•Reflects On Life @ 60
A few months back, Wellness Coach, Arinola Adeniyi, the founder of VENIVICI Spa who passed on last week, spoke to City People Magazine shortly after she turned 60.
What was it like for her coping with the Covid-19 lockdown last year, we asked her? “It was awesome for me. If you ask for my personal opinion, I think we all needed to slow down the world was moving at an amazing speed, so this is a way of saying cool down. That 25 hours you are all looking for, might not happen. We have all lost the pace. We were in the Modern Day Living Syndrome and 24hrs was no longer enough to achieve all we had to do. We were all on the treadmill of life, just moving and when we keep moving that way, we don’t have time to connect with ourselves”.
“What came before the pandemic was Stress and it was getting out of hand. 24 hrs was not enough. Then, by weekend we get busy again with social functions and for some of us, the social functions involves going out of town and we wanted to be at every event because of the relationship we have with people”.
“Then, let’s talk about our careers, where we all desire to get to the peak of it as fast as possible. We were all just running in circles and Stress had become a great issue and people were falling sick for no reason. If you look at Cancer it is related to lifestyle. Then 90 percent of all doctor’s visits before the pandemic were all Stress related. Sickness was on the increase and Lifestyle was going out of the window. The World Health Organisation definition of Health was not just Physical. It included Mental, Emotional and Physical Wellbeing. So for me, the lockdown was a time to Relax, Rest and Renew and I think we have had enough of that now”.
“I am happy, more attention is now being paid to Health awareness. A lot of attention has been given to physical hygiene, like Wash your hands, Cough properly and all that”.
“My message to all of us is to be naturally responsible, pay attention to your Wellbeing, because it counts in our moving forward. The way you Think and Feel, determines your Destiny. And when we talk about the way we feel, we have 2 emotions either Positive or Negative which is the frustration, pains, fears, the doubt, negative emotions which are all not good.”
Is it possible to delete those negative feelings from our system? “You can’t delete them, but you have to be conscious and aware of them. The minute they override your resourceful state and you linger on them for too long, you begin to fall into Depression. Its very important you choose your resourceful state which will attract your happiness, joy, bliss gratitude. It’s a constant struggle but the decision you make when you say am not giving up is self thought and nobody will do that for you. You need to do it yourself. You can do all the zoom training and yet not gain anything because Knowledge without Action is nothing”.
What prompted her to open Venivici at that time? “Venivici was created 21 years ago and the idea sounded odd to many people back then, and that is why it’s good to have a Vision. When you have a Purpose and Ambition in life you will always get it right. Back then I had a very comfortable and promising job. But when you have a Vision and Purpose to take care of people I didn’t create. It wasn’t because it was a trending thing then. There was no Spa at that time. So it was from a place of purpose. It was God sending me out. If you have gone through a particular thing in life it will be easier to help others too. I lived an extremely stressful life in the Corporate World and I discovered life is not just about your job, not all about your spirituality, not just your financial comfort but it’s of different dimensions, Body Soul and Spirit. It’s necessary to have an energetic soul and body, reflective mind and joyous body. You should be able to ask what you have done for your body and spirit and that is the power God has given us, the power of choice”.
What is her take on all of us trying to boost our Immune System? “That is true. That is what Lifestyle & Well being is all about. It’s more than going for your medicals annually abroad. What are you doing before you go back in the next 12 months. We can see the virus has no cure. Really, most of the cure proferred so far are all natural remedies, our Ginger, garlic, lemon grass all played vital roles so we can heal ourselves. We have the natural cure. If it’s an accident we can go to the hospital but when it comes to lifestyle we have the remedy”.
“The immune system is as strong as the right attention you are giving to your body, from your nutrition, to your exercise your thought your emotion and your state of mind and there is this saying that you are successful because you are happy so emotions have come to play a vital role in all of this.”
Her mum passed on before the Covid-19 pandemic and this devastated Arin. How did she take the sad news. “She was 90 and her health was becoming frail, “Arin explained. “She was becoming frail and we were ordinarily spending more time with her. But we didn’t know that it would come that fast. Then, came the beginning of the year and luckily COVID had not started then. So, we had time to plan, to have the party. I feel very greatful that we were able to do the funeral before COVID started. It was the last weekend in February and I think by 8th or 10th of March there was this scare of COVID in Nigeria. We were able to give her a befitting burial. It was good that we did that before all of these started”.
