Aping the caveman

 

Health is primarily a product of our lifestyle – what we eat and drink, how we work, how we rest, and what thoughts and feelings we entertain. The caveman was closer to nature, and hence his lifestyle was arguably more in sync with nature. In order to stay healthy, we can emulate the lifestyle of our ancestors. The caveman would wake up at sunrise, and move out of his cave early, in pursuit of food, and in order to be ahead in the race for food. He would not have been a nighttime hunter, because of average eyesight, and more powerful nocturnal predators on the prowl. He would, probably, return to his cave before darkness set in, and retire soon into night’s slumber. On the other hand, in the modern world, thanks to advancements in science and technology, the hours after sunset are available for human activity, thereby procrastinating bedtime, and consequently, the time to rise in the morning! Modern man would definitely do better by adopting the caveman norm – early to bed and early to rise – what humans were designed for.

Published in the Assam Tribune, Horizon, 21st Apr 2017

The caveman, in pursuit of food, would perhaps walk a few miles, and run intermittently, either chasing an animal, or being chased by one. He would climb trees to pluck fruits, and squat on the ground to eat or break open a nut or fruit. Occasionally, he would pick up a fight with another creature. He would spend a few hours lazing around, doing nothing, or cleansing each other’s lice, or taking a nap. If we normalized all his laborious activities, such as walking, running, climbing, digging, fishing, fighting and hunting, to an equivalent of walking at the pace of two miles per hour, he would walk around fourteen miles every day, assuming around seven hours of average daily activity level. Allowing for sickness, adverse weather conditions, and other reasons, which obliged him to stay home, at times, say, for every alternate day, it would still average around seven miles of walking every living day of his life. We may argue that the caveman’s activity profile was one of hardship, and not necessarily, the ideal activity profile for modern times. Allowing for this argument, we can settle halfway, that is, around three to four miles of walk per day, as the caveman activity benchmark.

Today, doctors recommend a minimum of 40 minutes of brisk walk, 5 days a week, and that would mean, around two miles of walk every day. Add to it, another mile or two, equivalent of daily chores at home, or in office, making it three or four miles of walk per day, quite the caveman benchmark. The recommendation of ten thousand steps a day, is also quite popular in the health circles, and even that counts up to around four miles a day, on an average. The caveman analogy explains why the doctors and experts are so right in their advice. On top of regular brisk walk, periodic cardio exercises and yoga, occasionally playing a sport, and choosing the stairs instead of the elevator, whenever possible, would help one to earn a few more health points.

Talking of diet, the caveman would probably gather naturally available food, and ones that suited his digestive anatomy. His primary menu would have included fruits, nuts and leaves. Once he invented weapons and fire, his menu would have expanded, including creatures that he could now hunt and roast, such as, poultry, fish and some herbivores. Over time, he picked up the art of rearing animals, and his menu probably diversified further, to include milk and curd. All along, as his inventions and discoveries grew, he got further away from his core diet. Following his discovery of oil, he experimented with cooking, and developed culinary skills. He, not only learned how to mix different ingredients in a utensil, and boil them into a broth, but also managed to breakdown complex life forms, erstwhile indigestible, into palatable dishes. He also learned fermentation and distillation, and invented the dough and bread, and discovered alcohol. Gradually he moved away from a nutrition-centric diet to a taste-centric diet. He became an expansive omnivore, and an indulgent eater and drinker. Food, which was once a necessity of life, became a source of pleasure. For the modern man, wisdom lies in adopting a nutrition-centric diet, like our forefathers. We can do well by choosing more of the caveman’s core diet, and less of his augmented non-core diet.

Another deadly phenomenon that grips humanity today, is stress. It is not that there was no stress in a caveman’s life. But, a caveman’s stress was more fundamental – it was rooted in his struggle for survival, against predators and natural adversities. But over time, with the advancement of human civilization, and proliferation of the market economy, the stress is no longer for mundane physiological survival, but owing to the complexity of human relations, and in pursuit of insatiable economic ambitions. More often than not, such man-made stress is far more amplified and devastating. Chronic stress is believed to be the root cause of several diseases, including depression, obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular and other deadly diseases. Fortunately, yoga, meditation, physical exercise, creative pursuits like art, literature and music, and spirituality, go a far way in alleviating stress.