One day, he "broke down" and ate a Kit Kat. You know those crunchy chocolate bars that we grew up on, which I must admit are very yummy.  When he brought it to my attention, expecting me to unleash some motivational monologue and a great deal of tactical diet-speak, I said, "Howie, all you did was eat a Kit Kat."  That's how I left it. Because that is all that happened. 

Howie, like so many others was well into his nutrition transition at this time. He made the wholehearted and educated decision to Switch, away from eating predominantly nutrient-poor foods to eating in a nutrient rich way, based on nutrient dense, vegetables, fruits, beans and legumes, nuts and seeds, and whole grains in great tasting ways. And while he was eating 90% or more nutrient rich foods at the time, Howie had also decided to go 100% plant based, meaning vegan with no animal foods whatsoever. He was still, as you can see, eating some refined foods.

I later explained to him, that it would be good to lighten up and that it was this experience, for all the reasons wrapped up in his decision to eat a Kit Kat, which require attention and time, that having 10% of your calories for old food favorites or times when you can't get your preferences met, or to deal with any situation where things may go awry, just makes sense. I further explained that this was not a problem, but rather "par for the course".

Of course his past conditioning around dieting, was getting in the way of this more liberated approach of "transitioning". I enlightened him to the fact that transitioning the way one eats is not limited to nutrition alone and that that's why we were promoting the More Plant Based Nutrient Rich® approach to improving the way one eats, and; why 90% or More was the ideal we were all striving for.

You will learn a great deal more about the 90% or More Plant Based Nutrient Rich approach after you take your Personal Diet Quality Assessment here at NutrientRich.com and start reading the Plan.

I began promoting the More Plant Based Nutrient Rich® approach to maintaining a nutrient rich healthy eating style, long before the findings of The China Study-- the most comprehensive study of nutrition ever conducted, determined that ideally less than 10% of our calories should come from animal products if you choose to eat them; or the reinforcement from Joel Fuhrman. MD, who also adopted this idea.

I began thinking in terms of eating 80-90% or more, plant based nutrient rich foods with approximately 10% or less of the foods you eat coming from nutrient poor animal products and refined foods because I felt it was very practical, given the way people were used to eating for so many years, the fact that most people can't stick to diet programs perfectly, and the fact that you can't always control your own behavior at certain times, let alone all external circumstances.

The philosophy was also driven by the reality that there are thousands of people who live to 80-90 years old, some even longer if you are a "George Burns" type, who are eating the SAD Standard American nutrient poor Diet. So I figured that if you were eating 80-90% nutrient rich, instead of nutrient poor, you would probably live a very long and healthy life.

I put the emphasis on the 90% later, because of the stance taken in The China Study based on it's seminal findings, and the studies of the healthy life expectancies in the longest-lived populations, all or most of whom eat less than 10% of calories from animal products and refined foods.

John Robbins, who recently launched The Food Revolution Summit, was also a big factor in this. In his book Diet for a New America, he said that no one would go hungry in the world if people simply ate 10% less animal foods than they are eating right now. He is also the author of Healthy at 100, which explains the secrets of the worlds healthiest and long lived people.

So back to Howie.

I didn't want him to make more out this situation than it needed to be and later explained to him the philosophy "out of mouth out of mind", and that while one of his old food favorites, Kit-Kat's, had been out of his mouth for a while, they were not just yet out of his mind, and he hadn't found a replacement... That he would continue to default to Kit-Kat's during certain situations as a coping mechanism like he had in the past until he created a new habit or routine, or changed the situation itself. I explained that the situation would need to be addressed and a new default would need to be established that gave him that same pleasure, until he didn't need it anymore, even if the new default was nutrient rich!

I believe I introduced him to Medjool dates, a very sugary nutrient-rich food that is very sweet; so sweet they can put a Kit Kat to shame. He tried them out, learned about them, discovered how to eat them and eventually created a new default. Eventually he also learned how to handle that situation very differently.

