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https://twitter.com/dallashartwig

One of the main (and best) things I get to do as an editor is advocate for our readers: What are they wanting? What do they need? Where are they struggling? How can we provide the insight, skills, and support they need to get healthier, happier, more centered and satisfied in their bodies and their lives?

Often, this leads me to scuttle all sorts of otherwise great content ideas (including a good number of my own): “That’s a neat concept/recipe/adventure/experience, but do our busy, stressed-out readers have the time, energy, and resources for it?”

Or: “That’s a nifty chart/list/download/interactive-thingy, but will it really help our readers in some way, or just give them one more thing to get distracted by?”

With every issue, our creative director, Lydia Anderson, goes through much the same process: “That’s a beautiful image, but will it inspire our readers or just leave them comparing bodies/faces/lifestyles and feeling bad about themselves?” Or, “This is terrific content, but without more white space, will anybody be able to see it, much less read it?”

Ultimately, every member of our team is charged with using similar filters to make decisions about her or his own pieces, refining concepts, copy, and images until they strike some magical Experience Life balance of beautiful/inspiring/exciting/fun and helpful/practical/realistic/worthwhile.

My editorial mentor, Dorothy Kalins, (founding editor of two category-redefining magazines — Saveur and Metropolitan Home), drummed into me a long time ago that the job of any good editor is to “serve the reader, serve the reader, serve the reader.”

To serve the reader, she told me, you have to know the reader. And to know the reader, it helps to have walked a few thousand miles in his or her shoes. In other words, it helps to be your reader.

That, I most definitely am. The whole concept for Experience Life came out of my desperate desire for a healthy-living magazine that addressed my real-life needs and priorities.

I really wanted to get healthier, but I was fed up with the bikini-body headlines, undoable diets, and over-the-top workouts. I was turned off by the airbrushed bodies, the exhortations to “Get These Thighs!” [big arrow pointing to someone else’s thighs].

I was bored by the blurb-length articles. And I was insulted by the implication that if I just got my hair big enough and my butt small enough, all of my problems would be solved.

What I wanted was a magazine that would address me as a whole, intelligent, complex, living being, not just a collection of perfectable body parts.

The fact that I got a chance to create that magazine is an extraordinary thing (giant thank you to our publisher and parent company, Life Time — The Healthy Way of Life Company).

The fact that I’ve convinced a bunch of talented people to keep on creating it with me for 14 years now is even more amazing. And the fact that each issue of Experience Life currently reaches more than 3 million people (wah!?) is freak-out cool.

The coolest thing of all, though, is that I think we’ve been proving an important point: Regardless of media trends toward aggregated, sensationalist pap, there are a lot of smart, motivated, health-seeking people who really do want and deserve something more.

Our readers want a dose of reality. Reality about what it takes to get and stay healthy in the face of unhealthy systems, messages, and trends. Reality about which “NEW!” breakthroughs and trends really matter, and which are just bread-and-circus blips on the continuum.

The reality I’m coming to terms with these days is that being truly healthy and happy in our current culture requires a sort of positive deviancy — a willingness to sidestep the so-called normal reality that is making so many people sick and crazy.

We created this issue in the spirit of noticing your reality and questioning it; in the spirit of reflecting on your life and experimenting with how you might evolve it to be even more to your liking.

If any of that interests you, be sure to check out my video interview with cover subject Dallas Hartwig, where we talk about some brilliant ways you can make your already great reality even better — starting now.

One of the first things you notice about Dallas Hartwig: He’s decisive.

This is a guy who is clear about his likes (strong coffee, good food, his custom Ducati motorcycle, and Cormac McCarthy) and his dislikes (inauthenticity, superficiality, junk science, and being told what to do).

He doesn’t mince words and he doesn’t shy away from debate.

Hartwig, 36, is even more unequivocal about his greatest love: his son, Atticus, age 2, whom he describes as “the best thing to happen to mankind since . . . ever” and for whom he says that he “would die a thousand deaths.”

The cofounder of Whole9 (a health-transformation resource with nearly 2 million followers), Hartwig is also the coauthor of two best-selling books, It Starts With Food and The Whole30, both of which present a flexible but strictly wholesome approach to eating — and living — well.

If Hartwig is decisive, it’s due at least in part to the fact that he’s spent a lot of time thinking, researching, exploring, and experimenting for himself — first as an athlete, then as a physical therapist and strength coach, and more recently as a health educator, functional-medicine practitioner, and sought-after speaker.

