The Single, Most Important Thing You Can Change to Ensure a Longer and Healthier Life.

If we simply look at the stats behind the most prevalent lifestyle habits that cause early death, we have to come down on diet as the one most responsible for shortening our lives.

As this chart points out, the combination of poor diet with inactivity has now surpassed smoking/tobacco as the main cause.

Choosing to change our diet to one that is more plant-based with lowered intake of meat and dairy is most likely the one habit that will contribute the most to a longer and healthier life.

Check out the many excellent articles and videos on this topic available from Dr. Michael Greger at www.nutritionfacts.org.

There are those who would argue that exercise is the one thing that would have the most impact. I would argue to the contrary, but submit that the combination of a nutritional diet and a disciplined exercise program is the best one-two punch for a longer healthier life.

I can use personal experience to substantiate the claim that exercise alone is inadequate.

I smoked for 18 years until age 37 at which time I quit and truly became a gym rat, an exercise devotee. However, I didn’t change my diet away from the Standard American Diet (SAD) of calorie-dense, processed foods, and was not into fruits and vegetables. I became aware of the need for a diet change (with help from my Weight Watcher-devoted wife) in my late-50s.

Since then, it has evolved to a diet more balanced with significant levels of fruits, vegetables, and lean meat or fish. I’ve also reduced dairy, but confess that butter is still too tempting to avoid altogether. (I rationalize that by cooking vegetables in butter).

At age 73, at the suggestion of my primary care doctor, I had a carotid and heart scan simply as a precaution since I had never had one. Despite being in great physical condition, the heart scan revealed that I was in the high-risk category for cardiovascular disease(CVD) with the scan showing significant artery calcification.

Fortunately, subsequent nuclear stress and echo stress tests revealed that the calcification was “distributed” and was not causing significant blood flow issues.  Fortunately, my left anterior descending artery (LAD), commonly known as the “widow maker” appears to be clear. I am lucky – I can continue my six-day-a-week exercise and strength-training regimen.

But the message was clear. My previous 5–6 decades of naivete about diet and my generally poor eating habits had contributed to this condition. I’m confident that I have stopped the progression of the calcification with my diet change and with my exercise program.

But, have I reversed it?

There are some who claim that CVD can be reversed (see Dr. Dean Ornish or Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn). Their evidence-based positions call for going totally vegan. I tried it and found it to be too much for me. So I’ve become a “flexitarian” with reduced animal-based products and a diet heavy on fruits and vegetables.

You may have heard of the story of Jim Fixx, the famous long-distance runner credited with helping start America’s fitness revolution by popularizing the sport of running and demonstrating the health benefits of regular jogging. Fixx had a family history of heart disease yet refused to change his diet away from heavy animal-based foods, claiming that what you eat is irrelevant as long as you maintained a high level of aerobic exercise. He died at 51 of a massive heart attack while on a run. The autopsy revealed that atherosclerosis had blocked one coronary artery 95%, a second 85%, and a third 70%.

So, diet is where I would focus first if health and longevity is your goal.

Be aware that we are up against formidable foes in being able to maintain a nutritional diet. Our food industry doesn’t care about our health and produces mostly C-R-A-P (calorie-rich-and-processed) foods. The industry has done a masterful job of taking our taste buds captive with their creative combinations of unhealthful components – sugar, salt, and fat.

Plus, we love our restaurants where the calorie content is 20–40% higher and the sugar-salt-fat content is higher than meals cooked at home.

Put that together with a healthcare system in which doctors receive no training on nutrition and care little about what we eat, you see that we are sort of in this boat alone when it comes to sustaining our good health.

We can keep it simple.

1. Protect the liver,feed the gut. That’s the advice of endocrinologist, Dr. Robert Lustig, from his highly educational book “Metabolical.” More simply stated, he’s saying eliminate the sugar and increase the fiber. 
2. Ratchet up your exercise. Try to get to 300 minutes of aerobic and anaerobic exercise per week.
3. Find a purpose for your life. Don’t let loneliness and isolation creep in – they are killers too.
4. Never stop learning. And make understanding how the body and mind work part of that learning.

Not a lot of magic here. Put the odds in your favor with this simple plan.