Real Food - Real Life 

Westerners aren’t typically faced with a food shortage. In fact, the opposite may be true: we have too much food to choose from. What foods we choose to eat, however, can directly impact our bodies in a negative or positive way.

Furthermore, food is much more than just calories or energy. Food actually communicates with your genes and the kind of food you eat gives your genes different information, helping them direct your body. Genes, in fact, regulate your entire biochemistry and physiology, including the production of hormones, brain chemicals, blood pressure, cholesterol, moods, metabolism, weight and the aging process.  

And we need real food for real life. Here’s why: our bodies are in a constant state of regeneration, a process made possible by what we eat. That’s why it’s necessary to eat foods made up of the same biochemical’s our bodies are comprised of, such as plants and animals found in nature, not the man-made non-foods or other substances found in our modern diet. 

Diana Schwarzbein, M.D., author of The Schwarzbein Principle, says that instead of real foods, we eat manufactured food products, assuming that these substances are healthy to consume. They’re not. The introduction of chemicals as food—instead of eating real food—has harmed humans at the cellular level, resulting in earlier aging and in degenerative health issues. 

Schwarzbeing says, “If we could see the intricate biochemical processes going on within our bodies, we would be appalled at the damage we do to ourselves when we ingest chemicals—the man-made foods, which are really ‘non-foods.’ For example, if after drinking a diet soda we could actually see what occurs on a cellular level—how the molecules, hormones and enzymes become imbalanced—it would be apparent that such a substance is bad for our bodies."

She continues, "But because the damage happens out of sight, we continue to travel along the accelerated metabolic aging track, and our health deteriorates slowly over a long period of time. Then when we gain body fat or have a health crisis, it seems as though the problem manifested itself suddenly.”

Diet soda is only one example of the non-food items we choose from on a daily basis. There are 320,000 processed foods and beverages competing for our food dollars in this country, and 116,000 of them have been introduced since 1990. Most of these are candy, gum, and snack foods, with $30 billion spent in marketing these non-foods to both adults and children. 

The bottom line is that our bodies were never meant for non-foods; we need whole, unprocessed foods—foods close to their natural state as possible. The truth is that whole foods speak to your genes in their native tongue and help your body function as it should.

Make sure you’re choosing real food for a real life. - Dr Rubin

Working The Pyramid Principle  

Have you ever heard the phrase: “you are what you eat?” Well, that is only part of the story. You are WHEN you eat also! In other words, if your meal strategy is upside down, so will your figure be. I bet you are slightly confused right now… 

Let me explain: What is food? It is energy for the body. 

If food = energy, when do we need the most energy… before we go to bed or when we get up to start the day? Of course, when we get up! When should we eat our biggest meal based on energy requirements? Breakfast, lunch, then dinner. That’s right. We are completely upside down! What is the typical American diet? 

How about a Pop-tart for breakfast, burger and fries for lunch, spaghetti and meatballs with sauce, garlic bread, milk and dessert for dinner? You ideally want your daily meal plan to be an upside down triangle, filtering the least amount of calories to the end of the day, and giving the body the most at the beginning of the day so that it has all day to burn them off. 

For Example: 

Have oatmeal, eggs and some fresh fruit for breakfast 

A chicken Caesar wrap for lunch with a side of raw carrots and hummus Kabobs for dinner with a tossed salad. 

Notice how the calorie count got smaller with each meal? You always want to eat the least amount of calories before you go to sleep. Since you are not expending energy moving around, your body will take the food and store it in your fat cells for a rainy day. Your body is much more forgiving in the mornings and lunchtime.  

IF you want to have bad unhealthy foods or consume large amounts of calories, DO IT FOR BREAKFAST! You will have more time to burn it off.