The Health & Wellness Problem of an Empire

The Proliferation of the Mobility Cart Crowd Signals Deeper Health & Wellness Issues in America

No empire lasts forever. No superpower occupies the top of the heap in perpetuity.

Eventually, they all fall. Some are overaggressive and stretched thin by ambitions of endless expansion. Some are unwise with their resources. Others allow internal strife and poor leadership to erode their fortitude.

There are threats from outside, and threats from within.

So how will America eventually decline? This is a question I’ve considered often. I’m not an economist, war general, or political-science expert, but I don’t think one needs to be to assess one of the greatest threats we face as Americans in modern times: the weakening of collective via the weakening of the individual. Make the mind, body, and spirit frail, person by person, and the Dominoes fall.   

One by one, if a country’s citizens become spiritually disconnected, mentally confused, emotionally shaken or numb, and physically inept, then the country has no future.

Among the greatest contributor’s to this weakening of the American citizenry are these: poor diets consisting of high-sugar and highly processed junk that lacks the nutrition our bodies and minds need to thrive; poor individual education regarding health and wellness issues, a trick that keeps people churning through the doors of the “sick-care” system; enslavement of the individual’s mind and thievery of the individual’s soul by pharmaceutical companies that are given free rein to create their own reality via endless advertising and lobbying; a lack of focus on personal responsibility (i.e., mass victim mentality) that doesn’t allow individuals to see how they can contribute to their own health and happiness; the supplanting of true spiritual quests by celebrity and self-worship; Hollywood’s propagation of nihilism, which has become a doctrine of sorts on which younger generations are now raised (and by Hollywood I mean to say the business and political players that might pull the strings of big entertainment and big tech, too); and a perpetual state of low-level depression, anxiety and fatalism that results from all of the above.

To illustrate some of this let’s just take a snapshot of American life at its worst for a second. Okay, two snapshots, both instances of average American life in average Midwestern towns.

First, my wife and I were shopping at Walmart recently. And although so much has previously been said about the bizarre and unhealthy nature of Walmart shoppers that is can seem cliché to point the circus, I will say this: if beings from another planet or society leaders from another time in history were to be dropped down into an average Walmart in our modern age, they would assume that much of America was physically handicapped and suffering from some sort of mental illness.

And they wouldn’t be completely wrong, inasmuch as the above culprits I named actually have left many people suffering physically and mentally.

Walmart. Where else have you seen the customer base fairly divided between individuals walking the store aisles on the power of their own two legs and those riding around in mobility carts? What is the true reason behind all of this need for mobility carts in a Walmart anyway? A cursory glance shows that morbid obesity might likely be at the heart of it all. The obesity is itself a problem, but it also leads to who knows what other health & wellness problems that are then exacerbated by prescription medications and inactivity, which might have begun the cycle in the first place. It is a chicken-and-egg puzzle.

But also, there is a disease of the human spirit at play here. A personal weakness or indifference—a lack of basic pride or shame—that would incline a person to not care about wheeling themselves around in public if their legs do in fact work.

Now, I have seen people with prosthetic limbs and those battling through what appears to be multiple sclerosis working out at my gym. I just recently was reading excerpts of a book about a man born with one leg who became a champion wrestler. Despite physical limitations or pains, I assure you that not everyone would accept a reality that involves strapping into a mobility cart at Walmart to play bumper cars with the rest of the clientele while browsing the cereal and Christmas clearance aisles from a compromised vantage point.

Still, every year, the number of Americans who fall into the category of willful carters seems to grow. And yes, it must be the same disease of spirit—that erosion of basic pride or shame—that has infected those wandering the store aisles in pajamas and slippers.

When in the world did it become acceptable to leave the house, to inhabit public space, without actually switching one’s dress from bedtime attire to daytime attire? Years back men wore suit jackets and ties no matter the occasion. I’m not suggesting we must return to the roaring twenties, but how about the blue-jean 80s or 90s? Just put on a pair of actual pants when leaving the house, this could be a helpful rule of thumb.  

No shirt, no shoes, no service. Also: “Pajama pants and slippers are not allowed in this establishment unless a person has come directly from hospital surgery or the confines of a mental institution.” How would that signage go over in our stores?

When I was younger I used to enjoy reading true crime books, many about the mafia, and I can distinctly remember reading about Vincent “the Chin” Gigante, the Genovese family mafia boss who used to wander the streets of New York in a bathrobe to feign insanity so that mental illness could be used as a potential defense against his crimes. Maybe this is what is happening nowadays. Maybe an entire generation of mafia up-and-comers are now planting the seeds of a future potential criminal defense by going to Starbucks and Walmart in large fuzzy slippers and Hello Kitty pajama pants.

So that was Snapshot of American Life Number One, and I think it provides ground for further exploration. Pick apart the Walmart/mobility cart/pajamas-and slipper puzzle, and then a good number of the problems in this country that need solving just might be unearthed.