Interestingly, while he holds firm, well-researched opinions about virtually every aspect of whole-person health and happiness, and while he’s spent the last six years criss-crossing the globe sharing his views via seminars, conferences, and media, Hartwig says he isn’t particularly interested in “fixing” anybody, or telling people what to do.

“I’m a big believer in the idea that we are all individuals with unique circumstances and genetics,” says Hartwig. “I want to provide a framework that empowers people to find their own way, and to change themselves however they see fit. I’m offering a road map but not driving directions or one ‘ideal’ destination.”

We caught up with Hartwig as he was coming off the promotional tour for his most recent book to find out how he got to where he is today, and what he’s hungry to do next.

Experience Life | How did you get into this whole healthy-living thing?

Dallas Hartwig | I was raised on a farm in Canada without running water or electricity. We grew our own food. We got up when it got light and went to bed when the sun went down. I was outside all the time. My parents were vegetarians — Seventh-day Adventists who believed being healthy was a spiritual obligation. So I was raised eating tons of vegetables and had the basics of healthy living and healthy rhythms pretty much built into me. Later, as I learned more, I embraced a more Paleo-inspired approach to eating, but I think that early respect for my body — that taste for nourishing food and healthy-living patterns — never really left me.

EL | What led you to the perspectives and practices you advocate for today?

DH | I’ve always been interested in athletic pursuits, so maintaining a high level of health was important to me. I played volleyball at the national level — hard — and wound up doing some damage to my shoulder. When I got out of grad school and started practicing as a physical therapist, I realized that none of the interventions we therapists were using were working very well for injuries like mine.

At that time, I was still eating a lot of whole grains and legumes and low-fat dairy, all of which was considered conventionally healthy at the time, but then I read a research paper by Loren Cordain in the British Journal of Nutrition. It discussed dietary triggers for rheumatoid arthritis — which my sister had — and I thought, “Hey, if this kind of nutritional approach can work for arthritic joints, maybe it can help with my shoulder, too.”

I dug into the research and tested it out for myself, and got much better results than I’d had with any other approach I’d tried. I also started feeling better overall. So I started looking deeper into the current nutrition and lifestyle science.

It seemed obvious that a lot of the old assumptions about diet were wrong. To the extent that my PT patients, friends, and family were willing to adopt more anti-inflammatory nutrition and lifestyle changes, they saw improvements, too.

I saw an opportunity to make a bigger difference, to help people change their lives in healthier directions, and I realized that’s really what I wanted to dig into.

EL | And that got you into what you’re doing now?

DH | Yeah. In my heart, I really wanted to help people, and we just weren’t doing a very good job of that within our limited scope of practice as PTs. I saw that a more systems-based, lifestyle-medicine approach would be more helpful to far more people.

The Whole9 and Whole30 workshops started out as a sort of side hobby and wound up being a full-time career. More and more people kept showing up and getting these life-changing results from relatively simple shifts in their diet and lifestyle, and it eventually became clear to me that this was going to be a powerful movement.

EL | What do you see as the most common misperceptions in health and fitness? What are you out to change?

DH | A lot of people confuse looking strong and fit with actually being healthy. I’ve seen so many people who work out all the time, who might look like they are in great shape, but they have chronic inflammation, anxiety, aches and pain, sleep problems, and digestive issues. They are depressed and their lab values are a mess.

I also see a lot of people whose behaviors around their athletic and fitness pursuits are inherently unhealthy. They want to look a certain way or achieve an athletic goal to prove something or to win some competition, but they are just ripping themselves apart in the process.

EL | What’s one thing you’d like to see more health seekers do differently?

DH | Rethink their priorities. I often suggest that people prioritize nutrition, sleep, and activity — in that order. And their eyes widen. People tend to assume that exercise is more important than sleep, but in my view, until you are well nourished and well rested, most attempts at intense exercise are going to backfire. If you aren’t recovering and repairing properly, your attempts at building fitness will eventually become very counterproductive.

EL | Now that your book tour is over, what’s next?

DH | First, I’m looking forward to walking more of my own talk in terms of balance, recovery, and fun. Aside from that, I’m excited about moving beyond nutrition and fitness into the other key factors that affect health and a high quality of life.

That was really always the intended focus of Whole9, but the nutrition aspect just blew up. Which makes sense: For most people, the most dramatic healthy transformation really does start with food. But there’s so much more to healthy living than food.

So now I’m developing a podcast and other resources that will address that broader whole-life perspective. Because the reality is, we live in a world that’s inherently at odds with our DNA and our physiology. I want to help people figure out successful strategies for thriving in this challenging modern environment, and for becoming healthy and strong and sane enough that they feel empowered to make a positive difference for themselves and others.

