Health - The Right Focus?

If u get problems with your tendons or shin splints from exercising, eating raw spinach helps get rid of the pain. Even tho eating raw spinach is a sacrifice onto itself.

Interesting read for sure, sorry I can't add anything helpful right away. Might get back to it <3

Try to get a girl if u dont have one. Someone you can bang once in a while, that helps a ton.

Try team sports, usually that's much better than swimming/gym whatever. It has the social element in it which helps you not to get bored. When I do my 1.5km swimming my brain doesn't stop thinking about "problems" until I'm done like 1000 meters.
But when I play football, I never ever think about anything else than the game from the very start.

Look at how much calories the food u eat has. Keep it 1600-1800 a day + sport will help you lose weight without starving while keeping normal energy levels. Vegetables, fruit and fish are your friends.

Do things other than Poker/Internet, have some hobbies. Read a book, go to the movies, have a beer. That self-motivating thing is kind of crap is your lifestyle is boring.

Also, when I'm not in the mood, I watch comedies

Can you post some link. Cant find anything on tom holford on google, and yes i have similar issues.

Well there is more to health than just abscense of pain.
Thats true.

BUT
Guys in the health buisness (public health, health awareness, sports and nutrition etc.) must make money , too ( As an athlete and Sports Scientist with main focus on public health and individual health awareness i can tell u this fo shoe)
I think the modern view on health is mainly a nice thing to make more money and gain public interest

Reality is:
When u can do all your daily activities without any major physical or mental pain + there are no alarming physical or mental warn signals found by experts
= u are healthy

but that wont make them any money at all...so
they have great interest in people thinking they arent healthy

just my 2 cents

Very interesting op and a couple of good replies, good reading here

On October 04 2010 10:53 PplusAD wrote: Well there is more to health than just abscense of pain. Thats true. BUT Guys in the health buisness (public health, health awareness, sports and nutrition etc.) must make money , too ( As an athlete and Sports Scientist with main focus on public health and individual health awareness i can tell u this fo shoe) I think the modern view on health is mainly a nice thing to make more money and gain public interest Reality is: When u can do all your daily activities without any major physical or mental pain + there are no alarming physical or mental warn signals found by experts = u are healthy but that wont make them any money at all...so they have great interest in people thinking they arent healthy just my 2 cents

Thats the thing about definition of 'being healthy'. Your and National Health Services(NHS) in the UK definition is that if you can function normally without any actual diseases, you are healthy.

I think that I don't have to tell you that a person who follows reasonable glycemic load died will be much more balanced emotionally and physically throughout the day that a person that doesn't.
Just try it yourself - eat nuts, vegetables and and other low GL food for 2 weeks, and then eat high GL food like Mars Bars, white bread etc.. only. The emotional and vitality spikes are ridiculous with the latter (especially if you don't exercise a have high GL diet)
I know this 100% confirmed not from some studies but also from my own experience. I will get into this in my future blog posts as I go through the sections, but a very clear example is prostate cancer or Alzheimer - you are about 100x more likely to get one of those if you live in the UK or US than if you live in China for example. And there was a study that has proven that when a person from Asia moved to western society and adapted western style of life, the likelihood increased and went close to the western levels of likelihood to get those diseases. So the problem is with what we eat and do.

There also can't be any doubt that emotion and energy levels are directly affected by your nutrition, hydration etc, and that vast majority of diseases can be prevented, or their likelihood radically decreased if you have correct income of nutritients and your body is in balance.

As I said, modern medicine is not about prevention, its about disease management. And although I am still overweight, feel tired all the time and have those spikes every day, I am considered 100% healthy from NHS perspective. The society has accepted stressed, imbalanced lifestyle and nutrition as standard, and a person that is ill 3-4 times per year, is constantly stressed and tired falls into 'standard healthy' bracket, because thats just how everyone is, as you are considered unhealthy only if you need to go to bed and can't work for a week, or if you have some kind of serious disease (90% of health care costs are spent on last couple months in life.)

EDIT: And not just NHS, the society sees this as a standard, and even myself. Its normal that I have bloating regularly, that I had to take ibuprofen some 20 times last year because of headache or back pain, that I feel tired in the morning and stressed at work...This is standard and if you look at an average office, some 50% people will feel like this and still consider themselves healthy and not do anything about it...

And thats one of the reasons why poker is so attractive for me by the way. Who cares that you are stressed, or have problems sleeping when you work at the office. If you come to work, reach your targets and file reports and have a weak day here and there and low productivity after lunch..so what? Nothing bad happens except you are cutting your life expectancy and increasing likelihood of illness.
If this happens when you play poker, you burn half your BR and lose most win rate in those 'weakish' moments, and tilt comes so much faster when you are stressed or have a headache, or if you are simply tired.

8) Generate vital energy - the Chi factor

wat

Look at how much calories the food u eat has. Keep it 1600-1800 a day + sport will help you lose weight without starving while keeping normal energy levels. Vegetables, fruit and fish are your friends.

Good point and especially fruits and vegetables are important part of good nutrition. However, 1600 calories is ridiculous for anyone doing sports. 2000 - 2500 would be more like it.

On October 04 2010 12:12 auffenpuffer wrote: Show nested quote + 8) Generate vital energy - the Chi factor wat

Ask Tommy Angelo (and any poker mindset coach).
Not sure what the book says as I haven't read it, but think yoga, meditation, but even counting to 10 while taking deep breaths or staring at one object and eliminating all other thoughts. Its all about being able to let go of the 'brain noise' and focus on the reality and on the moment and be 'aware' of yourself.

Again its the part of definition of 'being healthy' as having a healthy body AND mind, and it seems vital to apply some sort of this in a poker player's routine (well it has been part of my routine for almost a year at least).

The WHO (World Health Organization) used to define health as the absence of disease. A long time ago they realized that definition was incomplete and added a bunch more stuff to it. It now includes a great deal more. In your rant you suggest that doctors and the health system in general don't care about their patients wellness. I beg to differ. It is highly recommended by almost all physicians that people exercise, avoid fast foods, eat green vegetables, and what have you. The fact that people are lazy as shit and do crappy things for their health is the not the fault of the health industry. It's the fault of human laziness.

Yes it is true that drug companies do some shady things. Yes it is true that their primary motivation for producing drugs is not your good health but rather their profit. However that's only one aspect of the health system in any country. In the UK correct me if I'm wrong - part of the universal healthcare system which has a flat price for most prescribed drugs. Obviously it won't include all drugs that can be prescribed in the world but certainly a large majority.

The point is taking care of your mind and body is not some giant secret. The knowledge of how to take care of yourself is out there. Getting appropriate sleep, exercise, and eating with a focus on good nutrition are all very important factors. Most people are simply too lazy or don't have the discipline to live a healthy life. They'd prefer to be lazy and unhealthy. It's not because the evil doctors are trying to keep them unhealthy. It's because the doctor says "you need to start exercising regularly" and fatty goes home and eats fast food 3 meals a day instead.