Now onto disturbing and mind-boggling Snapshot of Modern American Life Number Two. I know someone who works in healthcare. This person, who has suffered her own fair share of health challenges over the years including very involved surgeries as a child, has a heart for helping those in true medical need. She also has a thick-skin for dealing with other people’s bodily issues and quirks, which is a requirement for working in healthcare that would immediately disqualify your truly from such service.

But while this healthcare worker has a heart for helping the needy—those who have been afflicted by the “normal human condition” which includes illness outside of a person’s control and accidental injury—she also recognizes that at least half of her time and at least half of the clinic’s resources are spent catering to the “new human condition,” which comprises illness and diseases of the body and mind that are a direct result of poor personal choices, loafing, and willful wellness illiteracy.

Here’s something you might not see every day, but that this healthcare worker, in some form or fashion, usually does. A family of four, all morbidly obese, comes into the clinic—an urgent care—complaining that something seemed “funny” about the Slurpees they’d recently purchased from a local gas station. They thought that perhaps their drinks had been drugged (again, because they tasted a little off). The whole family was worried (and I guess understandably so if one suspects poisoning), but rather than walk into a local police station they decided to come to an urgent care.

And here’s the real kicker: the family members came into the clinic still slurping on their Slurpees.

“Something tastes really wrong here.” Slurp, slurp. “I wonder if maybe this was drugged.” Slurp, slurp. “Can you people do a test on the drink to see if something weird is in here?” Slurp, slurp.

Well guess what? Yes, there is something “weird” in these Slurpee type drinks that one usually gets from convenience stores or concession stands, namely high fructose corn syrup, preservatives, and artificial colors. And it is precisely these sorts of additives corrupt much of the food supply in America. Then there is problem number two, which is also shared by many facets of the modern American diet: these drinks are completely bereft of any actual nutritional value.

Harmful additives and no nutrition: a one-two punch that leaves people suffering, as this family clearly was in some respects.

Now, there is so much to unpack in this disturbing scene starring the Slurpee Family.

First, and perhaps most important when it comes to turning the tide of American health, is the family’s total lack of understanding when it comes to how their dietary choices might be affecting their appearance, energy, and physical and mental acuity.

You are what you eat, or slurp! Perhaps this needs to be the slogan for a new dietary education campaign spearheaded by Washington.

This unfortunate family, and many like them, seemed to have a total blind spot for how their dietary choices—including convenient and seemingly “innocent” treats from the gas station or ball park—are chipping away at their potential as human beings.

Without wanting to sound insulting in any way, it does seem that the brain power—the powers of reasoning and awareness—have been blunted for this family, likely through a combination of poor dietary choices, physical inactivity, prescription medications, and uneducated groupthink (even if the group was only their family of four).

Despite their suspicions that the drinks had been inadvertently compromised or even covertly poisoned, they continued to drink them down, even as they asked for a test to be done on the drinks in order to identify potential contaminants/poisons.

And just as baffling is the family’s decision to go into a local urgent care clinic seeking a resolution to the suspected problem. They could have inquired with the employees at the convenience store where they bought the drinks, first off; or they could have simply taken a sip and at the first taste of impropriety tossed the drinks and gone on about their day; they could also have filed a complaint with the drink company that manufactures the drinks. There were any number of reasonable options.

Yet they chose to march into a local urgent care, where other people were perhaps dealing with heart issues, broken bones, and infections in need of antibiotics, to complain about the Slurpees that were so suspiciously distasteful that they only felt safe finishing them in the witness of healthcare workers.

This is another issue to unpack here. What is the average American’s understanding of the healthcare system, and of the role that doctors, clinics, medications, and interventions ought to play in the overall picture of their health and wellbeing? Far too many people put the onus on “others” to pick up the pieces of their poor health and lifestyle choices after the fact. They don’t exercise or eat right, they feed their minds and bodies all sorts of junk, they neglect the nourishment of a spiritual life, and then they waltz into a local clinic not understanding why they feel like shit and wanting the staff to fix it all in  matter or days or hours with a pill, vaccine, or procedure.

Now I am by no means perfect when it comes to taking care of myself (I miss workouts sometimes, and I also enjoy frozen pizza, beer, French fries, scones, and an occasional Diet Mt. Dew), but I also know that I am better in this regard than in years past when I mostly made self-care a second or third-thought and then relied on doctors to tell me what was wrong and how to fix it.

The primary lesson in my rambling might be this: the individual needs to understand that he or she is primarily responsible for his or her own wellbeing. This begins with education—education regarding how certain foods, drinks, activities, and medications—either contribute to a person feeling better or worse on a daily basis—and it then continues with effort, a resolution by the individual to act and care for themselves in a way that respects the physical and mental gifts they have been given by God.  

And if, one by one, we as Americans begin to make choices that honor the sanctity and majesty of our bodies and minds, then as a collective we might even remain a superpower for a few years longer.

Or at least until one of our enemies comes up with a sweeping plan to poison the national Slurpee supply.

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MICHAEL PRIEBE is a writer and life coach who has worked with individuals from all over the world to help facilitate positive transformations. If you would like to work with him in coaching you can find more information here: Michael Priebe Coaching