I have been reading everything I can find on health, nutrition, fitness, strength and aging.
The experts do not agree on much.
The only thing they all seem to agree on is that we people in the western world are over fed and under nourished.
We have so much food.
Our super markets are full of food from all over the world.
But what are we actually eating? We drink pop, diet and regular, coffee, tea and only occasionally pure fresh water.
We have bagels and donuts for breakfast.
If we are health conscious we may have whole grain cereal, but with for most of us, with lots of sugar cooked into it, then we sprinkle sugar on top.
Salads are used as an appetizer not as a main component of the meal.
So how should we be eating? This is the problem; what should we be eating? If you ask a group of people, they may smirk a little.
What a silly question.
We all know what we should be eating.
Then you get as many different answers as there are people in the room.
There is some consensus.
Most will say no white bread (while eating a sandwich that is, you guessed it, white bread) and most will agree that potato chips with a cola is not a great supper.
Beyond that there is not much agreement.
Do we eat whole grains? or are grains to high on the glycemic index? If you care, white bread is 70 on the index and whole wheat is 68.
This is not a significant difference, both are considered high as table sugar is less at 64! Can we even process grains properly? Some say no, we can't others disagree.
I have read that meat will make you sick and that the vegetarian lifestyle is the only healthy lifestyle, but others say you have to have meat for one of the "B" vitamins.
It can make you head swim.
So much conflicting information! Where do I stand? As much as possible eat as naturally as possible.
Eat foods that the ancients would have been able to gather or hunt.
Can you go out into a field and pick a bunch of high fructose corn syrup? Did you grandmother bake pies with red dye number 4? Did your great grandmother add sulfur dioxide to her jams and jellies' to preserve freshness? Humans have been here 100,000 years and have survived quite nicely without processed food.
Now that we can buy food in neat little packages, we are fat, weak, tired and grow old far too soon.
Not everything that tastes good is bad for you.
Nature's bounty includes some truly delicious food.
Do not look at your diet as a pain you must endure to live a long healthy life.
The human body was made (whether through creation of evolution it does not matter) to work.
We may need to change our diet, but we do not have to change everything all at once.
Start small.
Even good changes if done too fast will make you sick.
If you have never fed your body veggies it will not have the enzymes and other means to digest them easily.
Add good foods into your diet, but do it slowly.
Start with crudités today [Crudités (pronounced crew-dee-tay) are sliced or whole small vegetables, easily held in the hand like baby carrots or carrots cut into bite size pieces, celery, and cucumbers.
Broccoli and cauliflower crowns are also popular], then add a delicious salad tomorrow.
Let your heart, mind, tongue and gut get used to the change, then add something new.
If you are out of shape, you may want to change everything and fix everything right now! Trouble is, that didn't work for me or anyone else I know.
I missed my white bread, waffles and potatoes.
Eventually I binged on them and worse yet could not make myself go back to salads for a long time.
It is better to have a slow, steady success than a quick failure.