There isn’t anything I can tell you about the basic principles of health that you don’t already know. But just to humour you, here is a diluted list: eat real food and drink clean water, get a good nights sleep and manage your stress, develop close knit relationships, and exercise moderately. None of this is really all that profound. Being healthy constitutes doing seemingly basic things consistently. If you are consistent enough, you will probably enjoy a long, quality life. So, the question arises: If you know what you need to do in order to be healthy, why don’t you do it?
There is a case to be made that the abundance of information in the health and longevity space causes the player to become confused and overwhelmed. One PhD recommends fasting; another carnivore. Your neighbour swears by CrossFit, and on the other side, triathlon. That’s why your stuck: it all seems to contradict so you take no action. Generally however, if you stick with the basics, it’s very difficult to go wrong. The problem is, most don’t. We get distracted by the latest gadgets or ground-breaking exotic supplements. And then we get bored and move onto the next. Rarely we do anything long enough to see genuine progress.
“Health and Longevity” has been marketed this way in our culture; as the weekend juice cleanses, the
superhero workout programs or the 30 day supplement courses. While some of these may be useful
interventions for the right person at the right time, by definition, they don’t support longevity – unless of course, you plan to live off celery juice for the rest of your life. Something that encourages longevity needs to be sustainable because health is the culmination of positive choices made over time. You don’t get healthy in a weekend; just as you don’t develop diabetes over night. Your body is the best barometer for this. It directly reflects your lifestyle for better or worse.
For a behaviour to be considered “healthy”, it needs to able to be done long term. The second part of this equation is what is most important. Most spend too much time agonising over what is healthy when in reality it is quite simple, – as we have established thus far – and we forget to properly consider whether we can sustain it. Because if it’s sustainable, it’s probably healthy.
It’s only a matter of time before your body breaks down courtesy of your highly processed diet; or your knee blows out due to your overly intense workout schedule. Put these behaviours on a long enough time scale – even the seemingly “healthy” ones like the strict keto diet or the long distance running – and you realise they are unsustainable. True, you change and so should your behaviours: what was once sustainable is now unsustainable. But this implies you have developed the awareness to recognise when a transition is necessary.
This is not to say you should never compete; or go through periods of highly specific training or focused efforts. Phase these in and out, for these periods serve arguably just as significant a purpose. It is to say that if health and longevity are primary concerns, you need to look through the lens of sustainability. “What am I interested in?”… “What do I enjoy doing?”… “What can I sustain?”…. These are more appropriate questions in this context.
This is an article featured in Sydney Observer’s March 2025 Issue
https://sydneyobserver.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Observer0325-web.pdf
CHANGE IS THE POINT 