What comes to mind when you think about health? Do you think about it as being in great athletic shape? Or maybe eating only fruits and veggies? It could be that you think of a million things all related to health – sleep, supplements, drinking lots of water, eating good food, etc. Whatever the case, I think you’ll find that health is about much more than the foods on your plate.
In today’s post, you’ll learn the true definition of good health, all of the different avenues in which you can be healthy (besides eating better), and most importantly, how to do it.
Let’s dive right in.
What is true health?
On my podcast, The Wellness Warrior, I start each episode by asking my guest what their definition of optimal health is. Funny enough, not a single one of them mentions eating healthy. Instead, they talk about being able to adapt to change well, being full of vitality and energy, showing up each day with passion and purpose, and removing the interference to allow the body to heal…
Why don’t they answer by saying, “eat more fruits and veggies”? It’s because true health is not just about the foods on your plate. It’s about being able to function at maximum capacity in terms of your mind, body, and spirit. It’s about being able to step aside and put trust in your body to heal and listening to the voice of your intuition. It’s about being able to wake up and literally jump out of bed excited to start the day. It’s something you should always be working towards and aware of.
Eating healthy is 1/13th of the puzzle
You might often hear the buzz word, holistic, in the health world which means an approach looks at the big picture – all of the underlying factors that go both seen and unseen. To be quite frank, being healthy really is a holistic ordeal. It has to do with every single part of your life.
At the Institute For Integrative Nutrition (where I’m a current student), they teach this huge concept known as Primary Foods. It’s everything that feeds you off of your plate:
- Spirituality
- Joy
- Social Life
- Relationships
- Home Environment
- Health
- Physical Activity
- Home Cooking
- Education
- Career
- Finances
- Creativity
Often times, you can be eating all of the right foods and taking all of the right supplements but if you’re out of balance in one of these areas in your life, you’re going to know it and you’re going to feel it.
The healthiest place on Earth
Eating healthy is a great way to bring health back into your life, but it’s not the only way. In one of my IIN modules, I listened to a talk by Dr. Dan Buettner, New York Times best selling author, journalist, and producer about the healthiest places around the globe; they’re called blue zones. Places like Ikaria, Greece; Sardina, Italy; Okinawa, Japan… communities where the people are not eating the healthiest foods.
They’re actually eating tons of fried foods, bacon, wine – everything that points to what we consider the opposite picture of health. So what is really going on here?
What separates these communities from the rest of the world is beyond food, it’s in the relationships, the history, the shared love. Families live in large units in which the grandparents, parents, kids, and grand kids live under one roof. The work they do is laborious and keeps them on their feet for long hours every day. They’re not worrying about counting calories, instead, they’re drinking wine with their friends and family sharing memories and laughs. The love is through the roof.
The elders are living upwards of 100-120 years old and it’s the authentic human connection that is catalyzing these longer life spans and higher quality of life.
The western world
Communities like these are so uncommon in the western world where technology allows us to all be so far apart, yet still “connected”. Not only that, but we have jobs that keep us sitting during the day and screens that keep us sitting at night. Having a real conversation or connection with someone is practically non-existent.
Luckily, things are starting to shift and Dan Buettner is actually transforming cities around the country to support healthier choices; he is modeling the behavior and set-up of those places like Ikaria, Greece.
As you can see, there is so much more to health than food. If you’re feeling hopeless with your health or you’ve tried all of the superfoods and supplements to try and heal, the foods off your plate might be the missing link. I really encourage you to start reflecting on each area of primary food that I mentioned above to see if something might be holding you back.
How to be healthy without actually eating better (the little known secret)
If your primary food is not in alignment with who you are and being properly nourished, then you will not achieve optimal health. What’s more is that if your primary foods are in fact properly nourishing you, the foods on your plate will also start to reflect that. So how can you start to clean up your diet of primary foods?
Little tiny baby steps.
Sometimes, it’s hard to start something new and maybe those 12 areas of primary food that I mentioned are quite overwhelming. You may be wondering where the heck to even start! There’s no perfect answer, but to not pick an area for improvement is the wrong one.
