because this was the biggest shift in my journey. 

I have Alopecia Areata since I was a kid, and not too long ago I was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, another autoimmune disease.

I knew that for me and given the history in my family, getting a second autoimmune disease was not a good sign, and the chances to get a third one were a lot higher.

When this happened, I felt like my body was betraying me, that my body was breaking down and my focus turned to stopping my body from declining further.

I decided that I had to “fix” my body. 

The problem with that great idea is that fixing something implies that that there is something that’s broken. 

It means that I was focused on finding what was wrong with my body, because obviously there was something wrong, right?

I changed my lifestyle and I started seeing great results, but after a while I noticed that I was turning my focus too much into everything that was going wrong.

I was extremely aware of every single ache, pain, sensation, pin, strain, tingling, redness, rashes, reactions…

I was focused on all of it and ignoring everything else that was working right. 

Every time I ate something, I was on the lookout for the reaction, what is it going to happen now? Is a headache starting, am I being bloated, are my joints hurting, what is wrong now?

I was so acutely aware of everything that it became almost an obsession.

I thought I was doing it right, I was aware of my feelings and documenting everything I noticed. After all, isn’t that what you are supposed to do when you are evaluating the impact of your behaviors on your health?

The problem with that is that “energy flows where attention goes” and all my attention was on the negative symptoms, so that’s what I was amplifying all the time…I was looking all the time at all these issues and thinking about all that was wrong with my body.

Luckily, I realized that I had to start changing my focus.

I realized that there was a lot that my body was doing right, and I started recognizing that progress. 

I stopped seeing my body as the enemy. 

Instead, I learned that our bodies are doing their job even when we think they are not. 

I learned that our pain signals are how our bodies communicate with us. 

Our pain is the signal to stop doing what we are doing. Not a signal to push harder or keep going. 

I learned that my tiredness was a signal telling me that I wasn’t allowing my body to rest, that I wasn’t producing enough energy, that I wasn’t getting enough movement, that I wasn’t drinking enough water…

I learned that my joint pains were signals telling me to eat less nightshades…

My headaches were telling me not to drink wine too often… 

My eyes’ strain was a signal to stop looking at the computer all day long…

I learned that my body was doing all that it could considering what I was putting it through. 

All those pains and aches were not symptoms of my body “doing it wrong” they were signals of my body telling me what I was doing wrong…my body was doing its job. I was the one not listening…

So, yes, if I had to give you one piece of advice it would be stop blaming your body. 

That’s it: Stop blaming your body for all that you think is doing wrong.

Stop thinking that your body is at fault for all your tiredness, for your headaches, for your fatigue, for your high cholesterol, for being overweight, for being too thin, for your lack of energy or your mood changes, for your painful periods or for your high blood sugar…

Or, like in my case, stop thinking that your body is at fault for all your autoimmune diseases…

Your body is telling you to stop doing what you are doing. Is guiding you towards better help… if you are willing to listen. 

And why is it crucial to listen and stop blaming your body?

Because when you keeping looking for what’s wrong, you are always looking at the problem not at the solutions. You get stuck.

When you ask questions like “why me? Why is this happening? What is wrong?” you are blaming your body and yourself. 

Blaming and focusing on the problems does not solve them.

Instead, you need to shift from blaming to finding solutions. 

You need to ask questions like “what is my body telling me? What is this pain telling me? What have I done that is causing this issue? What can I do to help with this?” 

As Tony Robins says, you need to ask better questions to get better answers. 

That way you’ll focus on the solutions and not on the problem. 

You’ll start seeing your body’s signals as guidance in your journey, not as negative reactions or as problems. You’ll be able to start moving ahead.

When I understood the aches and pains as signals from my body, I started shifting and asking myself what was I doing that was making my body react that way. 

That helped me finding solutions, I was able to identify the causes of some of my pains and in that way I was able to know the consequences of repeating those behaviors. 

I changed from being helpless and a victim to being empowered finding solutions to my issues. I became one with my body and work with it to feel better. 

So, if you are dealing with issues in your health, if you are focused on all the problems with your body, why not listening to what are those issues telling you? Why not changing the questions you ask yourself and see if you can get ahead and feel better? 

I know it works for me, maybe you can give it a chance and see how it works for you…

Let me know if you try changing your approach! 

And don’t forget: Stop blaming you body!!!

xoxo, 

Sofia

image by Chris Jarvis @hypethat