by Dr. Emil Tompkins: Chiropractor Marana for families and children
If I were to ask you what it means to be healthy, what would you answer? Would you say. Feeling great? Would you say, exercising intensely? I’m asking because everyone has a different answer to the question “What is health?”
One of the best definitions of “health” comes from the World Health Organization: Health is optimal physical mental and social well being, not just the absence of disease.
So health has to be more than feeling good, health has to be more than not having diseases that will kill you early, health is so much more than that. We’re going to talk today about the 4 pillars to achieving true health.
- Nutritional Well Being
- Physical Fitness
- Emotional Fitness
- Neural Integrity
Pillar 1: Nutritional well being. If you’re going to be healthy you must ensure your body is receiving the proper nutrients for ideal function. Our body derives it’s energy, it’s building blocks for growth and healing, and it’s cancer and disease fighting properties from the food we eat. We must make sure that we are taking in the nutrients that give us proper energy, the right building blocks and the right disease fighting components for a long life. As a Chiropractor Marana, we look to uncover ways to 
accomplish this easily and effectively.
There’s a principle called xenohormesis that explains how certain food components can alter the function of your genes. This has so much more to do with the long term health of our body then “I just love cake so I gotta have some!!” If you can alter your genes with food, you must put the right stuff in. Start by eating clean. Eating natural and preferably organic items primarily will be the first step in ensuring nutritional success. Our office helps our community improve it’s nutrition by offering workshop, webinars, on healthy nutrition. We also offer a physician supervised weight loss program that has been researched to be incredibly effective at helping people to lose weight.
Pillar 2: Physical Activity: Our body must engage in regular physical activity for a number of reasons. You will be physically strong enough to live normal activities of daily living without pain or limitation. You will lose weight, lower blood pressure, cholesterol and blood sugar. Exercise even improves your mental state. Finding ways to keep moving will improve your length of life and quality of life. It’s been shown that High intensity interval training is best for heart health, stress relief and weight loss. Here’s an example. Exercise programs that have you perform a few repetition of strength exercises with a cardiovascular fitness activity in between sets, over the course of 20-30 minutes, will help you of burn more fat than with 1 hour of steady state activity. Our new Chiropractor Marana 21 Day Fitness Fast Track shows us how to do this quickly and effectively
Pillar 3: Emotional Fitness: Stress causes more disease and premature death then most people know. Immediate stress raises the heart rate, elevates blood pressure. This is great for fighting or running away from danger, but it’s horrible when we’re under stress all day every day. Over time, we will develop heart disease, cancers, and serious emotional issues because of the stress. So we must do something about it. Because we can’t always control whether we have stressful events, we can control how we respond to them. So the first key to relieving stress is to acknowledge that certain things are stressful but I will embrace it, take on the challenge with the right mindset, and get through whatever life’s struggles bring.
We can also do things that improve our regular stress response. Things like regular exercises, getting proper rest, and discovering calming activities for you. Everyone is different in this area so you’ll have to do some exploring. Get connected with Dr. Tompkins video workshop, Stress relief, the Easy Way for more tips, tools and steps to relieving your stress.
Pillar 4: Neural Integrity. Chiropractor Marana We live our lives through our nervous system. Our brain controls and coordinates every function in our body by sending messages from the brain, down the spinal cord, out to the nerves to every part of the body. The proper function of our nervous system is key to living as healthy as we can. Certain things can happen that will negatively affect our nervous systems function. Poor posture, physical stress, a traumatic birth process, can cause subtle spinal problems that will over time, put pressure on nerves that travel out of the spine. This stress will slowly limit our nervous system’s function and begin to affect our health.
As a chiropractor, it is my job to locate those areas of interference, correct them, and begin to restore normal neurological function. When we do this, our body functions better, we feel better and we’re healthier because of it. We have condition based care plans to get you through your pain, and we also have great wellness programs that are designed to help you to continually improve your health and your families health for a lifetime.
At Tompkins Family Chiropractic, a Chiropractor Marana, some people come in because of pain, but everyone comes in with a need to be healthier, whether they realize it or not. Our job is to support our patients in many ways and help them to achieve ultimate health. Maybe you’re here simply to improve your back pain. Or maybe you’d like to improve headaches. it’s possible we’re taking care of your child with ADHD. Or suppose you’re one of those who want to experience what it really means to be truly healthy. Either way, we’re partnering with you to help you achieve ultimate health by addressing each pillar.
If you are currently a practice member at Tompkins Family Chiropractic, Chiropractor Marana, let us know which area you’d like more assistance. If you are not yet a part of our office. We have lots of ways we can help you to move your health in the right direction. One step at a time, we’ll get there.
Dr. Emil Tompkins, Chiropractor Marana
