Hi,
I hope you all are having a marvelous fourth of July holiday, with all of the festivities and fun times and summer activities. I had some thoughts this past week about the raging debate over the idea of installing universal health care in our country. Since this is a celebration of Independence Day, I found myself wondering what the founding fathers would have thought about the idea of a universal health care system.
I imagined that they would probably have supported it, perhaps with a few conditions, because in those times survival depended so much on people helping people. It does today also, even though many people may not be aware of it.
Whether we get universal health care or not remains to be determined, and it might be a long time before we find out. It will be an even longer time before it begins to take effect, even if it does make through both the House and the Senate.
So the question is what do we do now, in the meantime, especially if we don’t have health insurance, or if the health insurance we do have is breaking our bank account? Or the bank account of our employer, who may have to lay us off as a consequence? Everyone is affected.
One thing that stands out as obvious, is that you, as an individual, can decrease your chances of being sick. And in the process, you can be increasing your energy, happiness, and saving money all at the same time.
How, you say? By increasing your level of fitness, you can greatly decrease your chances of all sorts of diseases and other horrible things like triple bypass surgery or diabetes. You can actually take steps, no matter your age, to turn things around and decrease your chances of getting sick. By beginning a program of exercising regularly and eating regularly and eating healthy, non processed food, you will become more independent of the system to some degree. And isn’t this Independence day? So perhaps this is a good thought for this holiday. Or more than just a thought. Maybe the moment you really, really begin to take action.
I know what you’re thinking: I’ve heard all of this before Hal, and I just don’t have time to exercise, and I certainly don’t have time to go to the gym. I know you don’t have time. I didn’t have time either. I’d put it off until end of the day, but then I never did it. Then I had a traumatic event, which I’ll tell you about later, and it gave me a lot of time to think about this. One of the most striking comparisons I made during this time was this: Which is cheaper, a $400 per year membership at the gym, or a $40,000(or is it $400,000, to me either number is astronomical) heart bypass surgery? Which is less work, lifting weights and cardio for an hour a day, or, when you get a little older, having to go in for some kind of embarrassing treatment every few days? Fortunately, we as individuals do still have our independence and the ability to decide for ourselves. I think you can guess which choices I would recommend.
There is a wealth of information on the internet about fitness, but I will point out a few of them that make the most sense to me, because some of the diet fads out there will do more harm than good. Fitness is not about starving yourself. One of these sources is:

http://www.buildcontent.com/Copy-Three-Healthy-Habits-of-Slim-Fit-People-4242.html

The author talks about eating regular meals, moving more, and observing progress.
The one book that really taught me the most about fitness, as far as books go, is Tom Venuto’s “Burn the Fat”.
http://www.burnthefat.com/

It explained the science of how building muscle actually increases your metabolism and burns fat so much more effectively than just walking, jogging or other forms of “cardio”. It’s well worth the cost even if you don’t follow all of the steps.
You might be wondering, what does all of this have to do with saving money? It has everything to do with saving money, because if you are fit as an individual, you will have more energy to do all of the things it takes to save money, like cooking or washing your own car.
By the way, the traumatic event I mentioned above was a cycling accident that laid me up for about ten weeks, and during that time I became ever more determined to become more physically so that I could enjoy life to the fullest. I am extremely happy about my recovery from that event.

Have a marvelous Fourth.

Hal Merrill