The Picture of Health, part 1

So, what is the picture of health?  Can you tell by looking at someone whether they’re healthy or not?  Which of these pictures make you think health?  How do these pictures make you feel?

The first of these pictures is a supermodel, who most certainly weighs the least of any of these pictures.  The next two pic’s are of Molly Galbraith (http://mollygalbraith.com/).  In the first pic(upper right) of her she was at one of the lowest bodyfat percentages of her life, yet admittedly felt horrible.  She said about that pic “I can remember feeling like every inch of my body had been beaten, and was bruised from head to toe”!  (Read more about that here: http://mollygalbraith.com/2013/07/extreme-leanness-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly/) That doesn’t sound like health to me!  The next picture(lower left) is Molly again, at a much more manageable weight and bodyfat.  The last image is of a size 14 model which, as I understand it, is the size of the average American woman.  To me, this woman looks pretty healthy, yet our society might call her “thick” or even “chunky”.  From my perspective the two pictures on the bottom look more like “health” to me, than the two on the top.

That was an exercise to get you thinking about what “health” looks like, but mostly to get you realizing that “health” is much more than what we see with our eyes, and cannot be measured with one single measure like weight or bodyfat percentage.  Take for example the two pictures of Molly Galbraith…  If you saw those two side by side, you may automatically assume that she’s more healthy in the pic on the left, because she’s more lean.  For that matter you might think that the first picture of Molly better represents “health” than the picture of the size 14 model because she’s obviously more lean.  I hope the fact that she said she felt like complete crap when that photo was taken will get you thinking twice about either of those notions. 

So, how do we recognize health???  Previously, I talked about The Journey To Health and denying perfectionism on the way to health, but what are we actually striving for and how do we know when we’re there?

First, let me say I don’t think we’re ever “there”…  Aspiring to be healthy is a never ending story (not this one: http://youtu.be/3khTntOxX-k), and there is ALWAYS something you could do better.  That said I think there are ways for us to measure either qualitatively or quantitatively whether or not we’re healthy, and that’s what I’ll attempt to outline here.  What follows is what I consider to be some baseline measurements for health.  Do I mean that if you don’t meet all of these metrics you’re not “healthy”???  Well no, not exactly.  I would say that you should me most of these metrics, and more importantly you should know which ones you meet and don’t meet.  Because after all, knowing IS half the battle!  A big piece of the healthfulness puzzle is understanding what areas you need to improve on.  Understanding your strengths and weaknesses, and addressing those weaknesses in a systematic fashion is what we should all strive to do.  I think we can all agree that this approach is a lot better than making some vague and/or unreachable new years resolution every year, then failing to follow through.  Or worse yet, just never addressing what’s wrong with us, and continuing to live blind (and without health).

So without further a due, here is the first half of my very basic list of health markers:

Qualitative Measures:

• Proper Exercise: Do you get regular (3+ times per week) exercise?  Do you move regularly (ie-walking, playing, etc.)?  If you exercise regularly, do you make sure to get enough quality rest to recover properly between sessions?  Are you keeping some athletic skills polished (ie- sports skills, gymnastic skills, etc.)?  To be able to check this box, you need to answer yes to all of these questions.  Here’s some basic guidelines:
• Exercising enough, but not too much: More 2 days/week; less than 7
• Lots of low intensity movement: Walking or other slow movement 5+ days/week for 30+ minutes
• Some strength training: Between 2 and 5 strength training session/week
• Some high intensity training: Between .5 and 4 high intensity sessions/week
• Proper recovery: this has many pieces including sleep, diet, and mobility covered elsewhere in this article; here I’ll just say you should take at least 1 day off/week, and more days will be needed if those other things aren’t dialed.
• Maintaining adequate strength: 5 pushups, 35 air squats, ¾ bodyweight deadlift, and 1 pullup are the minimums
• Aerobic capacity: Jog a mile in 10 minutes or less
• Skill: Maintain some sort of sport-specific skill whether it’s golf, bowling, softball, skiing, or otherwise at an average (or above) level.
• For more information on this topic: http://chriskresser.com/9-steps-to-perfect-health-7-move-like-your-ancestors

• Proper Eating:  Do you eat mostly proteins and veggies?  Is it rare for you to eat processed food from a box or package?  Do you mostly keep sugar, grains, and alcohol out of your diet?  To be able to check this box, you need to answer yes to all of these questions.  Here’s some basic guidelines:
• Diet of whole foods: Lots of lean protein, lots of veggies, some fruits, some good fats, cheats and treats (processed foods, sugar, grains, alcohol) are 20% of your intake or less.
• Eating enough, but not too much: when eating a diet of whole foods, most people can just eat until they’re full and not overeat; when cheating or enjoying treats we should be conscious of not overeating.
• For more information on this topic: http://robbwolf.com/what-is-the-paleo-diet/

• Healthy Sleep:
• Sleep enough: 7-8 hours in completely dark room
• Aim wake up without an alarm clock (I know…I know…)
• For more information on this topic: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/the-definitive-guide-to-sleep/

• Healthy Joints:
• To call a joint healthy it should move in a full range-of-motion without pain; we should strive to achieve this with ALL joints in the body
• Adequate mobility: Be able to perform the duties of your life (job, workouts, sports, etc.) safely and without pain or discomfort, by maintaining adequate mobility (range of motion, and stability) to accomplish the required tasks.
• Perform “basic maintenance” on ourselves: Stretching, mobility exercises (next bullet point), and seeking treatment (massage, chiropractic, PT, etc.) as needed for maintenance.
• For more information on this topic: http://www.mobilitywod.com/

That’s my list of qualitative markers of basic health.  Again, this is by no means an exhaustive list, but a basic minimum we should all meet no matter our age or athletic ability.  In part two of this blog I’ll share my list of quantitative measures of health.  Look for that next week…

How do you like this list, and what do you think of these markers?  Did I miss something, or just miss the mark on something?  Please let me know what you think…