Human by Design is a pragmatic, practical and wise approach to health and wellbeing. How so?
Pragmatism is an approach that assesses the truth of meaning of theories or beliefs in terms of the success of their practical application. Practicality is the quality of being able to provide effective solutions to problems. Wisdom is the soundness of a decision or action with regard to the application of experience, knowledge, and good judgment. Pragmatism is the framework. Practicality is application. Wisdom is the outcome.
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Adaptation is as good as it has to be. It doesn't have to be perfect to be effective. Adaptation depends on context.
Action only needs to be as good as it has to be in order to be effective. It doesn't have to be perfect to be effective. Actions depend on context. If everything is context dependent, in what context are you developing health and wellness. Appropriate View - See reality as it truly is.
Appropriate Intention - Be kind. Appropriate Speaking - Say what is true and useful. Appropriate Action - Do no harm. Appropriate Working - Find your vocation. Appropriate Effort - Do not give up the way. Appropriate Awareness - Be completely present. Appropriate Concentration - Pay attention. Survival is associated with minimal health. It is when environmental conditions push the threshold of design. Thriving is associated with optimal health and wellbeing. It is when environmental conditions and design are congruent. Are you surviving or thriving?
Execute the following movement session three times a week, ideally every other day. Rest only long enough to catch your breath between movements. (add pics?) Lay on your back and stand up, then return to lying on your back. Do this six times. Immediately after, lay and your stomach and stand up, then return to lying on your stomach. Don't forget to alternate legs. Do this six times. You can use your hands to assist if necessary. Jump in place like you are jumping rope. Do this ten times. Immediately after completion of repetitions, begin jumping forward and backward, using the same motion. Do this ten times for each direction (front/back). Immediately after, jump side to side ten times each direction (left/right). Pretend you are hopping over an imaginary line with front/back and side/side motions. Begin by standing with your feet shoulder width apart with your hands clasped together in front of your lap. Bring your arms up and around, tracing a large circle in front of your body bringing them to rest in the original position in front of your lap. Repeat the same motion to the opposite direction. Do this eight times for each direction for sixteen total repetitions. Make the largest possible circle that you can. Find a door that can support you weight. Hook your hands over the top of the door and pull yourself to the top, using your legs and feet if necessary. Hang in this position for five seconds, ten seconds if you can. When finished and once your grip feels good, hook your hands back over the top of the door and curl your legs up so they clear the floor. Hang in this position for five seconds, ten seconds if you can. Begin by standing with your feet slightly wider than shoulder width apart, with your hands clasped together in front of your lap. Keeping your arms straight, bend over at the waist and push your butt back bringing your clasped hands back between your legs. From there, stand up and bring your arms up and over your head in a dynamic, arching motion - like throwing a ball over the back of your head. Do this four to six times. Begin by standing with your feet close together, with your hands clasped together in front of your lap. Keeping your arms straight, bring your arms up above your head and stand on your tip toes. From there, bring your arms down in a dynamic motion - like slamming a ball onto the ground. Do this four to six times.
Intro to Paleolithic Nutrition - Sample daily meal plan
Ingest a mixed fruit salad, mixed vegetable omelette, a large, mixed salad with lean animal protein and a small handful of mixed nuts over the course of a day. Do not ingest cereals/grains, potatoes, legumes and milk and dairy. Ingest water, tea without sweetner (green or black) and black coffee. Include a cup of berries and two, four to six ounce servings (two small pieces) of fruit in the fruit salad. Vegetable omelette is composed of two to three eggs and two, one cup servings of vegetables. You can replace the omelette with a meal composed of two, one cup servings of vegetables and one, three ounce serving of lean animal protein. The large salad is composed of two cups of salad greens, two one cup servings of vegetables, three tablespoons of light salad dressing and one three to four ounce serving of lean animal protein. Mixed nuts are ingested as a snack. Do not exceed one ounce of mixed, unsalted/unroasted nuts. Peanuts are not a nut. It's much more effective if you prepare your meals the night before and have them available to you the following day (pack your meals). Intro to Zazen - Four second breathing.
Inhale deeply for a count of four seconds, making sure that your abdomen/belly pushes out or up; depending on your position (upright or supine). Hold the breath for a four second count. Exhale for a four second count. Your abdomen/belly should descend or recede, depending on your position (upright or supine). Hold the breath for a four second count. That's one series. Repeat the series four times in a row. Repeat the series at least three times a day - ideally morning, noon and night. However, this practice can be done anytime. Pay close attention to your abdomen/belly as you inhale, hold and exhale through the entire series. Be completely present - Pay close attention to what is going on around you. Keep at it.
