Table of Contents
People Throughout History Would Have LovedFit for Life Not Fat for Life...
People who like this sort of thing will find this the sort of thing they like.
Abraham Lincoln
Life is not just being alive, but being well.
Martial
Every great advance in natural knowledge has involved absolute rejection of authority.
Thomas Huxley
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as self-evident.
Arthur Schopenhauer
Never allow schooling to interfere with your education.
Mark Twain
Fit for Life Not Fat for Life and the information contained in this book are not intended as a substitute for the advice and/or medical care of the readers physician, nor are they meant to discourage or dissuade the reader from the advice of his or her physician. The reader should regularly consult with a physician in matters relating to his or her health, and especially with regard to symptoms that may require diagnosis. Any eating or lifestyle regimen should be undertaken under the direct supervision of the readers physician. Moreover, anyone with chronic or serious ailments should undertake any eating and lifestyle program, and/or changes to his or her personal eating and lifestyle regimen, under the direct supervision of his or her physician. If the reader has any questions concerning the information presented in this book, or its application to his or her particular medical profile, or if the reader has unusual medical or nutritional needs or constraints that may conflict with the advice of this book, he or she should consult his or her physician. If the reader is pregnant or nursing, she should consult her physician before embarking on any nutrition or lifestyle program.
The body is a machine for living. It is organized for that, it is its nature. Let life go on in it, unhindered, and let it defend itself. It will do more than if you paralyze it by encumbering it with remedies.
LEO TOLSTOY
WAR AND PEACE
INTRODUCTION: THE MIRACLE OF LIFE
Emblazoned across the front cover of
Newsweek magazine, below a picture of a very obviously overweight child, the caption asks in large block letters:
FAT FOR LIFE?
This book answers that question with a resounding no! Not fat for lifefit for life.
As I looked at the picture of this child on the cover of the magazine, a child so noticeably overweight, I could not help but be moved by his predicament. Certainly, he would much prefer to be singled out for a scholastic or athletic achievement, rather than for having to go to a fat farm to try to bring his weight under control. It is well established that if he does not figure out how to do so, not only will his childhood be riddled with health problems, but his adult-hood as well.
Furthermore, I could not help but reflect on the problem of overweight that also continues to exist within the adult population. Nearly two-thirds of the American population is considered to be overweight to some degree. At any given moment, over 80 million people are said to be on special diets, spending billions of dollars every year on weight loss.
And I could not help but reflect on my own long-running and ongoing effort to keep my weight in check. I have been living on this planet for nearly sixty trips around the sun, and for my entire adult life, I have wrestled with my addiction to food and my desire to eat.
I cannot recall the number of times I have wondered, sometimes with amazement and sometimes with envy, how there can be people who can eat their own body weight in any kind of food they like, at any time of day or night, and not gain a single ounce, while others can put on five pounds merely by walking through the deli section of the grocery store. Those of us who dwell in the latter category know all too well that in order to maintain a reasonable body weight, we have to be ever-vigilant and diligent if we dont want to wind up blocking out the sun for those around us.
Except for programs that involve surgery and/or drugs, both of which I have an extreme aversion to, I have tried more weight-loss plans and diets than I care to recount. Not until I came to realize that there are certain fundamental truths that govern all human bodiesregardless of shape, size, genetic makeup or rate of metabolismwas I able to discover how to eat the foods I like and still keep my weight down.
These truths I refer toyou can call them laws, rules, principles or whatever you chooseexist and are real. And until they are acknowledged and respected, you can read all 500 or so diet books at your local bookstore; you can count calories, calculate grams of carbohydrates, fats and proteins, and measure portions; you can take appetite suppressants and starve yourself; you can drink powdered meal replacements and eat boring prepared diet foods that taste like straw; you can do all these things until the pyramids turn to dust, and it all will be to no avail. After all, arent these the things people have been doing for years, even decades, and isnt the problem of overweight still as prevalent as ever?
The fact is, it doesnt matter if you are aware of the laws to which I am referring but choose to ignore them, or if you have never even been made aware of them: The end result will be the same. The effort to lose weight will be met with the same frustrations with which you are, in all probability, all too familiar.
Consider the law of gravity. No matter who you are, no matter if you are rich or poor, big or small, educated or not, male or female, and no matter where you livebe it in the United States, Asia, Africa or Europethe law of gravity applies to all of us equally. Even if you dont believe in gravity, dont care for it and refuse to acknowledge it, if you dont respect it, the repercussions of violating it are the same. If a man falls, or even leaps, from a five-story building, he will be splattered on the ground, whether he is aware of the law of gravity or not. Someone might say, Well, no wonder hes all smashed up. He broke the law of gravity. In actual fact, he didnt break the law of gravity; he illustrated it.
Other laws, equally as unyielding as the law of gravity, govern the human digestive tract and the process of eating food. Not being aware of them will not save you from the results of violating them. After reading this book, at least you will be aware of the principles to which I am referring, and you will be able to avoid the usual pitfalls and frustrations that customarily accompany attempts to lose weight.
You will be glad to learn how few of these truths there are, how marvelously easy they are to incorporate into your eating lifestyle, and how wonderfully simple it is to live in harmony with them, so that the eating experience remains a joyous one while you lose the weight you desire to lose.
There is no wealth but life.
JOHN RUSKIN
What would you say is the one thing that is more precious to you or more valuable to you than anything else? Isnt it life? Glorious, magnificent, abundant life. How special and dear life is. All the money, all the diamonds, rubies, emeralds and sapphires, all the gold, all the riches the Earth can yield, all of it combined is but dust compared to a single moment of life.
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