#1270 Spray Painting Leaves

In our last +1, we hung out with some scientists and doctors who decided to test whether or not FOOD prescriptions would be more cost-effective (and health-boosting effective) than just normal prescriptions for medicine.

(We might have also talked about the green spray paint prescription our nutty gardener recommended we apply to our brown leaves! 😲)

I promised to share some of the details on that research.

And…

My apologies for not honoring that commitment but I’m going to need to push that back to tomorrow.

Today I need to chat about what happened right after I drafted that last +1.

So…

I created that +1 during my AM1 Deep Work Time Block.

I needed to find the Food Fix book—which I was pretty sure I gave to Alexandra so she could read. I headed out to the kitchen to ask her where it was. She and the kids were eating breakfast. We started chatting about what I was working on.

Then I paused and started explaining the idea to Emerson.

I said: “Hey buddy. Imagine we have a tree and the green leaves are turning brown. We’re not sure what’s going on, we just know something’s not quite right. So, we call in an expert gardener to see what he thinks we should do.”

He nods his head.

I continue: “So, this guy shows up, looks at the brown leaves then reaches into his bag and pulls out a can of green spray paint.”

Pause. Emerson’s eyes are widening.

“Then you know what he does? He paints the brown leaves green and tells you that should do the trick. Then he writes down the type of green spray paint we should get from Home Depot and tells us all we need to do is spray just a little bit on the leaves every day and we’ll be fine.”

Pause. Emerson is looking at me in disbelief.

Then I continue by asking: “What would you say to that guy?”

To which Emerson immediately replies with a laugh: “I’d tell him we want the tree to be ALIVE not DEAD!”

To which I laugh and say, “Right?” (Hah.)

He continues: “I mean, that might make it LOOK GOOD but it’s still not going to live.”

What could I say other than: “Exactly, buddy. Exactly.”

Then I asked him what he thinks would help. He thought taking care of the soil and watering it and giving good nutrients would help. I agreed.

Then we had a conversation about the parallel wisdom with our health and the importance of getting to the ROOT CAUSES of our ailments rather than prescribing proverbial spray paint.

And, well, that’s Today’s +1.

Root causes and childlike wisdom for the win!

If you feel so inspired, perhaps you can explain this to a 5 or 7 or 11 (or 16 or 21 or 35 or 52 or 70 year old).

And, most importantly, let’s put the Theory to Practice as we write ourselves some empowering, life-enhancing prescriptions.

TODAY.