Health is easily one of the most important resources we can have in life; it impacts both our well being, and the amount of time we have to live, enjoy life, and act on our ambitions and dreams. When you’re in better health, or have overcome a tough condition, the world simply opens up more than if you’re chronically ill and dealing with the complications of that
Of course, life doesn’t end until it ends, and many people have remarkably full, meaningful, and rich lives, while simultaneously battling against chronic health conditions. Still, all things being equal, it seems like everyone would have to agree that being healthy is just a much better state of affairs than being ill.
It’s no accident that entire industries have, in recent times, grown to incredible heights of power, influence, and public awareness, specifically on the back of the fact that they make claims about being able to effectively combat many prevalent health conditions.
The pharmaceutical industry, for example, certainly does a roaring trade, and the demand for healthcare professionals such as nurses has led to increasing educational opportunities, via remote technologies, as in the form of RN to BSN online programs.
But assuming you’re interested in ensuring the best possible health for yourself, as well as that of your loved ones, and any potential patients you might be responsible for — where should you start? You may think that the answer would be with a particular exercise regimen or variety of herbal teas. This article, however, is based on the premise that the best place to start is with your own mindset.
Ultimately, everything you do, or fail to do, in life is intimately connected with your own state of mind. The beliefs, assumptions, and mental heuristics you apply to a given situation will massively influence your reaction to that situation.
For that reason, here are some tips on how to get your mindset right for pursuing and encouraging optimal health.
Understand the essential importance of balance in life
One of the key principles that you see coming up again and again in the myths, literature, and religions of the world, is the sheer and overwhelming importance of balance. When you’re in balance — that is, living harmoniously — things just work out better for you across the board. When, on the other hand, you’re in a state of imbalance — things invariably go wrong.
Certainly, the idea of “balance” can be seen in pretty abstract confusing, metaphysical terms, but it can also be considered in a much more straightforward and pragmatic way.
If you’re working yourself into the ground all day, every day, with little if any time for rest or leisure, you’re in an imbalanced state, and one which is likely to lead to significant health problems. Chronic stress, as is well known, increases the risk of all manner of negative health outcomes in the body, as chronically heightened levels of the stress hormone cortisol inevitably lead to hormonal dysregulation and organ damage, among other things.
This same principle of balance can be applied to pretty much everything. Are you eating processed food on a regular basis because you’re too tired, distracted, or short on time to cook? Do you chronically deprive yourself of sleep in order to juggle more responsibilities and tasks during your hectic days?
As a general rule of thumb, when you’re doing a particular thing in excess — even getting too much exercise and too little rest — you’re at risk of landing yourself in an undesirable situation with regards to your health and wellness.
Reflect on the value of tradition, and the lessons it contains
Science is, of course, great for all manner of reasons, and it’s thanks to the scientific innovations in the understanding of things like germs and the communicability of diseases, not to mention nutritional requirements, surgical procedures, and so on, that we have in large part to thank for our increased life expectancy in the present day.
That being said, however, if you’re constantly referring to the latest scientific research to tell you how to live your life on an everyday basis, and what kinds of practices to engage in, foods to eat, and so on, in order to be healthy — you’re likely going to end up going insane and not managing to do much of value in terms of actually becoming or remaining healthy.
The reason? Well, science is simply too diffuse, fast-paced, and uncertain to work in that manner. Scientific consensus are generally useful once they’ve been repeatedly established and built on for decades if not centuries — and even then, much remains hidden from view, and many “certainties” get thrown out every generation or so in a major paradigm shift.
Then, there’s the fact that different scientists propose and argue competing hypotheses, with some being sponsored by interest groups and so prone to turning out unreliable research.
Think that sounds like some conspiracy theory? All you need to do is to look back to the 1950’s where various scientists, sponsored by the tobacco industry, released papers and statements claiming that smoking was a harmless pastime.
Or, consider how throughout the ’80s and ’90s butter was seen as evil because of its high saturated fat content, while margarine was promoted. Only for the general consensus today to be that margarine is deeply unhealthy. In fact, these days you’ll find many scientists and, more importantly, news publications quoting scientists, saying that low-carb high-fat diets are the right way to go.
So, if you can’t reliably base all of your health decisions around scientific research, what can you base them around? Well, one option could be tradition.
Author Nassim Nicholas Taleb has suggested in his writings that traditions are, essentially, heuristics for success. That is to say, they typically represent strategies that have endured over time, because they proved effective and useful for the survival of the groups who followed them.
A particular diet that’s been around in an exceptionally healthy part of the world for a thousand years, for example, has been “time-tested” and may well be a better health reference point for you to follow than the latest media report on the latest scientific article.
Relax, but don’t take things too “easy” — understand the principle of hormesis
Part of the principle of balance mentioned above is, of course, getting adequate rest, which is a very important bit of advice in a time when people are all too often working around the clock, stressed about personal and professional environments, not getting enough sleep, and so on.
Be mindful, though, that the opposite side of the coin in the balance equation is that you need to do enough of the hard and “stressful” stuff too, just as long as the stress in question is the “good” kind of stress.
There’s a concept known as “hormesis” which refers to the way in which the body can develop in some positive way, as a result of adapting to a particular stress in the environment. If you exercise within reason, for example, you’re stressing the body — but you’re stressing it in such a way that it will repair itself and be stronger and better conditioned as a result.
Hormesis is thought to apply in various other ways as well. Athletes who train at higher altitudes where the oxygen content of the air is thinner, develop more red blood cells to compensate, and so become better athletes when performing at ground level.
To be as healthy as possible, you’ve got to embrace bits of positive stress into your life. Just don’t become too imbalanced.
Be willing to experiment to discover what works for you
There are many different suggestions on finding the path for optimum health that may work for given individuals, or that may not. Some people swear that switching to a high-carb, low-fat, low-protein vegan diet changed their lives for the better in every conceivable way. Other people insist just as fervently that eating vegan ruined their health, and they thrive instead on high-fat, moderate-protein, low-carb ketogenic diets.
Who is “right?” well, why not both of them? There is research supporting the benefits of both diets in different contexts, for particular conditions.
The bottom line is that we’re all different, and the way our bodies react to certain habits, diets, or types of exercise, will inevitably have quite a lot to do with your own particular nuanced circumstances.
Keeping that in mind, it’s pretty clear that the only reasonable way to proceed when identifying the best health practices for you, is to try different things out and see how they affect you. Refer to tradition, popular trends, and plausible sounding ideas and articles in order to identify strategies and techniques that you’d like to explore — and then, explore them yourself and see how each makes you feel.
If you find that you feel terrible after each jogging session, try cycling. If you can’t handle weightlifting, give yoga a shot. Keep a journal at hand, and record your experience with different techniques in it.