Pushing Your Mental Boundaries Around Personal Health
January 12, 2009
In the world of health, fitness and nutrition, an important principle to understand is “bio-individuality”. Loosely translated this means one person’s pleasure is another person’s poison – what works for one person doesn’t work for everyone & we need to work over time to find what works best for us.
As you begin to make changes in your personal health & work towards improvements it becomes critical to stay in tune to your body, track changes & measure results as many of you now know. We cannot master our bio-individuality otherwise to achieve continuous results & improvements in our health over time.
It also becomes important to understand making health a sustainable lifestyle is a long-term journey, not a destination – it is not some point you will come to in 4 weeks, 3 months, or even a year – you will continue on, and you will continue learning what works best for YOUR OWN SINGLE BODY.
To this end, I’d like to share with you some tools on this particular post now that you’re a few weeks into your journey that will help you open your mind and begin to learn more about how to succeed at a healthy lifestyle through developing a preventative health approach and mindset in our lives.
These are a few selected favorite reads I’ve collected over the years – I’ve hand-picked some of the top trusted resources & so they are well-worth the investment of your time & money. Take the time to supplement your journey as you push your physical & emotional boundaries right now, and also expand the boundaries of your mind when it comes to your personal health….read on:
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\”Good Calories, Bad Calories\” by Gary Taubes
“In Good Calories, Bad Calories, Taubes tries to bury the idea that a low-fat diet promotes weight loss and better health. Obesity is caused, he argues, not by the quantity of calories you eat but by the quality. Carbohydrates, particularly refined ones like white bread and pasta, raise insulin levels, promoting the storage of fat. Taubes’s eye-opening challenge to widely accepted ideas on nutrition and weight loss is as provocative as was his 2001 NewYork Times Magazine article, What if It’s All a Big Fat Lie? Taubes (Bad Science), a writer for Science magazine, begins by showing how public health data has been misinterpreted to mark dietary fat and cholesterol as the primary causes of coronary heart disease. Deeper examination, he says, shows that heart disease and other diseases of civilization appear to result from increased consumption of refined carbohydrates: sugar, white flour and white rice. Taubes cites clinical evidence showing that elevated triglyceride levels, rather than high total cholesterol, are associated with increased risk of heart disease-but measuring triglycerides is more difficult than measuring cholesterol. His call for dietary advice that is based on rigorous science, not century-old preconceptions.”
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In Defense of Food: An Eater\’s Manifesto by Michael Pollan
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. “In his hugely influential treatise The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Pollan traced a direct line between the industrialization of our food supply and the degradation of the environment. His new book takes up where the previous work left off. Examining the question of what to eat from the perspective of health, this powerfully argued, thoroughly researched and elegant manifesto cuts straight to the chase with a maxim that is deceptively simple: Eat food, not too much, mostly plants. But as Pollan explains, food in a country that is driven by a thirty-two billion-dollar marketing machine is both a loaded term and, in its purest sense, a holy grail. The first section of his three-part essay refutes the authority of the diet bullies, pointing up the confluence of interests among manufacturers of processed foods, marketers and nutritional scientists—a cabal whose nutritional advice has given rise to a notably unhealthy preoccupation with nutrition and diet and the idea of eating healthily. The second portion vivisects the Western diet, questioning, among other sacred cows, the idea that dietary fat leads to chronic illness. A writer of great subtlety, Pollan doesn’t preach to the choir; in fact, rarely does he preach at all, preferring to lets the facts speak for themselves.” (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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\”What to Eat\” by Nutrition Industry Leader & Guru Marion Nestle
Amazon.com Review
How do we choose what to eat? Buffeted by health claims–should we, for example, restrict our intake of carbs or fats or both? Is organic food better for us?–we become confused and tune out. In supermarkets we buy semi-consciously, unaware that our choices are carefully orchestrated by sophisticated marketing strategies concerned only with the bottom line. That we should confront such persuasion is the major point made by nutritionist-consumer advocate Marion Nestle in her extraordinary What to Eat, an aisle-by-aisle guide to supermarket buying and thus an anatomy of American food business. “The way food is situated in today’s society discourages healthful food choices,” Nestle tells us, a fact that finds literal representation in our supermarkets, where food placement–dependant on “slotting fees,” guaranteed advertising and other incentives–determines every purchase we make.
Nestle walks readers through every supermarket section–produce, meat, fish, dairy, packaged foods, bottled waters, and more–decoding labels and clarifying nutritional and other claims (in supermarket-speak, for example, “fresh” means most likely to spoil first, not recently picked or prepared), and in so doing explores issues like the effects of food production on our environment, the way pricing works, and additives and their effect on nutrition.
