ARKTIC LIME Health
Table of Contents Setting and actually sticking to your New Year’s Resolutions Words and illustrations by Margarita Louka
Why do I feel SAD?
Words and illustrations by Rachel Sawyer
Staying Sane in an Insane World
Words and illustrations by Margarita Louka
The Dietary Battles
Words and illustrations by Rachel Sawyer Cover and endpaper by Margarita Louka
Setting and actually sticking to your New Year’s Resolutions Every January, we start listing down the changes we want to make in our life. There is something so refreshing about a fresh start, a blank canvas. It’s the excitement — and the anxiety — that you could do absolutely anything with this blank canvas! The buzz around New Year, with everyone announcing their goals (whether publicly or privately), inspires us to embark on our own journey towards self-improvement. We start listing down what we want to achieve: exercise more? Eat healthier? These are very common New Year’s Resolutions, and they are great in theory. However, it is proven that as February goes by and the excitement of a new beginning fades, many people end up giving up on their New Year’s Resolutions as they lose the motivation to carry them out. What is this phenomenon? Perhaps there are some people that half-heartedly embark on their journey because they feel like they must make a fresh start. However, lots of people are genuine about achieving their goals. Perhaps the ‘failure’ to achieve their New Year’s Resolutions is because our society is built on huge expectations — for others, and most importantly for ourselves. We are constantly surrounded by images of ‘perfection’, so of course we strive for perfection for ourselves. We set impossible goals, like structures that could never work in real life; a dream, not a solid plan.
Planning is key to succeeding! If you want to achieve your goals, try to aim for consistency instead of trying to achieve everything at once. You will get where you want, but remember, reaching a goal requires time and patience. Try to set small achievable goals, and set a timeline for every stage of your journey. Setting a goal such as “I want to lose 20 pounds” sounds too overwhelming. However, saying “I want to lose 2 pounds every 2 weeks” makes your goal suddenly more achievable. I like to think of metaphorically placing my goal in the middle of a dart board — even if I miss the goal, I still may land close to where I want to be. Having a diary is a great way to keep yourself accountable. If you track your habits daily and write down what you want to do every day to lead you to your goal, you are more likely to stick to it. Reflection is also a great progress tracker, not to mention a cathartic process! If you are serious about achieving your goal, you would have made it part of your daily routine. Making time once a week to sit down and reflect on how you felt the past week will make you self-aware, and will show you what works and what doesn’t. There is no right or wrong way to go about this, but there is always a way to get to where you want! It’s all about finding what works for you, and being consistent instead of expecting quick results. Don’t let complacency hold you back!
Why do I feel SAD? It’s a struggle to wake up in the morning; it’s cold, dark and raining; the day job is the ‘same old same old’; you leave for work in the dark and you come home in it too. Does this sound familiar recently? Well that’s because this is a recipe for SAD, and I don’t just mean feeling low. I mean Seasonal Affective Disorder. SAD is a form of depression that often correlates with Winter. Some people are known to feel it during the Summer, however it’s most acute during the darkest and coldest months. Symptoms can often include tiredness, a constant low mood, negative thoughts and a disinterest in your hobbies. It may seem unusual to suffer from SAD in the Winter as we have so many holidays to look forward to that lift our spirits- Halloween, Christmas, New Year. This is likely to have you labeled as a Scrooge when your mood is so low, but people fail to understand the level of stress and anxiety that the holiday season can bring too. Stress and anxiety being contributors to depression. SAD’s cause is linked to the lack of sunlight over the Winter period that leads to a higher level of melatonin and lower level of serotonin, which is what regulates your sleep and mood. SAD can affect anyone, but there are simple steps that can be taken to prevent/reduce the symptoms: Get as much natural light as possible Wrap up warm and take your lunch break outside. Go for a walk in the forest at the weekend. Buy a light box to simulate natural light when indoors.
Eat healthily During SAD you are more likely to gain weight and crave carbohydrates. An overweight body is not a healthy body and you won’t be taking in the necessary vitamins and minerals that also keep your mind and mood happy too. Exercise Overcoming the lethargy can be a trial, but your body desperately needs serotonin and the quickest way to get it is through exercise. A walk, a swim, a quick session at the gym. Little and often is best way forward when your motivation is low. Keep your friends close Don’t feel tempted to sulk yourself away into a lonely stupor. Tell a close friend you are struggling with SAD. Let them help you to feel supported and loved. You will regain a sense of belonging and purpose that will help to boost your mood. Like most forms of depression, dealing with the symptoms alone or ignoring them completely often only make them worse. Carrying out the above steps is a good start, but if you feel your symptoms of SAD are too much to cope with, you should always seek advice from your GP. We often feel we are bothering our GP’s with trivial ailments, but depression can develop into a serious illness. Get some help sooner rather than later.
