A Step-by-Step Look at Health As Something To Be Used — Part 2

This is a straightforward, step-by-step take on health as something to be used you can actually use. The aim here is to keep things realistic and easy to sustain. Let's look at what actually matters with health as something to be used, and what you can safely ignore.

The simple version

And it establishes a limit. When health practices begin to consume the very things they were meant to enable — the friendships, the meals, the travel, the spontaneity — they have exceeded their purpose. The instrument has become the object.

None of this has to happen all at once; even one small adjustment in this area tends to pay off over time.

Step by step

Health is the condition of being able to do things. The things are the point.

It helps to focus on what you can realistically do most days, rather than an ideal you can only manage occasionally.

What to do first

Worth keeping in mind: there is a question that health advice rarely asks: what is the health for? A body maintained with great care and never used for anything has been preserved rather than lived in.

If you remember only one thing here, let it be that steady, repeatable habits beat short bursts of effort. MedlinePlus, from the U.S. National Institutes of Health provides reliable, up-to-date information on this topic.

What to keep doing

The question is not rhetorical. It has practical consequences for what a person trains, eats, and rests for. Someone who wants to walk in the mountains at seventy trains differently from someone who wants a particular appearance at thirty. Someone who wants to remain useful to their family attends to strength and cognition rather than to a number on a scale. Someone who wants to keep working at what they love attends to sleep and stress rather than to a supplement regime.

A quick self-check

Having an answer also changes adherence. Abstract health — a diffuse sense that one ought to be healthier — motivates poorly. Concrete capability motivates well. Being able to carry a child on one's shoulders, to hike a specific route, to garden without pain, to sit on the floor and stand up again, to think clearly at the end of a long day: these are things a person can want, and wanting them makes the behaviours that produce them considerably easier to sustain. For a closer look, see cholibrium.

Give yourself room to be imperfect here; a missed day is an event, not a reason to give up.

Putting the steps together

Worth keeping in mind: this also reframes the sacrifices. Going to bed early is not deprivation if it purchases a morning worth having. Cooking is not a chore if the meal is shared.

Practical tips

In everyday terms, this can look like:

• Notice what works for you personally, since everyone responds a little differently.
• Aim for good enough on busy days instead of skipping entirely.
• Give any change a few weeks before judging whether it is helping.
• Keep the useful option easy to reach and the tempting one a little harder.

The bottom line

Take it one small step at a time. The best approach is the one you can keep going with. Start where you are and build slowly from there.