Insights

Imagine

The other day I was walking across the mezzanine at the institute and one of our clients yelled up to me, “Hey Dr. Skaggs, watch this!”

This wonderful, spirited woman artfully launched into a one-leg stance. She held her focus, laser-like in front of her, and her precision was excellent. She counted out loud to seventeen! She was very excited. She is 75.

It was great to see the message from the Insight really landed with her. She was looking ahead and seeing how standing on one-leg would make a difference in her life. The magic is practicing, continuing to do it consistently. Imagine if she were to continue to do that every day for the next year!?

Remember from our last Insight how being able to stand on one leg for 10 seconds was linked to 80% improvement in all-cause mortality. And that not being able to stand on one leg for 10 seconds increases your likelihood of dying in the next 10 years by 100%.

If something as simple as the ability to stand on one leg is linked to longevity, it seems logical that training that skill would make a difference?

A headline this week said, “The US healthcare system is broken at every level.” The article spoke to the phenomenon of the US spending more on healthcare than any other country and yet having declining health and lifespans, often lower than most underdeveloped countries. While this is a current article, these statistics have existed for over a decade.

What the article and sometimes reports like these fail to acknowledge is that the people in the healthcare system are providing remarkable care. And almost every day I talk to a colleague in the system who cares and knows there are problems. Clearly there are areas where we are missing the mark. Clearly, it is complicated.

What if part of our healthcare problem is asking the wrong questions? Imagine if 100,000 million Americans practiced one-leg standing like our client? What if some of the answers were simple behavior changes the individuals could control? At the end of the day, who has the most control of your health, pain, and longevity? Of course, that answer is you.

If you have settled into The Power of Doing What Matters, you know that it proposes doing simple exercises like, standing on one-leg, breathing, reading, juggling and more. These are not new inventions or high-tech developments. Most of the exercises and training suggested in the book are well recognized as beneficial. The unique message of the book is to help individuals find their way to doing exercises and training that hit the target for them. The book can help close the curious gap of what we know and what we do.

It is likely one-third of the exercises and lessons in the book will really connect with you. Another one-third will somewhat land and one-third may not connect at all. If you do one-third of the exercises in the book, consistently for a year or more, it can be a game-changer. Just ask Bert.

The proposal is not that the stories, exercises, and training in the book is all you need to do. The proposal is that the stories, exercises, and training in the book will help almost everything you do.

Imagine if 100 million Americans focused on doing what matters!?

Imagine one year from now, 100 million Americans saying, “Hey, watch this!”

Reach for the stars,

Clayton Skaggs

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