What Type of Lifestyle Are You Living?

This is not a post about healthy living or diets, but instead the idea of a “lifestyle” and the way we use this idea in several facets of blogging and our own lives.

I got to thinking one day in the shower (things always come to you in the shower, do not they?) That we feature the term “lifestyle” to so many things. For lots of us bloggers, we call ourselves “lifestyle” bloggers — where we blog about anything from food to healthy living, inspiration, creativity, travel, everyday life, etc.. I sometimes refer to my site as a creative lifestyle site, by way of instance, because I see by blog for a community where creatives can come together to share life, ideas, and inspiration in several diverse forms.

Other examples include living a school lifestyle, a vegan lifestyle, a minimalist lifestyle, a green way of life, a Christian way of life, a post-grad lifestyle, etc. You could be a business operator, a project manager, an artist, a creative, a traveler, a runner, an athlete or an intense adventurer.

Personally, over the last few years, I have experimented with a minimalist lifestyle, a vegan lifestyle (which I LOVE and wholeheartedly believe in), and different creative lifestyles (occasionally focused on journaling or blogging or other things like design or artwork).

All these lifestyles can attach to our identities.

But can a lot of “lifestyles” hurt us and our direction in life?

I wonder this as I realize that the term “lifestyle” is growing so common.

Can there become a stage where we’re living a lot of lifestyles? Can we attach too many things to our individuality that does not really matter? That doesn’t actually define who we are?

In the current era, marketing and communications (even under the purest intentions) can make “lifestyles” from nearly anything. In actuality, that appears to be a goal of marketing a product — linking it to something beyond the concrete item itself. By way of instance, marketing and exotic passionfruit juice as a very important ingredient to living a nomadic, super adventurous travel writer’s life joins items into a lifestyle certain individuals might want to live. This generates values, stories, and feelings that individuals may go out and “buy.”

It is almost as if we’ve got a cupboard full of “lifestyles” we could select from daily. We can decide to be whatever we wish to be.

Oftentimes, that may be a fantastic thing. I am all about leaving options open! But just what is a lifestyle and how are we choosing to live?

What Does a “Lifestyle” Mean?

A lifestyle is expressed in both the job, behavior, leisure and social routines we do — it is a mix of what we repeatedly do. It affects how we view ourselves and our individuality.

Lifestyles unite motives, needs, desires, feelings. Our lifestyle relates to our sense of joy and peace.

In general, a lifestyle is all about the big picture, the accumulation of small details of our everyday lives.

We only have one life, right? So let us look at it from a broad perspective.

So if we committed ten unique theories as our “lifestyles,” we actually limit the large picture for each of these.

If One Lifestyle Gets in the Way of Some Other

Finally, what we maintain our lifestyle is and the way we live our own life can be completely different. It all comes down to priorities.

For the last seven months, I’ve focused a great deal of my focus on veganism and my eating habits. I’ve learned a great deal and I have altered my entire life, to put it simply. I have spent hours seeing Youtube movies, documentaries, locating vegan recipes, appearing at ingredients on bundles and cooking tasty foods. All remarkable things!

My reasons for going vegan have expanded from health reasons to moral and environmental reasons and I have uncovered the larger picture on how our lifestyle choices impact our planet and the lives of others.

I believe I have put lots of my belief and religious energy to the vegan lifestyle, which might have been used pouring in my Christian faith or in different ways to help others. I don’t have any regrets about living a vegan lifestyle — but finally, I’d like it to come from my faith as a Christian and rooted in my journey with Christ.

That is how I see a genuine lifestyle evolving — from one pure attention in what you believe in. That is the way we live productive, loyal and inspiring lives.

A minimalist lifestyle is all about simplifying and focusing on what really matters in life to you. I believe that is so important. However, I challenge this mindset farther — would not what actually matters to you be your lifestyle? Would not minimalism be a by-product of your attention?

Let us challenge ourselves to really define our lifestyle. What is the fashion of our lives? Are we living for what really is important to us? Are we letting additional “lifestyles” get in the way? What is our true focus as people on this planet?

Let us consider how we spend our time and the things we do this week. Let us reflect on what we feel and the impact we make on others.

Have a few minutes to breathe in deep, and really consider your passion in life and where your center is. Consider love. About moving forward. About peace.

It is in these moments where we live most vibrantly. Let us find our style. Let us shine our lights.