Habit 8: Practicing health

Have you reached a milestone age yet? Say 40, 50 or 60 and asked questions about your life and achievements?

Questions like

• have I achieved my goals?
• where did my dreams go? Or what were my dreams again?
• what do I want to see happen in five years? ten years? or longer?
  

At milestone ages (multiples of ten), we evaluate our lives and what we have achieved [1].

When we ask questions about how far we’ve come and how happy we are with life, we tend to evaluate life domains such as family, goals, marriage, health and career.

But which domain leads to the highest ratings of happiness and life satisfaction as we reach milestone ages?

Research shows it’s out health and predominantly how healthy we feel, which is our subjective rating of how healthy we are that contributes to our happiness levels [1].

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0133254

Our health at the ten year increments makes the biggest difference between “I’m satisfied with my life” and “I have regrets and life isn’t so great”.

Most of us probably fall in the middle of these two responses, but I want to encourage you (and me) to make habits and choices now so we can say “my health is great and I love my life” when we turn 40, 50, 60 and beyond.

But how do we become our healthiest selves and have time for our responsibilities and the rest we need?

Why is it hard to prioritize this habit, even though it makes us happier?

We care about other people.

We love our children.

We need to work, make money and contribute to our world.

We’re busy. We’re responsible.

We have other habits to maintain so we can live our best lives. Habits like healthy thinking, living to our purpose and being positively productive.

Our best self holds us back from our even better self

Becoming and staying healthy is a challenge because there are legitimate reasons we don’t go for a walk, attend the local pool, eat veges and fruit or drink the amount of water on our to do list. it’s because we do care about our lives and we are living to the standards of our best selves.

Some reasons we might put our health to the side:

• Loving others so we put their needs first
• Career focus and demands
• Fatigue
• Time limitations
• Long work hours
• Kid’s activities
• Emotional concerns at times in our lives (burnout, stress, depression to name a few)
• Home tasks like cooking, cleaning, washing etc
• Staying organized, productive and fruitful.
  

These are all important and necessary, but our health impacts our ability to function in the above areas. Our health makes these demands more possible and enjoyable.

How being healthy builds our happiest lives

Our health habits now predict how happy we will be later on, notably at milestone years [1].

Researchers here looked at how satisfied people are with their lives when they reached ages of whole tens.

They note that people tend to evaluate their lives more at these ten year increments and health was the strongest predictor of life happiness and satisfaction, even more so than day to day happy emotions.

They did mention that positive emotions do relate to satisfaction with life, but less so when people take stock of their lives at milestone ages.

Why our health so strongly predicts how satisfied we are with life?

1. How healthy we feel determines the age we feel in our bodies. If we feel sick, we feel older and less content.
2. Our current state of health can be an indictor of the choices we made in the past (I add a note here of course not all health problems are caused by our choices).
   

Three mindsets for building the habit that makes you happier (and helps you stay happy)

1. View your health like and investment portfolio. I’m not a financial planner but investment portfolios are usually made up of a diverse range of investments to reduce financial risk and grow wealth, allowing the investment to take some ups and downs because it is balanced. In our health activities, we can add simple investments that add up over time. To start, we might choose to add a piece of fruit every day and a liter more of water to our intake. Over time, we are better hydrated and the vitamins and fiber help our digestion and energy. We might add in three 20 minute walks per week. This is a gradual improvement approach versus a sudden risky activity.
2. Look to the basics of health. As medical and health professionals, we know these basics but we’re inundated with diet books and quick solutions. Instead, what if we just ate more fruit, veges, healthy proteins and whole grains while reducing processed snacks? What if we walked outdoors for peace and joy? I’m talking to myself here too.
3. Make the firm decision to be your healthiest self as a priority to benefit yourself and your family. When we feel good, we’re happier and easier to get along with.
   

The ‘define, choose and schedule’ approach to greater health

1. Define what health is to you. This is how you want to feel. Where is your health right now and how would you like to be?
2. Choose the actions your will take each day and each week. Keep it simple and back to the basics of whole foods, water and balance of exercise and rest. (always take into account any allergies, health conditions and food intolerances you have).
3. Schedule. What would your ideal healthy week look like? Now you can block appointments in your diary. If you can walk once a week, this is better than no exercise.
   

Conclusion and disclaimer

I’m not a personal trainer, dietitian or doctor. But I’ve worked in the health and fitness industry prior moving into allied health. I’ve had some health issues myself and I always feel better when I come back to basics and simple plans for health. This article isn’t health advice that is tailored to your medical history, so it’s a good idea to see a doctor or health professional to take your history and make a tailored plan.

The goal of this article is to encourage you to prioritize your health.

As we get a bit older, this habit multiplies our returns of happiness and satisfaction with life.

Journal exercise

This is a question prompt to try.

Imagine you wake up tomorrow and you’re in the best state of health you can imagine. What does your life look like?

Sources

Miron-Shatz T, Bhargave R, Doniger GM (2015) Milestone Age Affects the Role of Health and Emotions in Life Satisfaction: A Preliminary Inquiry. PLOS ONE 10(8): e0133254. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0133254