It’s mindboggling that, in the personal development niche, we hardly ever find ourselves talking about health.
Health is, really, the ultimate personal development topic. It’s the foundation for everything that you do and how you feel. So why don’t we concentrate on it more?
I don’t know. Probably because no one is qualified (I don’t know of any PD blogger who has an MD), and, really, health is a pretty easy thing to ignore. Most people hardly ever do things to change their lifestyle, especially when it revolves around health. Point is: for the majority of people, they either have healthy habits or unhealthy habits.
Before I give a few practical tips on how you can improve your health immediately, let’s set the record straight about your health.
Your health defines how well you want to live your life – before any change in mindset and psychology that you can do using the other information on this website.
As I said before, it is the foundation for how you feel at any given moment. Not eating a healthy, balanced diet will hurt your mood, your physical abilities, and your physique. Conversely, if you eat correctly and treat your body with respect, you’ll feel pretty good, nearly all the time (unless you’re tired). Take care of your health above anything else, or else you’ll suffer the consequences. Having good genes certainly does help, but you can be reasonably healthy, no matter what hand you’ve been dealt (unless you have some awful genetically-inherited disease, in which case, I am really, really, really sorry for you and wish you all the best in life; I don’t know how I’d be able to live with that).
Bottom line: treat your body with respect. Many of the readers of this blog are pretty young, and to you, I say this: don’t make your body take too much stress at this stage of your life. You may think you’re invincible now, but, as you age, your body will show you just how well you’ve been treating it. Just because you can get away with bad eating habits now doesn’t mean you should. You may regret it later in life.
I know a few people who treated their bodies right when they were young and now they look like they’re in their mid-thirties when they’re actually in their mid-forties. I’ve seen these things with my own eyes – and it sold me on the idea of being healthy from cradle to grave.
3 Ways to Improve Your Health Today
I’ll stop preaching now, and give you the top 3 things you can do to improve your health right now (as in, they don’t require weeks and weeks of dieting):
1. Drink nothing but water (and milk/milk alternatives, for the calcium): This one will be fairly controversial, but I stand by it. The only exception I’ll allow are green teas, since their caffeine levels are fairly low and their antioxidant levels are high. Anyway, you want to shoot for at least 3.5 liters of water per day (that’s 7 of your average plastic water bottles), and enough of milk or “milk”, like soy or almond milk, to reach your 100% RDA in calcium. I’ll cover your objections below:
- Coffee: I’m not opposed to someone drinking a cup of coffee here and there. What I am opposed to, however, is relying on coffee for that morning ‘pick-me-up’ that you need to function. That’s what’s called a caffeine addiction. And addictions are no good. We all know more than a few people who are addicted to coffee and need it more than anything in the world. Don’t be like them. Please. Don’t shortchange your life just because of an addiction to a drug. If you need a good, clean, morning pick-me-up, drink 20 ounces of water as soon as you wake up. Works as well as coffee without the crash, or exorbitant amounts of cream or sugar.
- Alcohol: Yet another controversial one. If you’re a moderate drinker, you can get away with a couple of beers here and there without killing your body. But, to perform at your peak, I recommend not drinking at all. Alcohol’s a toxin – while your liver can filter it out, even small amounts of alcohol can damage your body over a long period of time – and, as always, I’ll recommend staying away from it. Many people drink to lose their social inhibition, but the truth is, you can lose your inhibition without alcohol too. If your friends try to pressure you into drinking when you’re out, then you need new friends. I’d recommend trying to go out sober for about a month to a month-and-a-half, just to see what happens. If you need a bit of booze to loosen up, do so after that, but at least experiment for me.
- Juices/Smoothies: Juices are no good because they have a lot of sugar and no fiber to regulate how your body absorbs it. This results in giant insulin spikes/crashes, which you have to be aware of even if you’re not a diabetic. Smoothies are okay, especially if you make them yourself, since the fruits’ fiber will be retained. Rule of thumb for smoothies: blender = good, juicer = bad. (The juicer doesn’t retain the fiber from the fruit)
- Soda/Sports Drinks: Do I even need to talk about these? Tons of processed sugar, no nutritional value. Consume sports drinks only while you’re working out. Otherwise, nix them.