How did she take her turning 60, a few months back? How did she celebrate it? What was the mode of celebration? “For me, age is just a number. Yes. Nigeria was also turning 60 and it was in October. But because of COVID, I couldn’t celebrate. But I still plan to celebrate it in 2021. I will do the 60+1. I couldn’t celebrate my 60th birthday because of the situation facing the world. You couldn’t travel anywhere. You couldn’t plan a destination party, or to have a week long programme for the less privileged. We still did some of those. Just that it was a small thing. The most important thing was that family members were all there”.
“And we really just had time to bond”. How did she feel the morning she turned 60? “No, how. Really, I was grateful to God that I survived this particular year. I was grateful to God because that particular year (2000), a lot of people had passed on. It was a nice feeling that I was 60. It was nice. I was happy. It was more of Gratitude that I am alive, because people younger than me had passed on. COVID had done all sorts of things to people. There were too many people that had died. So, to wake up and still have that breathe was worth thanking God, because the time we breathe, it is a rare privilege. And I wasn’t paying for the Oxygen. I know how much they said they were buying Oxygen in the hospital for COVID-19 treatment. So, I woke up feeling so very grateful for sparing my life and for taking me this far, because God has done so much for me. It was such a very happy day.”
What are the lessons she learnt from the COVID-19 pandemic? What is her message to many celebrities on how to cope with COVID-19? “The lessons are take the good out of 2020. Don’t get depressed. Technology played a big part in helping us survive the pandemic I discovered a lot of things about me that I didn’t know because my mind was quiet. When you are Still, Creativity comes out of you. During the lockdown, I was writing Poems. I didn’t know I could write poems. A lot of good came out of COVID-19″.
“Moving on, I know more and more people will be more careful with their health and the lifestyle choices they are making. The responsibility rest with us”. How has she continued to look young at 60? What is her secret? What can others learn? “The way we Think, and the way we Feel, determines our Destiny. We must be able to embrace life as it comes, and the choices that we make daily, really will determine our outcome. Looking young, looking good, a lot of it comes from the mind. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. The choices we make over time, determine your look. You can’t start at 60. You have to start well before 60 because ageing is a natural process of life, but you can look younger, longer. But you have to take natural steps. If you take care of your body, it will serve you for longer. In my own case, I knew that, so I took care of my body from way back, because I know it is the only one you have to live in. I imbibed these principles way back. So, I was very deliberate and intentional about staying healthy, keep your regimen simple”.
“Have a positive outlook to life. Reduce your stress. Have a Quiet mind. Adopt a policy of seeing good in everything that comes your way. They all sort of add up. The way we think. The way we feel determine our destiny. We need to change our thoughts. We should begin to be Positive. We should look into the future with positive thoughts about life. Our thoughts are about self-fulfilling prophecies and what we also affirm and say with our mouths”.
“So, what you say, you see, what you do, you become. What you want to see is what you should put in your mind.
Yes, you will be busy during the day, but at night what do you focus on? I have a Gratitude Journal that I fill every night. I usually reflect on the types of good things that happened to me today. I would write them down. I do not write the negative things. I usually delete the negative things as if it didn’t happen. What I write down are the positive ones and that gladdens your heart. I write down little things that gladden & warm my heart. I constantly erase all the negative emotions and then, just be grateful to God. You have to learn to focus on good things. We have to learn how to deal with Fear, Anger, Anxiety, Unforgiveness”.
“Medical studies have shown that a lot of the Cancers people are having these days are from Unforgiveness. So, we have to begin to learn to forgive others. It is human nature to offend each other. God forgives us everyday. So we too should learn to be able to forgive others or discuss it. Don’t mount up the anger or unforgiveness. Bitterness produces bad chemicals in the body and it begins to break down your cells. That is why they say, some of these cancers are self-inflicted. What these hormones will produce are not good at all. So we have to learn to forgive others and to live on the positive side and be happy. There was a book I read recently titled: Happy For No Reason. You must wake up and be happy”.
“It is a choice. You should wake up, stand up, look into the mirror and say This is the day the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it. Simple. It is a Conscious and Deliberate thing”.
“What Covid-19 pandemic has done to all of us is to make people appreciate the role of staying healthy. People now know they have to keep their immune system strong, they know that now they have to Detoxify. You have to get rid of the toxins and your system becomes alkaline”.
“Cancers only come into Acidic areas. When you get rid of the Toxins, your system becomes Alkaline and you are able to live well and live better. A lot of it has to do with you and the choices you make and your daily habits. It is not something you do once a week. It must become part of you.
“You have to create your groove. Nobody is going to create it for you. It is your personal responsibility. You must know what works for you and begin to do them. If you do all these, you will have PEACE, JOY, HAPPINESS. You will have a confident expectation of the future”.
