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What strategies do you use to maintain your health and well-being?
First off, I by no means maintain healthy eating habits. I know for a fact that I don’t eat nearly as many vegetables as I should, & I definitely am not drinking enough plain water. However, I try to maintain a balance in my overall health & well-being in other ways.
I spend at least 30 minutes every day going for walks in our neighborhood, or run around & physically play in the backyard with my little bean. This is my main source of daily exercise. Plus, I get a healthy dose of Vitamin-D & fresh air. My little bean loves exploring in our backyard, & I love spending this time teaching her about all the different things in our garden.
If I am idle, listening to music or checking Instagram/YouTube, I try to stay in a standing position, not sitting down. It is very easy for me to get comfortable in one spot & not move for long periods of time. So I would rather stand instead of sit, thus eventually ruining my posture. Besides that, I’d like to believe that standing burns any small amount of calories, which is a win in my book.
On the flip side, I take a daily supplement for my hair, skin & mail health. Yes, this is a vanity supplement more than for body health, but I believe it also improves my mental attitude toward my body-image issues. I haven’t yet seen much improvement in my skin, but my hair definitely sheds a lot less, & my thin finger nails are less prone to cracking & splitting.
I used to take a ton of other daily vitamins & supplements (i.e. all the letter vitamins, Omega-3, women’s multivitamin, etc.), but I stopped taking all those vitamins after learning that they aren’t really boosting my immune system or overall health. As long as I am eating foods with the appropriate nutrients & nutrition, I don’t need to choke down 10 different vitamin/supplement pills the size of a McDonald’s happy meal toy.
There are other ways I maintain my well-being, like taking time for myself. That usually happens during the time my little bean is taking her daily nap. I make myself a second (sometimes third) cup of coffee, grab a sweet snack, then sit down to read a little tabloid celebrity gossip, or I will read a catch up on a few chapters in the current volume of the Japanese manga I am reading.
During this precious time, I will completely zone out & focus on the one thing I had planned & allotted for that time in my schedule. That helps me unwind & relax a little bit before I have to jump right back into mom & housekeeper mode.
These things seem pretty simple, but they fit my life & work for me. I do lots of little things throughout the day, everyday, rather than saving up all of my time & energy to workout at a fitness club or gym once or twice a week. This is more beneficial for my overall health & well-being rather than a few bursts of workouts/exercises. If it is not fully improving my health, at least it is improving my mood. Cheers.
Today’s song of the day:
What are your future travel plans?
Next week, Jian, his parents, our little bean & I are celebrating Jian’s birthday in Manhattan a.k.a. New York City. This was the place Jian & his parents first lived when they immigrated to the United States. So this city holds a special place in their hearts. Jian& his parents haven’t been back there for over 15 years. I haven’t been back there since 2009. I got violently sick on my last visit, so I never got to fully experience New York, but at least I fully utilized our hotel room. (Silver linings!)
Yes, the main reason we are all traveling to New York City is to celebrate Jian’s birthday. However, our second most important reason is to test our little bean on her first airplane ride. We as a trio are ultimately planning on going to Japan later this year, & we don’t want our little bean’s first plane ride to be a 12 hour flight across the International Date Line without any practice.
That brings me to our second major travel plans for the year. WE ARE GOING BACK TO JAPAN! WOO-HOO!! I don’t know if we will visit my family burial plot at the cemetery in Kamakura. It’s a tradition we do every time we go back to visit family, but according to our culture’s superstitions & beliefs, young children should not visit the dead. They are more susceptible to attracting spirits.
This upcoming trip to Japan is going to be a huge undertaking, one that Jian & I have never done before, even when we were childless. We are planning on city hopping this time on our 2 week vacation. We will first stay in Osaka, then migrate over to Tokyo for the second leg of our trip. Somewhere in between, we will have contact with my cousins who are based in Yokohama & Tokyo. We won’t be able to meet everyone, as my family is too big to see everybody, but we will at least get to introduce our little bean to a couple of close relatives.
I am really excited but also incredibly nervous to be traveling to such far away places with my little bean. Yes, these once-in-a-lifetime memories far outweigh the worries, but as a parent, I am a worrier by nature. I am praying like crazy that my kid will at least be moderately civilized on all her airplane rides. That is a ginormous hope, but I am crossing my fingers every time the thought crosses my mind.
I have been reading & seeing more news lately about more & more weather anomalies & extremely violent turbulence causing huge problems with airplanes & flights. As a professional overthinker, this terrifies me to no end. I know I cannot control any of these things, but still, these thoughts are sitting in the back of my mind. I can only hope for the best. That’s all I can do for now. At the very least, I am extremely grateful to have the opportunity & means to travel at all. For that, I shall focus all of my thoughts on gratitude & appreciation for my advantages. Until the next one, Bon Voyage & cheers!
Today’s song of the day:
What do you listen to while you work?
I got so overjoyed this morning when I picked up my smartphone & saw this topic prompt light up my notification screen. My mind went into overdrive, thinking of all the ways I could approach this prompt, but stopped short when I tried to think of a way to write without word vomiting a whole bunch of things that would turn into tangents only myself would understand, & that you probably wouldn’t give two shits about. (See what I mean? A stupid tangent.)
So let me get straight to the answer. The things I listen to while I am working totally depends on my mood, but also my current obsession. I have a couple of pinned Spotify playlists that I have personally curated that I will rotate through. I will listen to ambient background sounds on YouTube as well. However, in the most recent weeks, I have been predominantly listening to a couple of select artists on repeat: Fuji Kaze, imase, that Polish guitarist I want to interview, Lucky Kilimanjaro & Arctic Monkeys. I’m going to an Arctic Monkeys concert in September, so I am trying to brush up on their discography at the moment. My mommy brain has forgotten a lot of the lyrics that used to be easy for me to memorize.
As of today, I am totally obsessed with Fuji Kaze‘s music. I have been listening to his album LOVE ALL SERVE ALL on repeat for the past several days. Fuji Kaze‘s music is super catchy & the lyrics are so thoughtful & full of meaning/intention/purpose. I think I am slowly becoming a, as he would put it, Kazetarian. I don’t think I would become a devout vegetarian like he is, but I absolutely would follow his philosophies & world views. This artist has such a pure & open heart. It’s hard not to fall in love with his melodic tunes. Listening to Fuji Kaze’s music totally puts me in a good mood, & helps improve my productivity. I get all excited listening to his music, & continuously work without stopping, which is rare because I very, very easily get distracted by anything & everything around me.
That’s all for now. I am going to continue working on this blog, & listening to some killer jams. Until the next beat, cheers!
Today’s song of the day:
Rabbits & Foxes 
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