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This series endeavors to help Young Adults (and everyone else) from the inside out. The first three post focused on the apprehension and application of wisdom, which is the spiritual True North designed into all humanity, yet suppressed in our society. Today we consider our biology and environment since both are integral to finding true life.

Unless we’re born with a physical or mental disability, we each have an opportunity to maximize the health and strength of our bodies and minds…life is that opportunity. In the same way we suppress the truth and ignore wisdom, so we also suppress the truth regarding the relationship between our bodies and minds, and our responsibility to care for them. Disparity of access to healthy food, water and education is real, but is another subject. Today we’ll focus on those aspects which we can control. We’re adults. By now we should understand and take our health seriously. Ignorance is only an excuse for children.

Untrained appetites will not lead us to health. There is also much conflicting information regarding nutrition and mental health. Not all organizations are messaging for our health. Be wary, and look deeper. My guiding principle is to always be wholistic, meaning that our bodies, minds, emotions, and souls are an integrated whole, not individual systems that are disconnected from each other. From there, my advice is that each person begin a life-long strategy of learning about our bodies, nutrition, and the power of food to either heal or make us sick. Just because you feel ok today, doesn’t mean you are healthy and not making yourself ill.

A healthy body is best fed with real food, not highly processed junk food. Eat fruits and vegetables and clean, quality protein sources. Limit the amount of grains and pasta, and rarely eat things like chips, candy or sweets. Never drink sugary drinks. We shouldn’t constantly be eating. It’s best to avoid snacks between healthy meals, and not over eat. It’s good to give our digestive system at least 12 hours in between our last meal and our first meal. Obviously, this isn’t universally applicable or possible but if it is, consider this as a foundation from which you learn about yourself and your food.

There are great experts in diet and food far more worthy of your time than me. My expertise has more to do with the message we tell ourselves about our food. When I drank a two-liter bottle of Mountain Dew everyday along with a sleeve of Oreo’s, I would’ve told you that I feel fine and was healthy. I was oblivious to my own addiction to sugar and the malware scripts that were setting up a life of disease if I didn’t make course corrections. The same is true for everyone. Just as we catch ourself if self-pity, we must catch ourself defending our foolish food addictions, and then pick wisdom. This ties directly to our mental health. Foods are drugs which alter our mood and impact emotions.

Spiritual health illuminates how our internal dialogue becomes our external behaviors. Many adults are ignorant of how their brains function and the impact of brain chemicals (neurotransmitters) on our mood, cognition, will, and personality. When someone says they are unmotivated, irritable, emotionally fragile, anxious, or restless, my first assumption is not that they need a drug or a therapist, but have trained their brain function based upon their food and entertainment choices.

Food becomes mood.

Children who can’t sit still don’t have a Ritalin deficiency. Teens with anxiety don’t have an SSRI deficiency. Adults who are stressed don’t have an alcohol deficiency. Fat people don’t have a Semaglutide deficiency. High cholesterol is not a statin deficiency. Our over-psychologized world in concert with modern medicine has fully embraced medical interventions when lifestyle choices would work just as well. I support medical interventions for extreme cases as determined by a qualified medical doctor, but can we be honest about why our culture prefers over-prescribing? Most people resist change, and suppressing the truth, they pop a pill to address the mood/behavior problem, which is first a food problem, which is first a spiritual problem.

Every problem is first a truth problem. We lack wisdom.

This pattern reveals extremely good news. Our brains adapt to our food, behaviors, and thoughts. It’s called neuroplasticity.

“Do not be conformed (pressed in a mold) to this world, but be transformed (metamorphosis) by the renewal of your mind (way of thinking), that you can test (regard as worthwhile) what is the will of God, his good and acceptable and perfect (will)“ (Romans 12:2)

Consider gaming and scrolling on mental health. As the technosphere excites us, our brains release a chemical called dopamine which signals reward, pleasure or motivation. The more we engage, the more our brains express dopamine. When our brains detect too much dopamine, it does two things: it grows new receptors for dopamine (to handle load) and it displaces the brain chemicals (GABA and serotonin) which help reduce and regulate anxiety and prevent us from being over-excited.

Boredom is the desperation of a dopamine addict. We can’t sit still so we go back to our tech because it feeds us dopamine. As our brains strive for homeostasis (due to over expressed dopamine), they act as if they don’t have enough regulating GABA. The result is increasing anxiety and dissatisfaction in the real world. We now have 13% of Americans over age 12 on anti-depressants with 19% being women. The rise in mental health disorders correlates globally with the rise of Instagram and social media in 2013.

Tech is not harmless. It’s programing our brains for un-reality. Making life, work, struggle, and growth undesirable.

Wisdom calls us to gain a dopamine fix through activities of life, or working out, because physical stress regulates brain chemicals leading to healthy bodies and minds. Can you identify your preferred delivery system for dopamine? It could be smoking, shopping, gambling, drinking, or eating. A better alternative is a sport that you enjoy, growing a business or big endeavor. Not all dopamine hits are destructive, but if you perceive one that is, then you are the only one who can make the change.

Will we examine our life? If we won’t quit sugar, social media, smoking, porn, drinking, or over-eating, then when our life sucks, we can’t complain. When our body is sick and our mind is weak, when we can’t or won’t compete in the marketplace, and poverty comes upon us, then we can’t claim to be victims, for we have chosen dopamine over true life. That makes us the biggest fool of all.

“A little sleep, a little slumber,
    a little folding of the hands to rest,
and poverty will come upon you like a robber,
    and want like an armed man.” (Proverbs 6:10-11)

“The Lord does not let the righteous go hungry,
    but he thwarts the craving of the wicked.
⁴ A slack hand causes poverty,
    but the hand of the diligent makes rich.
⁵ He who gathers in summer is a prudent son,
    but he who sleeps in harvest is a son who brings shame.” (Proverbs 10:3-5)

“Poverty and disgrace come to him who ignores instruction, but whoever heeds reproof is honored.” (Proverbs 13:18

As young adults, you have to understand how everything works and commit yourself to this discovery and to the practice of mastering it, or life will never open to you.