What is Health?
Being Healthy has different ideas to different people and it’s a mine field of confusion and conflicting ideas.
I’ll try to make a little more sense of what health is and how to build your health. Keep in mind that being healthy and or doing things to make you healthy doesn’t always mean your healthy.
Below are the things that I believe contribute to health.
Body Mass Index (BMI)
Having a healthy body mass Index or Weight (kg) divided by Height (metres) squared. There is obviously a lot of arguments that body fat is a better measure and I agree to some extent, but in the end all our organs need to function with our body mass and having a BMI between around 20 to 25 is a good start.
The contribution that body mass index makes to health comes down to many factors including reducing the risk of the following diseases.
Blood Pressure
Cholesterol
Cancer
Diabetes
Heart Disease
Chronic Kidney Disease
Metabolic disease
The risk of all of these diseases above can be reduced just by maintaining a healthy BMI. At a healthy BMI the risk of any of these inflammatory illnesses is much lower.
Exercise
Exercise is not just great for maintaining a healthy body weight.
Exercise also stimulates your body to recover and not just from exercise but also cellular reproduction in all cells of the body.
Hormonal regulation is another advantage of exercise. Obviously as we get older our hormones change but exercise has been shown to stimulate the hormones that stimulate cellular recovery and are the hormones that are at a higher level when we are younger.
Maintaining muscle mass. A big contribution to ageing is sarcopenia or loss of muscle mass. Why is losing muscle mass such a bad thing? Muscle regulates your metabolism, helps maintain blood sugar, posture, body fat levels and many other positive affects. Maintaining muscle mass is a great way to maintain health. Exercise is a great way of maintaining muscle mass and maintaining or even improving health.
Resistance Training for Health
Resistance training in recent years has proven quite effective for;
increasing muscle mass,
reducing body fat,
reducing blood sugar levels
increasing bone density
increasing metabolic rate
great improvements in overall health.
As mentioned the effects of sarcopenia for overall health has been demonstrated in many studies of health in aging. Being active is good but resistance training is one of the best health promoting exercises.
We don’t all need to be body builders but increasing muscle mass or at least maintaining muscle mass is one of the best ways to promote health.
Nutritious high volume foods versus nutrient dense foods
There is a difference between nutritious high volume foods and nutrient dense foods. The difference is that nutrient dense foods are generally processed foods with a higher amount of calories per hundred grams, very little fibre and very little water. These foods include, breads, pastas, pastries, cakes, etc.
High volume nutritious foods have very few calories per 100g, a good amount of fibre and water per 100g. These foods have a lot of volume and are quite filling. These types of foods are fruits, vegetables. These types of foods contain vitamins, minerals and phytonutrients that help contribute to health promotion.
Unprocessed meats also contain more protein, less fat and the fats are also better quality unprocessed fats. Processed meats contain mor trans fats, more processed carbohydrates and generally have less protein per 100g.
Unprocessed grains and legumes are the best grains and legumes. These are best when soaked in water overnight before cooking. Soaking helps to remove certain chemicals in grains and legumes that prevent them from digesting well and causing gas and bloating.
Overall the best foods to eat are unprocessed natural foods like fresh meats, fruits and vegetables and unprocessed grains and legumes. Unprocessed grains that are soaked in water overnight are better For digestion.
Conclusion
In conclusion, maintaining a healthy BMI of 20 to 25 is the most important contributors to health. Then comes the consumption of unprocessed nutritious foods that are high in fibre, vitamins and minerals and less calories per 100g and more volume per 100g.
We cannot dismiss the role that exercise and especially resistance exercise can play in creating better health.
What are your thoughts?
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