Look at any leading health and fitness magazine, and you’ll probably notice a pronounced (and sometimes amusing) emphasis on time urgency.

“Flat Abs NOW!” has long been my favorite cover line (and it apparently rivals “Six-Pack Abs!” as the most effective sales pitch ever, because it is repeated religiously by publishers desperate to move newsstand copies). But I also enjoy “Blast Fat Fast!” and “Get Ripped Right Now!” and “The 8-Hour Diet.”

Such headlines are aimed directly at our brains’ impulse-purchase mechanisms. They prey on our natural tendency to want whatever we want right this instant.

The promises we see plastered all over magazine covers, advertisements, and product labels often entice our “wish selves” to buy into the notion of fast, dramatic change. And by doing so, they may trigger a momentary spurt of real-life “I can do it!” motivation.

The problem is, beyond wishful thinking, these right-now gimmicks rarely deliver much in the way of results. Because they don’t often get us any closer to what most of us are really after, which is a healthy, fit, high-vitality body we can build, keep, and enjoy for a lifetime.

Even though I’m not a fan of most quick-fix solutions, I do think there can be real value in certain “quick-start” or “springboard” programs. When you jump into a new nutritional or fitness regimen with a clear goal in mind — and particularly when you start getting satisfying results early on — that can (and often does) mark the start of a bona fide, lasting transformation.

I’ve seen this positive scenario play out in the case of well-designed elimination diets and detox programs, for example. I’ve also seen it happen in the case of smart, strength-oriented fitness programs where palpable results can be felt, and perhaps even seen, within a couple of weeks.

Whenever we start doing something that triggers positive biochemical, metabolic, cellular, and neurological change, the effect can be so dramatic that we decide, “Yeah, more of this!”

By the same token, whenever we stop doing something that’s been making us sick, heavy, and depressed, we may find that we very much enjoy the break from feeling chronically awful, and thus we find ourselves highly motivated to keep going.

That is when a 10-day “diet” or two-week fitness program can, in fact, become the entry point to a whole new way of life.

The key is to start where you are and then keep going — in a way, and at a pace, you can sustain. Because here’s the truth: There is no magic pill or silver bullet that’s going to spare you from having to make lasting change if what you want is lasting results.

Whether a particular program or intervention has any positive lasting effect ultimately depends not on any too-fast-to-be-true promise, but on you.

So if you want to create healthy change for real, here’s what I suggest:

Adjust your mindset. If your current perspective is something like “Ugh, I hate my body, and I have to find some way — any way — to change it as quickly as possible,” you are probably on a treacherous, side-winding path.

Why? Because that desperation will make you vulnerable to all kinds of quick-fix temptations — like wonder-diets, weight-loss pills, or overly aggressive fitness programs — that were never designed to be remotely sustainable, and may actually do you more harm than good. Before long, you’ll probably wind up right back where you started, or worse.

A better mindset? “I really want to look and feel better as soon as I reasonably can; I know I am going to need to change my life to make that happen, and I’m willing to start by making some smart, sustainable changes now.”

Play the long game. Even if it initially delivers results, the liquid diet or outrageous workout program you undertake “NOW!” has limited value if you’re not likely to do it, or something like it, for the long haul — which, even if you wanted to, would probably not be a good idea.

The lie we tend to tell ourselves is this: “Once I get the body I want (by any short-term, white-knuckle means necessary), I’ll surely be motivated to maintain that body with lasting healthy lifestyle change. Then I’ll get around to learning the skills and developing the discipline I need to put them in place in real life.”

But, from what I’ve seen, it just doesn’t work that way. And too often, that lie is what keeps us stuck.

So what sets you free? Letting go of your attachment to instant results, and instead committing yourself to becoming a healthy person in both body and mind. Ironically, the results of that approach will probably deliver equally fast results — results that deliver far better and more dramatic returns in the long run.

Adopt an experimental mindset: If you’re not yet ready to commit to changing your life forever, but you know you want to look and feel healthier than you do, consider running some short-term trials.

Find out for yourself: What does it feel like when I eat more vegetables, when I eat only whole foods, when I lay off sugar and alcohol, when I go off gluten and dairy? What does it feel like when I do some daily physical activity — gentle or intense, brief or prolonged? What happens when I cut back on TV time and get more sleep?

What I learned from experiments like these (even when I initially committed to following an experimental “program” for only a few days at a time) was that the more frequently I did those things, the better I felt, and the better I looked, the more willing I was to do more.