It's amazing what happens when you get new information and begin thinking differently.

What's the moral of the story?

There are several: 

a) There is more to changing the way you eat than food alone.

b) There is a nutrient rich version or replacement for every food you are eating right now.

b1) If you're going to eat as a copy mechanism, make it nutrient rich, so that you get other benefits and the consequences aren't nearly as negative.

c) Empathy goes a long way, when addressing habits and reasons why you do what you do.

d) Even after you've make the decision to Switch to Rich, you will likely still eat a nutrient poor food from time to time, even if you've gone vegan. Vegan's are notorious for eating lots of refined junk foods even though they are not eating animal foods.

e) Understand that transitioning requires strategy (s) at times. It's not productive to turn your eating a "Kit Kat" into personal, ego driven, battle of staying on or falling off your diet. That's the industry of change, steer clear of all that diet speak and drama. There are reasons why things happen and why you do things. Take the intelligent approach, keep it impersonal and address the present situation.

f) Sometimes you may just choose to eat a Kit Kat and be completely in control, that's fine.

g) When you are eating More Plant Based Nutrient Rich®, that 10% is there until you don't need it anymore. Default to it when you need to.

I'm sure I could finish the alphabet, with new "morals of this story" so to speak, but you should be getting the idea. Eating Nutrient Rich is not a diet all wrapped up in the "diet speak" of old-- all that on and off the program, story-driven, emotional roller coaster creating drama so many of us have learned from the diet industry, to make make an industry out of something that shouldn't even be an industry- to keep people stuck, dieting.

As you can deduce from this post, it's an industry that can snare even the smarted people, who have no yet learned that the power of nutrient poor diet, or the power of switching to a nutrient rich healthy eating style. If you have not yet developed the psychology to support healthy eating in an unhealthy world and haven't yet learned the art and science of transitioning you are at a disadvantage.

This is why making the Switch to Rich, Nutrient Rich, the Great Tasting Healthy Way to Eat, starts with a wholehearted, educated decision and then, becomes what we call a nutrition transition that happens over time.

We help you travel that path with The Nutrient Rich Healthy Eating Plan, the most direct path to success, helping you learn what take most people 20 years or more to discover about making a transition successfully. But even with the Plan, transitioning takes time and sometimes you will eat your old food favorites.

Just remember, "all you did was eat a Kit Kat". Just keep moving forward.

Luxury is defined as: 

 

1.      A material object, service, etc., conducive to sumptuous living, usually a delicacy, elegance, or refinement of living rather than a necessity.

 2.      It is also a free or habitual indulgence in or enjoyment of comforts and pleasures in addition to those necessary for reasonable standard of well being.

 3.      A means of ministering to such indulgences or enjoyment.

 4.      A pleasure out of the ordinary allowed to oneself.

 5.      A foolish or worthless form of self-indulgence.

 

No guilt really, we are all just waking up to this reality. It took me years to wake up!

As a matter of fact, in our new subscriber guide called, Wow, I Thought I was Eating Healthy!, the word “healthier” is what we are emphasizing as the descriptor of the various diet tactics that people get caught up in that keep them trapped eating nutrient poor and never really experiencing the Success Results they desire.

Simply put, "healthier" is not healthy enough to yield the Success Results everybody wants, but so few people experience, unless they have already made the Switch, and are already eating Nutrient Rich. When people say they are eating "healthier," as they dine on low cal cheeses, fancy processed foods that are often found in specialized stores, grilled chicken, and meals that are not comprised of whole food ingredients; sure they are eating "healthier" than the Sad American Diet SAD, and that is an improvement, but they are not eating healthy enough. In reality, oftentimes, they are simply just eating better versions of the SAD, or are cutting back on the nutrient-poor foods they were eating prior to trying to eat "healthier."