Staying Sane in an Insane World Christmas is a busy time for most people. Going from a roast dinner, to a party, and then to a work gathering can be exhausting. We all work hard the whole year, so when Christmas is over, you may end up feeling more burned out instead of rested after your holidays. And then January comes around and the cycle repeats itself. You go back to work, when there’s barely any light outside and come back home when it’s dark. You go back to your busy routine. This always seems to be the case in our society. I know so many people that constantly need to be busy. I fall victim to that train of thought many times, and I must confess that I am that person. I remember when I used to return home from university after a long day and sometimes not feel very tired. I was very perplexed and thought that I must have not been productive during my day if I wasn’t tired by the end of it. The problem can also be reversed: doing nothing is just as bad as overdoing it. Exhaustion kills but so does boredom! Perhaps we should strive for a happy middle ground. I believe being productive is important, but not when it takes so much energy just to keep yourself going. I believe everyone should find time at least once a week to devote to themselves and switch off. Read a book. Knit a scarf. Paint or do yoga, or any other hobby you’ve always wanted to do but never thought you had the time! Lots of working people have the weekend to relax and unwind, but even that can be hectic when you have family commitments or chores. Sometimes it is good to step back and prioritize your me time; your mental and physical health are just as important. One way to stick to your me time is to schedule it. I am a big lover of planners and I use them to record everything- from what I did that day, to chores I need to do, to what I ate! If you schedule a time when you know you’re free, and write it down, you are more likely to stick to it, because it’s like arranging a date with yourself! Resting and relaxation aren’t prioritized enough in our busy society. However, with some trial and error there will be a way to integrate them into your life.
The Dietary Battle You’re a vegan? Well isn’t that high and mighty of you! You’re a meat eater? Well you’re despicable for not caring about animals and the climate crisis! You’re a vegetarian? Well… Erm…Well you’re just as pretentious as the vegans! We often like to point fingers and cast judgment before bothering to inform our opinions properly. It’s an ugly human trait, but it seems it’s here to stay. Time and time again, when our own opinions or values are contradicted by opposing information, we will fight against it until we are blue in the face- even at times when we are wrong. But have you ever stopped to genuinely consider the opposite opinion before discarding it? Veganism is stigmatised to a point where even Vegans themselves have stopped using the word. For what is essentially a selfless, responsible and expensive dietary decision; Veganism is scorned by other diets. More recently however, meat eaters are now also shamed and branded as selfish and uncompromising. So what are we to do? Whichever way we go, we are met with contempt. Not even the internet can give us clear advice. It is too easy to find yourself lost in a sea of information, where often a lot of it is fake or twisted statistics. Recognising the truth from click bait and scare mongering is more difficult than ever, especially when it comes to our diets.
But here is the rub. Humans are stubborn creatures that don’t like change. We stick to what we know and find any reason to suit our argument. Some of us are incapable of sticking to a decision, let alone making the decision at all. I can decide not to eat meat today, but fold tomorrow when the opportunity for a drive through burger arrises. Here is the question I put to you. Regardless of whether you eat meat or don’t, what will help save the existence of the human race? Let’s remove the blind fold and sugar coated wording, and realise that when we say the planet is in danger, it’s not the physical planet we really mean. The planet has been through immense heat waves and ice ages, and yet still revolves around the sun like normal. What we really mean is humans are in danger. Fossil fuels and the meat industry are one of the two biggest contributors to the climate crisis. So well done for using the bus and cycling, turning off your lights, and buying hybrid cars, but in reality you’re only fighting half the fight. Some people will never stop eating meat. They just won’t. Much in the same that you can’t force a Vegan to eat a chicken. They just won’t. But does that mean we are to stop encouraging them to help the climate crisis? No. We need to motivate them to eat both veg and meat, but in a different way. So, can we for once, cast our self-righteous and judgemental opinions on one another’s diet to one side and realise that to help the planet - ie yourself, your children and your grandchildren’s existence - we all need to do one thing. Eat more veg than meat.