Saturday Musings - Being Healthy

What's going in your mouth?

A number of things happened to me when I turned around fifty years old. For a start, I found myself less tolerant of putting up with friends that had the habit of making bad decisions and then asking to be bailed out. Why should I perpetuate their illogical decision-making processes?

The second thing that happened was I became very aware of my own mortality. Sitting in front of a computer twelve plus hours per day and living on a diet of Coke-cola, chips and basically anything bad for you had finally caught up with me and I felt terrible.

Once my personal pity party was over my wonderful wife gave me a swift kick up the backside, dragged me away from my PC and introduced me to the outdoors. I would like to say that I had an epiphany of how good it was to be outside but in reality, I went kicking and screaming.

I almost began to dread the weekends because I knew Roselyn would suggest going for a walk, a bike ride or God forbid a hike. When I look back on it now, I have no idea why she put up with the myriad of excuses that I came up with so that I would remain locked inside.

It was when she suggested we watch a documentary on Netflix titled “Forks vs Knives” one evening that the message was finally brought home. For those of you that haven’t seen it, the film discusses changing what we place on our forks versus going under the surgeon’s knife. It presents some pretty compelling evidence that clearly showed me that I was in the process of killing myself or at the very least shortening my lifespan.

Fast forward many documentaries and years later and I’ve lost weight, regularly go to the gym, love hiking (we did the 53km Milford Trek through mountains in New Zealand this year!) and the outdoors is now my playground. What’s more than that, I’ve now dramatically changed what I eat.

A couple of weeks ago we re-watched one of the very inspirational Netflix documentaries and at the end of it I said to Roselyn, “Why don’t we try going vegetarian for a couple of weeks?” We’d already massively reduced any meat in our diet to just a few meals per week but don't forget that it wasn't too long ago that I was the self-proclaimed king of carnivores.

Two-weeks later we’ve been eating some of the tastiest meals I’ve ever had, and I feel fantastic! I have more energy, I’m more mentally alert and I’m able to focus on tasks like never before.

Have we become vegetarians? Actually, not quite. We have some seafood once per week and if I was invited to a friend’s house and they served meat I would politely eat it. From a choice perspective, we plan on keeping with the new lifestyle (it’s not a diet) as we are experiencing too many benefits to go off it.

This week I’ve now invited my parents to come on the journey of eating more healthily and exercising each day. The initial reaction was just like me several years ago. They began to negotiate what they were allowed to “get away with” as if their health was something that should be negotiated with....go figure?

This past week they’ve stuck with it and already the changes for them have been dramatic. Weights just falling off them (yes already), my Dad is joining me at the gym, and I’ve been taking them both to the local park for walks. Have they enjoyed this past week? Sort of, every change in lifestyle is difficult…..but the results (under their doctor’s supervision) to various medical ailments have been compelling.

Most of what we are doing isn’t rocket science. If you go to the World Health Organisation’s website, you can see they advocate a plant-based diet and not the traditional food pyramid that many of us have grown up with.

I would encourage you to consider changing what you put into your mouth for just two weeks. While you’re at it, go for a walk, rediscover the outdoors and enjoy your family even more than you already do.

Have a great weekend!
Michael