Of course, diet, stress, and environmental factors can all change the expression (or the physical outcome) of your DNA.

For how many hours a week is a chair pressing on your hamstrings? How does this constant pressure affect the blood vessels running down to your feet or the nerves in the pelvis?

The government currently recommends three categories of movement—cardio, strength training, and stretching—which can be likened to the macronutrient groups carbohydrates, fat, and protein. Without a better prescription for what to eat/how to move, the moves we consume to meet our recommended daily allowance (RDA) become mostly junk. And, without

But a different point of view is that we aren’t really sick—we are just starved. And we aren’t using food as medicine. Food isn’t medicine at all. It’s just food; we need its nutrients to survive and thrive. It’s that simple.

Imagine your body is made of clay, with each type and frequency of movement shaping the physical outcome. Take your imaginary body-ball-of-clay through your personal movement timeline, considering your early development, favorite activities, accidents or sports injuries, footwear habits, the desks at school, your favorite couch, and driving

Exercise (a repetitive intake of an isolated muscle contraction to fill a hole of missing strength) is often prescribed like vitamins (a capsule ingested to decrease a nutritional void).

Dancing Skeletons, a book by nutritional anthropologist Katherine Dettwyler

“The doctor said my bad knees were genetic,” or, “Research shows that cardiovascular disease is genetic.” But using the term genetic in this way is at best outdated and at worst totally paralyzing to the person with the issue.

You are used to thinking of yourself as one big body, and not the sum total of many tiny parts. When we think of loads—especially loads in a book about exercise—we tend to apply the term to the force (“I was loaded down with a heavy weight”) instead of thinking about how that heavy weight created unique deformations (and loads) on a trillion of