If you haven’t noticed by now be some of my recent posts there is a focus on self-improvement. For those of you who are new to the site or just spent to much time on Facebook and not on the content of these pages then UTKM’s core concepts may be foreign to you. One of them however is Never stopped learning and growing. This doesn’t just include the students, but the instructors and myself as well. For us, an instructor who no longer wants to improve themselves and face the challenges associated with it probably does not want to be an instructor anymore. We have this attitude because leading by example is the best way to get students and others to do it too.
Don’t get me wrong, being a better person is hard. In fact, it may be the hardest thing most people do in their lives. It means facing the things we don’t like about ourselves in a honest manner and deciding if we are willing to change for the good. With the new years in order, I don’t really want to make a new years resolution I want to make a lifestyle change.
For those who have taken a class with me you may think, or know that I can come off as very confident and charismatic. The truth is despite this, I truly have a hard time making meaningful connections with those around me. Whatever the reasons for this are, dont really matter. What matters is that I would like to change this.
If you dont have meaningful connections how can you reach out and get the information you want for self-improvement? Traditionally, there were books, then the internet, now there are podcasts. Podcasts are amazing as they give you a direct connection, often to the people that textbooks cite, except you can get the most updated information directly from the source.
One of my go-to podcasts for health, wellness and fitness is the Ben Greenfield podcast. Ben is one of the top fitness and nutritional experts in America and an elite athlete. He is driven to constantly better himself in all aspects of himself because he knows despite his achievements there is much to improve.
His recent podcast posted before the end of the year titled,
The Hidden Health Epidemic Nobody Is Talking About (& 6 Ways To Protect Yourself From It)
Really spoke to me. Yes, Ben is a little religious for my tastes but the reality he is right. If you are depressed because you feel lonely it is likely you are lacking meaningful connections with even a few people. I can say that this may very well be the case for me (though I dont feel particularly lonely as I have the UTKM family.) I find it difficult to relate to people, and many people find me difficult for one reason or another. I have noticed whether intentionally or otherwise the podcasts I listen to all have been focusing on self-improvement lately(probably very intentional due to the new year).
If you are like me a more right-leaning (Politically) indivudal then you might find a lot of the people who talk about mindfulness and meaningful connections often sound very WOO WOO. The truth is, its probably because they aren’t the best themselves and are really just parroting the information. That or they have done a little too many hallucinogens in their lives and have lost touch a little. The reality is, the science seems to be fairly consistent at this point.
Humans are social creatures and as humans to be happy we need meaningful connections.
Even if this podcast doesn’t reach you like the way it did for me use it as a starting point and find someone that you can connect to. Either way, Ben is an amazing source for the most updated science-based fitness knowledge and info.
To give you an idea of some of the things he covers in this podcast:
- How loneliness, or “social isolation” negatively affects your physical health…8:30
- The correlation between smartphone prevalence and loneliness…16:15
- Practical things you can do to fight loneliness…24:12
- The chemistry behind face to face interactions…38:20
- 6 ways to enhance your life and longevity with love…47:15
*pulled from his website on the link given above for the podcast
At this point, this episode has been out for almost a week and I have listened to it a few times. Two of the things I am working on immediately is
- putting away my phone during meal times and turning off notifications outside of business hours.
- I am also working on the eye contact part, something that has always been a challenge for me for one reason or another. Usually, if you think I am looking you in the eye there is a good chance I am actually looking at your nose. A trick I picked up a few years ago but probably does not help with meaningful relationships.
In many ways. Podcasts like this are far more helpful than seeing doctors. Usually, their advice is diet and exercise. But that’s usually because they are not really trained outside of acute medicine among other reasons, but I will not get into a rant here about it….
For someone like me, this advice is useless because I do exercise and I do eat fairly well. So what else could it be? Well, it should seem obvious to the doctors, but it is not. (I generally only go to them if I have already figured out what the problem is like the time I tore my ACL, even though they thought I did not).
So if your doctors are not helping you, and you do exercise and you still feel lonely. Then it is possible you lack meaningful connections. This is why those who are surrounded by people are still lonely. It is because the majority of the relationships are shallow, hollow, fake or just surface relationships. So if you think this might be you then, this podcast is a great start to a new lifestyle change for the new year.
I hope it is as helpful for you as it was/is for me.
P.S. If you are the type of person who prefers to read. The Transcript for the podcast can be found here!