I always thought that physical exercise trumps nutrition. I can put anything in my body but if I am exercising on a regular basis then I could overcome the negative impact of the high food intake. I equated physical exercise, high running mileage in my case, with building stronger immunity. Covid proved all my misconceptions wrong. When I first knew that I had Covid back in Apr’20, my immediate thoughts were that it will pass like any other fever. I was witness to the rapid spread and mayhem caused by Covid in India at that time but felt that being physically active makes me more immune. Over the next weeks I was humbled as I huffed and puffed even to walk a few steps a day.

As soon as I was Covid negative my first thought was would I be able to run? Made the stupid decision to start back running few days after I thought I had recovered, which led to events of coughing up blood on few on my runs. I still remember the morning when I coughed profusely and spewed blood after trying to run faster than I could. This is when it really hit me that there is something wrong with my approach to health. I just decided to take a break and rest. Give my body and mind the space it needed and myself some time to think. During the next 10-12 months period I read extensively and did a course to become a health coach with an aim to understand what makes good health and how do you determine you are on the right path. I will use my blog to share what I learn. There are four principles which I found was a good place to start and ask yourself daily (How well did I do across the 4 principles?) to be on the right path.

Nutrition (Principle 1): I believe this is the most neglected but most important element for good health. We need to be careful of what we put in our bodies and how much quantity. There are few universal truths almost every scientific research agrees on. Doing these well means you are building the right foundation for your health.

Universal Truth 1: Ensure you include fruits and vegetables along with nuts, seeds and dry fruits in your diet every day. These should be the foundation of your diet.   

Universal Truth 2: Maintain a healthy combination of proteins, carbohydrates and fats in your diet. Proteins are often neglected therefore we should be more mindful on how to include protein in our diet. I will dive further into this topic in subsequent articles to discuss what a “healthy combination” means.

Universal Truth 3: Practice “Hara hachi bu”, a term coined by one of the world’s the longest living populations in Okinawa, Japan, which means eat until you are 80% full. There is a scientific evidence to this with time-lag of 15-20 minutes when we realize that we have over eaten. Stop as soon as you start feeling “I am getting full but maybe one more serving as I am not full enough and the food is tasty”.    

Sleep (Principle 2): There is enough scientific evidence to prove that sleeping 7-8 hours everyday is important for the mental and physical recovery of the body. Anything less than optimal amount for more than a few days has harmful impact on the body. Infact there are studies which have shown that > 8 hours sleep on a regular basis is also not good for health.  

Physical Health (Principle 3): Most people now understand the importance of physical health but normally associate it with cardio. A good physical health routine includes both cardio and strength training in a given week. 150 minutes of cardio along with strength 2 times per week is a good goal.

Emotional/Mental Health (Principle 4): This is the least understood element of health. Infact, I believe it governs how well we do in all the other aspects. Almost everyone has had those times when they went berserk eating (stress eating), or couldn’t sleep rolling in their bed or just didn’t want to go out for that run. This all relates to our mental state. Taking care of our mental state, asking yourself “How am I doing today?” in the morning isn’t a bad idea. You will be surprised at the responses if you honestly check-in with self on a regular basis. Rather than pushing self to go through the daily grind giving due respect to your mental state is important for overall health.