Health Levers

Levers are few things that we have control over that affect a particular outcome. Here I'm thinking about health and I mentioned the following levers an earlier post.   

-Eat

-Sleep

-Stress

-Community

-Exercise

I believe these are the most important levers that have an effect on quality of life as measured by:

-Mental wellbeing (management of stress, anxiety but also excitement and positive mood)

-Lifespan (length of life)

-Healthspan (the area under of the curve of how we feel x how long we live)

-Mobility (lack of back/neck pain, ease of moving around in old age)

From here, there are a whole list of tactics to try an improve on all of these areas. 

-Not leaving sweets and beer around the house is a better strategy than "willpower."

-Fasting reduces caloric consumption (rules of no eating before noon and after 8pm)

-Eye mask/blackout curtains and ear plugs for sleep

-Leaving your phone outside of the bedroom (don't let it be the last/first thing you see between sleep)

-Easing into exercise (2min the first day and building up verrrrrry slowly over time helps habit formation)

-Meditation (one I do not do yet at the moment)

-Deadhang, up dog and down dog, camel and lunge/warrior are some of the best poses for mobility (spine, chest, hips are just big parts of your body)

-DL, Squat, Bench/push ress, Row are the best lifts for strength (body can squat, lunge, press, pull, walk and twist - and these work out 4 out of 6)

There's also a wholistic nature to health. Stress manifests itself in various ways such as overeating, abusing alcohol, stiffness in lower back or lack of sleep.