Health or Wealth

Which is more valuable?

A colleague shared a concept with me once that really opened my eyes.? He drew a chart on the whiteboard.? Along the horizontal axis of the chart was the variable of time, starting at birth and ranging to age 100.? The vertical axis was the variable of low to high, with 1 being low and 10 being high.? The chart had two lines – one that represented health and another that represented wealth.? ?The message was simple: as we retire and get older, we want both our financial savings and our health to be high.? Typically, we envision our line for financial savings to steadily increase, with a greater sloped curve the latter half of our life.? As we progress in our career, we tend to increase our income and typically pay off our home mortgage in our 50’s or 60’s.?

The other line, which represents our overall health, starts off high and remains steady, but as we reach our 50’s or 60’s, it naturally declines.? The eye opening message is that the two lines will ultimately intersect.? The chart makes it apparently clear that our health should be of equal or higher concern as we live our life.? Why?? Because, even if we have a lot of savings going into retirement, if we are not in good health, we won’t be able to enjoy it.? Further, particularly with today’s healthcare prices, if we have poor health, our financial savings will be gobbled up by healthcare expenses, leaving us with no health and no wealth.

This concept has had a profound effect on me and how I view my own health.? If you know me, you know that I love deep fried breaded cheese curds, with plenty of choices in Wisconsin.? This is why I practice moderation to only have fried cheese curds once per day (just kidding).?

I have used this message to reach people to get them to care about their personal health and to participate in a wellness program.? I can say from experience that it has helped reach some people to improve their lifestyle and overall health.