The more I adopted my most successful experiments as habits, the more satisfaction I took in my choices, and the more motivated I became to expand my healthy-living skill set and mindset even further.

My experiments in trying dozens of “Bikini Body Now!” diets and “Flab-Be-Gone!” workouts turned out to be far less rewarding. Most of them only led to disappointment and self-reproach — either because I couldn’t manage to follow them for more than a day or so, or because the results weren’t as promised, or because they just didn’t seem worth the crazy-making self-denial and misery involved.

Inevitably, after a few days of starving or overexerting myself to the point of pain and exhaustion, I noticed I was far less resilient and happy, and far more likely to boomerang back into my unhealthy choices and patterns with a vengeance.

Ultimately, Revolutionary Act No. 12, “Go at Your Own Pace,” reminds us of an inescapable and wonderful truth: Your body reflects your life. It reflects your daily habits and choices, your perspectives, your willingness to grow and change.

Becoming a healthy person for real means adopting the identity of a healthy person, deciding to make the daily choices of a healthy person, and then acquiring the skills and perspectives of a healthy person — at whatever pace you can manage. Now, and for the rest of your life. Amen.

Preloaded, stackable containers are key to the efficiency of this easy-to-make breakfast or snack. They eliminate time-consuming fumbling with multiple bags, boxes, and canisters — and they make prep and cleanup a snap.

You can choose any combination of low-glycemic fruits, berries, coconut, nuts, and seeds that you like. Switch up your selections based on what you have on hand, your mood, or what’s in season.

Start with a half cup or so of your preferred fruit in a bowl, then add each of the other ingredients in turn, restacking containers as you go. Finally, add whole or unsweetened non-dairy milk (or yogurt) to taste. Adjust serving sizes and ingredient ratios based on your appetite and energy needs.

Over the past few decades, we’ve gotten clear that the essentials of a healthy life include a whole lot more than nutrition and exercise. We now know (and science has shown) that sleep, stress management, and satisfying human connections are all crucial to sustainable well-being.

But there’s one essential we still tend to overlook: time spent in nature.

There’s plenty of research that demonstrates the biochemical, neuro-logical, and psychological reasons why exposure to the outdoors matters so much (read on for more on that).

But perhaps the biggest evidence for nature’s importance in our lives is our appetite for it (dubbed “biophilia”), and how good it feels to be in its midst.

I often reflect on how my dad, a city kid raised in the tenement jungles of Gary, Ind., learned to love and appreciate the outdoors as an adult. This occurred thanks in good part to my mom, who had been raised on a farm and loved nothing more than being around living, growing things.

Shortly after they were married, my mom introduced my dad to north-woods camping, and once he got a taste for the natural world, he was smitten. For the next 50 years, trips to the Boundary Waters–area family cabin became one of his favorite experiences — and ours.

Although my father was never much of an outdoorsman (he was more inclined to sit on a rock and read than set out on a wilderness expedition), he reveled in being outdoors, especially up north.

I have so many mental images of him just gazing out at the water, or turning his face up to the sky, eyes closed, and listening for loon calls.

Both my parents also loved taking walks, and they would often remark on the pleasure they experienced in just being out in the weather, seeing the beauty of plants and trees, noticing birds and animals scurrying about.

There’s this thing called “undirected fascination” that happens to us in nature — the experience of having our attention naturally drawn from one thing to another without any clear plan, purpose, or agenda.

It turns out that undirected fascination does great things for our body and mind. So does sunshine, of course (see “Here Comes the Sun“). And water (see “Blue Mind“). And being in the richly oxygenated environments where many plants grow and give off health-promoting phytoncides. (For more on that, check out the Japanese practice of Shinrin-yoku, or “Forest Bathing.”)

Basically, both our bodies and minds are hungry for nature. They soak it up like they absorb other essential nutrients, operating far better after much-needed infusions and throwing up warning flags whenever we aren’t getting enough.

Even if it weren’t for all of nature’s evident health benefits, though, I’d still be grateful to both my parents for instilling in me an early love and appreciation of the natural world.

Today, my mom and sisters, their partners and families, and I all live on the same organic farm. Until very recently, my dad lived close nearby, too. And it seems the sweetest times we’ve shared as a family have always been outdoors: coffee at the picnic table, wine in the garden, evening driveway walks, our hikes up the tractor road to see what’s growing, blooming, hatching.

The best part is just feeling a part of it all, feeling alive and right and connected to each other and our sense of place.

My father passed away this spring. Over the summer, we’ll distribute his ashes, per his request, in two locations: the farm and at our cabin up north. Dad was clear that he wanted to become one with the places he loved the most, and the places his loved ones loved and would always frequent.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. We become what we take in and experience on this planet. And what we take in, we eventually give back so it can become something else again.

