When cross-fit is not good for your health.

A few days ago, a cafe was serving its evening customers. The wine was poured, couples stared into each other's eyes over plates of salad and fish. The chink of cutlery and laughter filled the air.

An idyllic Brazillian evening.

Moments later, handbags were flying, glasses abandoned, and chairs slapped to the ground as diners ran for their lives. Hysteria and panic filled the air as masses ran blindly into the night.

What happened to cause such a sudden change in the atmosphere?

What horror had been unleashed to switch things around so fast?

Cross fit, that's what.

Crossfit and tension.

An unassuming cross-fit team on an evening training session was the spark that lit the tinder of panic.

The bone-dry tinder was the backdrop of heightened gang troubles in the area.

So when the group jogged passed, the diners were triggered.

Misread the situation, thought there was a gang fight close by and ran for their lives. Resulting in an all-out hysteria.

One simple hum drum act perceived differently can cause chaos.

All the cross-fit group did was run down a public sidewalk. Nothing more, no sinister motive intended.

The same action at a different time or place would barely have warranted a glance in their direction.

So what's the difference?

It's the context.

Context is critical. Something innocuous one day can give an opposite result the next.

Our current economic climate is our tinder. It is heightening awareness that we never had before, and not always in a good way.

Everywhere we turn at the moment, we are bombarded with alerts, urgency and gloom.

The noise can be overwhelming, and even the most stoic of us are not immune to internalising what we hear about the cost of living crisis.

It's no wonder we are all on edge. Finding it hard to hear anything clearly through the noise.

This can sometimes leave us feeling like the world is outside our control and that we are at the whim of greater powers than us.

This is not the full story and things might not be as bad as you are led to believe.

Understanding this... is where your real power lies.

We can control how we take in information AND how we process that information.

How we process that information impacts our feelings.

How we feel impacts our thoughts, and our thoughts affect our actions.

Our actions can build us up or tear us down.

This has been a year that even the best of us could not have predicted.

Our world has been turned upside down twice over, which frankly is the nemesis of peace of mind.

We may be unable to change the global situation on an individual basis right now, but we can change our own.

But DO NOT underestimate what is within YOUR control.

Understanding what is within your control and taking action on that control is an empowering place to be.

We can choose to jump up and run with the crowd and use up all our precious energy and bandwidth on stress and worry, which isn't good for anyone.

or

We can choose to assess the situation and make it work for us as best we can.

By taking a thousand tiny steps in a positive direction and pushing that needle slowly but surely in our favour.

We

- Change energy provider.

- Cut a subscription.

- Have a no-spend day

- Boil only what we need in the kettle.

- Get out more in nature to clear our heads and breathe deeply.

- Have a movie night in with homemade popcorn.

No matter how small that action is, it is action, and action shifts the locus of control back to you.

DO NOT underestimate the power of doing the small things well.

These seemingly insignificant actions compound over time, significantly impacting your financial and mental well-being.

So no matter where you are on your journey, see what is happening around you, acknowledge and assess, and ask the right questions. Then make the best choices for you and your life.

The skills you learn here and now will be with you for the rest of your life, supporting you and making you stronger.

Always.

Kel