Actions for Building a Healthy Diet

When it comes to building a healthy diet, there are two items that we must consider.

First, are the real, whole foods that we need to think about adding into our diets.

Second, are the industrial not-so-foods that need to be removed from our diets.

Today, I bring these practices to you, focusing primarily on the removal of industrial not-so-foods.

Removing Industrial Not-So-Foods

The importance of consuming real, whole foods is easy to understand: if we don’t supply our body with the resources it needs to function, then it will lose its ability to function and find its way down the path of poor health and disease.

However, it’s not the only piece to building a healthy diet.

The other item that we must consider is the edible substances we may be delivering to our bodies that the human body has not been designed to effectively process.

What I am referring to are the items that are carefully crafted in laboratories. They are made up of ingredients that may or may not have once been considered a food, but at the time they enter into the body resemble nothing of the sort that the human body has been consuming for millennia.

The total package: a combination of ingredients that are labeled and accepted as food, and yet are not received by the body as food.

I call these sorts of edible substances industrial not-so-foods. Even though we may recognize them as food, our bodies have not been designed to fully recognize them as such.

Because of this, a number of problems arise when they are consumed. To name just a few:

1. high doses of energy (sugar, protein, fat) are dumped into the bloodstream, leading to:
   • blood sugar spikes
   • large volumes of energy sent into storage
2. the brain does not register the full amount of energy consumed
   • leading to over-eating over the course of the day
3. hazardous chemicals and other substances enter into the body
   • disrupting the ability of the systems supporting the body to function properly

Unfortunately, the vast majority of individuals living in the modern world consume most of their calories from industrial not-so-foods.

This means that we have some work to do.

Removing industrial not-so-foods from our diet is essential to building a healthy body. To accomplish this, we need to address two items:

1. Replacing the portion of our meals made up of industrial not-so-foods with real, whole foods
2. Eliminating the habit of consuming industrial not-so-food based snacks, treats, and unnecessary meal additives

Practice for removing industrial not-so-foods:

Today, I invite you to take stock of your diet and to examine how you can take action to remove industrial not-so-foods.

Begin by identifying the industrial not-so-foods that you regularly consume. Feel free to write this out as a list.

Then, categorize them based on whether they make up a real meal or are just an extra load that could be done away with. That is, think about whether the food is a part of a meal or necessary snack (does it provide your body with energy it needs to function?), or whether it is something that just happens to find its way into your digestive system because you were bored, satisfying a craving, or giving into pressure when the item was put in front of you (hello break room donuts).

Then, let’s work through how we can get these out of your life.

1. Replace industrial not-so-foods with real, whole foods

Look at the list of industrial not-so-foods that make up your meals or necessary snacks. These are the not-so-foods that are supplying your body with the energy it needs to function and cannot be removed without being replaced with something else.

Now, think about how you can replace these not-so-foods with sources of real, whole foods.

Here’s a few examples to help you out:

• Refined grain is likely the main industrial not-so-food in your diet. Instead of consuming bread, pasta, cereal, and other refined grains, consider the following:
  • Whole grains: note that you must use caution when choosing these, as labels do a fantastic job of fooling us into thinking that a product is from whole grain sources when it is really just a whole bunch of refined grain
    • A trick to get past this: only choose whole grains that are in their whole grain form. You can see this – if a food looks like a grain, then it’s probably a grain.
    • If a food looks like a product made from grains, examine labels carefully to understand the ingredients and process used to create the product.
    • If you’re unsure whether or not it’s a whole grain, then it’s probably best to choose another food
• Vegetable/seed oils: replace these industrially produced oils with sources of fat that have been carefully, easily, and naturally produced.
  • My favorite cooking fats are butter (from grass-fed cows), coconut oil, and avocado oil. The reason: these are stable oils that won’t be damaged by heat.
  • My favorite oil for dressings is olive oil. It adds a nice flavor and blend of healthy fats. Do not use this oil for cooking though, as its delicate fats are readily damaged by heat.
• Sugar: ideally, we are working to move away from the need to consume sweet foods. However, when we are just getting started, it helps to think about replacing sugary foods with:
  • similar foods that contain no sugar
  • sources of whole foods that contain some sugar, such as whole fruit
  • small amounts of real honey
• Processed meat or any animal products from unhealthy animals
  • animal-based foods are an important part of the human diet. The problem is that animals in our modern system are treated horrendously. This is obviously horrific for the animals themselves, but is also bad for your own health
  • aim for animal-based foods from happy and healthy animals. This means that the animal was raised in a natural environment and fed its natural diet

2. Eliminate unnecessary snacks and treats

One of the primary ways I distinguish real, whole foods from industrial not-so-foods is by their satiation factor. When I eat a real, whole food, my brain registers that I just ate food. When I eat industrial not-so-foods, my brain doesn’t get this same signal.

This means that I often walk away from consuming a not-so-food feeling just as hungry, or even hungrier, than I was before.

To address this, I approach the food I eat with an important series of questions: Am I really hungry? Will this food satisfy this hunger? Did this food leave me satiated or hungrier?

I’ve found that if I am really hungry, then I will happily eat any real, whole food. If I’m not actually hungry, then real, whole foods don’t sound that good.

So, if I find myself reaching for an industrial not-so-food while I don’t want to eat a real, whole food, then I’m not actually hungry and don’t need to be eating anything.

For example, if raw almonds don’t sound good but chips or flavored crackers do, then I’m not actually hungry – I’m just adding unnecessary calories into my diet in the form of industrial not-so-foods, and this is what we need to move away from.

Try this out: Any time you reach for an industrial not-so-food at any point that’s not meal-time, instead reach for a real, whole food. If you find that you want the industrial not-so-food and not the real, whole food, then you are not actually hungry – you are probably just bored or looking to satisfy a craving.

A final note on this process

The process that is building a diet based on real, whole foods is something that may take some time. With this understanding, our goal with this practice is not to completely overhaul our diet.

Rather, it is to begin working on our understanding of the industrial not-so-foods in our diet so that we can move forward eliminating these foods.

If you begin today taking a serious look at what exactly you are putting into your body and how it makes you feel, then you will find that over the next days and weeks, you will begin to shift away from reaching for industrial not-so-foods and automatically reach for real, whole foods.

One last thing…

If you find yourself needing clarity on what exactly a real, whole food is, what exactly an industrial not-so-food is, and why it is so important that we distinguish between the two, make sure to head over to the sidebar to subscribe. When you do, you’ll receive my guide to all of the above.