February 2021 Wellness Newsletter

Your monthly dose of APS programs, nutrition, wellness & fitness trends (and a dollop of heart health)!

Have you ever thought about how many phrases we use with the word “heart”? The heart of the matter, that hurts my heart, heart of gold, heart of stone, a heavy heart, change of heart, eat your heart out, their heart is in the right place, cross my heart, bless your heart, in a heartbeat…and so many more.

 We use it in reference to almost every emotional situation in the book.

It’s American Heart Month. Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the US.  Across race, ethnicities, and genders, it’s numero uno. ‘That hurts my heart’ considering it is 80% preventable.

This amazing muscle operating off internal, self-generated electrical impulses beats over 100,000 times a day. Yet, unlike other muscles in our body that are susceptible to injury from overuse due to physical exercise, rarely do we over-exercise our hearts.

It’s usually the emotional toll of life that breaks our hearts.  Stress, anger, trauma, depression, anxiety, fatigue from lack of sleep or worry, and the subsequential behaviors from those emotions are what leads to heart disease.

Over the next 4 weeks, we’re going to talk about ways to guard our hearts against this pervasive disease. We'll ‘get to the heart’ of the matter to experience 'a change of heart’ for our wellness. To do this we are going to consider the mindful states of well-being - Anger (frustration), fatigue (stress), rushing (stress), and complacency (apathy and depression), and focus on cultivating the opposite - Hearts of joy, patience, hope, and happiness. 

If the excessive use of heart idioms haven't raised your blood pressure by now, stay connected with APS Employee Wellness on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Contact Becky MacGregor: becky.macgregor@aps.edu if you have any questions. Take good care and thank you from 'the bottom of my heart.'