{"id":23270,"date":"2018-11-09T09:29:31","date_gmt":"2018-11-09T17:29:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/?p=23270"},"modified":"2018-11-05T07:39:01","modified_gmt":"2018-11-05T15:39:01","slug":"healthy-aging-paradigm-shift-prevention","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/all-mfn\/healthy-aging-paradigm-shift-prevention\/","title":{"rendered":"Healthy Aging: A Paradigm Shift to Prevention"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a previous article about\u00a0A Paradigm Shift to Personal Responsibility<\/a>, I\u00a0set up the premise that the healthcare system is technologically driven and derives its results through partnerships with the insurance industry, government, pharmaceutical industry, medical profession and the hospitals that deliver services to patients.<\/p>\n

Given the\u00a0complexity of the system,\u00a0patients have\u00a0have to learn to navigate it\u00a0to\u00a0get the proper guidance, access and information from the right people at the right time for the right results. Moreover, the system is laden with traps in the form of\u00a0its many \u201chidden\u201d extra costs which means that going down the wrong route can turn into an expensive\u00a0mistakes. Therefore, I believe that people need to become educated on the value of prevention by living a life\u00a0that represents the core values of \u201cwellness\u201d and all that this word has come to mean over the past two decades.<\/p>\n

\"\"A Definition of Wellness<\/strong><\/h4>\n

In 1993, I prepared a presentation for the Association of Human Resource Professionals entitled \u201cImproving Health in The Workplace\u201d. I designed it as a proposal to encourage corporate managers to see the value and importance of prevention through the eyes of the employee in partnership with the company. My intention was to develop a \u201cwin-win\u201d model whereby the company enhanced employees\u2019 lives by investing in programs that would help create a \u201cworkplace health consciousness\u201d. This would assist people in making healthier choices thereby improving productivity and performance. The company would benefit in the form of fewer days of work missed and the cost of healthcare would decline as well.<\/p>\n

Needless to say, the presentation did not net me any new corporate clients but it did yield a couple of wonderful personal training clients. My thought process was focused on personal health and fitness services delivered on site, but being a single fitness provider the idea was probably too impractical to pursue. My presentation focused on the individual and its takeaway messages was:<\/p>\n

We are what we eat, we are what we think, we are what we do, we are what we feel, and finally we are what we believe.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

My\u00a0idea was that if we become healthy in our thinking and expression first, then our bodies will follow suit:\u00a0our new thought patterns will foster the\u00a0adoption of new attitudes and behaviors. This model is just as true today as it was back in 1993 because wellness is not fitness \u2013 it is a consciousness of health that is ingrained in what we value most about our life\u00a0and what that means to us.<\/p>\n

The Values of Wellness and Prevention<\/h4>\n

I think it\u00a0only fair to share with you my vision statement because it goes to the heart of why I am a proponent of healthy aging and believe prevention comes from \u201cwithin\u201d us as we focus on our choices\u00a0while living in the present.<\/p>\n

Healthy aging is a consciousness issue. It is not merely the death of our cells but is a complex and dynamic process that is grounded in CHANGE as life unfolds for each of us. The challenge, as I see it, is in discovering the potential that lies within us to become all we were meant to be \u2013 mentally, physically, and spiritually. This potential can carry us to living a life of fulfillment, peace, and prosperity if we remain PRESENT during each moment of our life \u2013 living consciously. Learning about who we are from the \u201cinside-out\u201d while acting upon our choices in the present, enables and empowers us to live a life of great accomplishment. This is my vision of a world that is possible.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I see now that what I envisioned for healthy aging will disappear in the world of the iPhone and other technologies if we do not become active players\u00a0in the\u00a0awareness of our own body and other sources that can\u00a0control our thoughts and other processes. The goal of prevention is to \u201ccatch\u201d the stressors BEFORE they create \u201cdis-ease\u201d in the body\u00a0causing\u00a0chronic\u00a0conditions such as cancer. The problem is that the tests and the other \u201cpreventative\u201d measures being used\u00a0today only catch problems AFTER they have started to take hold in our bodies.<\/p>\n

\"\"The Power of Five<\/strong><\/h4>\n

1. The Power of Thought:<\/strong>\u00a0Thinking is life. What we think we become. Everything in life evolves from thought. From this power comes our imagination, affirmations and ability to visualize outcomes. Dreams come from our thoughts.\u00a0Disneyland<\/em>\u00a0was once a thought in Walt Disney\u2019s mind. If we are staring at our phones over 200 times a day (which has been tested), we are missing out on our life\u00a0and the changes that are occurring right before our eyes.<\/p>\n

