Is Your Diet Ruining Your Life?

The acronym for the Standard American Diet is SAD, and that might be the best possible way to describe the way we typically eat. Our busy lives are prioritized with work, cleaning, errands, kids, dogs, shopping, even exercise usually comes before food, which is why 20% of American meals are consumed in the car. While it isn't impossible to eat healthy in the car, it isn't easy either, 25% of Americans eat fast food for at least 1 meal a day, and we eat 31% more processed food than fresh food.

We all want to look and feel our best, many of us want to lose weight, and we should always want to live our lives at their fully optimized and highest potential. You may be asking yourself what SAD has to do with this...as long as you are counting calories and eating low fat food, you should be fine right? I'd argue 'wrong' on both accounts and here is why:

First off, feeling hungry and being happy are on opposite sides of the Maslow ledger. It's literally impossible to live a happy life while feeling the pains of starvation. Food and feeling 'fueled' are basic elemental human needs. It's not just happiness though, 20-25% of our total calories are used by our brain. So if you are starving your body, you are starving your brain and sapping your brainpower too!

Secondly, we are literally made of the food we consume. It is processed inside our bodies and ends up being used to create and sustain us.  If you were going to build a car and you got to pick the parts, you'd pick the best possible parts right? Well, if you want to build the best possible you, you need to choose the best possible calories for the job. And no; low fat, reduced fat, and zero fat processed foods are not going to make my list. Our brain is 60% fat, to function optimally, our brains need to maintain this level of fat. A lower amount of fat, in fact, can lead to neurological disorders. This does not mean you should run to the nearest drive though for an XL order of fries. This is where the quality of your calories comes into play. All calories are not created equal, and thinking that you can "work-off" the negative effects of bad calories just by burning an equal amount of calories at the gym, is equivalent to thinking you can work off the negative effects of a pack of cigarettes by taking a brisk walk in clean mountain air and breathing deeply. Vegetable/soy oils, heated and older unsaturated oils, and of course partially hydrogenated and processed oils create inflammation in the body. 

Quality fats are maybe the most essential thing we should be eating, and are most often lacking in the standard American diet (SAD). Some great choices for healthy fats are:

Grass fed butter/Ghee

Coconut Oil 

MCT Oil

Avocados

Eggs (yokes included!)

Raw Macadamia Nuts

Getting these items into your body on a regular basis (especially in the morning) is one way to really optimize the way your body functions throughout the day. Not only will you feel better and think more clearly, but you'll almost certainly lose weight, gain muscle, or both. When your body has the proper levels of healthy fats, it just simply functions better, your hormones tend to balance out, and your body tends to find its healthy homeostasis point so you'll function the way you are designed to!