I'm all for admiring the body's beautiful curves, angles, toned muscles and its ability to make social media soar, but this superficial view can backfire.

Your Body is Like Your Home

Why is your body like your home? Because like your home, your body requires ongoing maintenance to stay healthy. What happens when you don't maintain your house? It falls apart and requires costly fixes. When you think about the similarities between your body and your homes it's striking. Let's take a closer look at the importance of living a healthy lifestyle.

Let's Take a Closer Look

To help you understand the relationship better, let's explore the comparison more. Your bones are the two-by-fours that support and protect the inner structure of your home. Your eyes are the windows. Your lungs are the ventilation ducts. Your brain is the fuse box. Your intestines are the plumbing system. Your mouth is the food processor. Your heart is the water main. Your hair is the lawn, and your fat is all the unnecessary junk you've stored in the closets and drawers. Now, if you can get past the fact that your forehead doesn't have a street number on it the similarities are remarkable. I think using the home analogy helps you understand that your body, like your house requires on-going maintenance to remain as healthy as possible.

They both are substantial investments. They both provide shelter for valuable personal property. And they are both places you should want to maintain. Understanding the importance of your body gives you the power to change it, support it, and strengthen it so you can prevent disease and live a healthier life.

Now, I'm not suggesting that medical doctors are not necessary because they are. I'm suggesting proactive wellness. When your toilet plugs up you don't immediately call a Plummer; you might first try to remedy the problem first by replacing the floating ball - correct? But what happens if you ignore the problem or don't replace the floating ball? Your toilet will start leaking, and then you have a bigger problem. You know that it's less costly to prevent problems by maintaining your house.

You Can Control Your Health Destiny

Of course, you can't always control what happens to you no matter how healthy or fit you are, but there are some things you can control - your attitude, your determination, and your willingness to take your health into your own hands. According to current research, if you can make five adjustments to your life, you can dramatically affect your life expectancy and the quality of your life.

The Five Things Are:

• Controlling your blood pressure
• Avoid smoking cigarettes
• Exercise 3 to 4 times a week
• Controlling stress
• Eat a healthy diet

Everyone ages, but you have the power to speed-up or slow-down your clock based on your lifestyle choices. For example, a fifty-year-old who smokes cigarettes, eats poorly, and doesn't exercise may have the body of a sixty-five-year-old. But, a fifty-year-old who eats well, stays away from toxins such as cigarettes and takes care of their body with moderate exercise could have the body of a thirty-six-year-old. By the time your fifty-years-old, your lifestyle dictates 80 percent of how you age; inherited genetics controls the rest.

Important points to consider

Food is your fuel and understanding how your body processes nutrients and why your body processes them in a certain way is critical. What I mean is, you need to understand just a bit about your metabolism. When you diet or don't eat enough your metabolism actually slows down and it stops burning calories. Your body is smart enough to protect itself from pseudo-starvation by burning fewer calories. That's why exercise is so important. Exercise is what keeps your metabolic rate moving. So, together with exercise and healthy eating should become a way of life, not a diet.

How much do you really know about your body?

Take the quiz below to see how well you understand your body and your general health. If you don't know the answers, don't worry. Next month, I will follow-up with the answers.

• What's the ideal blood pressure?
• What's the greatest threat to your arteries?
• What's the significant sign that you might have Alzheimer's related dementia?
• What foods have similar qualities as an addictive drug?
• What is most likely to give you an ulcer?
• What hormone is most responsible for both male and female sex drive?
• In menopause, what is the primary thing that happens?
• What is the best test to measure cardiovascular stamina?
• What's the most active muscle in your body?
• Why should you avoid using Q-tips to clean your ears?
• What's the primary role of muscles?
• Does pelivs and abdominal exercises mostly prevent back pain?
• What's the best thing you can do to prevent infections?
• Is it true that most over the counter hormones are a sham?

I challenge you to take your own health into your hands and become your own health advocate.

Did you like this article? Drop me a comment and let me know if you would like to see more articles like this.