Health or Wealth – Exclusive or Part and Parcel?

 

I’m a late convert to the idea of staying fit. Prior to ex-wife number two nagging me about being fat and the doctors telling me that my blood sugar was at a rate where I could expect to pop a variety of pills for the rest of my life, I never really thought of getting fit. If anything, I saw gyms as a place where the wets hung out and while working out in the park looked good in a “Rocky IV” way, the idea of getting out there and doing it, was never as appealing as watching someone else do it.

However, whatever my early reservations towards exercise were, I had to get started and as I have been on this path of adding physical activity in my later years, I’ve noticed that adding physical activity in your daily life is not just about the physical. Its kind of a mental and spiritual exercise too.

As you exercise daily, you’ll notice things too. With the exception of the usual “gym bros,” you’ll start noticing that everyone else around you, particularly in the professional middle class setting, tends to look rather pasty.

There’s a reason for that and its cultural. We’re essentially trained to look for “comfort” in all that we do. Hence, modern PMET jobs involving sitting at a desk on a daily basis looking at screen. The more you sit at your desk, the better. Whatever I may have said about sitting, the reality is that if there’s a choice between sitting in a nice air conditioned or centrally heated office and being in the hot sun of icy cold, only the insane would chose the latter. Then, there’s what happens after a day in the office. Who wants to “sweet” in a gym when you can meet your mates for a pint or two at the pub.

We, in the professional middle-class, are literally programed to think of “comfort” as our life’s ambition. A good deal of middle-class professionals has separated the concept of “wealth” and “exercise.” I think of my godson, who is a good-looking young man, whose ambition is to get a “pot belly,” or to look “prosperous.” I’m reminded of a Teddy Bear who worked in the office for a spell. Upon the urging of his then girlfriend, now wife, I told him to lose weight and that it was uncool for the rest of us to worry he’d go into cardiac arrest every time he walked more than five meters. His reply was that he was going to focus on building his career and his wealth before worrying about his health.  

One only has to look at a conversation between Bobby Saputra, Asia’s favourite internet character, and his dad to see how wealth and health are considered very separate things, that are almost mutually exclusive:

https://www.tiktok.com/@supercoolben10/video/7441176214657568022

 

 This mentality doesn’t get better with age. By the time people reach “my” age (50), there’s a prevailing attitude that intense exercise is what you leave to the young folk and Tai Chi is what you do in the park and so “middle age” doesn’t do any exercise.

I disagree with this outlook. From what I’ve been reading and binge watching, staying healthy and relatively fit is what you call the best insurance for old age. A middle-aged man who maintains muscle mass becomes and old man who does not need nursing care. Let’s face it, health insurance premiums go up as you age as do hospital cost. So, the best way to ensure you don’t go broke in old age thanks to medical costs.

I guess since I’m not exactly a well to do Middle Aged man, I have a hard time making this case. The common gripe people will have is that since I can’t afford a car or hot house, I got to talk about fitness.

Thankfully, I met someone who is from a very well rich family and we managed to find common ground in the fact that we believe in fitness, particularly as you get older.

Meeting her enforced an observation that there is a correlation between physical and professional fitness. Just look at the richest people in the world. There isn’t a fat slob amongst them. Even Donald Trump, the most prominent fat slob in the world, was fairly trim.

There’s a reason for that, which is the qualities needed to succeed professionally are more often than not, the same qualities need to get fit. At the most basic level, both activities require the ability to delay gratification and the discipline to keep going month after month without seeing any results. Fit people tend to have better abilities to withstand the stress, which comes with the high powered and paying jobs. Even on the most superficial level, fit people tend to look like people you have confidence in dealing with.

As this Instagram post points out – the very successful treat their physical fitness part of their daily routine rather than as a luxury.

https://www.instagram.com/p/DH8siL6AYPz/?hl=en

 

  Again, let’s go back to the topic of hospital cost. Yes, rich people can afford better health care than poor people. However, rich people also know that even if they can afford the best treatment, being sick will costs them business opportunities. So, they work at avoiding going to hospital. Hence, you have a situation where the rich eat better food and work out, whereas the poor eat junk. One only has to think of Christiano Ronaldo who drinks water and the 1,000 ilbs sisters who drink 12 cans of soda a day:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIAFe7zaCRU

 

 

 The point is simple. People who want to succeed professionally are also people who look after their well-being, physically and mentally. Being healthy is not exclusive to being rich. If anything its an essential part of getting to the top.