Plant, animal, mineral: We really are all one thing — carbon mixed with energy and mystery and dark matter. As Joni Mitchell wrote: “We are stardust, we are golden, and we’ve got to get ourselves back to the garden.” Or, as the Bioneers motto goes: “It’s all alive; it’s all connected; it’s all intelligent.”

I think maybe that’s the most powerful thing about spending time in nature — that sense of returning again and again to a place we recognize and know that we belong. Here and now, today, perhaps forever.

Did you happen to come down with one of those awful bugs that were going around this winter? If so, you might recall not just how lousy you felt, but also how little interest you had, while ill, in much of anything except recovering.

Attending a community meeting? Volunteering? Cleaning up a littered ditch? Mentoring somebody? Calling your member of Congress?

Ugh, no. When you’re feeling sick, exhausted, or down in the dumps, it’s hard to summon that kind of get-up-and-go. Problem-solving and world-improving are probably not on the menu. Because as well intended as you may be, it’s probably everything you can do just to get through the day.

Of course, if you’re normally healthy, and just happen to get some bug that’s going around, you’ll generally recover pretty quickly, so this depleted state will be a mercifully short-lived phenomenon.

But what if you’re not normally all that healthy and energetic? What if we’re not talking about a 24-hour flu here, but rather a protracted case of the low-grade blahs?

What if you’ve been feeling baseline lousy, logy, stressed, heavy, or physically and mentally dragged down not just for a few days, but for weeks, months, or years on end?

A run of that kind of chronic suffering can be enough to make you forget what it’s like to feel really good, energized, enthusiastic. Or even to imagine that might be possible.

Unfortunately, that’s the semi-depleted state that most Americans are living in most of the time.

Right now, two out of three adults are overweight or obese. Nearly half of us are contending with one or more chronic diseases. And some estimates suggest that almost 70 percent of U.S. adults rely on at least one prescription medication.

In some cases, those drugs help us muddle through and keep scary symptoms at bay, but (as their advertising disclaimers reflect) their side effects and interactions can also undermine our health and the quality of our lives in a multitude of ways.

And then there’s stress, which contributes to chronic illness and depression, and has its own special way of making you feel that nothing you do will ever be enough — that you’re not keeping pace even with the basic requirements of your life.

If you’re feeling like that, don’t blame yourself. This is an epidemic that millions are suffering from. It’s a byproduct of the culture we live in. And that’s a big part of why, according to psychology researcher Barbara Fredrickson, PhD, only a small minority — about 20 percent of us — can be said to be thriving at any given time.

Of course, even if you are suffering and feeling lousy, you can still be contributing a lot and helping make the world a better place. But I bet you anything that if you felt better, you’d be able to operate at an even higher

level. You’d have more energy, clarity, and capacity available to offer with ease. Without it costing you or depleting you in any way.

Health, to me, is about that sense of thriving, that sense of surplus, that feeling that you not only have enough (energy, vitality, focus, strength, enthusiasm for life), you have plenty.

When you’re really healthy and happy, you may have so much, in fact, that you start looking for ways to give back and share it around. As I wrote in last month’s column (“Revolutionary Act No. 10: See the Bigger Picture”), when you get better, everybody benefits.

That’s what Revolutionary Act No. 11, “Be Part of the Solution,” is all about. It recognizes that in the context of the local and global challenges we are collectively facing, it’s going to take a great deal of energy, determination, creativity, and hope to solve the problems that want solving.

It also surmises that much of that energy, determination, creativity, and hope is going to come from people who can summon a surplus on behalf of themselves, their loved ones, and the communities they care about.

The more people succumb to chronic illness, obesity, and daily reliance on pharmaceutical medications for lifestyle-related conditions, the fewer resources they can bring to bear in improving their own and their communities’ situation. Economically, too, the more we spend on ineffective, stop-gap healthcare, the less we have to put toward other world-improving efforts and solutions.

With this in mind, I was excited to learn recently that Bernice King (Martin Luther King Jr.’s daughter) and the King Center have embraced an expanded definition of nonviolent social change that includes nonviolence against one’s own body.

That redefinition reflects the reality that one of the most pernicious forms of violence — especially within socially and economically challenged communities — now occurs in the form of chronic illness and obesity, which are experienced at record rates among low-income and minority groups.

Such health challenges and disparities pose a significant threat not just to individual health, but to the freedoms and life chances of whole communities. By continuously undermining our capacity and absorbing our resources, chronic health limitations undermine our ability to thrive, to contribute socially, and thus to effect positive change on our own and others’ behalf.

