Believes matter!  

One of the definitions of Vitality – according to Merriam-Webster on-line dictionary is “power of enduring”. Most of us are yearning for Vitality when we fell we don’t have it, we feel always tired and fatigued and don’t have enough energy to satisfy our own expectations.

Thus, the desire to buy Vitality in a capsule, a potion or get it by eating or drinking is on everyone’s mind and industry is cashing-in on this ubiquitous yearning. But does it work – is there a Vitality activating supplement? Advertisements are certainly not short on promises and hope and desperation is fueling the miracle-cure commerce.

Can we subjectively quantify Vitality?

First of all – we have to ask, how do we measure Vitality? What is the benchmark? Do we have more or less Vitality than others at the same age and how do Vitality levels change during a day?

The Department of Biological Anthropology, University of Oxford did a study to measure Vitality, here are the findings:

Subjective perceptions of mental and physical energy were measured by the use of visual analogue scales (VAS) over the course of a week in a group of normal volunteers. These variables were found to correlate, highly both with one another and with assessments of vigor and fatigue measured with a standard adjectival format. In addition, high correlations were found with a measure of positive effect. These five variables also displayed characteristic patterns of diurnal variation. Physical and mental energy, vigor and positive affect were highest in the morning, falling progressively and significantly over the day. In contrast, fatigue showed the opposite pattern. Extraversion showed positive correlations with physical and mental energy, vigor and positive effect, and negative correlations with fatigue and negative effect, most being significant (P less than 0.05). Conversely, neuroticism showed a negative correlation with the first four energy variables but was positively related to fatigue and negative effect, most correlations again being significant. Physical and mental energy, vigor and positive affect also showed a positive correlation (P less than 0.01) with a measure of happiness. It is concluded that VAS-derived ratings of physical and mental energy are reliable indicators of self-perceived vigor and fatigue.

Can we objectively determine Vitality?

An interesting technology is emerging and vying for acceptance as credible science. The method is referred to as GDV (Gas discharge Visualization) and several papers by various authors were presented at 18th IEEE Symposium on Computer-Based Medical Systems, 2005. IEEE Proceedings. “The study - by Kononenko, I.; Sedej, M.; Sadikov, A., - verifies a hypothesis that GDV in fact measures vitality. For that purpose a limited study was performed and the findings support the hypothesis.” While GDV is a product of modern computer and imaging technology, the underlying method is Image formation in the gas discharge around objects of different nature initiated by strong impulsive electromagnetic field (also called Kirlian effect) is known for more than two centuries. So far the main direction of investigation of the effect was purely practical: it turned out that gas discharge pictures around biological objects could provide substantial information about the internal state of the object. In particular, physicians in many countries actively use the gas discharge images of human fingers and toes nowadays for screening and monitoring of human state.

Interestingly, Merriam-Webster On-line dictionary defines Vitality as: “the peculiarity distinguishing the living from the nonliving” – but we prefer its commonly understood meaning: “physical or mental vigor especially when highly developed”.

Vitality is not just our name, it is also our mission. Part of our background is Nutrition Research and it is Nutrition that fuels the human body to carry out its daily tasks. Sadly, contemporary nutrition is – in part responsible for many of today’s health problems, namely obesity, high blood pressure, cholesterol, lack of libido, lack of energy, degenerative diseases, violence, diabetes, and many others. Basically, society has sacrificed Vitality on the altar of convenience such as Fast Food, Sodas, Sugar, Aspartame and eating while doing other things like watching TV, driving or working on the computer.

At Vitality Concepts we understand that lifestyles have changed and people are unwilling or unable to revert to sequential rather than parallel actions. Our clinicians are trained to devise personal Vitality Concepts that take your individual lifestyle issues as basis. That means we don’t ask you to change your lifestyle (unless there are no alternatives), we devise your curriculum for sustainable Vitality according to your lifestyle.

We may feel “OK” - that is “not sick” but still complain of stress, fatigue, low energy, irritability or just feel tired. Typically we consider ourselves as healthy, simply because we are unable to describe a disease symptom. Vitality is the mother of Health. If you feel charged up with energy and determination to get things done, it enhances your appearance and you impress others with your Vitality! There is no quantitative measure of Vitality but you know when you have it – and when you lack it. Vitality is an acquired property and the ultimate desirable Objective in life – without Vitality all our material possessions are meaningless.