"You can't change what you don't know. So if you don't know how to be healthy and how to be well, there are some things that you have to learn. The seven pillars of health will really help you understand the things you can do something about and the things you might need a little bit of help with," said Michelle, who, along with her husband Mark, are the founders of a successful medical practice that helps patients from around the world achieve good health.
At the top of the list in the seven pillars of health is nutrition, which, according to Michelle, is the most important medical decision that a person makes every day.
"And that medical decision is at the end of your fork. And some of us eat three times a day, some of us eat three times a day and two snacks. Now, for eating 365 days of the year, that's a lot of medical decisions," Michelle said.
"And if they're not healthy and they are full of inflammatory foods, that's a lot of poor medical decisions. And you might find yourself in search of a lot of sandbags, like a lot of medicines to try to put band-aids on things that you need to do something about."
At number two in the seven pillars of health is sleep, and Mark emphasized that people need seven to eight hours of sleep per night. He noted that not getting enough sleep leads to sleep deprivation and builds up fatigue debt that can create more wellness debt.
"It is like trying to pay back the balance on a credit card. The minimum at a time, it just continues to expand and compound and it gets out of hand over time and so sleep is a big deal," Mark stated. Michelle added that not falling in line with the natural circadian rhythm means you won't get good quality sleep that aids regeneration, tissue repair and brain recovery.
The third health pillar is stress management. Stress, according to Michelle, is one of the main things driving people into the clinician's office, the doctor's office and the chiropractor's office. She added that when tension is so high, people come in with high blood pressure. (Related: What stress does to you: learn to control your stress reaction type)
"Now that's really not a medication deficiency. That's a lifestyle balancing insufficiency. We've got to learn to balance lifestyle. We have to learn to eat right. We have to get adequate exercise, rest and we have to manage that thing called stress," Michelle explained.
Dr. Mark pointed out that stress is going to impact sleep, the way people eat and the way they behave.
The fourth health pillar is movement, which, according to Mark, is not merely exercising or going to the gym. He said that movement means "working out every day to do something."
"And for us, it's sort of this thing that we do to control stress and so that we sleep better and then we eat well so that we can move well, sleep well and manage stress well," said Mark, who added that movement is a good stress reliever.
He also recommends 150 minutes per week minimum of dedicated move at something that you like to do, you can do over again and you can repeat often.
These primary four pillars of health, according to the bestselling authors and podcasters, are called the "core four" because people do have control over them. The last three health pillars are DNA, hormones and peptides.
Nutrition is CRUCIAL to healthy aging.
Proper sleep hygiene is a must, since your body burns calories even in sleep.
Do you need to sweat to have a good workout?
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