Food Can Make Or Break Us

Food can make or break us. I don’t think I need to prove this point, we all know that we will eventually become what we eat. Don’t just take my word for it, Albertha J.M. Walhout, PhD, was quoted in Science Daily to say, "That a small amount of a 'healthy' food in an otherwise unhealthy diet could elicit a beneficial change in gene expression that could have profound physiological effects". Junk food or nutritious food? Everyone thinks it’s an easy choice, but our busy lives make this obviously apparent easy choice a negative result in the end. The way I see it, it’s easy to just grab a chocolate bar, it’s easy to just reach for processed snacks, and it’s easy to just drive thru a fast food restaurant when you have only 30 minutes to get dinner ready before your children’s bed time.

So let’s stop saying that it’s an easy choice between junk and nutritious food, it’s not. This is a matter of willpower, and especially a matter of difficult choices. What’s more important to you? Your rigorous daily schedule or taking 5 minutes to think about what your children ate yesterday, earlier in the day, and think about offering them some balance before deciding on what to feed them. Yes, even if you have to take 30 minutes to prepare it. What is more important to you?

Food Safe Zones

The first thing to think about is surround yourself with healthy food. Food that you will reach for when you are hungry and have little time to think before you put it in your mouth. This is crucial, and the most powerful way for you being able to determine your future health by surrounding you and your family with healthier food. No more quick and instinctual reactions to grab junk food.

This is also a great way to create a safe zone for you and your family. Get yourself home before you make a bad decision. Get home and eat right, do not make last minute stops to grab a snack for you or your family. Just get to your safe zone as soon as possible so that you can get the right, healthy food for you and your family.

Food For A Healthier Life

Junk or nutritious food? What is Junk Food? I classify junk food as very highly processed, supposedly edible, substance that contains 10 or more chemicals ingredients that have to be industrially extracted and processed to even look, not to mention taste, like food. It’s easy to say we will avoid these types of foods, but in reality we need to research. Research the side of the box, read up on the restaurant, and study its nutritious values. Start to map safe zones for you and your family to walk into around town. Yes, it’s a lot of work, but you need to keep asking yourself, what’s important to me?

Vegetables and fruits are a quite easy and obvious choice for our daily diet. But we need to surround ourselves with these types of foods. A plant-heavy diet of real and wholesome foods result in a number of health benefits to people. The Centers for Disease Control published a paper "Research to Practice Series 1; Can eating fruits and vegetables help people to manage their weight?", which shows how their research found that eating a large amount of vegetables and fruits can help lower risk of many types of chronic diseases in people, including cancer and cardiovascular disease.

Food We Should All Be Eating

Processed foods can be damaging to our health. The American Society for Nutrition published in 2013 a paper "Intake of trans fat and all-cause mortality in the Reasons for Geographical and Racial Differences in Stroke (REGARDS) cohort". Showing that Trans fats, commonly found in packaged processed foods, increases the chance of heart disease, and ultimately death. Restaurant meals use food with this ingredient, and eating in these establishments will affect your health. You and your family will face the consequences sooner or later. What you eat will result in how you and y our family feel, sleep, and eventually look.

So please give this subject some thought, if not for yourself, think of your family. Think how much better they will feel, sleep, and look in the future for eating good nutritious food. Take all the junk food out of the house, and do not let anyone, I mean anyone, bring junk food home. This might mean you may need to get stern, but this will show everyone around you how serious you are about eating right and staying healthy.

Published: August 1, 2016

By: Phillip Gilliam