(2010-08-04) Benson How Healthy

Buster Benson ponders “What’s the best way to be healthy?” (re HealthMonth)

It actually comes down to what works (for you). While some people lack information about how to be healthy, and all of us have gaps in our knowledge, it’s more about motivation and Habit-creation than about simple information acquisition.

(I might have written this already in this WikiLog somewhere, but can't find it now, so I'll risk repeating myself.) I heard/read somewhere a long time ago that, in his pre-Acid days, Tim Leary reviewed the history of all sorts of "interventions" from anti-depressants to Voo Doo, and found that they all had the same results: 1/3 get better, 1/3 stay the same, 1/3 get worse. I see at least 2 possible interpretations:

• for a given person/goal, there's some objectively-optimum intervention which could in theory be identified systematically

• it's too context-sensitive (Complexity) to "solve" - you just have to muddle along and keep trying new things. (Or even the same thing again, as time changes you.)

• found/isolated the Tim Leary original reference at Intervention Roulette.