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What is wellness? How does one attain wellness? How important is wellness to each of us? What keeps us from being well? These are simple questions that most of us probably don’t spend a lot of time thinking about. Yet, without giving each of these questions their due diligence, we derail our hopes for achieving a more optimal level of health and well being.

Very few people would find it difficult to list five things they could be doing to make themselves healthier that they are not currently doing. In most cases, it does little good telling people that exercise would help them, as would eating more fruits and vegetables, less processed foods and sugars, not smoking, watching less TV and decreasing stress. That’s because it is self- evident that those actions make one healthier, i.e., “You’re not telling me anything I don’t already know.” Most of us know the basics of what it takes to be healthier, but simply don’t follow through. The question, then, becomes very simple: Why don’t we do what we know we should?

The responses to that question are as varied as the individuals who give them. However, the common thread is, “I can’t.” Does this sound familiar? “I can’t exercise because I don’t have time.” “I can’t stop smoking because it is too hard.” “I can’t eat more fruits and vegetables because I don’t like them.” “I can’t afford it because my insurance doesn’t cover it.” “I can’t reduce my stress because…I just can’t!” The list goes on and on.

Let me share something with you from the perspective of a health-care provider that I know with absolute certainty. People will never change where they are with their health unless they change the way they think.

I’ve seen many people make great changes in their level of health with exercise and nutrition, only to find themselves back to where they started with a completely defeated mentality. This is because they never changed the way they thought about health and wellness and about its level of priority in their life.

The process typically goes like this: I want to HAVE (better health, less weight, more energy, less pain, etc.) so I must DO (exercise, nutrition, decrease stress, etc), then I will BE (happy, healthy, fit, energetic, etc). This logic is destined for failure because the BE (who we are) can never be the result of the process. It must be the start of the process.

The HAVE-DO-BE mentality has become programmed into our consciousness because we want to “have” things first in order to become someone different. The only way it can work is to apply a BE-DO-HAVE mentality by first asking the question, Who do I really want to BE? If I want to BE someone who is happy, healthy, fit, energetic, etc., then I must DO exercise, nutrition, decrease stress, etc., and only then I will HAVE better health, less weight, more energy, less pain, etc.

For those serious about changing their current state of health, the painful truth is that nobody else will do it for them. It takes time, constant effort and continual upgrading, but the rewards are outstanding.

It is said that wellness is a lifestyle. When wellness becomes part of who a person is, suddenly the “I can’t” goes beyond “I can” and simply becomes “I am.”

Stuart Cayer is with Scarborough Wellness, which promotes

healthy lifestyles for people of all ages.