What Is Health?
IS A person really in good health just because he does not feel sick? Well, how often have you heard of individuals who seemed perfectly robust but suddenly died of some unexpected cause? Reports show that nearly one fifth of those who die of heart disease each year did not show the slightest indication that something was wrong with them. Clearly, feeling good or fit is no guarantee that one is in good health.
Take, for example, a 22-year-old college basketball player. By all the usual standards, he would be considered a healthy person in his prime. But one night he died—suddenly. Investigations revealed that the cause of death was a drug overdose. Though he was physically in top shape, was he leading a healthy life? Hardly.
In reality, then, health is more than simply not being sick. Of course, heredity and the environment play their roles, but under normal circumstances, our way of life is perhaps the single most important factor governing our health. What we eat and drink, how active we are, how much rest we get, how we react to stress, and a number of other personal habits will either enhance our health or damage it. Thus, to a large extent, our health is what we make of it. The Bible principle, “Whatever a man is sowing, this he will also reap,” applies just as well to our physical health.—Galatians 6:7.
Health and Life-Style
It is well-known, for instance, that in many large Japanese companies, employees go through rigorous exercise routines each day. The result? “There is a considerable body of statistical evidence that lends weight to the view that Japanese workers are the world’s healthiest,” says the news magazine Asiaweek. On the other hand, the report points out that in Japan “cancer is the cause of roughly one death in four; heart attack and strokes each one in five, and respiratory illness one in twelve. One male in every 52 kills himself (for women, suicide is one in 70).”
Do these statements seem inconsistent or even contradictory? Not really, when we examine the facts. With 40 percent of all adults puffing away on 300 thousand million cigarettes a year, Japan ranks second worldwide (just after Greece) in cigarette consumption per capita. Furthermore, each year Japanese men drink 8 thousand million bottles of beer and 1.6 thousand million quarts [1.5 thousand million L] of sake. This is equivalent to taking in nearly half a quart [0.5 L] of pure alcohol per man per week. It would really be surprising if such harmful practices did not have a marked effect on the health of the people.
Though it may be argued that the Japanese do have the greatest life expectancy of any people and that their tobacco- and alcohol-consumption rates are lower than some others, such comparisons are ultimately meaningless. The reality is that people are dying prematurely and unnecessarily. They may appear to be healthier than others, but are they really healthy?
Clearly, then, our health reflects the sum total of our life-style and our day-to-day habits. Good health involves a balanced way of life that results in our physical, mental, emotional, and social well-being, enabling us to cope with our environment and derive reasonable joy and satisfaction from our daily activities. What can we do to achieve that?
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Heredity and the environment play their roles, but our way of life is perhaps the single most important factor governing our health
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An appearance of good health may be deceiving