Life is brief. As humans, we’re tasked with making the most of the limited time we have on this earth. Realizing this, it breaks my heart to see people live below their potential.   Now, I have been in the healthcare business for 15 years and have seen miraculous recoveries in conditions ranging from low back pain to cancer.   In fact, I would argue there are very few conditions out there that do not have an example of a full recovery with nearly every level of intervention.

Unfortunately, most people hurry through life, never stopping to smell the roses and only decide to try for health after years of neglect. People will literally spend decades of their life abusing themselves, then are perplexed when they develop some disease. The frustrating part for me, as a healthcare provider, is that for most of us, there is no mystery to being healthy. In fact, I would say that most people know what to do, they just choose not to do it. Moreover, many of the conditions for which patients chronically endure are correctible with adequate lifestyle change and focused intent.

In my experience, being healthy is not a matter of chance but a matter of choice. For the average individual, your health at any given period of your life is more a reflection of the decisions you’ve made than fate or some form of destiny for illness. Humans are not built for illness. We’re built to be healthy. It’s what we do to ourselves that makes us sick.

You see, you have a near limitless potential for health inside of you. Even a basic understanding of health shows that your body is constantly repairing the effects of physical and mental stresses. Each and every one of us is under relentless assault. Our jobs, our homes, our hobbies, and our lifestyles are constantly attacking us. And, our body is constantly adapting to the assault.

So, why do people get sick? Is it genetics? Recent genetic research suggests that our environment may be actually changing our genes over time. But, does this mean that chronic illnesses are necessarily passed down? Does it mean that if your father and grandfather had heart disease, then heart disease is inevitable for you too? Perhaps genetics does play a mild role but I don’t think genetics explains the measurable rise in chronic illnesses in recent years. Diseases like high blood pressure, diabetes, asthma, and even cancer have been steadily rising in the U.S. for quite some time. The World Health Organization ranks the U.S. as 37^th in general health but I recently heard a statistic that said we consume 42% of the world’s pharmaceuticals. What does that mean? It means that the ‘solutions’ we are turning to are not making us any healthier. Could a more reasonable solution be that chronic illness is learned? I mean, your habits and attitudes about food, exercise, and lifestyle were learned from your parents, who learned from their parents, who learned from their parents, and so on. So, maybe “it runs in my family” is a less accurate description than “I learned about health from my family.” Break the cycle and live up to your potential.

We are becoming a reflection of the choices we make. They say you are what you eat. In a way, that is very true. They also say ‘garbage in, garbage out.’ I think a more correct phrase would be ‘garbage in, garbage stays.’ You become a reflection of the choices you make, good or bad.

Your body is a machine. Much like a car, for example, how your body functions depends on how you treat it. You can’t expect your car to run well if you only drive it every 6 months and fuel it with garbage. The same is true of you. The difference is, and this fact is lost on too many people, your body can self heal. A car can’t. Your physiology is designed to heal. When you cut your finger, you heal. When you break a bone, you heal. When you get the flu, you heal. So, why is it that when we get, say, high blood pressure, we no longer heal? Why do we stop healing when we get diabetes? Is it because you have some form of genetic marker that says, “Ok, at this age you will get sick with a chronic, incurable disease?” Or, is it more likely that you are no longer able to heal from this illness because your potential has been suppressed due to years of neglect? More importantly, is there now hope for you now?

There is a belief in the population that I have seen all too frequently, and believe to be incorrect, that being sick is part of getting older. What if there was a way to change your direction and restore your body’s ability to heal? I’m not talking about magic potions and hocus pocus. I’m talking about getting your health back by making a measurable lifestyle change. You have a limitless health potential inside of you that you’ve suppresses with your neglect and bad choices. What if you could get some of that back? Wouldn’t even a 10% improvement in your health be a huge win? Your potential for health is still inside of you. You just have to remove any obstacles to the healing process and rediscover your potential. Your body is designed to heal. It wants to heal.

