Today we are living in an epidemic of lifestyle diseases. Be it diabetes, high BP, arthritis, fatty liver, thyroid, cholesterol, obesity or even cancers, all of these have skyrocketed in the last 25-30 years. However, the interesting observation is that none of these diseases happen overnight. We do not wake up one morning with any of these lifestyle diseases. Our unhealthy habits are responsible for these diseases.
In the last six years of my practice, I have observed that health or disease is just a by-product of our habits. It is years of people’s habits — a combination of food, inactivity, poor sleep habits, and stress levels — that led them to their current state of health. Epigenetics — a science that teaches us that our genes can change by what we do — explains that whatever enters our body can either make our cells healthier or more inflamed. And there are only the following things that can enter our body — food and thought, and emotion. Hence, we should be mindful that every day if we take care of our food and thoughts, it is an opportunity for us to heal ourselves and become healthier than what we were yesterday.
The first step to start healing is to stop making the disease. I will share four simple lifestyle changes that can ensure you are healthy.
Switch non-real foods with real foods — There are either foods or food-like substances. So, biscuits, chips, packed items, deep-fried and maida — are not real food. They are food-like substances that can trigger more inflammation within us and thereby more disease. So, if we wish to stop causing disease, we should stop consuming them and start having real foods. Natural plant foods — like fruits and vegetables — have fibre, antioxidants, living enzymes, and tons of disease reversing properties.
Switch one hour in the gym to being more active throughout the day — The culture of sitting for five to six hours at a stretch creates insulin resistance at a cellular level. And insulin resistance has a vital role in ageing, obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer. Many people feel that if they are working out an hour a day in the gym, it's okay for them. However, there is a difference between working out an hour and sitting full-day versus being active throughout the day.
Sleep on time — One major contributor to poor health is compromised sleep. Quality sleep and sleeping on time are vital for cleaning the system and stopping the growth of disease. It’s just as important for our cells to clean themselves out and clear away debris. And the majority of cleaning happens while we are sleeping. When people have compromised sleep, their body is not cleaning itself the way it should be, leading to more disease and poor health.
Live in gratitude and happiness throughout the day — Like poor sleep, another major reason for an increase in lifestyle diseases is stress. As human beings, we have 70-80 thousand thoughts in a single day. And each thought has an emotion. We have just two choices. We either live in hormones of stress, fear, anxiety, or love, happiness, and gratitude. And when we live in gratitude, our genes are expressed more healthily, while in stressful situations, our genes express more proteins that will trigger disease.
In the end, what really matters is our habits and the way we live our life every single day. It’s a choice that we have to make.
(The writer is a disease reversal expert based in India. He is the Founder & CEO of Reverse Factor. To know more call 8100550660 or visit www.reversefactor.in)
