When you dig down through all the hype and the noise about diet and exercise to what science has proven to be true and effective management for all human bodies, you will find nothing there. There is nothing in existence that will work for each of us in all our diverse needs. Our bodies just have too many variables. We are incredibly complex systems, and there is not a single thing that will be right for all of us in all our circumstances.
We all have different sleep needs, food needs, and ability levels. Even more granularly we have differences within those categories. We have different needs for the amount of sleep, the type of sleep, the time we sleep. We need different amounts of food, absorb different amounts of calories, have different food sensitivities, and different cultural needs. Some of us are out running marathons while some of us use mobility devices. There is no approach that is the morally correct thing to do, because there is no approach that is always right.
Even the most accepted best practices with the least controversial approaches don’t actually apply to everyone. They don’t apply to me. The most basic advice seems to be: Eat fresh vegetables and get some exercise. But I have gastroparesis and ME/CFS. Fresh vegetables can cause me major digestive issues and Post Exertional Malaise means that a workout might cost me three days of functionality.
Doctors have regularly given me the head-cocked expression of a confused dog when I tried to explain that the treatment they were recommending for my disability was impossible due to my disability.
There is not a single intervention that is appropriate for all of us. You can’t even recommend drinking water to everyone without adding some qualifiers for people in places like Flint, Michigan or Jackson, Mississippi.
Even interventions I personally believe to usually be dangerous may have a functional purpose in the proper circumstances. In almost all circumstances I would rip a juice cleanse out of your hand and toss it down the drain. But if you had kidney disease or gastrointestinal disabilities, specific juices might be helpful.
Nothing is Just One Thing is a principle behind Body Loyalty pointing out that every self care choice effects each of us differently. Food, movement, medicine, solutions. Even aspirin treats us all differently. There is no way to be “right”. You just have to meet your needs.
When we have inherited a view that health is a reflection of morality, it is understandable to want to find the virtuous, right, true approach to physical health and just do that forever. But that view is wrong. Health is not moral, there is no right thing to do, all we can do is take the actions that meet our body’s needs.
Nothing is Just One Thing sums up three truths:
No intervention works the same for all of us
No intervention will work the same for us indefinitely
No intervention comes without side effects that also need to be mitigated
Nothing works the same for all of us because our bodies are too diverse and the context of our lives are too variable. We have different needs, and we have different resources to meet those needs. No solution can be said to work for everyone if it costs more money than most people have.
Some people really respond well to positive affirmations and get great results, other people (particularly neurodivergent people) hate them. A couple of my friends were complaining about affirmations and one said to the other, “Of course you hate affirmations. Because you hate lying and you hate liars.” For some people these statements are aspirational, for others, they’re self betrayal.
Breathwork is really powerful, but when the wrong kind of breathwork meets up with the wrong person, it can be really activating. Instead of feeling peace and connecting to their body, some people have panic attacks or other scary consequences.
Atticus can literally hear sounds I can’t hear. I can see things he can’t see. Our bodies work in extremely different ways, and that’s just two people in the same family. When you look beyond your doorstep the variables grow exponentially.
Even when we find something that works well for us, it is almost guaranteed to stop working at some point. Bodies change, needs change, resources change, abilities change. The strategies you use need to change right along with them.
You will have different needs at different times in your life. The amount you eat at puberty will not be the same as the amount you eat in pregnancy which will not be the same as the amount you eat in old age.
A popular statement in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is, “Yesterday’s solutions are today’s problems.” Interventions that worked well at one point can become the barrier creating problems if we stay committed to them past their usefulness. Responding the way you did as a child, when you are a grown up, can bring a whole lot of trouble. A strategy that was adaptive in one setting becomes maladaptive in another.
Science also continues to advance and we’re sure to discover that something we’re currently doing is harming us. Lysol marketed itself as birth control. Radium used to be administered in spas as a health tonic. Asbestos was in baby powder until 2020. We will continue to make discoveries and need to change our approach in response. We do better when we know better.
No intervention you try will come without additional effects, so you’ll also need to find a solution that brings effects you can live with. That new diet might cause you some weight loss, but also destroy your skin and hair and cost you relationships. Can it really be said to be successful then? We are whole people and the choices we make impact our whole lives. There is no goal so virtuous on its own that it justifies causing harm to the rest of you.
If pursuing a goal makes you miserable and robs you of your quality of life, it will never be sustainable. All these interventions are supposed to be for our health, but what good is health if you hate your life?
The interventions we choose need to work within the context of our lives. This has come up for us over and over again in Atti’s schooling as we choose IEP goals. If we created a goal that would only be possible under precise conditions at school, that I’d never be able to follow up with at home, it was a bad goal. If it required more support than I had to give or specialized knowledge we didn’t have access to, it was a bad goal. If it brought additional consequences we couldn’t mitigate, it was a bad goal.
A good goal is a goal that is possible. If we continuously pick goals that aren’t possible for us, all we’re doing is planting shame seeds that will yield a ripe harvest when we fail. Interventions that don’t account for the side effects they bring or the life circumstances they occur in, will always fail.
We really can’t compare journeys with each other because every decision we make is based on innumerable intersecting variables. What is right in one situation is going to be completely wrong in a different one. Our usual method of making health choices typically involves trying to replicate the journey of someone you admire or run from the journey of someone who fear. Instead you have to focus on your own work and see what opportunities are in front of you for you to solve the problems in your life.
Health is not a moral consequence. There is no way to be right.
Nothing is just one thing. Advocate for your body and determine what works for you.