2. Establish a good sleep cycle: This requires a lot of trial and error. What you want to do is establish a consistent schedule so your body gets the maximum amount of restorative sleep per night. The catch is this: some people need more sleep than others, and do better if they sleep at different times (or their schedules demand that they sleep at different times). Some people function fine on 5 hours’ sleep, others do better with 10. During the school year, I typically go to bed around 10:00 and wake up at 5:30, which is 7 and a half hours of sleep. It’s all about finding the schedule that works for you. If you’re a night owl, go to bed late, wake up when you have to, and try to catch a nap midday. If you’re a morning person, something like my sleep schedule would probably work for you. Just experiment with different things to see which one you (and your body!) like best.
Once you find a cycle you like, though, be sure to stick with it!
3. Eat green stuff: I’m talking about leafy greens, here, like lettuce and spinach. Eat more of them – try to have a bowl of salad containing them at least once a day. You can eat them raw, if you so choose, as well. Baby spinach is my personal favorite, though buying spring mixes and the like works just fine too. I don’t know what it is about greens, but they just make me feel good (doing my own research, chlorophyll from the greens may be responsible for this). After eating greens, my body feels more relaxed, I get this nice “healthy” feeling running through my body, and I look better as well. That’s reason enough to start eating them as much as you can; I know that the effects of eating greens are not a placebo effect! Others have claimed the same effects from adding a lot of greens to their diets.
Also: if you do buy your own greens, please buy organic! They’ll be more fresh, tastier, and better for you and the environment!
What other tips do you have to immediately improve your health and wellness?
Hi Brett,
Good post. I just want to add that people may get sick while having healthy green leafy foods-to some extent, people’s blood types have an impact!
http://www.dadamo.com/
http://www.drlam.com/blood_type_diet/
http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=7894
I would say nix anything processed. The food is full of sodium (will make you retain water, increase weight), or sugar (spike your insulin levels, make you crash). Eat everything fresh or only frozen vegetables/fruits. Balance the greens with meat, fish, nuts (bulk, not canned), and some dairy. You’ll feel a lot better within a few weeks.
http://www.primalblueprint.com for more information about living on a paleo diet.
Hey James!
Absolutely! Avoiding processed foods has made me feel much better over time.
I’ve tried the paleo diet, but being only 17, it’s very, very tough to pull off. The unavailability of food that fit under it (in my house) and my insanely high caloric needs made me have to go back to a regular diet.
Thanks for the helpful advice!
You are very right Brett. From what I’ve seen, PD bloggers tend to avoid health topics. The thing is, without health, you have nothing! Your mind can’t be balanced if your body isn’t. I’m guilty too of writing to improve the mind. If your mind is right, you can accomplish anything, but it seems I tend to neglect the ‘body’ topic too. Having said that, I have dropped about 20 lbs using heavy resistance training almost exclusively, and even wrote a post about doing the same. You have reminded me to include the body more in personal development. Thanks!
Heya Steve!
Interval training is much, much, much better for dropping weight (seriously; I’m not being condescending). I’d recommend doing Tabata intervals for sprints.
Basically, go to your local sports field with a stopwatch in tow. Sprint for 20 seconds, full effort, then rest for 10 seconds. Sprint for 20 seconds again, then rest for 10… and so on until you complete 8 cycles. The whole workout’s 4 minutes but it’s very demanding and will get you dropping weight fast – much faster than typical resistance training.
Look up “HIIT” (high intensity interval training) for other training ideas!
Thank you for your comment
Agree completely, so today I had 2 scrambled eggs, 1 bisquit, 1 link sausage, didn’t eat the entire thing, salad with grilled chicken for lunch with oil and vinegar. Oh, just had a mini M&M peanuts. Working on 1/2 quart of water. Not bad. I don’t move enough is my problem. My weight is perfect although if I lost 5 lbs, I would feel a little better.
Hey Lisa,
Even though I neglected to mention it, I think exercise is even more important than the things that I mentioned. Make time in your day to do some exercise – something like running or swimming work great.
Sounds like you’ve got everything working well!
Thanks for commenting, as always!
This is good stuff. My favorite part is: EAT ORGANIC! One of the Grandfathers of personal development, author of a gazillion books and mentor to mentors, Mr. Paul J. Meyer gathered his top Executives together prior to his passing last year. They were doing a Q & A session. Someone asked, “If you were on your death bed right now, and you had one last sentence to share with us, what would it be?” His answer, especially as a devout Christian, surprised everyone. All thought he would get on his Christian soap box, but he didn’t. He simply said, “EAT ORGANIC!”
