A simplistic approach to food can make a complicated subject much easier to understand and more importantly, can make the process of eating right much easier to follow.

The key is to gravitate as much as we can toward whole foods and away from processed foods.
Our nutritional needs come mostly from raw foods. That’s why the American Cancer Society’s health poster shows mountains of fruits and vegetables.
Unfortunately, most of us don’t want to eat raw foods.
We’d rather have fat or sugar—or both.

We all know that fat can taste good in many forms.
The problem is that the short-term taste benefit converts into long term excess weight that we then have to carry around.
Think about it.
Imagine that you decided to put five-pound weights in each of the front and back pockets of your trousers and lug them everywhere.
Think of how much extra work you would have to do just to get around.
Think about how much extra strain you put on your joints and muscles.

As a result of this extra work, you feel fatigue and decide to boost your system with a cheap sugar product, like a candy bar.
You get a sugar rush, followed thereafter by a sugar crash.
Worse than the crash are the long-term effects.
The sugar has nowhere to go.
It will convert into more fat.

You then add more weights to your pockets and carry them continuously.
The stress and strain become even greater.
Our desire to exercise diminishes.
We turn to caffeine, sugar and other stimulants.
The vicious cycle perpetuates itself.

This vicious cycle makes us old.
We have to break it.

WHAT DO WE NEED?

We need fiber for cleansing.
What is the best source?
Vegetables. They contain fiber and hydrate us.

Where else can we find it?
Fruit, and they also hydrate our body naturally.

We should be eating between 6 and 8 servings of uncooked fruits and vegetables per day.
That’s a challenge.
Most of us won’t do it.

What about protein?
You need no more than a serving that fits in the palm of your hand, once or twice each day.
Chicken or fish digest more easily than red meat and fish contain essential fatty acids that lower the risk of heart disease.

Again, think about the consequences of excess.
Whatever you don’t need must be processed and expelled.
That takes tremendous energy.
Whatever is not expelled must be stored somewhere and in some form.
What form will the storage take?
Fat, fat and more fat, the only form our body knows.

We need to stay way from foods high in sugar.
Consider foods high in sugar like throwing gasoline on a fire.
The immediate flare up caused by the short-term energy boost will be replaced by a tired, sluggish feeling within a very short time.
We need complex carbohydrates that burn more slowly, give us a consistent energy flow that enables us to perform at our best.

We also need to pay attention to when we eat.
If we need around 2000 calories for ideal functioning according to leading nutritionists, then obviously, when we consume them can have an enormous impact on weight loss.
If we consume 80 percent of our calories at breakfast and lunch and only 20 percent after 2 P.M., this will greatly help us lose weight.

On the other hand, if we eat very little early in the day and wait until late to consume 80 percent of our calories, then we have no time left to consume them.
This will lead to weight gain.
The same 2000 calories, depending on when we ingest them, can contribute to either weight loss or weight gain according to our choices.

What can we do to fight the tendency to over-eat late?
Eat smaller portions.
Use a smaller plate at dinner-time.

Also—eat more slowly.
Our body has an appetite indicator, which like a thermostat, controls our appetite.
It tells us when we are hungry and continues to function for about twenty minutes after we eat our first bite.
If we develop the habit of eating slowly, after 20 minutes, we will no longer feel hungry and will eat for pleasure, not to satisfy a craving.

Here’s the kicker.
If we eat less, we have to digest less.
If we don’t need to digest as much, we don’t force our body to work so hard.
If the body doesn’t have to work as hard, we stay younger longer.

We must find a way to moderate our food intake or we will wear out our equipment.

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