What do you have to do to preserve health? I am writing this essay for the general population and not for those who are in the extreme health spectrum and have already developed significant health conditions which may or may not be related to aging, genetics or lack of healthy habits.
It’s much easier to preserve health than to eradicate ailments. We, the medical industry, have a pill for every ill but these medications rarely if ever eradicate the ailment completely. You notice your parents, your grandparents are taking multiple pills, one for cholesterol, one to thin their blood because they have a cardiovascular condition, a stroke or at a high risk for recurrence of these conditions, they are on high blood pressure medications, cholesterol medication and soon the number of pills to be taken can fill a small snack plate. Where did we go wrong? How did these ailments came to be? How did human race survive getting older a few decades or a century ago when we did not have these medications?
This race to illnesses and then the race to health has spawned multiple industries, I am talking about self-styled gurus, health influencers, advisors, longevity centers, measuring and monitoring devices, eating and dietary fats, supplement industries, numerous styles of fasting, rings, watches, straps, devices, data crunching AI advisors, calories counters, movement monitors, sleep monitors, emotional health advisors, life coaches. But in reality, are we better off? Are we happier?
We humans are attracted to complexity. The more complex a concept or advice or a “protocol” is, the more confident we feel about the advice we are getting but in reality, majority of concepts of health, nutrition, relationships, finance and probably in science are very simple. We do not like simplicity as we believe we have been taken hoodwinked, taken for a ride. But here it is: If you still have your health, it’s much easier to preserve it than treat chronic illnesses. The path that will lead you to preservation of health has only a few caveats:
- Daily physical activity. You will not outrun your day worth of inactivity by getting all the steps in the evening. Putter around. Fidget.
- As Michael Polan said: Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.
- Practice Discipline and self-restraint. Too much of a good thing is not necessarily a better thing.
- Get enough sleep
- Stay strong
- Don’t use recreational drugs, limit alcohol, high risk behavior.
- Consume mindfully for your body, mind and soul.
- Don’t always seek comfort. We grow at the junction of comfort and discomfort, both physically and mentally.
- Beware of visceral fat. Read about Body Roundness Index.
- If you are monitoring your data via electronic gizmos, learn about what you are monitoring and how it pertains to improvement of health. Just follow a few markers like HRV ( Heart Rate Variability), Resting heart rate, Quality of sleep and VO2Max.