What Nestle reveals is both discouraging and empowering. Through ubiquitous advertising, almost universal food availability, the growth of portion size, and unchecked marketing to kids, we’re encouraged to eat more than we need, with consequent negative impact on our health. Knowledge is indeed power, and Nestle’s lively, witty, and thoroughly enlightening book–the work, readers quickly see, of a food lover intent on increasing sensual satisfaction at table as well as promoting health–will help its readers become completely cognizant about food shopping. It’s a must for anyone who eats and buys food and wants to do both better. –Arthur Boehm –This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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And my personal fav & an absolute must-read as my client support approach in healthy lifestyle, fitness & nutrition counseling is very aligned with her work….
\”The Diet Cure\” by Julia Ross
Amazon.com Review
For most health books, the word cure in the title is a definite sign to steer clear. The Diet Cure is a refreshing exception. Author Julia Ross has the unusual job description of “nutritional psychologist,” which means that she works with people to eradicate food cravings, addictions, and eating disorders (including overeating). The gist of The Diet Cure plan is that food allergies, hormonal irregularities, blood sugar swings, and thyroid dysfunction, among other factors, cause biochemical imbalances that lead to food addiction and weight gain, and that these problems can usually be lessened or eradicated with the proper diet and supplements.
To be sure, most of these health problems ought to be diagnosed by a medical professional, but they often get overlooked because their symptoms can be numerous and vague (fatigue, depression, inability to concentrate). They’re not easily diagnosed by the common managed-care tests (such as the TSH, or thyroid-stimulating hormone, blood test; Ross advises several more specific tests if a thyroid problem is suspected). Ross’s questionnaires, worksheets, and profiles of case studies from her 10 years of clinical experience will enable you to determine what may be the hidden causes that sabotage your weight-loss efforts.
Ross’s book should be lauded for its educational tone. She warns of the dangers of zinc and vitamin B1 deficiencies, two common problems found in chronic dieters, along with protein and fat deficiencies and adrenal exhaustion (which is particularly common in caffeine fiends). She rails against the most popular diet programs, including the Zone, the Atkins Diet, and even Weight Watchers, for (among other things) their ignorance of food allergies such as grains, dairy products, and sugar. For those whom Ross terms, perhaps frighteningly, sugar addicts or “recreational sugar users,” she suggests an amino-acid and fish-oil supplement plan to curb sugar cravings and aid weight loss. Many of her patients over the past decade testify in the book that their environmental allergies and weight-loss problems disappeared after they cut sugar from their diets.
Ross’s suggestions may seem radical to many primary-care physicians; her approach to health and weight loss definitely takes a holistic approach. She does, however, back up her suggestions and plan with references to medical studies, along with dozens of print and online resources on finding a nutritionist, naturopathic physician, holistic M.D., and testing labs (many of them mail-order). This is one diet that Americans in particular ought to pay attention to.
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From Publishers Weekly
Long-term lung cancer survivor Anderson (The Cancer Conqueror) believes that wellness and illness are not just conditions experienced by individuals but are expressions of whole persons functioning in a range of contexts: in their society, among their co-workers, with their family and friends. His holistic approach to wellness addresses attitudes and core beliefs, vocation and emotion, as well as physical habits and nutrition. The advice is sound and sometimes unexpected: “stress is to be not only expected but preferred…. The problem isn’t stress, it’s toxic stress.” Despite the rigid connotation of the title, these “laws” are generous and encouraging, reflecting Anderson’s accessible presentation of material in aphoristic, anecdotal chapters. This inspirational guide sometimes lacks subtlety, but it doesn’t harangue and is filled with inspiring verbal snapshots of people whose lives have been enriched by adopting the practices and beliefs explicated here. Author tour.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc
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And just as a kicker — you have a manual in the glove box of your car, right? Why not put a personal health manual in your home when we all possess a body as well…
\”The Human Body Book\” by Steve Parker
There it is healthy folks, some of the best of the best in health education, understanding & reference. Life is a endless series of opportunities to expand your mind – never stop learning, especially if you plan to succeed at a healthful lifestyle – the only way we can do this is by taking ownership & learning the tools to become personally empowered around our health.
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Entry Filed under: Family Health: Parents & Youth, Fitness & Weight Loss, Healthy Lifestyle, Holistic Health & Healing, Nutrition, Supplements & Vitamins. .
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