Don't get me wrong...I love trends, take one look in my closet and you'll know. But what is it about diets that are so trendy? But we all seem to be doing it all so wrong, when the answer is just so simple. We only have one body and we need to do all we can to take care of it, and sometimes the one's who do seem to care are more interested in what is the most trendiest way of eating and not the healthiest. The answer is this simple: A Well Balanced Diet. That is it, the problem with most diets is that they take one potential "body destroyer" and cut it out 100% from the dieters life. Whether that be carbohydrates, fat, meat, sugar, foreign food or root vegetables. People seem to think that if they just remove the one thing, they will rejuvenate their body and become healthy. The scary part of this is, that often the diet may make you smaller in size for a while, but it is not actually making you healthier or ridding your self of the more harmful internal fat.
In reality if the food is something that is natural to this earth, a reasonable amount of it will not harm you. If you want to try to be a heathy person there are so many more harmful things that should be removed from your diet than the list of things the trendy diets tell us we should avoid. Before cutting out nature's grocery store try some of the garbage man has made for us to eat: processed foods (like soy products, spreads, bleached flours and sugars), ground meats (hamburgers), cured meat (bacon and sausage), pickled vegetables, instant meals, TV dinners, powdered mixes and preserved food are the ones to avoid or cut out. What made people think that natural foods like grain, fruits, dairy, meat and natural sugar would harm your body? The key is moderation because it is true that too much of these natural foods will harm you, some more others obviously, like too much red meat no matter how fresh is bad for the brain, but a small amount now and then, like 2-5 servings a month will give your body benefits it can't find anywhere else. Even too much a certain vegetable will overload you body, but cutting something natural from your diet shocks your body. Yes it is true that when cutting something from your diet you could ingest supplements, but can a man-made substance ever win-out against mother nature. For example dairy is so much more than calcium, meat is so much more than protein, grain is so much more than carbohydrates and vegetables are so much more than vitamins, that is why we need a good balance so out body can gather everything it needs. The body was created with a lot of thought and it our responsibility to take care of it.
No doubt in North America, we eat way too much of certain things. Meat for example, 2-3 servings a day? That is a joke right? Minimizing you meat intake and trying out other form of natures protein allows your body some variety. Try seafood, wild poultry, lentils, nuts, broccoli, seeds and eggs. The average body needs only 45 grams of protein a day. When beef and pork are you sole sources of protein, you ingest some good stuff, but also a lot of bad stuff, like growth hormones.
The same goes for grains. Our body uses the simple and natural sugars in carbs to provide us with energy, which we obviously need, but we should still be careful. North Americans eat way to much wheat (and mostly bleached wheat at that). No wonder there are so many people allergic to wheat now. There are so many other types of grains out there and your body would enjoy a balance of them now and then.
Vegetables too, what did you have this week, let me guess...carrot, celery, tomato, potato and onion. While all good for you, not all vegetables are created equal and your body needs balance of as many as you can get, generally the more vibrant the colour the better they will be for you, but don't "cut-out" the other kinds, they have stuff no other type of vegetable has.
Basically all you need is common sense when choosing what to eat. Balance your self and use moderation instead of removing certain items you think might be bad for you, while you continue to much on factory made foods you know are bad for you. Most importantly, enjoy what you eat and don't obsess over it, beating yourself about making a mistake now and then will only cause stress which is one of the worst things for you body, but thats a whole another blog entry.
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