Practice:
• Some of the feedback on these emails is how far people feel they are from the ideal, from what we are promoting. The intention of the newsletter is not to make anyone feel behind. The goal is for personal wellness to be a priority. To encourage everyone to do one thing every day that is healthy or positive. In meeting with medical students yesterday, we all discussed what we were working on specifically to enhance wellness.
• Four students had four different practices. 1. Run more, involved signing up for a race (grand gesture). 2. 9 Rounds kickboxing – great local place that lets you punch a bag for 27 minutes. No thinking, just hitting, exercise and catharsis. 3. Eat more vegetables – from a student who never liked them growing up, now pleasantly surprised by how much she appreciates the taste and the feeling. 4. Sleep more – a student set her bedtime at 10 or 10:30pm, 8 hours of sleep a night, now waking up before her alarm clock for the first time.
• What one small thing can you do today or this week or this month to improve your health?
Humanities:
• NYU Langone Health has a Division of Medical Humanities and they offer a weekly/biweekly newsletter with what is happening around the internet on humanities in medicine. All different arts are represented. Always at least one very cool link in the newsletter. Here is the subscription page.
• The August 3 newsletter linked to this cool piece in the Atlantic on Why Doctors Should Read Fiction. The article is specifically arguing that we should move from review of “ethics cases” to review of actual short stories in training on bioethics. Short stories written by real writers are more enjoyable, memorable, and have a deeper narrative. One of those times when fiction is “more true” than fact? (Right Jordan Peterson?).
Lunges:
• Burpees are hard. Squats and deadlifts are very taxing. 30 second bike sprints are formidable. But lunges are kryptonite. No other exercise takes me from 0 to 100 in such a brief time. Start just lunging around your house or office. Move up to carrying a 10, 25, 45 pound weight. A few sets of 20 steps will be all you need. You can even do them standing still by taking a little jump in between and switching legs. Get up and do a few right now.
Soy:
• We live in a strange time now when “soy” is used as an adjective to insult someone. People say soy raises estrogen, causes cancer, prevents cancer, etc. As with pretty much everything, the truth is very complicated.
• If you haven’t checked out examine.com, it is an excellent resource, very balanced and evidence-based. Some of their products are costly, but they have a free summary of a topic about every couple weeks.
• Their summary of soy is in depth and very interesting. A point they make that comes up often is that soy is traditionally fermented (natty, tempeh, miso, tofu), and this process can remove some of the anti-nutrients. Cate Shanahan covers the fermentation effect in Deep Nutrition. Overall the examine.com article lands on a favorable decision regarding soy in most cohorts. The only setting where they recommend caution is soy baby formula.
US – China:
• Destined for War sounds like a pessimistic book, but its goal is to provide advice on how to deal with the emerging power of China and avoid conflict. The US still leads China in GDP per capita and quality of life / well-being. But in measures of GDP and PPP (purchasing power parity), China is at the level of the US and quickly leaving us behind. From 2011 to 2013, China produced and used more cement than the US did in the 20th century. In 2011, a Chinese firm built a 30 story skyscraper in 15 days; then in 2014 a 57 story one in 19 days. Days. China now has the most extensive highway system and high-speed rail network in the world. Their per capita income is rising rapidly; China creates a new billionaire every week. The 300 million Chinese students studying in US universities come in with a 3 year advantage in critical thinking compared to American counterparts. China received twice as many patents as the US, with 1 million in one year (2015).
• The question is not “is China’s economy surpassing ours?” The question is how do we make this transition peaceful? Thucidydes Trap refers to the unstable state when an emerging world power catches up to the reigning power. When Athens rose up, the fear this instilled in Sparta led to the Peloponnesian War. This struggle has occurred 16 times in 500 years. In 4 of the 16, the powers were able to avoid war (most recently the US-Soviet Union [15] and the UK/France-Germany [16]). In the next newsletter we will see what the US and China can do to land on the safe side of history.
Quote:
Man lives on one quarter of what he eats. On the other three quarters live his doctors.
– Inscription in an Egyptian pyramid, c. 3800 B.C.
