What's the absolute Biggest Health mistake we could possibly make?

There’s a lot of mistakes we all make in our lives. Some bigger than others. 

We passed on an investment that made a lot of money for someone else. (Think Apple or Amazon. Oh I wish...)

Or we didn’t take that trip of a lifetime we always wanted to take thinking we would get to it but just never did. And we've regretted it ever since.

But as the saying goes 'to err is human.' We can take some solace that everyone makes mistakes. 

However, there's one mistake that we cannot afford the luxury of making. It's the single biggest mistake any of us could possibly make because, if we make it, the cost is great.

And that huge mistake is this: Taking our health for granted.

No question, that can be the biggest mistake we could ever make because the potential consequences can be severe, and even life threatening.

Everything else we care to do in life depends upon that one thing: our health.
 

The downward slide from good health to poor health is slow for most people. So slow that, moment to moment, we don’t see it. But just because you don't necessarily 'feel' it, if you're not doing the things that promote your health, it's probably happening. It’s simply under the radar of awareness. So we just go about our lives believing all is well. Keep in mind that the first sign of heart disease is very often a heart attack. 

The Signs Are There

We might think everything is good, but the signs are usually there.   

Being out of breath with even a short flight of stairs or a little extra exertion. Or waking up with achy joints that at first come and go, but eventually don’t go away. Or low energy at work, or for the family after dinner. Just too tired. Maybe a little extra weight is creeping on, or your memory ‘isn’t what it used to be.’ Or you're just feeling old. Yes indeed. The signs are there.

You might be tempted to chalk it up to aging. But there are plenty of older people and whole cultures that defy our concept of aging. So, is it aging, or something else?

Gaze Into the future

A real eye opener is when we take a look at a few key health statistics. They can serve as a glimpse into our potential future.

And if you live in America and eat the Standard American Diet, and live the Standard American Lifestyle, or SAD/SAL for short, the statistics are YOUR potential future.

I say potential, because nothing is written in stone. Yet.  

It’s easy to see health statistics as simply numbers, not people. But they really are representative of everyday folks, people like you, me, and your neighbors across the street. We're in them. You're in them. 

And while we can rebound from that investment not made, and we can live without taking that dream trip even though we might have regrets, we may not rebound so well from a health crisis.

Prevention, Prevention, Prevention.

So it's far better to try to prevent it than waiting for it to happen and then 'hoping' your health insurance covers it or worse. The best time to treat a heart attack is before it happens.

In a great many ways, you have some say in your health. Diet and exercise are always the cornerstones of prevention.

But it doesn't stop there. There are also nutritional supplements, natural remedies, detox activities such as a sauna or using herbs, de-stressing techniques  and many others. There's a lot of options in the build your health toolbox. You just have to look. 

Someone has a heart attack every 34 seconds in America, and most don’t see it coming. But they might have if they had of looked at their lifestyle or diet along the way.

A heart attack or stroke, a cancer or diabetes diagnoses, Alzheimer's disease, or Arthritis and so many more. These events will radically alter the course of your life.

So I’m hopeful that you start picking up on the little daily signs that are hidden under a veil of ‘normal’ and seeing them for what they could be telling you and doing something about it.

Building health is not a side-line activity. It requires your participation.

A lot about health is choice and change, and doing the things on a day to day basis that support your body and your health. It's not always easy, but it's more than worth it.