Confused on what’s healthy? Just think about our biology

Time-out!

(After three days of some heavy non-fiction concerning atrial fibrillation, may I lighten up a bit, and have some fun free-lancing about health, exercise and genes?)

Here goes…

Good health flows from our genes.

Our brains focus,

eyes peer,

adrenals secret,

nodes depolarize,

ventricles squeeze,

valves open, and then close,

muscles flex, and relax,

bones propel.

No, this all isn’t a bike race.

It’s a man (or woman) 400,000 years ago…

surviving.

Now, there are twenty-somethings bent on making us healthier. Good on them.

The essence of their mission urges us to be our Greatist selves by living as our biology says we should. We didn’t evolve to slog. Rather, our genes hollar at us to go fast, try hard and even sweat sometimes. Ironman finishers and marathoners didn’t chase down their prey; they were too tired. It was the probably the crit racers, 5k runners and sprinters that fed the village.

Some want to write lots of words on the matter of high-intensity interval training. But modern-day twenty-somethings don’t feel compelled to just write about health. Youngers are known to draw info-graph the message:

For the buttoned-up and old-school who refuse health advice from twenty-year olds, this moning’s WSJ was also calling you to train harder.

So it is settled. High-intensity training must be off-the-charts good. For what else could be agreed upon by twenty-somethings, the NY Times and the WSJ?

JMM