The other part of your article I wanted to chime in is the DRINK MILK part. This is controversial advice, but good advice. If I may, I would add, DRINK IT RAW! Same with your juice. Milk straight from a cow is like liquid gold. It is soooo good for the body. But once it is pasteurized and homogenized, it not only becomes useless to the body, but becomes bad for the body.
During the pasteurizing process, all the enzymes needed to ingest the milk get cooked and killed. This is why so many people are “lactose intolerant.” They just can’t digest the milk. But if they drink raw milk (straight from the cow) they will be delighted to see that they have no problems (at least most of them).
If you have not seen it, just as a side note, rent the movie, “Food Inc.” It will mess you up, but give you a good education. And of course, the movie “Super Size Me” was good too. But then again, we all know McDonald’s is CRAP!
CSH
Hey Chris!
Yup, eating organic has been a great way to feel better on a regular basis. Eating organic spinach always makes me feel amazing – I don’t know why, as I said, but it’s been a great move for me.
People also have a very difficult time finding raw milk because they don’t live near farms, and I haven’t drank it myself, but I’ve heard similar things about it. I’d recommend that people at least try it once and see if they like it!
And I find your claim that most people are lactose intolerant because of milk’s pasteurization a little dubious. What actually happens is that that, as we age, the gene that produces the enzymes that can break down and digest lactose stops working, since we don’t need it anymore after we’re past our breast-feeding years (our mother’s milk is the only reason we CAN drink milk). In some cases, people are “lactose intolerant” very early in life because the gene shuts off earlier. However, if we continually put dairy products in our body, our body will keep the gene active. I’m not going to speculate on how people who are lactose intolerant can drink raw milk without problems, but if I had to guess, it’s that there’s an enzyme in raw milk that can break down lactose.
Thanks for your comment!
I completely agree that a life without health is a life that is not worth living, but at the same time, I think that it is critically important to define what health means on an individual basis. For example, I do not consider health the absence of sickness or disease, but rather the ability to live in congruence while reaching for your full potential. Health is the degree to which you experience vitality in any dimension of life, whereas the dimensions are physical, biochemical, and psychological. These components need to work synergistically and are all inclusive when it comes to food, sleep, exercise, supplementation, personal development, meditation, etc. I guess that what I am emphasizing is that HEALTH is a choice and it is a way of life. It is impossible to reach for your full potential without addressing all three dimensions simultaneously and if one is not considered, then it is guaranteed that a particular area of your life will be unfulfilled. BUTTTT…once you are able to grasp this concept and then apply it to your life, you will begin to live in a way that you have never deemed possible!
Hey there Jared!
You’re right. For this post, I was just talking about our physical health, rather than talking about our psychological and spiritual health. A full spectrum of health will be covered in a later post.
Being in great health consistently is the reason I’m able to perform at my peak every day! I wouldn’t trade my health for the world.
Thanks for your comment!
Steve, yes the body (our health) is a critical component to our overall success. Jim Rohn taught, “people don’t do well, because they don’t feel well.” And, if we attract what we are, and we feel like garbage, it’s not going to be pretty. Truly, we are what we eat.
I think you forgot the most important effort of all: EXERCISE. At least a half hour, six days a week. NO excuses!
Matilda,
Depending on the person, six days per week of exercise might be too much. For example, I’d recommend that people who are going to the gym to try and bulk up only go three days per week, since the body needs recovery time to build muscle mass. For others, like true athletes, I think 6 days is optimal – it’s what I do year round!
(Oh, and I was going to cover exercise in another post entirely. These tips are quick ones that people can implement today, instead of planning their week around it!)
Thanks for your comment!
Hey man,
I talk about health quite often on my blog. In fact, I’ve spent the last 2 months working on a product that I will launch early Nov where I teach people how to create healthy meals. Stay tuned:)
The best meals are ones that consist of as much fruits, vegetables,nuts and lean protein as possible. No sugars, no artificial ingredients and no processed foods. That is how nature intended it and that is how are bodies are designed!
Like it that you’re spreading the health message!
Great stuff!
