Unbothered Part II: You are the CEO of You, Inc.

Hello and happy Thursday friends! First, I want to thank you all for the tremendously positive responses to Unbothered Part I. It’s hard to share personal anecdotes anywhere, especially on the Internet, but reading your comments that I inspired you or motivated you made it all worth it. After many requests, I’ve decided to focus part II of Unbothered on wellness. It’s taken me awhile to publish this because there is just SO MUCH to wellness—I didn’t realize just how integrated wellness is into my own life. Do I write a post about my general diet, my morning ritual (multiple requests on this one, which I’ll touch on here and do an in-depth post later!), my physical activity, meditation, sleeping habits, water intake? Each time I sat down to write this post, I didn’t feel I was answering your questions how they deserved to be answered. So I sat on it, and the more I thought about it, I realized everything I do in regards to wellness has the same foundation: discipline. And where does that discipline come from? I’m about to break that down for you. 🙂

WHY BEING THE CEO OF YOU, INC. IS YOUR GREATEST ASSET

You are the Chief Executive Officer of You, Inc. You are the CEO of your life, your room, your couch, your car, whatever. But most importantly, you are the CEO of your actual being. And since you are the CEO of your actual being, you better treat it well. What are the most basic characteristics of a leader? Honest, communicative, positive, motivational, reliable… are you treating yourself as such? Do you listen to your body’s needs and respond positively? Spending a night in with a facemask while watching Netflix doesn’t count. That’s not being the CEO of You, Inc. It’s just a fleetingly short term solution to feel good for a couple hours. If you want to improve your wellness then you need to come up with long term solutions that make you feel good always. That’s where discipline comes in.

You need discipline to reach your Maximum Wellness Ability, or what I like to call as of 30 seconds ago, MWA. I used to be laaazzzyyy. I was unmotivated, negative, pessimistic, ate horribly, and just went about life. It was when I started—you guessed it—practicing gratitude that I realized, “Azadeh, you are so damn blessed that you have four working limbs, five working senses, and healthy internal organs. You are so lucky you are able to sit up on your own every morning in bed and have as many meals as your heart desires in a day. And most importantly, you overcame severe depression at an early age.” What a wake up call. Health is wealth—the biggest and most important wealth there is—and for us to take advantage of it is just… gross.

Over time I began to cultivate little habits to improve my well-being, but over the last few years I reeeally got into it. I’m on a mission (I’m actually on a lot of missions, haha) to reach my MWA. I don’t know if it’s truly something with an attainable end goal per se, but I know if I continue to consistently improve upon my well being, I’ll get there. Wellness isn’t just drinking green smoothies and going to the gym—it’s a lifestyle of habits that will positively affect each area of your life. But if your goal is to look like an Instagram model with 365-days-a-year tanned abs and clear skin, guess what? That’s all discipline! You know how much time goes into curating the perfect ‘gram? Got to give credit where it’s due—those girls hustle for those magically unrealistic feeds!

By disciplining myself as CEO of Me, Inc. with daily habits and rituals, I’ve been able to improve all parts of my life: work, school, side hustle, finance, relationships, family, etc. First off, if you’re not practicing gratitude and meditating every morning then what are you doing? My discipline begins the moment I open my eyes. I have a very rigorous and strict morning routine I’ve set for myself. I wake up at 5:30 every morning.  Whoever reads that and thinks I hate myself, you’re wrong—it’s because I LOVE myself that I wake up early!  From there it’s gratitude, meditation, first water bottle of the day, workout, power smoothie, side hustle, write my daily goals/to do list, get ready for work, breakfast, prep lunch, head out the door. Most of this list is completed before 7am and that’s just my morning routine.

This morning routine didn’t come together overnight though, it took months and years of good habits developing. Discipline comes from mental strength and willpower. And this is just my version of wellness—I’m a morning person and enjoy starting my days feeling accomplished. Yours could be the total opposite, but guess what? As long as it’s blessing your growth positively, both daily and in the long run, it still counts.

In my opinion, discipline is just the first tier in the world of wellness. The healthy eating and active lifestyle parts will naturally come after. So now what does this have to do with being unbothered? It’s because you are still putting yourself first, but doing it with such tact that you inspire others around you to step up their game too. And who doesn’t want to be part of a circle where everyone around you rises collectively? You’re not winning, until your team is winning.  And winning here is everyone reaching their MWAs.

Final note- kept less photos in this post, but check out my Instagram where I will post more of this look and shoot!

XoXo,
Azadeh

Photos C/O Daniel Kerrigan