Yes it is a tough call but mom is right when she told you that ‘you are what you eat’. You need to know that ‘healthy’ means more than just having a body that is thin and that you won’t develop weight issues unnecessarily. There are many misconceptions about the foods you should eat and the ones you shouldn’t. You might have heard that if you are eating lots of vegetables and fruits then you’re doing good. While that might be true, what you might not realise is that we shouldn’t label fruits and veggies as ‘healthy’ and the same for the one’s in cereals. We ought to think of them more as medicinal plants with a host of properties essential to our well being.
Your mom might have told you that you are what you eat. I may be stating the truth when I say you are what you absorb. So what you eat becomes your very essence. This is why you don’t add any extra flavor when eating vegetables. The sense you get is how it was meant to be, not how it looks like it is. If the damaging effects of it are not apparent to you, than you are just deluding yourself into thinking that you are doing well.
How do fruits and vegetables benefit our bodies?
They contain anti-oxidants. Why do we need anti-oxidants? You see, the body absorbs the free radicals from whatever it is you are inhaling and destroys them without allowing them to do any damage to your body. These free radicals are waste products of oxidation.Live longer by absorbing anti-oxidants to reduce the damage!
Your mom used to tell you that you are what you eat, right? Well, guess what, you are also what you absorb. If you don’t get enough of the best type of nutrients that is in fruits and vegetables you body will be using up your own forces to fight off the free radicals that are constantly being generated. Every time you eat one more vegetable or fruit, your own bodily clock gets set to automatically want more. You will never get fully healthy unless you eat a minimum of five to eight of these nutrient-dense, health-promoting, nature’s wisdom foods (also know as fruits and vegetables).
Five to eight is the cut off. You need to keep replenishing your system with the best kind of foods to maintain optimal performance, but you do not want to overdo it. After all, kids need to eat. right?
Eat They Way I Do
For example, I’m building a decent sized salad for my kid today. He’s about 8 years old, he can hardly walk around the room without saying, ” mom, I’m hungry.” I’m ready to oblige. I take out the 10 packet return packs of shredded lettuce, crapecles, tomatoes, red onion, carrots, cucumber, and anything else I can think of that might make a good salad, and put it into a large bowl. Then I mix it all up with 2 tbsp of fat free sour cream, a tbsp of fat free Parmesan cheese, some pine nuts and I practically choke up the house with the aroma of it.
I took a bite after the first bite and said, “This is great, I really like this salad.” I repeated it to him a few more times, and tell you, I think he finally gets it. I told him about the free salad rule, and that is,take your time with the meal, each bite isesis careful,Studies show that the longer you take with a meal, the more you pay attention to the taste sensation on each tongue, and the better your health improves. My husband and I never ever go more than 3 or four bites in one sitting. Well, except when we are all getting together for a nice lunch…
Note: The salad must be present for the 5-star to appear.
My kid has since learned that it takes 25 chews to properly chew up an apple, so now he can eat that whole plate of lettuce in one sitting. I get the odd look when I do this, but it’s just my way of letting him know that it’s a special treat that he really needs, and that if he didn’t like it he wouldn’t pay for it…
Learn from Me
To get that extra forward bite, chew the food for ten seconds before swallowing. This allows your stomach to start working on the food, instead of your brain trying to figure out the chew signal. You will also receive better results if you avoid chewing at the end of a meal. I actually stopped telling people to chew their food after eight or so bites. O.K. you can do that now? Good.
