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Choice Health Hints

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Apr 30, 1914

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 91, No. 18.

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Choice Health Hints

By David Paulson, M. D.

DAVID PAULSON, M. D.
Good health is the best form of life insurance.
When you sell health for money, you exchange wealth for trash.
If you want to have health, you must fight those things that cause disease.

Fresh Air and Sunshine

No one has a corner on the air market. There is no fresh air trust.
Your lungs cannot be washed, but they can be aired.
You would not offend your stomach with dirty water; then why offend your lungs with filthy air?
A flood of sunshine in the home may fade carpets, but it puts the bloom of health upon your cheeks. Take your choice.
An open window is better than an open grave.
Warm, stuffy rooms have killed more people than have ever frozen to death.
Those who sleep with their windows open can get along with an hour's less sleep than others. They are that much ahead by breathing fresh air.
One of the most certain ways of producing not only unhealthy blood but also an unhealthy mucous membrane, is to fill the lungs sixteen times a minute with impure air.

Deep Breathing

You will live longer if you take longer breaths, for you will have better blood.
Deep breathing improves the digestion. Practice it frequently during the day. More die of air starvation than food starvation.
After each meal breathe as deeply as you can ten times in succession, then breathe normally for a minute, then take ten more deep breaths. Increase this by one round every day until you take from three hundred to four hundred deep breaths daily as a regular habit.

Dietetic Suggestions

Do not eat a morsel between meals. If you keep your digestive mill constantly grinding, it will soon wear out.
Food must be well relished in order to be well digested.
Many dietetic errors are due to a low conception of eating.
Avoid iced foods and drinks.
Do not make a cold storage plant out of your stomach.
Fletcher has well said: "Do not eat when you are mad, or bad, or sad; only when you are glad."
It is not only necessary to bring a good appetite to the table, but it is also important to come with a good state of mind.
Remember your teeth are put in your mouth, not in your stomach; so the first thing to do is to chew. Chew for your life. If you chew long, you will live long; and you will not need to eat so much.
If you taste your food before you swallow it, you will not have to taste it afterward.
Eat your bread with gladness.
"A merry heart doeth good like a medicine."

Drugs, Spices, and Condiments

Intemperate eating is infinitely more common than intemperance in drinking.
"Avoid patent medicines as you would a pestilence."
Use salt sparingly. Condiments should be wholly discarded, because they irritate the stomach, tending to produce gastric and intestinal catarrh.
Tea and coffee are drugs, not foods, and should come from the drug store instead of the kitchen.
Avoid mustard, pepper, and highly spiced foods that taste hot when they are cold, for they continue being hot after they are swallowed, and even after they are absorbed into the blood. Mustard plasters may properly be appliedexternally, but should not be used internally.
It is because we have so little scientific cookery that so many have to resort to mustard, pepper, and other fiery condiments and spices. These things that taste hot when they are really cold, that give the palate a twist, also injure the nervous system.

Water Drinking

Do not drink while eating, nor eat while drinking.
If you drink at mealtime, you should drink between the mouthfuls instead of with the food.
Drink a glass of water on rising and retiring, an hour before each meal, and one to three hours after eating.
The average mortal would live much more comfortably if he drank a larger quantity of water.

Exercise

When one is resting, only one third of the blood in the body is in the muscles; but when one is exercising, two thirds of it is in the muscles. There is no better way of relieving congestion of internal organs than by exercising. The benefit of active exercise remains a long time after it has been taken.
There is no better all-round exercise than vigorous, energetic walking. It should be taken with the head erect, chest up, abdomen drawn in, breathing deeply through the nose, maintaining at the same time a cheerful state of mind, trying to be in harmony with nature and nature's God.
A capital way of strengthening the abdominal muscles is to sit well forward in a chair with chest well up, and then tilt forward and backward, raising the knees each time. Do this a few times a day when you have nothing else to do; you will be astonished in a short time to see how it will strengthen the abdominal muscles; and it is far more important to have strong abdominal muscles than it is to have strong muscles in the arm.

Religion and Health

Health and happiness result from obedience to God's laws. Misery and unhappiness result from disobedience.
We shall make but little progress in this campaign for better health until our souls are gripped with the great truth that the laws of health are the laws of God; that sickness and suffering are directly or indirectly due to the violation of these laws.
If we cooperate intelligently with God in the restoration of health, making use of such opportunities as are within our reach, discarding such things as he has clearly shown us are wrong, he will give us health, and he will bless to our own good and to the good of his work whatever infirmities he permits us to retain, just as he did in Paul's case.
Every invalid should heed the divine injunction: "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest," and have implicit, personal faith in that power that upholds the universe and has promised, "I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee."