Your Health Isn't Inherited—It's Learned
Are your health problems yours? Or, were they passed down from previous generations?
The generational curse of health — and I'm not talking about genetics.
I spent many years attempting to blame my faulty genes for the way they were making me sick. Like everyone, I was confronted with what I had inherited every time I filled out a family health history.
It felt like a grim look into the future.
But did it have to be?
I got into the health space so I wouldn't become another checkmark on that dreaded sheet. I wanted something different, but how different could I be? Was my health doomed to be a product of my genetics?
These are fair questions, considering so much of what we assume in health is passed down from previous generations.
But there is more than meets the eye. And science has changed to be more in your favor and less in the grim reality of your genetics.
It's worth noting that you are not a product of your genetics, at least not in the way most people assume. In fact, your genetic makeup is nearly identical to that of all humans. Research has found that we share 99.9% of the same genetic makeup.
Outside of the different alleles (alleles change the expression of specific genes and what is responsible for the color of your hair and eyes) or gene mutations, humans are still wildly different. This opens the door to the question, where do these differences come from if it's not your genetics?
If it’s not genetic, where do the differences come from?
The answer… It comes from your inherited environment, not your inherited genetics.
New understanding of gene expression through the study of epigenetics proves health is less about what genes you inherited and more about your learned environment.
Let me explain.
The study of epigenetics has found that your health is a product of the genes that are expressed rather than the genes you carry. This changes things because it proves you're not a product of your DNA sequence, but you're actually a product of how your DNA is read by your cells. How your DNA is read, or the expression of your DNA, is modified through your enviornment, experiences, and behavior -- all of which can be inherited.
Now, I say it 'can be' because it doesn't always have to be or continue to be. That highlights the best news about this subject. You have so much power to change it.
Your DNA sequence does not solely determine your health. It's not set in stone but is adaptable, moldable, and changeable throughout your entire life based on the expression of those genes. The expression of genes is determined by your environment. It's modified based on your experiences and behavior.
This is getting sciencey, but bear with me; it will get practical soon.
Health is not the sum of the genes you were born with. Your health is (at least partially) determined by the inheritance of an environment that changed the expression of your genes, creating the outcomes you experience.
What I'm trying to say is that...
Health is repeated throughout generations, not because of what genes you share but because you've shared and repeated a similar enviornment that has created a similar expression in those genes. This leaves you a product of similar health problems.
It might not feel like it changes things, but it really does. It proves you're not a victim of your genes. You're a victim of a bad environment, and that, my friend, can be changed.
You’re not a victim of your genes. You’re a victim of a bad environment.
If you stay stuck believing you're a product of a faulty gene pool, your health is out of your control. It just is, more or less, bad luck.
But when you understand it's not your genetics as much as an inherited environment, all of a sudden, health becomes moldable. Health becomes more in your control.
We've spent far too long in the health space, assuming health problems exist because we inherited bad genes. It leaves you assuming (and believing) things like, "My mom was overweight, which is why I'm overweight." Or making claims like, "It's just because of my genetics."
Other than being untrue, that leaves so much of your health out of your control. Worse, it leaves you wallowing in the victimhood of being born into a poor gene pool.
But I need you to know that regardless of your gene pool, you are a product of your environment more than your genetics.
You are a product of:
The beliefs you inherited.
The posture you learned.
The stories that have been passed down.
All things can be changed (if needed), and doing so will change your health.
In part two of the podcast series "Bad Diet Advice," I discuss the power of inherited beliefs about health, your body, and what it means to heal. You might be surprised to learn that most of what you believe is inherited, making you more like your parents than you probably want to believe.
But it doesn't have to stay this way! LISTEN TO THE EPISODE AS I BREAK DOWN THE GENERATIONAL CURSE OF BAD DIET BELIEFS.
Health isn't inherited. It's learned.
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