Posts Tagged by balance

Last week, I asked you all what was, on the surface, a relatively simple question — How do you keep yourself healthy?

(Source)

…and then I disappeared on a mini-vacation and left you hanging…

It was a vague question, and purposely so. I could have asked what you did to stay in shape, how you avoided getting sick or injured, how you made sure your body got the proper nutrients, or what you did to avoid getting overly stressed. And I’m sure I wouldn’t gotten some great tips from everyone. But I definitely wouldn’t have gotten the wealth of information and the range of responses that you all provided. All of your comments were so interesting! (Have you read them? If not, I highly recommend that you do!) Because although I really was interested in what things you actually do to stay healthy, my true purpose in asking was to see how you defined that elusive word: “healthy.” Being healthy means something different to each person, and how you define health shapes what you do to stay that way.

I have to say you guys definitely didn’t disappoint! I loved reading all of your replies — thank you for putting so much thought into them! Most people touched on multiple aspects of health in their comments – physical, mental, and emotional – with responses about exercise, diet, relationships, reducing stress, and achieving balance. What I loved the most about this was that many of you talked about happiness, laughing, and maintaining fulfilling relationships as important things you do to keep healthy. These are definitely major aspects of an overall healthy lifestyle that are too often overlooked!

Interestingly enough, only one person actually brought up the fact that part of being healthy means avoiding getting sick (although Maria did mention getting her flu shot), which you’d think would be one of the most obvious interpretations of the question. Jen was also the only one who touched on the importance of oral health (though I wouldn’t expect anything less from a fellow public health-er ). But don’t worry, it wasn’t a test, and no one response was more valid than the others. The interesting thing was the diversity of all the replies.

What made this even more interesting was the difference between your replies and the replies of the individuals at my meeting. Although I probably should be honest and say that it wasn’t exactly a fair experiment. First of all, this is something we’re all used to talking about in the blog-world, as we read and write about the things we and others are doing to stay healthy everyday.  Secondly, the situation is a little different — I’m sure if we were all sitting around a table at the beginning of a meeting, our answers wouldn’t exactly be so detailed (or maybe I’m under-estimating all of you and they would be!).

Regardless…do you want to know what I noticed about those replies? With the exception of one person, everyone else said just said something that was related to physical activity. As we went around the room, one person after the other listed the type of exercise they did. And yes, even yours truly! No talk about foods they ate (or didn’t eat), nothing about happiness or relationships or avoiding stress, and certainly nothing about how to prevent illness/disease!

Why would the the first thing that jumped to the minds of a group of health professionals be related to exercise? I honestly can’t say for sure. Part of it may have been that the first person did so, and everyone else followed suit. And part of it could be related to the huge push in the public health world to find ways to get people to move more. But does it mean that all of you are just smarter than they are? (…maybe… ) I can’t imagine that all these people thought that the only way to keep healthy was to run/walk/attend spinning class. It was just interesting that those were the only things everyone chose to mention. If you have any theories about it, I’d love to hear them!

The one person who didn’t respond with some sort of physical activity replied in an off-the-cuff manner that she drank red wine, because she honestly believes it’s good for you and it’s about all she can manage these days. I suspect this may have been at least partially because she didn’t have any sort of regular form of physical activity to list off (or maybe she was simply trying to find a creative way to break the mold of our answers).

Anyway, I don’t have some huge take-home educational message in this post. But I do hope that it got you thinking about how broad the concept of being healthy is. We all have our own ideas about the picture of health that we are striving for, and we promote that through our actions (and our writing). Even among a group of individuals who are interested in health, you can easily see that there isn’t just one way to lead a healthy. And while there are obviously certain things you can never pass off as healthy habits or foods…

…there really are many different ways to get and stay healthy. The most important thing is to find the habits that work for you — the things that become part of your day that you look forward to, rather than dread. Or as Becky so aptly said:

I always thought staying healthy was inconvenient – too much work – and I come across many people who still feel that way. Oddly, my healthy habits have also become my passions. I love preparing fun dinners with local produce. I love the endorphin kick from a sweaty morning run. Healthy can be fun, too!

So one last time, I will encourage you to read through the comments and see all the different perspectives!

And finally, I will leave you with this slightly off-topic but hilarious bit by Jim Gaffigan about vegetarians and meat (confession: I have a slight obsession with him).