Diggy,
You’re definitely in the minority! I’ve seen your posts on it (ironically, your post today was on health!), but hardly anyone else I know devotes any significant time to it. It’s bizarre. Maybe we’re just in the best shape out of all the PD bloggers
Thanks for commenting, as always, my friend.
Looks like Brett had enough on his hands with this post without adding exercise to it. eBook maybe
You open up a whole new can of worms when you talk about health too. Now you have me wondering if that’s why PD Bloggers don’t do it as much 
I don’t know what they or that says, but I know the people in my life who are lactose intolerant and any age, who have had raw milk don’t experience the “issues.” They are very surprised.
Also, here’s a tip for getting raw milk.
First, a lot of states say it’s illegal, when in fact it’s not. In California where I used to live, I could get it at the natural market. Now, I live in Utah and it’s much harder to find, but I have a place in my small town that sells it, but I had to sign a waver that they keep on file.
In states where in fact it is illegal to purchase raw milk, you can actually buy a “share” of a cow, and since it’s your cow, you drink it’ milk!
I love, love, love it! Good discussion going here.
Hi Brett,
Taking care of our health and our eating habits is crucial. Eating fruits and vegetables helps us a lot. I used to love fast food and I still do, but I have cut down on eating it and now I have good eating habits. Thanks for sharing
Dia,
I haven’t eaten fast food in nearly a year, partly because I know it’s awful for me, and partly because I’m afraid I’ll get incredibly sick if I ever break down and eat it. Keeping it out of my diet helped me immensely!
Thanks for the comment, my friend
Hey, all!
Love the idea of attending to all parts of us when working on PD, and also the lively dialog in the comments. But… I’m afraid I have to grab that canoper for an XL size can of worms.
In my experience, “health” is an individual, personal thing, yet people seem to continue to treat us as if we’re all the same (and it’s not working well, either). In the medical community, this is sometimes referred to as “N=1″ meaning the sample or treatment group has a size of one. So, I would have to respectfully disagree with all of you. And here’s why:
• There is no such thing as a “normal” metabolism rate. (You can substitute other “rates” as they apply: pulse, blood pressure, temperature, height/weight, any blood test result… You get the idea.) Every person’s body digests, stores, and utilizes food at their own rate. Yes, a physician can tell you if you’re in an “average” range that’s been generally accepted as “normal.” Whether or not that’s healthy for you is a determination the physician can only make by examining the evidence: You. (For example, are you consistently gaining weight even though you’ve cut calories and are burning more by increased activity? Maybe have a look at that thyroid.)
• Didn’t you know you’d have your words come back to haunt you when you referred to people “([...] with awful genetically-inherited disease[s], in which case, I am really, really, really sorry for you and wish you all the best in life; I don’t know how I’d be able to live with that).” I’ve met some of those people. Wait a minute… I am one of those people. At any rate, we do what everybody else does. We work with what we were given. Some days what we’re given feels like a blessing and others not so much. Personally, my overall goal is to have more blessed days than cursed ones. I and those I know succeed just as well and as poorly, too, working with what we’re given. (Some might get a little PO’d with the “really, really, really sorry” part, though. It’s a pride thing.)
• Is your shape the same as your mother/father, grandmother/father, same gendered siblings, et al, at around the same ages? There might be more to genetics than you’ve thought. I know when my grandmother started pointing out these female family resemblances, I said I’d never be “that gross-looking” (said only as a tall-for-her-age and lanky pre-teen can say it). Then I hit 30. Then 40. One day, I was looking in the mirror at my mother, and her mother, and her mother. Then I turned 50 and saw in the mirror I’d grown a mole in the same spot as my grandmother’s with the same kinky black hair sticking out of it! But we won’t talk about that.
My point (and I have one) is to find out what’s right for you: your energy level, your commitment level, your willingness to make time for prepping all that fresh food (that has to be taken away from something else), your financial ability (fresh food’s more costly), your physical abilities, “etcetela, etcetela, etcetela. (Ha! Let’s see how many know that musical reference.)
Thanks for indulging. Didn’t mean to write a post.
Annie
Hey Annie,
-First point: absolutely correct. I have no qualms there.
-Second: I don’t think my words have come back to haunt me at all. I just meant that, if I were in that position, I doubt I’d cope very well, and I feel so badly for people who do have those kinds of diseases. I know everyone does the best they can with what they’re given, but that doesn’t stop me from feeling bad for them! Would you rather I have no empathy for them at all?
