Stay Woke Regarding Your Health this Holiday Season!

Yep, I just went there.  I just appropriated a social trope (stay woke) in order to help you stay healthy over the holidays.  For those of you still dozing out there, “stay woke” is a social/political term that refers to being aware of various forms of oppression and injustice in the world, including all the big “isms” (racism, sexism, classism, etc).  The term has been around since the 1940s and in the 1960s was used a great deal by the Civil Rights protesters to ensure people were socially and politically awake or aware.

It has since been revived in our politically polarized world.  However, as with most popular terms used by the kids on social media, the term has gone mainstream and its true meaning has been perverted, first into meaning someone who is “hip” or “with it,” then into the punchline for various jokes.  It has also been appropriated by the corporate world to, ironically, prove a company’s “wokeness” in order to sell product.  That being the case, I simply jumped on the corporate bandwagon…now let me explain how to apply it to your life this holiday season.

The holidays can be a blur of friends, family, food, wrapping paper, alcohol, lack of exercise, road trips, hours spent on Amazon, and cookies.  And my key for getting through it all while maintaining your health can be summed up in four words: get woke, stay woke.  What do I mean by that?  Simply be aware of what you’re eating, drinking and doing (or not doing) over the course of the next month.  So why not just go with “aware” rather than “woke?”  Because my kids told me to and “woke” sticks in the mind better than plain, old, tired “aware.”

The one thing the holidays do quite well is disrupt your routine, especially your exercise routine.  Whether its because you’re traveling, hung-over, with friends and family, shopping, not at work and laying around in your comfy pants, or digesting food, exercise tends to be pushed to the back burner.

Get woke about that fact and stay woke about it through the holidays and beyond so that you can fight against it.  As much as possible, shift your exercise routine during the holidays, but do not eliminate it.  If you had a late night and usually work-out in the morning, sleep in and exercise later, but do not lay around all the next day wallowing in self pity, bad breath and gastric discomfort.

The average person burns about 110 calories per mile traveled on foot; jogging or walking.  Thus, a meal that contains two glasses of wine, turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, dinner roll, and a slice of apple pie would force you to walk about 17 miles to burn off.

Be woke and stay woke about these facts as you eat your holiday meals, drink your holiday drinks and nosh on your holiday hors d’oeuvres these next few weeks.  And if you find yourself continually saying, “I don’t care, it’s the holidays” stop drinking and have someone slap you every time you utter those words.  Do not ruin all the hard work you’ve put in over the past 11 months by gorging on unhealthy food and imbibing unhealthy drinks during the 12^th month.

Get woke, stay woke.  You’ll thank me come early January.