Yvonne Bernhard is a lifestyle content creator, mindful body teacher and editor of the blogazine No Envy. A rhythm guide for an active, healthy mind and body and a place for inspiration and information. She takes you on a journey to the Falkensteiner Balance Resort Stegersbach and gives you an insight into the vitalising Metabolic Balance Med Retreat – a nutrition and metabolism programme according to Metabolic Balance.
METABOLIC BALANCE MED RETREAT
What if there were a reset button for body, mind, and soul? “Everything back to factory settings, please!” A light-footed, fresh start that promises one thing above all: more energy, recharged batteries, serenity, new habits in terms of nutrition, relaxation, exercise, and a change of perspective for an otherwise busy life in front of and behind the screen. It often takes a bit of courage to leave your comfort zone and change routines. Sometimes you just need to turn away from the daily grind and consciously immerse yourself in a world that reprioritises, rethink health and nutrition. I’m thinking of a holiday with benefits. A retreat.
FINDING A BETTER BALANCE
Sought and found: At the Falkensteiner Balance Resort in Stegersbach in southern Burgenland, where the Metabolic Balance Med Retreat offers space for those seeking tranquillity and invites you on a very special journey: Back to yourself, to a better body feeling, to more well-being. To the questions: WHAT IS GOOD FOR ME? WHAT CAN I DO FOR MYSELF, MY BODY, AND MY MIND?
Focusing on what is really essential. I approach the answers to these questions with a one-week programme that is intended as a holistic health concept combining medical diagnostics with wellness.
What’s behind it is easily explained: the stay is meant to provide a lasting basis for newfound vitality. It is about the interplay of individual experiences from spa treatments, such as the Balance Signature Massage as a welcome ritual, and yoga to workouts and a cooking course, which provides small everyday pleasures far beyond the hotel visit, enables new perspectives and provides well-founded impulses from a therapeutic and nutritional point of view. Because sustainability is also defined by the echo that such a programme triggers in oneself. And it leads you to take on the unexpected and try out the unknown. That is exactly what I am doing.
HOW AM I ACTUALLY DOING?
Yes, how am I actually doing? This is a question I ask not only myself but also the Metabolic Balance experts, who familiarise me with the HRV measurement after an introductory talk and initial check. What the heart variability measurement has to do with training, regeneration and basic well-being, quality of life as well as dealing with stress will become clear in our follow-up discussion. As someone to whom training, exercise, and the mind-body connection are important, I will put myself to the test. And I can be satisfied. No wellness fortune-telling, but hard facts and professional advice, on the basis of which my individual programme will now be put together.
THE ART OF THE SIMPLE
One image I definitely take with me is the fire of life. The spark within us that we should not only preserve but kindle. In a figurative sense, burn for ourselves and our health. The basis for this is the three pillars of health according to Metabolic Balance: nutrition, exercise, and relaxation. There is a lot to learn.
For example, at the cooking course on the interplay between nutrition and metabolism. How our body reacts to certain foods and why. All the way to cooking tips and ingredients that make us more aware of the everyday use of ingredients.
At the end of the day, we all feel the same way: we want to cook efficiently, simply, and healthily and save time in the process. André Beck, the Metabolic Balance professional, not only has the training and expertise to do this, but above all, he has the necessary lightness that is needed to make cooking fun. In addition, the reminder of simplicity, the return to simple dishes with added value: fish steamed in bamboo baskets with seasonal vegetables. Homemade express oatmeal pancakes. Variations of herb spreads. Mango curry. Apple-cinnamon porridge with that special something.
NOW IT’S TIME TO TAKE A DEEP BREATH
A 2700 square metre Acquapura SPA area is and remains an argument. A place of retreat and tranquillity. On recommendation, there are more rest breaks here and now, but also in the future. I make a point of doing that, I forget that far too often in everyday life. At the expense of my performance. No matter whether we are working hard mentally or exercising our bodies. Regeneration is everything. And those who know me know that the Zirben sauna is the place where I forget time and place and just be.
For even more privacy, there is a detox base bath in the room afterwards and a peeling with the sisal nest provided, which promotes detoxification and blood circulation in the body in addition to the Metabolic Programme.
MY CONCLUSION
This was a short ramble, a few facets of a thought-provoking week. I have come closer to myself, and that alone is so much more than one can wish for. Time for oneself is the most valuable thing, and time with one’s loved ones is the ultimate.
Both are not only possible at the Falkensteiner Balance Resort Stegersbach, nestled in the forest, and meadows, with the hotel’s own permaculture garden, it is the beginning of a small journey towards more precaution and awareness for the most important thing in life: our health.
Let’s seize the opportunities that help us take care of ourselves. Healthy is often so close.