Unless they are already Nutrient Rich Healthy Eaters, who are dining on 90% or More Plant-Based Nutrient Rich foods in great-tasting ways, in a way that is optimizing for nutrient density, they are not eating nearly as healthfully as they can and need to be eating if they want to actually get the success results they set out for.

Yes, there truly is a HEALTHY way to eat and it is called -- Nutrient Rich. The reason we refer to our Plan as The Nutrient Rich Healthy Eating Plan is because nutrient-rich, or nutrient-dense eating, is what defines whether or not the food you are eating is healthy.

A "healthier" food may not be nutrient rich at all. In most cases "healthier" foods are only healthier as compared to the Standard American Diet of nutrient-poor and nutrient-barren foods, but people are so addicted to "healthier" foods that aren't really healthy, that simply eating "healthier" seems like a better alternative than minimizing or eliminating nutrient-poor foods, and replacing them with nutrient-dense or nutrient-rich ones. And why do they do that? Why do they stay stuck eating nutrient-poor foods? Food addiction.

Had Food Addiction Got You Stuck Eating Healthier?

Food addiction is when you are getting concentrated calories, most of the time in non-health-promoting forms like animal products and refined foods, not enough nutrients to keep the body from accumulating toxic substances, and when the body tries to clean up, you experience the overwhelmingly uncomfortable feelings of withdrawal for some period of time. How long this lasts depends on your prior eating style.

Are you aware of your current eating style and its effects on your body? Are you suffering unnecessarily from food addiction? If you get headaches or become irritable when you don't eat for a few hours, I'm sorry to inform you--but you are food addicted!

Your are eating in a way that is...

• Toxifying your body
• Promoting weight gain
• Degrading your health and personal performance
• Inducing diseases like diabetes, heart disease and cancer
• Aging your faster
• Resulting in an older look, and
• Shortening your life

Notice, these are the opposites of the Success Results we promote at NutrientRich.com when we talk about Nutrient Rich Healthy Eating. In fact, if you are eating nutrient poor, you are undoubtedly suffering from all of the issues listed above--and it doesn't need to be that way.

Make the choice to Switch to Rich, Nutrient Rich--The Great-Tasting Healthy Way to Eat and get all 7 Success Results -- and then some:

• Detoxify Your Body
• Lose Weight Naturally
• Improve Your Health
• Reverse Disease
• Age Slower
• Look Younger
• Live Longer 

Some people are thinking that he lived a long time, saying "82" was a long life, and that this was inevitable, especially since we watched his health deteriorate over time, on TV. But his death was not inevitable at 82, nor was the almost 20 years of dramatic health decline from diabetes, caused by a nutrient poor, calorie rich unhealthy diet.

Dying at 82, is nearly 20-25 years short of a healthy life expectancy for humans based on longevity studies of long lived populations and science that we have in hand today!

I will miss Dick Clark and New Year’s Eve will never be the same without him, even with the well-received Ryan Seacrest. But mostly, I feel sad that he died at 82, after suffering from type 2 diabetes, for 20 years, some strokes and a heart attack.

If you have been following my blog posts and social media statuses, or if you have reviewed my website, nutrientrich.com, you will learn that all three of these illnesses are the types of lifestyle-induced diseases that can be prevented through a nutrient-rich healthy eating style and that the natural life span (healthy life expectancy for Americans is from 95-105. Ref: Healthy at 100, Jon Robbins. Food Revolution.

Dick Clark's death is a perfect example of a person who suffered needlessly from lifestyle-induced illnesses, until his death. The onus on SUFFERED! People who eat a nutrient rich diet, as part of a resilient lifestyle based on sound fundamentals, can live long and healthy lives—into their 100’s-- relatively illness free, and certainly free of diseases we know are caused by what we eat.

Rest in Peace Dick Clark, and thank you for all that you shared with us and taught us and all the joy you brought us.

