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Diet: Healthy Eating
Many people have been brainwashed by the food industry to eat more and more processed foods that are bad for them. Countless commercials, billboards, and other advertisements are strategically designed to shape the way you eat. The food industry is now a $1 trillion per year business in the U.S.
Make no mistake about it: there’s a concerted effort to influence what you eat. Processed junk foods and drinks have higher profit margins than fresh natural foods. Are you going to let big businesses dictate how you eat? If so, your health will predictably suffer.
The National Research Council, American Heart Association, and American Cancer Associations agree about common dietary causes of heart disease, obesity, diabetes, cancer, and stroke. The culprits?
- Insufficient fiber, fruits, and vegetables.
- Excessive fat, red meat, salt, sugar, and alcohol.
- Tobacco products.
Proper nutrition is vital for a long, healthy, happy and productive life. James Scala, Ph.D., author of Making the Vitamin Connection, decries “. . . the malnutrition of those who are just getting by, not quite sick enough to merit attention or relief, but caught in a self-perpetuating cycle of sub-optimal mental and physical development that holds whole societies down for generation after generation.”
This is not new information. In 1941, Surgeon General Dr. Thomas Parran said “Many well-to-do Americans who can eat what they like are so badly fed as to be physically inferior and mentally dull.”
There’s no doubt about it. What you eat directly affects your energy levels:
- A chronically poor diet of over-processed junk food leads to a ‘I’m just trying to get by’ existence. Life feels like you’re walking in quicksand.
Not enough energy.
- Sugar, caffeine, and nicotine cause frantic energy followed by a drop off. Life feels like a roller-coaster.
Too much hectic energy, then too little.
- Optimal nutrition and other healthy habits contribute to calm, efficient energy all day long. Life feels like you’re a powerful jet cruising through life. Just right!
It’s your life. Are you going to eat to live or live to eat? Food tastes good for only a few seconds before swallowing. After that, it directly improves or impairs your health. I’d rather eat healthfully and feel great all the time than pig out and feel miserable. Remember your vision of feeling, looking, and being your very best? What’s more important? Feeling magnificent or eating food that tastes good for a few moments?
Over the years, I’ve realized that it’s just not worth eating to satisfy my taste buds. When I eat too much junk, sweets, or fat, I feel wiped out the rest of the day and sometimes even the next day. Conversely, when I eat a healthy meal, I feel more energetic and happy. I love feeling great so much that it’s an easy decision to eat healthfully almost all the time.
Don’t worry, I’m not recommending that you completely avoid all junk food. Most people can occasionally enjoy junk food, sweets, or fatty foods IF they eat a healthy diet most of the time.
The good news is that, over time, you will truly enjoy healthy food more than junk food. Eat healthfully for sixty days and then revisit your old fast food restaurants and vending machines. If you’re like most people, those foods will taste sickeningly sweet, too rich, and repulsively fattening.
Read Dr. Mark Pitstick’s book Radiant
Wellness for much more information
about how optimal nutrition can improve your life.
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