The good news is, we can change that. If you want to become a bigger and better part of the solution, here are some ways you can begin:

• Make your health a priority. No matter who else you are trying to take care of, and no matter what ambitions you have for changing the world, do everything you can to safeguard rather than deplete or sacrifice your own vitality, resilience, and well-being. You are a precious resource. The world needs more, not less, of the very best you have to offer.
• Set an example others can follow. You don’t need a bikini body and six-pack abs to be a health-and-fitness role model. The mere fact that you get out for a daily walk, or eat lots of vegetables, or drink water rather than soda could make an immense impact on the perceptions and choices of others without your ever realizing it. Health happens in community, and by example. That can start with you.
• Recognize that even low-grade illness equals oppression. To the extent you are feeling lousy and exhausted, you are not truly free or fully empowered. While it is absolutely possible to be chronically ill and also be a powerhouse contributor to positive change within your family, neighborhood, or community, it’s not easy. The healthier you get — even within the frame of health limitations that are beyond your control — the more easily you’ll be able to offer your best with grace, the more sustainable your contributions will be, and the better they will feel to give.

For more ways you can shift your body and mind in the direction of solutions that make you happy, see the “Revolutionary Reading” below. And keep in mind that it’s never too late to change. It’s never too late to put your body and mind on a healing track, and to bring the rest of your world along for the ride.

In his now classic book, The 5 Love Languages, Gary Chapman, PhD, lays out five ways that people express and receive love: Words of Affirmation, Acts of Service, Receiving Gifts, Quality Time, and Physical Touch.

According to Chapman’s analysis, my top language would be “acts of service,” followed in a near tie by “physical touch” and “quality time.”

Basically, this means that if you do something nice for me, give me a big hug, or hang out with me in some way I find pleasant, it’s probably going to mean more to me than if you buy me a present or tell me that you think I’m awesome.

Which isn’t to say I wouldn’t also like to get some thoughtful gifts and sweet compliments (love those, too!). It’s just that the other expressions tend to mean more and go deeper with me.

Chapman’s original Love Languages book was published in 1992. Over the years, Chapman expanded this work, which focused primarily on romantic partnerships, in order to address familial dynamics (The 5 Love Languages of Children; The 5 Love Languages of Teenagers) and professional interactions (The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace).

Both at home and at work, Chapman points out, our natural tendency is to try to “speak” our own preferred languages to others, even though they may not be the languages that speak to them. (If you don’t know your languages, you can take the quiz at www.5lovelanguages.com to find out, or read our article on the topic at “The 5 Love Languages“.)

The trouble is, if you’re a “Touch” person and constantly trying to express appreciation by offering public displays of affection or pats on the back to someone who is more the “Time,” “Gifts,” or “Words” type, your intended expression may never really land for the other person.

Bottom line: If you’re willing to learn the languages that significant people in your life hear and understand best, and willing to share which expressions of care mean the most to you, things tend to go a whole lot better.

Beyond taking Chapman’s Love Languages quiz, I think it can also be fun to notice — on a daily basis, as well as looking back over the last week, month, year, or even decade — which expressions of care, love, and kindness have meant the most to you.

[callout]Every healthy act is, in a way, a demonstration of love and kindness.[/callout]

Think about it: What were your peak life experiences during those periods, and who do you have to thank for supporting them, enriching them, or making them possible?

You’ll probably find that the things for which you are most grateful (and which you find most memorable) tend to fall right in line with your dominant love languages.

For example, looking back over the past few years, I remember the day I wrote all “101 Revolutionary Ways to Be Healthy.” My sister lent me her quiet little guesthouse so I wouldn’t be interrupted or distracted. My mom made me lunch. My team took the helm of the magazine so I could get closure on the project at hand. A friend and fellow editor looked over my work and reassured me that it made sense.

And then, of course, once I had all of the 101 Ways put together, a bunch of talented folks collaborated to refine, design, and program the whole thing into an amazing mobile app.

Now, nearly 200,000 downloads later, I look back at how many people’s acts of service and kindness went into that and the whole Revolutionary Act project, and it gives me even greater satisfaction for that reason.

Speaking of Revolutionary Act, it continues to grow, morph, and take on a life of its own. Today, in addition to RevolutionaryAct.com and the “101 Revolutionary Ways” mobile app, we have dedicated social profiles on Facebook and Twitter, and a Pinterest board.