2. The Power of Change:<\/strong>\u00a0\u201cChange is the only constant in the natural order\u201d as one of my favorite teachers taught me back in 1982. How we deal with change and address the challenges that change brings, plays a key role in whether we can go with the flow \u2013 or remain stuck where we are. Comfort zones keep us trapped in the place where change becomes almost impossible to embrace, but if we learn to let go of the past and embrace who we are in the present, life becomes so much more rewarding. \u201cGo with the flow\u201d is the best advice I can give when dealing with ALL change \u2013 it makes life so much easier and rewarding.<\/p>\n

3. The Power of Choice:<\/strong>\u00a0Choice is the real point of power in life. We \u201cchoose\u201d every day of our life:\u00a0whether we to go to work, go to the store, play with our kids or plan our futures. The point of making choices in the present is to create what you want from your life \u2013 and in your life. If you choose your health you will become active without excuses. You will eat well. You will entertain uplifting and loving thoughts. You will express yourself gently to those you love. You will not demand but forgive. You will value your every experience and be grateful for your gifts. This is to choose life in all its wonder and potential happiness.<\/p>\n

4. The Power of Belief:<\/strong>\u00a0Believing in yourself is always the place to begin. Believing in your potential to accomplish great things and to make a difference in the world takes work but it is possible with proper reflection and thought. \u201cIf you can conceive and believe, you can achieve\u201d. This is true in all areas of life. Take responsibility for your beliefs and if they need to be altered or replaced \u2013 do so. Don\u2019t wait until you are sick and tired and finally unable to believe at all in something more than your own life. Affirmations, meditation and reflection in quiet moments are ways to check in on your current beliefs. If you believe in yourself, anything is possible.<\/p>\n

5. The Power of Consciousness:<\/strong>\u00a0\u201cThe mind of man is unlimited in its potential and responds to specific demands made upon it\u201d. This is another statement of belief I hold. I believe in opening my mind to new ideas and thoughts. I can create new and exciting ideas and some of these become realities in the world. This very piece of\u00a0writing was an idea that is now materialised in\u00a0the world to inspire others. My consciousness is one of hope and faith that I am being guided to create programs that will help people of all ages grow in consciousness so that they too can benefit from the ideas that others shared with me over the past 40 years.<\/p>\n

Living in the present is challenging given the world we live in and all the demands that are placed upon us. We are on call 24\/7 if we choose to let ourselves be taken in that direction. I refuse to let myself get taken into the world as Steve Jobs envisioned it. His world is not my world. I believe in the freedom to create my life by making the choices that are appropriate for me at any given\u00a0time. Make your choices consciously and respond to your life and the changes it brings you by not resisting them. Be open and receptive to them. Thinking is the key. Think \u201cthrough\u201d your life. Do NOT react to outside pressures. Only then you will be able to enjoy the journey. This is true prevention.<\/p>\n

Originally printed on\u00a0HealthyNewAge.com<\/a>. Reprinted with permission from Nicholas Prukop.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

Nicholas Prukop is an ACE Certified Personal Trainer & a Health Coach, a fitness professional with over 25 years of experience whose passion for health and fitness comes from his boyhood in Hawaii where he grew up a swimmer on Maui. He found his calling in writing his first book \u201cHealthy Aging & You: Your Journey to Becoming Happy, Healthy & Fit<\/a>\u201d and since then he has dedicated himself to empowering, inspiring and enabling people of all ages to reach for the best that is within them and become who they are meant to be \u2013 happy, healthy and fit \u2013 and be a part of a world where each person can contribute their own unique gifts to life.<\/em><\/p>\n

If you need help in designing a fitness plan, you can contact Nicholas Prukop via email at\u00a0runningnick@sbcglobal.net\u00a0or read his inspiring book\u00a0Healthy Aging & YOU<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In a previous article about\u00a0A Paradigm Shift to Personal Responsibility, I\u00a0set up the premise that the healthcare system is technologically driven and derives its results through partnerships with the insurance industry, government, pharmaceutical industry, medical profession and the hospitals that deliver services to patients. Given the\u00a0complexity of the system,\u00a0patients have\u00a0have to learn to navigate it\u00a0to\u00a0get the proper guidance, access and information from the right people at the right time for the right results. Moreover, the system is laden with traps in the form of\u00a0its many \u201chidden\u201d extra costs which means that going down the wrong route can turn into an expensive\u00a0mistakes. Therefore, I believe that people need to become educated on the value of prevention by living a life\u00a0that represents the core values of \u201cwellness\u201d and all that this word has come to mean over the past two decades. A Definition of Wellness In 1993, I prepared a presentation for the Association of Human Resource Professionals entitled \u201cImproving Health in The Workplace\u201d. I designed it as a proposal to encourage corporate managers to see the value and importance of prevention through the eyes of the employee in partnership with the company. My intention was to develop a \u201cwin-win\u201d model whereby […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":162,"featured_media":23271,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[54,134,193],"class_list":["post-23270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-mfn","tag-exercise","tag-fitness","tag-healthy-aging"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/162"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23271"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medfitnetwork.org\/public\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}