Health Can Be Simple
Health has, in many ways, become a tangled mess. Everywhere we look, there’s another “must-do”, “can’t-eat”, “quick-fix” or “miracle plan”. We scroll, we compare, we try, and often end up more confused than before.
The truth? We’ve never had more information about how to be healthy, yet many of us have never found it harder to actually be healthy.
But of course, however well marketed and packaged something might appear, no app or algorithm can actually eat, move, sleep, or breathe for us. No supplement can solve all our problems. Nor can more tracked data automatically make us feel any better. In fact, it can often just add to the noise and overwhelm.
Meanwhile, despite all this increasing awareness around wellness and health practices, rates of chronic illness continue to rise. The paradox is now pretty stark: we might know more, but we’re not often managing to do it.
And yet, the science is remarkably clear and consistent. Real, lasting health doesn’t require perfection or complexity. In fact, it’s still built on a handful of the most simple things. Technology might have moved on at a million miles per hour, but our physiology hasn’t. What our bodies need is remarkably consistent and unchanging over time.
These are concepts and ideas we’ve heard a million times before, like;
Moving regularly
Eating mostly nourishing food
Sleeping enough
Managing stress in ways that work for you
Staying connected to others
Avoiding what harms you (like smoking, recreational drugs or excessive drinking), and seeking medical care in a timely manner.
That’s it.
No bio-hacking, supplementing, or gadgetery required (unless you want to, that is). Just good enough consistency across all of these different areas over time. And that is the real secret to simplicity; no one area of our health needs to be perfect if we can balance all of them well enough. Everything in life and health is interconnected, and much like the spokes on a bicycle wheel, each area will help to support the others if they are all functional. One or two perfectly polished spokes cannot compensate for the remainder being ignored, broken or dysfunctional.
That means that a perfect diet cannot compensate for a complete lack of sleep and rip-roaring stress. Even if it is all super-food, organic, expensive and perfectly macro-counted.
A perfect exercise routine cannot outrun a lack of social support or a 20-a-day smoking habit. Even if you spend half your waking hours at the gym.
But a generally good diet, pretty regular exercise, enough sleep most nights, the odd good laugh with your friends, and a consistent way to offload the everyday stresses and strains of life can be hugely powerful. And achievable.
The foundations of health really can be this disarmingly simple, despite years of media noise telling us otherwise. But that doesn’t mean they’re ineffective. One large study found that following eight basic healthy habits (formed from a combination of the above), resulted in a 24 year difference in life expectancy compared to following none of them.
Simplicity over time can create extraordinary results.
And simplicity is actually possible.