We also recently launched our #MyRevAct campaign to encourage folks to celebrate the ways they are embracing healthy revolutionary acts in their daily lives. For this week’s challenge, check out RevolutionaryAct.com/myrevact. Then use #MyRevAct to share your own healthy-happy acts on the social platforms of your choice.

Remember, regardless of your preferred love language, every healthy act is, in a way, a demonstration of love and kindness — toward yourself and others. Because the healthier and happier you are, the more powerfully you can express all the good stuff you’ve got to give.

A few weeks ago, I took on the project of clearing out my supplement drawer. Among other things I discovered: multivitamins from the mid-2000s, a container of supergreens hardened to grayish-yellow cement, some rancid flaxseeds, and three separate unmarked baggies containing a variety of unidentifiable nutritionals.

At the time they were packaged, all these products were arguably good for me. Now, having outlived their expiration dates, they had been reduced to so much dust and clutter.

The truth is, most useful and helpful things have a limited useful lifespan. And once they outlive that window, they become a burdensome waste of space.

Look at any decent perishable food, nutritional supplement, or personal-care product and you’ll likely find some little “best if consumed by” code or “freshness date” on the package.

Beyond this date, you know the product is no longer at its best — and in the event the product has spoiled or become contaminated, it may even do you harm.

The same can be said for a great many of our ideas, beliefs, and habits. Unfortunately, most of them don’t come with any obvious expiration indicator. So how can we know when they are ready for the dustbin?

This was a question I’ve been thinking about since I attended a seminar a few weeks back. The course explored both the history and the modern-day dynamics of man-woman relating.

During one session, an older gentleman acknowledged that he held some rather old-fashioned notions about women — ideas that were limiting his success not just in relating with the opposite sex, but also in evolving his life in happier, more rewarding directions.

In response to one rather revealing comment this gentleman made, one of the instructors suggested, “It might be time to check the expiration date on some of your ideas.”

I loved that phrase, and it led me to realize that our obsolete notions do come with an expiration indicator of sorts. It’s called pain.

[callout]Our obsolete notions do come with an expiration indicator of sorts. It’s called pain.[/callout]

Each of us is burdened by certain thought forms — from bigoted notions and prejudices about others to limiting beliefs about ourselves and the way the world works — that cause us a certain amount of trouble and discomfort.

We can continue to recycle our limiting notions long after they have stopped doing us any good — and too often, long after they’ve begun doing us harm — but we’re bound to suffer an increasing amount of pain and frustration as a result of these efforts.

And many times, this is how our outmoded ideas show us they are ready for the trash: They begin limiting our life choices. They weigh us down. They cramp our sense of identity.

At some point, they cost us enough (energy, money, health, happiness, hope) that we become willing to actively review and reconsider them.

That split second when we realize for the first time that maybe, just maybe, some long-stored notion is no longer true for us — that’s a moment of victory, a moment of rebirth.

It’s much like the first time you put on a pair of new glasses (note, most optometry prescriptions have expiration dates, too): You literally begin perceiving the world through new lenses.

That’s why I think it’s worth regularly challenging our own notions, including the ones we hold about past, present, and future selves. (For more on that, see “Rewrite Your Reality”.)

By way of example, here are just a few of the expired beliefs that I’ve elected to toss like so many ancient, stinky fish-oil capsules:

•  “The harder I work, the more value I contribute, and the better I do.”
•  “My desires are a burden to others; I should strive to minimize my wants and needs.”
•  “Healthy living requires tremendous willpower and self-denial.”
•  “I am going to get less attractive as I age, and my social value will diminish as a result.”

For as long as I clung to these ideas, they were true for me. Like Richard Bach said: “Argue for your limitations, and sure enough, they’re yours.”

So what happens when we let our stale, outdated ideas go?

Life seems fresher, easier, more fun. Our lives expand in new directions. We grow, stretch, leap, soar.

I can’t think of a better way to head into spring.

Typically, when we want to check our health-and-fitness progress, we step on the scale or look in the mirror. But when it comes to well-being, what you see isn’t always what you get — or at least, not all that you get.

We’ve been inclined to believe that pursuing health and fitness is predominantly self-focused, and that we alone stand to profit from the results.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Certainly, whenever we change our lives for the healthier, there’s a lot in it for us as individuals: more energy, strength, confidence, vitality, mental clarity, better moods, improved appearance, lower disease risks, and so on.

But there’s just as much in it (if not more) for all the people, places, and projects that we touch during the course of our daily lives.

Weirdly, this is not something we are typically encouraged to reflect upon, or to draw on as a potential source of inspiration.