What I would like to add to Ms. Pope’s article is a third option that goes beyond the modern day omnivorous eating style, or that of the strict Vegan, which presents a dilemma for most people. It is the More Plant-Based Nutrient Rich® healthy eating approach, which bridges the gap that causes so many people to fall short of their desired outcome.

Ms. Pope points out that going Vegan, at the “snap of a finger,” can be “fraught with challenges.” I acknowledge this. It can be challenging to go from being a modern-day omnivore, who is eating approximately 25% animal foods, and over 60% refined foods, with approximately 12% or less coming from actual whole, plant-based nutrient-rich foods, to a strict herbivore (aka Vegan) diet.

That is a big leap—and anyone with experience knows it’s not simply a matter of making “the Switch.” Deciding to make a “Switch” to a More Plant-Based Nutrient Rich® eating style or a Vegan diet is first and foremost, a decision.

What follows is a transition, or what we call a nutrition transition. As with any other style of living, it takes time as you develop the mindset and skill set you need to succeed. When you try to take a big leap in a single bound, without enough inspiration, education and support, which is what most people do, the chances are good that you won’t make it. You will fall prey to the many challenges that Ms. Pope outlines in her article.

As a Performance Lifestyle Trainer, who spends a good deal of time training people on Nutrient Rich® healthy eating, I have never been a proponent of lifestyle changes that take you too far too fast--with the exception of those people who are suffering from critical conditions, who need to take immediate, deliberate and uncompromising measures. President Clinton, who Ms. Pope and I refer to, is a good example of this.

But, for the average person, who simply no longer wants to deal the negative consequences of the Standard American Diet (SAD), and is tired of weight loss-only diets that may help you lose weight, but keep you stuck, diet-trapped for life, and want more motivation than simply eating “healthier” provides (a vague term at best), going Vegan seems like a potentially clear cut decision—one that is charged with emotion and logic.

But, as Ms. Pope points out, it can be fraught with "physical, social and economic challenges," and, to be honest, this is true for any other dietary changes. These challenges are not about “going Vegan,” they are about making a lifestyle change. There are costs on many levels when making a change, and they can be challenging when you don’t have the knowledge or experience. So challenge yourself!

Why is that a problem? Even an article, like Ms. Pope’s, can deter people from change if the challenges aren’t seen in the proper context. I don’t know about you, but if I was newbie, her article might deter me. But, facing challenges is how you get successful, and eating a More Plant-Based Nutrient Rich®, potentially Vegan, diet if you choose, is the healthy and successful way to eat so you can detoxify your body, lose weight naturally, dramatically improve your health, reverse lifestyle-induced diseases, age slower, look younger and live longer.

As much as we support people in going Vegan, we suggest that you start eating in a More Plant-Based Nutrient Rich® way as the most viable approach. It’s a more natural mindset, which is flexible, but no less committed than you are to a healthy eating style. It helps to mitigate the many challenges, which are par-for-the-course of any significant change, such as going Vegan, because it’s not an all or nothing approach. By the same token, we encourage people to get to 90% or More Plant- Based Nutrient Rich®, because that’s the zone where you will experience the most success, which we define as The 7 Success Results, at NutrientRich.com.

With this approach, you aren’t “fraught with struggle,” trying to “stick with a Vegan diet.” Rather, if you want to go Vegan, you can go through the natural change process to get there. If you don’t, taking on too much too fast will leave you struggling with ideas like “I need a personal chef,” “I have to give up my favorite foods” and what will my “unsympathetic friends” say—all while you are personally dealing with all the nutritional, psycho social and economic changes that will come your way when you change too fast. Under less duress, when you transition your eating style, you will resolve and evolve through all of these issues. That’s what every person goes through, and it’s not going to be any different for you.

This all brings up the main point of this blog post. Even in Vegan circles, many people, including health professionals don’t use the “V” word simply because it’s perceived as a big leap from how most people eat, and one that will prevent most people from even getting started, because it’s so black and white. Couple that with a limited nutritional education and experience with this kind of change, and you are set up for failure.

