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here are three critical personal things in the pursuit of your purpose. The first is your spiritual health. Before you log off, every human is a spirit who lives in a body. The second crucial aspect of pursuit of your purpose is your mental health. The mind is the engine of nearly everything related to success. The last one is your body.

About a decade ago, I fell sick in a strange way. I was vomiting with a very high frequency per hour. I felt like my head was heavy. At the hospital, the conducted a battery of tests and found out that there was no form of sickness or infection in my body. The doctors told me that I was fatigued. It was true. I used to report at work at 7:00 am and leave at 8:00 am. There was minimal break in between. I did not watch my diet neither did I exercise my body in anyway.

Why We Don’t Take ‘Intentional Health’ Seriously

The situation is repeated over and over in all corners of this world. Two main things make us neglect taking care of our bodies:

1. We are ignorant:

We think that nutrition and exercise is not a priority and a necessity. We think that it’s either for athletes or for well to do people. Matter of fact, I have lived in two extremes in my life. I have lived in an environment that you can consider for well to do people…the famous middle-class. I have also lived in an environment for people who are struggling to make ends meet. In both environments, I always maintained my discipline of jogging each evening. What I found out struck me to the core. For some strange reason, there are quite a number of “joggers” in the middle class areas. The same cannot be said of those who live in not so good areas. When you go out there jogging, they look at you like a cow on a new gate. It is ignorance.

2. Secondly, we have not been intentional about it.

We have schedules that are so filled that we fail to prioritize our health. A friend of mine says that a doctor told them that if we do not pay the price for physical fitness and nutrition today, we shall pay for it later. That is why some people have daunting, disturbing and excruciating elderly lives. They are paying for the misuse of their bodies while young. IN fact, while young, you always think that life is on your side and that you have time. It hits you so late…that age where you do one press up per day and one sit up per day. You press down in the evening and up in the morning. You catch my drift. Still that age is redeemable if we get intentional enough

2.5 Lastly, we don’t exercise simply because we do not have time.

We are tied down with things that take away our time. For the most part, these things are those that are outside of our purpose in life. A good example is what I was doing in that job I mentioned earlier. It might have been a necessity at that time but I can assure you that if I never walked out of that job later on, I probably would never have set my foot on a rocky path of discovering my purpose.

Importance of Health

Speaking of purpose, you cannot fulfill it with infirmities in your body, at least self inflicted ones. I am talking about neglecting to do two things: Exercise and nutrition. You know that you are physically fit when you can walk a flight of stairs to the third floor but you still feel like you could conquer more floors. The opposite is true. You climb the first flight of stairs and you feel like you want to faint, you can’t catch your breath.

Health and vitality is a very crucial aspect of your purpose pursuit. It is the only thing that we are yet to automate, digitize and find apps for. I assure you that if I ever came up with an App that does press ups and sit ups for people, I would be an overnight millionaire. The fact is that I do not think we will ever digitize personal discipline. That is where it all boils down to. It boils down to being committed and disciplined about your body.

1. Exercise Creates a Sharp mind

I do not know about you, but there seems to be a strong connection between a sharp mind and physical exercise. I have found out in my personal life that when I do push my physical body, that is when my mind is activated to be sharp. I am not a medical person but I am sure that there can be found a strong connection between the mind and physical exercises medically or scientifically.

2. Exercise Creates a Stream of Ideas

Nearly a quarter of the ideas that I have for my blog, including this article have been born out of moments of physical exercises. It seems to me like a dormant mind really is dormant with ideas, but a mind activate through physical exercises is creative, active and full of ideas that flash back and forth. Your pursuit of purpose will need a heavy dose of ideas in order to reach levels of excellence and fruition. So, do you feel like you lack ideas, take a jog, go and do some tread-milling then thank me later.

3. Exercise improves metabolism

Exercises help your digestive system. I don’t know how but it becomes so versatile. A good digestive system creates vitality and generates much needed extra strength. This point might sound like a lie the first time you try doing physicals, but as you break past the initial pain barrier, you realize how much strength has been generated by your body. I know that any purpose worth pursuing needs hoards of extra energy every day.

4. Exercise releases the good feeling chemicals

Exercise refreshes you and releases endorphins in your body system. You feel refreshed and good after excercising. You know why this is important? Because pursuit of purpose at times meets with so many negatives in the day and in its course. As such, your mind can be filled with negativity during the day. In fact, a Coach of mine says that he has never seen a depressed man or woman who is jogging. For some reason, exercise deals with those negative feelings. It sends signals of life around your body and it responds by boosting you with endorphins. You need this daily.

5. Exercise improves health and creates longevity

You need to live long. Trouble is that without exercise, you are cutting your days short here on earth. Your purpose needs you to be around as long as you possibly can. God says, “With Long life, I will satisfy him and show him my salvation”. This means that long life is God’s agenda. So let’s get on with it. Again, do not ever think that the long life will come through prayer and spiritual gymnastics. You need to be smart and add to your spiritualiy some physical and nutritional disciplines.

Your purpose is a great thing to do and deliver…and you must be absolutely committed to improving your health in order to fulfill it. Let’s get started and let’s keep at it!