Being that today is the first day to sign up for Spa Week Spring 2012 $50 treatments, it’s also a good day to start taking a little more time for ourselves in other parts of our lives. Being busy and eating healthy often don’t go hand in hand. It’s easy after a stressful day to convince yourself that you need a little fast-food hug. But before your New Year’s resolutions start turning into excuse-olutions, put your foot down and make Spring a new chance for a healthy start.

We’ve already challenged you to think outside the microwave and have even given you a jump start with some easy recipes, but today’s LWBA provides even more motivation to get cooking. Take the time to cook for yourself, and you may even whip up some weight loss. Plus, you could learn some serious kitchen skills.

By Sarah Jenks

When we dial up the engagements and plans, our personal lives fall to the wayside.  And I bet that the first thing to fall off your list of priorities is cooking.

I know very few people who cook on a regular basis. Those who I do know that spend time over the less hectic months of summer making salads and taking picnics into the park quickly replace their culinary crusades during the winter with sushi take-out shoveled down in a frenzy between social obligations. Another hurried consumption habit involves a quick PB&J sandwich after the gym eaten on the couch in front of the tube. Once Spring has sprung, it’s time to get out of our bad winter habits.

When our lives get nutty, and we are burning the candle at both ends, we have the tendency to push, push, push until we collapse.  And the collapse is inevitable.  But the reality is that in order to continue to live life at the pace we do, we must take some time to re-fuel everyday.

There are many ways to re-fuel, but the biggest bang for your buck is going to come from cooking. First, homemade food contains fewer chemicals, low-quality ingredients, and added sodium and sugar. When you cook, you are much more likely to make wholesome choices and know what’s going into your body. This will give you immense energy to keep up with your busy schedule, help you sleep better, and may even aid in weight loss.

Second, cooking slows you down. When you operate at a certain vibration all day, your stress level is going to be chronically high which will drain your adrenals and make you exhausted. Taking the time to slow down, cook, and focus on something other than tomorrow’s presentation will decrease your stress level and center you.

Third, cooking helps you connect. Of course, going out to dinner is fun, and a great way to see people, but there is something so caring about cooking with a friend, lover, or family member. By putting love and care into preparing a meal, you are really nurturing your relationship and creating beautiful space to connect with that person.

All this sounds delicious, right?

Well here are tips to get you started:

1. Increase your cooking habits by one or two nights per week.

2. Have a dinner party on a Friday or Saturday night instead of going out.

3. Check out a local farmer’s market to get inspired.

If you’re thinking that you’re too busy to cook, and there’s no chance in hell that you’ll have time to implement these changes then I’m here to gently convince you otherwise.

Here’s my guarantee to you. Cooking will actually create more time in your day. If you embrace the opportunity to re-fuel then you will inhabit the rest of your life with vibrancy and increased efficiency. It may seem like an effort at first to change the habit, but remember that it is also an effort to spend your days feeling tossed and turned by chaos. So, get your butt back into the kitchen and watch as your life becomes more serene, your energy skyrockets, and your health improves meal by meal.

Sarah Jenks, founder of theBreathtakingBride.com, helps women fall in love with their bodies and lose weight through exploring the emotional reasons of why we eat. Sarah believes that you can talk about the benefits of broccoli until you are blue in the face, but real change won’t happen until we pull back the veil of fad diets and calorie counting to reveal the true cause of our over eating. Feeling lost about weight loss? Visit her website to download her free guide: “What to do if you feel fat, hopeless and ready to give up.”