The nutritional world is full of ex Vegetarians and Vegans, who have resorted to far less healthy diets that make them “feel” better, simply because they tried to go Vegan or Vegetarian too fast focused mainly on “giving up” meat, before they learned how to eat a More Plant-Based Nutrient Rich® healthy eating style, which is what we teach at nutrientRich.com. If you then want to go Vegan, great!

The Truth is, if you gave most people $1m, they wouldn’t know how to manage it, and would likely blow it. But, someone who has grown into developing wealth has fewer challenges, even though they may have had them at an earlier time. It’s the same with nutrient-rich healthy eating—you have to transition into it over time, even if you go gangbusters at the start, if you expect that you are going to sustain the change.

When you have the right nutritional knowledge, combined with the emerging experience you get with a plan and support to guide you, even eating a 100% plant-based Vegan style can be attained and enjoyed in a big way. But, you have to go through the natural change process.
So here’s what the natural change process looks like. It was inspired by a research article, called Consumer’s Readiness to Eat a Plant-Based Diet which is based on original research from W. F, Prochaska.

The Natural Change Process:

• Pre-contemplation—not yet acknowledging that there is a problem behavior that needs to be changed, such as eating the Standard American Diet (SAD), focusing on weight loss alone at the expense of your health, or thinking you are eating healthy, when you are not.

• Contemplation—you acknowledge that there is a problem, but are not yet ready or sure you want to make a change. Ms Pope’s article doesn’t help that cause.

• Preparation/Determination—getting ready to change, by learning a new way, like you are doing right now by reading this article. It may inspire you to become a subscriber at NutrientRich.com, where you will learn how healthy an eater you really are, and will be encouraged to make the Switch to Rich, Nutrient Rich—The Great-Tasting Healthy Way to Eat.

• Action/Willpower—actually changing the behavior (the way you eat). At NutrientRich.com, we will help you do just that.

• Maintenance—maintaining the behavior change (new eating style), with a community of friends going through a similar process.

• Relapse—returning to older behaviors and abandoning the new changes, which will happen if you don’t have a community of friends that support your new behavior or the right approach!

Unfortunately, too many people experience relapse, and it’s simply attributed to trying to change too far too fast by going Vegan from a previous eating style that is miles away. It’s the reason why people feel like they have to “give up” their old food favorites and they struggle with that. They haven’t yet created the desire for new foods, and get too caught up in missing what they now feel they can’t have anymore. Can you blame them? I can’t. I felt that way too.

It doesn’t need to be that way. With a More Plant Based Nutrient Rich® approach, where up to 90% or more of the foods and meals you eat are derived from plants, you leave yourself at least 10% wiggle room for your old food favorites, as you make the transition.

For example, if you eat a 2,000 calorie diet, 1800 calories will come from nutrient-rich foods in the optimized way you will learn about in The Nutrient Rich Healthy Eating Plan, and 200 calories can come from nutrient-poor foods, if you so choose. It can take several exposures to a new food for your taste buds to change, but your taste buds will change along the way, and soon, you’ll be desiring great-tasting nutrient-rich foods, the same way you used to desire your old food favorites.

In reference to Ms. Pope’s comments about how hard it is to give up dairy or any other nutrient-poor foods for that matter, no one wants to “give up” anything that they like. You have to look at this differently if you are going to be successful. And, that is to enjoy the dairy and cheese in your 10%, until you don’t need it any more.

In conclusion, I appreciate Ms. Pope and her candid revelations about the challenges one may face when going Vegan. Yet, I need to point out that these challenges are only that “challenging” when you are going Vegan in the same way most people “go on a diet.”

There are thousands of people who have make the Switch to a More Plant-Based Nutrient Rich® healthy eating style, without all of that “struggle” and it has everything to do with the approach.

I thought I would share it with you.