Bad genes or just bad lifestyle?

One of the most memorable quotes I’ve read came from a witty article about South Florida. It said: “The winters are colder than you might think, and the summers are hotter than you can imagine.” While true, minus the occasional hurricane, you still have year-round access to the outdoors.

One way I capitalize on terrain not frozen solid or covered by snow is by taking off my shoes for some skin-on-earth grounding. Not only are there antioxidant effects, but also infrared scans show that grounding decreases chronic inflammation — likely due to the closing of the electric circuit. Our ancestors evolved while walking barefoot across the plain, or with just a thin strip of animal skin to protect their feet. Modern humans go months (or forever) without bare skin touching the surface of the planet. At least as correlation, you can see our species’ present condition at any public venue.

While millions are unable to ground regularly due to the risk of frostbite, or living in a concrete jungle, my primary obstacle to grounding is my wife. The good news is she generally ignores my bare feet at events like a family barbeque at a ranch in Southwest Florida. The bad news is that at my son’s t-ball games, she demands that I re-shoe immediately.

There is a picture floating around Twitter showing a group of super fit and barefoot African tribespeople standing on dry grass under infinite blue skies. The caption says that this tribe gets more than half its calories from a particular kind of nut, which is high in polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs). The implication is that it’s not the food making us sick — such as high-PUFA vegetable oils. Rather, it is our modern lifestyle that is killing us, unplugged from the Earth and sealed inside.  

Forget whether the journal of this tribe’s nut consumption is accurate. (I’m reminded of the Blue Zone diet sensation, which turned out to be just bad recordkeeping of the elders’ ages). For me, this image is about the meaning of “bad genes.” In nature, we are all evolved to thrive. Genes only become a factor when we override our ancestral programming.

You’ll see the occassional news story about the smoker and drinker whose “good genes” enabled her to live with full faculties to 122. In reality, genes are just a small part of the achievement. Check out the link — world record longevity is a result of an ideal lifestyle.