Reading Peter Attia's Outlive

Why I Think This is a Good Place to Start

Late in 2024, I had the thought that the act of reading should become one of new critical elements of health. With all the discussion about light, sleep, and circadian rhythms, it was becoming apparent that being healthy was much more than just meal planning. It was then that I decided to launch the idea of a Reading Circle in January 2025.

But there will never be a perfect book about health. There are too many variables, too many differences between people, too many options for diets. What works for one person on one day will likely not work for another person. It may not even work for the same person years down the road.

The body is a moving target, and so is our health.

However, what grabbed me about Outlive by Dr Peter Attia, is that he is not aiming to create a protocol or a recipe for health. He is simply painting a picture of the negative trends that tend to happen in our physiology (metabolic imbalance, cardiovascular concerns, autoimmune and cancer developments, and memory and brain degeneration). As a practiced physician, he knows that most of us will brush up against one of these imbalances at some point in our lives.

And his focus is on prevention.

When I saw that Dr Attia understands that prevention begins in early life and continues all life long, I grew to be one of his biggest fans. Prevention is the hallmark of nutritional health. Ancient cultures prized particular foods and waters not only for their ability to heal, but for their ability to provide longevity from one generation to another. Nutrition strives toward prevention.

The trouble is that in our culture, most people don’t have any interest in their health until something goes wrong. In the crisis of sickness, we look for cures through multiple interventions. However, when the crisis is over, the attention to health usually comes to a close.

This is where Dr Attia’s work can help us understand that prevention is a necessary life long strategy. All the little things add up, it turns out. This is why seeking health is something that matters, even before sickness is on the scene.

Now, of course, rarely does life play out in such a way that we find ourselves seeking health in early years. Usually there are multiple bumps along the road that draw our health back to our attention. Outlive reminds us to listen to these moments, and helps provide motivation to continue to seek new paths to sustainable health.

The framework that he uses in the book is that we are ready to move from Medicine 2.0 to Medicine 3.0. Without eliminating the success of Medicine 2.0 (antibiotics and surgery), we have the science now to really begin to unpack how to prevent serious conditions from gaining a foothold in our culture. The challenge is that people don’t yet understand what to do.

This is where reading comes in. The more we can read, the more we can talk about this, the more we can break down any of the misunderstandings, the better for our culture and future world.

I heard recently that women have the longest lifespan but the shortest health span. This is referred to as the gender paradox, and it broke my heart, as I’ve seen many women struggle in their later years with fatigue, joint and bone pain, memory concerns, and muscle degeneration. Years of life and wisdom can be lost through this tragic shortened health span. These trends might not be stoppable, but they can be slowed through an ongoing focus on strategic preventative care.

As Dr Attia says, “We must focus on delaying the onset rather than extending the duration of disease - and not just one disease but all chronic diseases. Our goal is to live longer without disease.”

This might seem far fetched, but so was flying across the country - if you lived in 1895. It’s just a matter of where you place your attention and your energy.

If you’re reading Outlive, keep on. If you haven’t picked it up, consider putting it on your list for your next read. If you have some questions that come up during the reading, make a note of those. You can always send me an email, or find me on Instagram @riverwoodwellness . I’ll have more opportunities in the coming weeks, including an upcoming webinar.

Stay tuned. But more importantly, stay tuned in to your own trends, your own needs, and your own health.