Why Eat Healthily?

Why Eat Healthily?
Because we eat three times a day! Food has a strong influence on the state of our health, and is a medicine that we will never discontinue. As plants acquire their nutrients from the ground and sun, we acquire our nutrients from the plants. Therefore our health is very closely connected to the health of the plants we eat (or the animals that ate them!) If you are interested in making your diet healthier, here is a quick pointer on how to start:
Choose High Quality Ingredients
Start by improving the quality of the ingredients that you buy. Peanut butter for instance, is an often poorly processed and low quality food. The nut oils are typically rancid, oxidizing our tissues and deteriorating our insides - however, the oils found in quality peanut butter, or even almond butter from a source you can trust, is very healthful and healing. In fact, fresh nut oils can repair the damage done by rancid nut oils! At room temperature, the nut butter should have a layer of clear oil on top, as it is less dense than the meat of the nut. The taste and smell of the nut butter should be fresh, and fruity. The consistency should be goopy, and a spoon should be able to stir the contents. Most commercially available nut butters are more comparable to icing in consistency and ingredients, since most peanut butters’ first ingredient is icing sugar!
Eat Whole Grains - like Oatmeal!
The mind is like a monkey! It can be overactive, jumpy and hard to settle down - or it can be stubborn, tired and lazy. Some foods like oats contain minerals, B vitamins and oils which have the incredible ability to focus, nurture and energize our over-worked and over-stimulated minds. Breakfast is fundamental to our health, and oatmeal is considered a healthy choice because of these beneficial effects.
Oatmeal is a whole grain which means its nutrients are intact, but when a grain is refined and processed, most of its vital nutrients are stripped away, leaving them nutritionally void. What’s worse is that our body must compensate for these missing nutrients by drawing them out of our own nutrient stores, making most prepared breakfast foods anti-nutrients!
Some of these nutritionally void foods include:
boxed breakfast cereals, waffles, toaster pastries, donuts, cereal bars, bagels, ..and even toast!
Continuously eating these foods will create nutrient deficiencies resulting in various diseases, but specifically: cravings, irritability, depression, sugar cravings, fat formation, and of course - poor concentration!

Submitted by Whole Foods Nutritionist Michael Fisher, RNCP
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The information in this article is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace a one-on-one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice.