Our bodies are designed and operate based on the food and stressors we consistently received for hundreds of thousands years.
Recent technological changes over the past 300 years have allowed humans to scale dramatically (you can see it by looking at the explosive world population growth in the chart on the next page). In doing so, we have created some amazing opportunities to dramatically increase health span, but only if you actively leverage the latest scientific break throughs in a good way and limit the longer-term toxicity and dangers of our hyper industrialized society.
As a result of such stressors, Americans now spend on average $8300 on healthcare per year (versus $2200 on food). All of these toxins and stressors have created chronic diseases and instead of addressing the underlying issues, we typically just address the symptoms through pills. Alternatively, the Japanese well live five years longer than an American and they only spend on average $3300 on healthcare a year bit sorry fifty percent more on healthier/unprocessed ($3200 a year).. Given these new stressors and dynamics, it’s critical to be aware of things you can do (or NOT do) to improve the health of your body / environment.
One challenge though is that everyone is different so some of these action ideas will work for some people (but not all). The exciting thing is that there are now many trackers and metrics that you can use to measure the impact of your behavioral modifications.
We had lots of physical activity
We just sit at a desk
Overweight, sedentary, unpliable
Polar Vantage watches track cardio and strength strain and training levels
Our body was designed to be afraid of things like tigers
Now our body reacts to a stressful email the same way as a real threat
Our bodies are aging more rapidly because of chronic stress and fear
Meditation is great ( The biggest challenge with meditation is knowing if you’re doing it right):
The Oura tracks heart rate & HRV (which are the gold standard metrics for stress and recovery)
We ate seasonal, diverse, mostly plant foods and had a healthy gut biome
Now we eat way more corn fed protein, fructose, sugar, artificial sweeteners, grains, GMOs, dairy & engineered foods which our bodies can’t process efficiently & over use antibiotics and pesticides
Industrialization of the food supply and over farming has decreased soil and vegetable nutrients
I like Digbi Health to see what foods I need more/less of. Check out their sample personal nutritional plan
We would kill and feast on a mastodon and then not eat for a while
We also ate only organic, real foods
Now we eat every few hours and don’t give our mitochondria a break and fuel ourselves with bad food
Our body is over stressed and needs like how a computer needs p a reboot every once and a while by not eating. Plus the bad food fuel we are consuming is causing inflammation and aging
To do so, I follow the following fasting recipe:
*drink half your body weight in OZ in water with electrolytes & magnesium
*plus I put MCT OIL powder in black coffee or tea Or caffeine free fake coffee
Here is an ios app to help with fasting
We lived with a tribe and took care of each other in person
Now we are isolated and mostly connect digitally
More social media equals more depression & unhappiness
Every day I try to be grateful for friends, family and the little things in life (which inspires me to be a better person) through 5 minute journal
Pre Edison & electricity we used to sleep 9 hours a day
Now, we sleep closer to seven and have constant exposure to blue light
Increased weight from hormone imbalances, higher stress, poor sleep quality