-Third, I don’t doubt that people have to do what’s right for them. All I’m saying is that we should make our health a priority, and in my opinion, people should be willing to spend the time and money needed to keep themselves at their peak, health-wise.
Thanks for writing such a detailed and involved comment!
The reason I don’t talk about health on my PD blog, is because I created an entirely different site devoted just to health and fitness.
Small technicality in your post, you mentioned drinking about 7 plastic water bottles of water a day. This is a good suggestion, except for the plastic bottle part. Plastic bottles, with time and heat, release BPA, which is linked to prostate and breast cancer, as well as elevated levels of xenoestrogens, which are plain bad news, especially for men.
Most people say, “But I keep mine in the fridge.” To which I say, “So what?” They are transported open in trucks, where sunlight releases the BPA into the water.
Much better to use Nalgene bottles.
I have a background in health and fitness and competitive sports, and in my experience, most PD bloggers who do venture the occasional health post have absolutely no idea what they are talking about and are generally about as fit as the general population at best. Their advice is usually based on whatever fad is going on in the industry at the time when it comes to either diet or exercise.
I’m not saying that about you, just a general observation. Cheers!
I didn’t say that you have to drink from plastic water bottles; I said that 3.5 liters is the equivalent of drinking 7 of your standard water bottles. I didn’t mean that you should buy 7 per day and drink them all! That’s expensive. At most, I drink three bottles of water from plastic bottles per day, and that’s very rare.
I’ll agree that most bloggers who venture to talk about health and fitness are probably no better than the rest of the population at large, but I’m an exception
Just thought I’d clear that up! Cheers!
I stand corrected my friend. It was very late when I commented!
Not a problem, Josh!
To your credit, my wording wasn’t the greatest and I see how it could be misinterpreted. I’ll go back and edit the post so others don’t get confused.
The best way for me was to make a plan. Make your own plan and resolve to complete it, and of course track your progress, somedays you might slip, and somedays you might win
Absolutely, Rosso! Making a commitment to healthy living made me step up my game, big time. After making the plan, the days where I won started outnumbering the ones where I lost quite a bit
Thanks for your comment!
Although I don’t class myself as a self-development blogger I do sometimes write about health issues. Here’s my post about why I switched to the paleo diet:
http://www.nomadicneill.com/blog/2010/09/17/interested-in-the-palaeolithic-primal-lifestyle/
I’d highly recommend checking out the paleo / primal / stone-age way of eating when you move out of your parents place in the future.
Neill,
That’s what I plan on doing! I already base as much of my diet as possible around paleo principles, but being an athlete it’s hard to replace the carbs I get from grains so I have to resort to eating a lot of them
When I do live on my own, I’m going to try and structure as much of my diet around paleo principles as possible, allowing for much less grain consumption. I still pile on the nuts/fruits/veggies/meat when I can, though!
Nice seeing you around here, man. Keep coming back
I think these are some great health tips, practical, simple and easy to habitualise. The main reason why people are so unhealthy today is not because they eat the occasional unhealthy food. Its because they have poor eating and exercise lifestyles.
If a person drinks a softdrink per day, that equals 365 sodas a year, not to mention all the sugar.
If someone always opts for fries on the side instead of a salad, imagine not only how much extra fat and oil they are consuming that time … but over a lifetime?!
The food decisions you make on a daily basis, is what determines overall how healthy you will be.
If you can change those unhealthy habits and replace them with healthier options, you can be well on your way to improving your overall energy and health.
Thanks for the post =)
Hi Brett,
You know I had this same thought to which is why I started really concentrating on writing about health related issues. I’ve talked about the Paleo diet, about exercise routines, and a lot of other things that are getting good traffic on my blog now.
There is a demand for it so its pretty wise to get some posts going about health.
Cheers,
Jeremy
Hey Jeremy,
Stop writing about health! I don’t want competition
(Just kidding! Keep it up!)
Thanks for stopping by
Hi Brett,
Lol! Nice one. Well let’s help each other out by guest posting for each other… What do you say?
Jeremy
Jeremy,
Since I just got in this writing position about a month or so ago, I need to focus more on building my ‘brand’ on this site before I start giving out guest posts.
Sorry, but thanks for your offer!
Let me know if there’s any other ways that I can help you