Instead, most of the health-and-fitness messages we receive via mass media (“Flat Abs Now!,” “Lose the Flab!,” “Drop 4 Sizes”) are aimed at the vulnerable narcissist within each of us.

They imply that the central rewards of health and fitness are largely derived from appearing healthy and fit, and by extension, from impressing others (or avoiding their judgment).

And so, within the vast and deep slipstream of positive results created by healthy lifestyle changes, we’ve tended to focus on only a comparatively narrow and superficial band.

Of course, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to achieve appearance-related changes. In fact, the aesthetic rewards that go along with healthy-body transformations have some very real superpowers. (I’ll get to those in a moment.)

But in many cases, some of the biggest payoffs of our healthy changes have less to do with us than with the people, places, and things that matter most to us.

The reality: When you make even a modest improvement in your health status, or in even a single health habit, a whole bunch of people around you invariably benefit — regardless of whether they (or you) happen to realize it at the time. And being even marginally aware of this dynamic can serve as a powerful intrinsic motivator.

Psychological research suggests that intrinsic motivators (those connected with our sense of enjoyment, value, or meaning) are dramatically more powerful and long lasting than extrinsic motivators (those connected with our desire to impress others, win material rewards, avoid punishments, or comply with social expectations).

By expanding your awareness of the potential intrinsic rewards embedded in the fabric of your life, you can tap into a new reservoir of motivation. The kind of meaningful motivation that comes in very handy on those days when bikini-body and flat-abs promises seem to have lost their luster, and the appeal of eating caramel corn in front of the television seems especially strong.

Here are just a few bigger-picture factors to keep in view.

• Relationships. Your level of health, vitality, self-esteem, and equanimity all powerfully influence how you show up for other people. Reflect on what you are like to be around when you are healthy versus unhealthy. Think about how your needs, resources, and capacity shift, and the potential support or pressure that shift creates for others (family, friends, kids, coworkers). As you get healthier and happier, the people closest to you are the most likely to benefit — and to be inspired by your example.
• Professional Chops. We tend to accomplish a great deal more when we are strong, clear-headed, and confident than when we are sick, tired, and “meh.” Which is why most employers today are less concerned about absenteeism than “presenteeism” — an increasingly common dynamic in which people physically show up at work but don’t contribute much. The level of drive and focus you have available to bring to your career and creative pursuits depends heavily on your level of physical, mental, and emotional health.
• Community. The healthier you are, the more surplus energy and attention you can contribute to causes and community efforts. It’s much harder to get out and volunteer, to be engaged with your neighbors, to focus on communal concerns, when you aren’t feeling your best. Which is why health-motivated people are often the ones who start community gardens, launch local walking and yoga groups, advocate for healthier school lunches, and crusade for other healthy causes.
• Storytelling. As you shift your life, and as you share the story of your journey, you create a bread-crumb trail for others to follow. This can have surprising and long-lasting effects — many you will never know about, and, likely, some that will outlive you.
• Silent Influence. As you go about your healthy business, other people notice and may begin to model their behavior on yours. The visible changes in your body can function as a superpower catalyst for others (“You look amazing! What are you doing differently these days?”), but ultimately it’s learning what you know, and seeing what you do, that winds up having the biggest impact. And don’t forget about your healthy diaspora: All the people you inspire will ultimately go out and inspire a whole bunch more people. I had a neat experience recently that illustrated this last point for me. A woman I helped many years ago — an overstressed nurse practitioner who was then going through a health and life crisis of her own — wound up getting some coaching that I recommended based on my own experience.

She shifted her daily priorities and choices, started taking better care of herself, got trained in functional medicine, and, to my surprise, wound up becoming one of the first members of the medical team at Life Time’s new LT Proactive Care Clinic. (For more of her story, see “The Nurse Who Learned to Heal Herself First“.)

She now provides the kind of life-changing care that lights her up, and that empowers other people to reclaim their health and optimize it.

I did my annual physical with her a couple months ago, and as she helped me interpret some labs and offered me great nutritional counsel, I was struck by how we’d come full circle: The simple health support I’d offered her so many years ago was now directly benefiting me, and being multiplied through thousands of other patients.

None of this would have happened had I not embarked on my own health journey decades ago. None of it would have been possible if there weren’t a whole lot of other inspired people out there working on creating healthier lives, sharing what they know, and creating the demand and delivery mechanisms necessary for more healthy stuff to get out into the world.

So go ahead: Look in the mirror — and see the bigger picture. When you change your life for the better, everyone around you changes for the better too, even if only by having witnessed the changes you’ve made and realizing they are possible.