Restore mobility, the ability to move freely and easily - Emphasize ground contact, agility, rotation, jumping, climbing and throwing motions. Give your body what it needs - Remove low quality, anti-nutrient dense ingestibles such as cereals (gluten-like complex), certain tubers (solanum/nightshade), legumes and milk and dairy. Replace with high-quality, nutrient dense ingestibles such as fruit, leaves, roots, tubers, nuts and animal flesh and organs. The most important interactions a species can have with its environment are those associated with survival and reproduction. These interactions are dependent upon the expenditure and intake of energy. This expenditure and intake of energy is manifested as the elements of movement and ingestion. As important as reproduction is to a species existence, this interaction is by beyond the scope of this post. However, reproduction is dependent upon survival and activities associated with this interaction can be viewed through the lens of a group of behaviors known as foraging. Simply stated, foraging can be understood as the amount of energy an organism expends to obtain energy from its environment for purpose of survival (and ultimately reproduction). Foraging behaviors, which are actions associated with movement and ingestion, are important determinants of how a species exists or existed in an environment.
We can determine a great deal about an organisms existence based on its foraging behavior. In reality, very few organisms seek out all the different energy sources (food) that they are capable of ingesting. Based on this observation, a theory has been developed to understand the factors that determine how an organism goes about obtaining food in an environment. This theory is known as optimal foraging theory, or OFT. Based on this theory, the food types preferentially sought out and ingested by an organism, as well as how they are obtained, interact to form that organism’s dietary strategy. Dietary strategies provide a convenient way for us to understand how the elements of movement (energy expenditure) and ingestion (energy intake) interact to determine a species existence. There are two main strategies: general and specific. A species that employs a generalist strategy tends to look for, pursue and ingest many of the food types it comes into contact with. Those species with a specialist strategy ignore many of the food types they come across, preferentially searching for a few specific food types. As a species, humans employ a generalist strategy and it was an important driver of our species evolution. OFT is based on the general assumption that foraging behavior is adaptive, a product of natural selection that yields the greatest possible benefit to an organism’s survival and reproductive success. More specifically, OFT is based on the theory that organisms forage or exist in a way that maximizes their net energy intake per unit time. This suggests behaviors that are based on finding and ingesting food types that contain the most energy while expending minimal amounts of energy doing so. This understanding provides us with a framework for understanding the elements of existence and the disparity between ancestral and current existence. Ancestral humans employed a foraging strategy that revolved around mobile and efficient diurnal gathering, scavenging and hunting practices. Gathering involves collecting wild food sources. Scavenging involves obtaining discarded dead organisms for ingestion. Hunting involves killing or trapping living organisms, or pursuing them with the intention to do so. This “ancestral foraging strategy” enabled us to survive and thrive on the African savanna and colonize the rest of the planet, sculpting our design along the way. How does knowledge about the ancestral foraging strategy translate into approximating ancestral environmental conditions in modern conditions? Adaptation is the most important concept associated with the Human by Design system. Through adaptation, an organism’s design changes to fit the conditions of the surrounding environment. The principle of SAID takes this further. It posits that an organism’s design will adapt specifically to the environmental demands that are imposed upon it. This principle is fundamental to the expression of every aspect of our design.
SAID means that adaptations are specific to environmental demand. The human genome possess a blueprint for specific adaptations associated with our species evolved capabilities; we just need to impose appropriate environmental demands. That said, our practices must be limited to methods that approximate ancestral activity. Selecting and applying appropriate practices from this perspective ensures the appropriate expression of our evolved capabilities. From the perspective of SAID, each practice revolves around the systematic application of stimuli that approximate ancestral demand. The application of appropriate stimuli leads to the appropriate adaptive response - restoration of our evolved capabilities. To accomplish this, we need to determine what constitutes appropriate stimuli. SAID indicates that a practice must approximate an ancestral activity to qualify as appropriate stimuli. What are the characteristics associated with appropriate stimuli? An important concept associated with SAID is stimulus threshold. Stimulus threshold is the optimal stimulus necessary for eliciting an adaptive response. A stimulus must be significant enough to produce an adaptive response, but not so demanding as to result in disability. This means we must be careful when selecting and applying stimuli. Stimulus thresholds are a product of genetics, which means they vary between adaptations as well as individuals. Due to this variability, how can we determine optimal stimulus thresholds associated with our evolved capabilities? Fortunately, research and experience point to adaptive windows associated with each capability, as well as methods that apply the appropriate stimuli. This knowledge provides the framework for the Human by Design system. |
AuthorSeth Clayton is the creator of the Human by Design System. He is a human from Charlotte, NC who is interested in helping you achieve optimal health and wellbeing through the avenues of Zen Buddhism, Functional Movement and Paleolithic Nutrition. Archives
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