No one has all the answers for completely restoring your health. Frankly, I would be skeptical of anyone making such a claim. However, having worked with thousands of patient’s in my office, I have found several consistencies in patients who have reversed their disease processes:

1. Stop eating so much junk – Your food is laced with poisons. From preservatives, to artificial colors and flavor enhancers, the FDA allows over 14,000 approved non-food chemicals in the food supply. Most of us consume copious amounts of these toxins annually. Remember, anything you put in your body that is not food is a poison. Your physiology is not designed to process artificial sweetener, additives, and chemically synthesized fats. It is designed to process carrots, and broccoli, and chicken. You need to eat food, the fresher the better.
2. Lay off the sugar – As Americans, we consume an obscene amount of sugar every year. Now, I’m not talking about apples and strawberries. Honestly, I’ve never seen a patient get to 300 pounds by eating fruit. I’m talking about processed sugar and refined wheat. Sure, we need a little sugar in our diet, but we shouldn’t be eating our body weight in it every year. Worse, much of the sugar we add to our food is highly chemically treated and concentrated. Not only does it contribute to weight gain and diabetes, but sugar is pro-inflammatory, leading to joint pain and fatigue. I’m not saying to be alarmist about it, but you need to know that if you want to stay healthy, refined sugar is going to keep you from that goal.
3. Get off your stinkin’ butt and move – Your body is designed for exercise. No, not the 30 minutes 3 times per week that’s been taught to us for years. How can you stay healthy on an hour and a half of exercise when you spend the other 166 hours a week largely sedentary? We are literally sitting ourselves to death. Humans are built to be hunter-gatherers. To that end, we are built for 12-16 hours of exercise per day. So, knowing that amount, is the exercise you are getting every day going to keep you healthy? Not unless you get in the game and get off your butt. And no, walking to get the mail or cleaning your house doesn’t count as exercise.
4. Enough with the ‘stinking thinking’ – If you want to be healthy, keeping a positive attitude is a must. We live in a day and age where we are constantly bombarded by bad news. So, stop subjecting yourself to it. You are what you think about. When it comes down to it, it’s not the circumstances that affect us as much as our attitudes about our circumstances. What I see in my patients, and research confirms this, is that happy positive people are generally healthier. So, turn off the news and enjoy your life. You’ll be happier for it.
5. You have to supplement – For years, we were told that vitamins are just a waste of money…that they don’t improve health. Vitamins were reserved for nutrient deprived countries to help prevent disease. Here’s a news flash! Americans are nutrient deprived. We’re overfed and undernourished. The reality is that many of us eat such a terrible diet, that we’re not getting all the nutrients we need to stay healthy. Worse, even the healthy foods we eat nowadays don’t have the same health benefits as they did 50 years ago because of chemical treatments and depleted soils. I’ve seen that my patients who supplement consistently are generally healthier in almost every way than patients who don’t.
6. Get adjusted – Physiology doesn’t lie. It’s impossible to be at maximum health with a corrupted nervous system. Your nervous system is in your spine and it probably needs attention. Do you really think that the mental and physical stresses we endure on a daily bases will have no affect on your nervous system function? Taking care of your spine and nervous system is just as important as diet and exercise to staying well. There is a reason that the number one disability in adults over 50 is spinal disorders. Why? Because fewer than 8% of the population has ever been adjusted in their life and less than 2% of the population gets adjusted for prevention. Our wellness care patients in our office don’t get sick often, generally sleep better, and are generally healthier than the patients we see who choose not to purse a spinal wellness plan. Get adjusted. It may make the difference in your health.

Don’t know how to get well? Find someone who does and listen to them. There are tons of healthcare providers and coaches out there who do understand health and still have faith in the body’s ability to heal despite huge obstacles. A key piece of advice that you must remember though: health is not the same as disease management. Health is health and symptom control is an illusion. Symptom free does not mean healthy.

Whatever you do, don’t give up on yourself. There is always hope. No matter how dire the circumstances, you still have healing potential inside of you. The question is: are you going to stand in your own way or are you going to make the changes necessary to change you circumstances? You have more power than you know. Choose to be healthy!