Once you’ve singled out an area to improve, take one little tiny baby step forward. If you want to work on home cooking and bringing more of that into your life, your first step could be to simply put a pan on the stove in the morning. That’s your action step. The next day, put the pan on the stove and then search google for a recipe. Don’t make it, just search it. The third day, put the pan on the stove, search google for your recipe, then get the ingredients ready.
I know, this sounds so incredibly dumb, but the power in little tiny baby steps is in the fact that they are so easy. Rather than feeling overwhelmed by figuring out what to cook (10 min), whether or not you have the ingredients(10 min), then actually cooking (30 min), you have no room to complain or avoid putting a pan on the stove (5 seconds). This is a tool you can use in any area of you life to make big goals easily achievable in bite size pieces.
On top of that, there’s 7 more things you can do to get healthy without changing the food on your plate.
7 pillars to a nutritious life
#1 Drink more water
Adding more water into your life can be a huge catalyst for overall change. Especially for weight loss, research has shown that obese people who drank 2 cups of water before each meal over a 3-month period lost 5 more pounds than those who didn’t. That’s pretty huge. Even if your goal isn’t weight-loss, drinking more water flushes out toxins, keeps your appetite in check, and leads to a reduction in sugary drink consumption.
#2 Get good sleep
At 6 hours of sleep a night, your risk of obesity goes up 23%, 5 hours – 50%, 4 hours – 73%. Sleep is huge when it comes to weight loss and health of the body and mind. During sleep, your body enters a state of rest and recovery and your brain literally reorganizes and clears out clutter. If you aren’t getting proper sleep, you’ll feel bad, make poor decisions, and be more easily stressed. That leads us to number 3.
#3 Stress less
Stress is a major contributing factor to illness and disease around the world. The good news – stress can’t exist in a place where the relaxation response is being stimulated. Meditation, deep breathing, and focusing on the present moment help to keep you grounded and at peace throughout the day. Find as many places throughout the day to just take a minute and focus on your breath (inhaling in 5 counts, exhaling in 5 counts).
#4 Love more
As we know, love and authentic human connection impacts both your physical and mental health. Start being appreciative of those around you, even when things are going bad. Start a gratitude journal and write down things you love about yourself and about the world and about others. Send someone a gratitude letter. The more love you give, the more you receive and the healthier you’ll be for it.
#5 Nurture yourself
Take time for yourself. You cannot pour from a cup that is empty. You need to get rid of any shame or guilt around self-care and start saying yes to the activities that rejuvenate you and no to those that don’t.
#6 Exercise consistently
Exercising for long periods of time is not the way to go, especially if you are just getting started. 10-15 minutes is plenty for a workout; 3 to 4 times a week is great! What’s more important than actual scheduled workouts is consistent movement throughout the day. Taking breaks to stretch and walk around every hour, taking the stairs instead of the elevator, parking far away rather than up front. Take advantage of the opportunities to move.
#7 Live consciously
If you want to be healthy, structure your life around your ideal picture of health. Don’t wait to be healthy, bring the thoughts, feelings, smells, tastes, and appearance to you. Make sure your home is clean; buy local and sustainable and Eco-friendly; add plants throughout your home to clean and circulate the air; organize and label items and drawers throughout the home; make a budget and get familiar with your finances; clean your refrigerator; keep your space and environment in top notch so that your physical and mental health can be too.
The most important thing to remember
Health is your own individual responsibility. Nobody in the world can give it to you – it won’t come from a doctor, it won’t come from the government, it comes from you. You get to make all of the choices. you choose what you eat, what you listen to, read, feed your mind, the people around you, everything.
Today, it seems almost counter culture to take things into your own hands. We always want the quick and easy way, the next secret that’s going to change our lives… and we look for these things outside of ourselves. It’s when you really start to look inward and focus on the host, focus on yourself and the choices you are making when you start to become free and notice transformation.
Once your realize you have the power, it’s like a huge weight is lifted off your shoulders and you realize holy shit, I can decide to become and do and look like and feel like whatever I want. It’s really that simple.
Wrap-Up
You now have an idea of what true health looks like and how to achieve it. The crazy thing is that you can make great strides in your health by not even modifying the foods that you are eating. Being healthy is a way of living; it’s a lifestyle, not a diet.
What area of primary food do you think you need to work on?
Did you learn something new in this post?
Let me know in the comments!
