While I have been active at the gym this year and for the last six months or so, through the winter, my steps count is well down on what it was through the summer months. I wear an Oura ring which tracks the steps and it pretty much fell off a cliff as it started to get colder, from averaging about 8000 a day to averaging 5500. Now that it is warming up again though, I plan on getting out more in the garden and perhaps taking some walks. I haven't been much of a walker for many years mostly due to my legs, but now that the leg surgery recovery is mostly done, I will make use of the newfound capabilities. My legs feel quite strange in some way, but it isn't uncomfortable, just different.
You can explore what that means at the link, but I would suggest that none of these measures is really a good measure of health overall. As I see it, we are multifaceted across physical, mental, emotional and social aspects, so a "health score" has to incorporate all facets at some level. There is no point being physically fit, if the mind and emotions are a volatile mess. Similarly, life potentially isn't so great if mentally healthy, but in constant pain and emotionally empty. And then, without people to share life with, is there much of a point to life itself?
However, I think physical health is highly important, because it heavily supports the other facets of ourselves, enabling us to meet with people as well as helping our mood and thoughts. Exercise is a keystone habit which means it puts pressure on many other parts of our life and helps them grow, whether it be improving our diet, tiding our living space, or paying a bit more attention to the way we present ourselves.
But movement is in decline on average, where due to the changes in daily behaviours, we are moving less in the workplace, in the home, and when we are out. More and more we are sitting behind screens, sitting on couches, and travelling in cars, by electric scooter (still never used one) or just dialling for everything we need as we sit around the house in comfy clothes, because outside is so scary. And the less we move, the worth our wellbeing becomes on average.
I was talking with a guy at the gym a couple weeks ago who is there often enough when I am, and I help him move some weights when he needs it. He was in a fire burned him from head to to, is missing both legs, his arms are a mess and he only has a couple fingers on one hand. Yet, there he is, exercising, whilst feeling the pull of his skin that has lost most of its elasticity. While I don't know him well enough to discuss this in-depth, I wonder what he thinks when he looks at all the other people who are there exercising also, with plenty of them being very fit, and a lot also unfit. And what about when he rolls down the street and sees so many people who apparently have no physical reason to not exercise, but are severely overweight. I wonder if it makes him jealous, or angry, or perhaps regretful that he didn't take advantage of his own body more before the accident.
Got ’til It’s Gone
I am almost 100% positive that if I was to for example lose the use of my legs, I would feel regretful that I didn't use them more when I could have. And it goes for everything I assume, where I know I wish I had done more with my brain when it was more capable before the stroke. And wish I had done more exercise when younger, as well as eaten more healthily. Or invested more, or socialised more, or partied more, or studied more. But I didn't. And while I can't make up that time, going forward, I can take steps to take advantage of what I have available now, rather than regret it after the opportunity passes, like so many other things in the past.
Many people lie and say they have no regrets, because if they went back and changed something, they wouldn't have the things they have now. But, that is also a silly way to look at it, because if they never had the things they have now, they wouldn't miss them either. We all have regrets, as they are part of the human condition. Yet we don't seem to learn much a out the process of regret, where it is when we should have or could have done something, but chose not to for some reason. And each day, we keep making similar choices. They might not be big things, like changing jobs, but life is only made of a handful of large experiences. What counts are the millions of daily experiences that make up our life, all the little things and what we could do each day to affect our wellbeing through the tiny choices we make.
Like exercising consistently.
Eating an apple instead of a pack of biscuits, reading a book instead of watching reality TV, going for a walk instead of sitting on the couch, and talking on the phone with a friend, instead of staring at a phone screen scrolling. Little things that might seem insignificant individually, but compound together to over time, make our lives fundamentally better.
Just take a step.
Taraz
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