How to make a decision about your health

To do or not to do

That is the question.

Health and Wellness is NOT about your diet or daily routine.

It is more about what goes on in your mind and how you make decisions.

Some examples:

Wants/Desires - Did you ever want or desire something so much that you overlooked things just to make it happen?

Fears - Did you ever fear something so much that you overlooked things just to try and prevent other things from possibly happening?

Rush - Did you ever want something so much that you rushed to make it happen before you had a chance to make sure it was safe and effective?

Peer pressure/Work pressure - Did you ever do something you normally might not have done due  to work/peer/social pressure? Or perhaps the opposite?

Life at times can be difficult and sh-t happens, unless you go through life constipated.

Butt, it is almost always better to think thoroughly about health and wellness decisions before deciding.

Do a bit of research.

Look at opposing viewpoints and see if they have any merit.

Try and understand the concepts a bit more to build your knowledge base.

If you think you have made up your mind, stop and play devils advocate for a bit and see if your mind changes.

I understand that it is far from a perfect world but this is your body and your life and it’s not like you can just run to Walmart and get a new heart, lung or kidney to replace the one you have that is not working well. You want to give your body a longer shelf life. You do not have access to trade-ins or replacement parts that work as well as the originals.

I have been at this health and wellness thing professionally now for over 30 years, but my interest started way before that. Every time I learn something and think to myself, “Now I got it. I know exactly what to do and how to do it”, something else comes along, whether it be a treatment or a process that makes me rethink.

I think that’s the key, to always be thinking. To never believe you know it all or know enough.  To always try and improve and learn some more.

Health and Wellness is about:

1- Knowing that what we truly know is much less than what we don’t know. So we just have to do our best with what we know at the time.

2- Knowing that health and wellness information on topics we read or hear about from educators are probably at best 50% true. The real issue though is figuring out which 50% is true and which is not before we jump and integrate it into our life.

3- Always question the “experts”. True experts want to always improve their knowledge base. If an expert on any topic does not want to be questioned, they are not an expert but more likely an “influencer” and is obtaining some gain from convincing or silencing you.

The American Diabetes Association (ADA) is an organization of “influencers”. Don’t let their professional title make you believe they are experts. Not to pick on the ADA alone, most professional medical associations today are influencers and not experts as their messages usually incorporate more marketing and advertising of sponsors than true health and wellness information.

One more example from the headlines why not to believe what you see or hear in the health and wellness side of media.

My favorite and most honest answer from experts is, “I don’t know. That’s a great question. I will have to dig deeper and think about that some more.”

So where should you start with your own health and wellness? Start somewhere after you have put a lot of unrushed and unbiased thought into it.

Try not to get stuck at first base.

So why did I write this at 6AM on a Saturday morning?

Well, as I am heading in a few days to a Conference where I will be hearing about both old and new topics, I have to remind myself of how I learn and how I improve my professional skills. I do this by hearing, listening, questioning, doubting and then doing all of the above over and over again before I decide to jump. I do this WITHOUT ruminating about the topics. I do this ONLY with topics that interest me, because then I know my brain will want to take a deeper dive for a better understanding. I do this because I take my job seriously and always want to improve what I do.

So in closing, if you want to learn more about health and wellness, stay tuned. I will do my best to send a few posts while at conference hopefully highlighting topics of interest to me and hopefully to you. I might even include a few pics of my meals, just to show you can travel and still stick to healthy food.

So my next decision now.

What should I pack for my trip???

As always questions and comments welcome.

-:/;;