Green Lemonade

The last thing you want is to eat a salad and sprouts everyday in the pursuit of a healthy, revitalized body. Sure that may work for some people, but for the rest of us how about some balance? After all, you don’t have to nibble on rabbit food alone in the pursuit of a feel-good, look-good body.

I don’t propose to have all the answers, but I’ve learned some valuable lessons so far on this adventure to live and enjoy a more natural, rejuvenating lifestyle. These are 10 goals I work to live by each day in my pursuit of a healthy lifestyle – some days I do awesome and some days are tougher – but each day I try my best. And when I do, I usually feel my best….

How about you?

Real Food Lifestyle: My 10 Goals To Live By

1. Enjoy the beauty in every day: I do my best not to get bogged down in obsession about trivial matters, including food. I try and take a moment to appreciate the subtle beauty and fun in each day. And when it comes to food, if I want a piece of chocolate cake or if I want to indulge in an ice cold martini occasionally – I do. I don’t feel guilty about it.




2. Make a conscious effort to eat “feel-good” foods at every meal. Generally, I find that I just feel better when I exercise and eat a diet RICH in – BUT NOT EXCLUSIVE to – fresh fruit, vegetables, salads and juices. I also eat beans, whole grains and nuts in moderation as well as quality meat, chicken and fish on occasion. Sometimes I dabble in meatless and dairy-free days. It actually feels pretty good, once you figure out what to eat. BUT don’t get me wrong, there are also days when I want to take down a few slices of a delicious margarita pizza…I just try and keep those days to a minimum.




3. Listen: I try and listen to my body. So often eating for me is tied to social events. Friend is coming into town? Why, dinner reservations are made at a favorite restaurant! Colleague leaving town? Celebratory drinks at the local bar! Etc, etc. There is always something “fun” (and usually oriented around food) in my life. So it could be easy to just be eating non-stop. Which might be fine, except I just wouldn’t feel so good after a while! So I do my best to enjoy my favorite foods and drinks in moderation. Again no one is perfect at this process and neither am I. When my mom comes to visit and brings a batch of her homemade blueberry muffins with a crunchy, sugary top well…happy memories from childhood come flooding back and of course I indulge in a few. In general, I have been working hard to identify true hunger in my day vs emotional hunger stemming from happiness or even stress.




4. Skip the calorie counting. I believe that having some sense of portion size, and calorie awareness is important, particularly if you are trying to lose weight. However, I’ve decided to take myself off of the rigorous calorie counting train and start listening to my body more. Counting calories with a fresh, raw food-centric diet is not equivalent to the calories you count on a traditional diet of cooked and/or processed foods. I try to focus on the nutritional content as opposed to the calorie content in my eating. AND I try and stick to a Buddha Bowl portion size – which is roughly equivalent to your two hands cupped. Food combining is also a nice built in portion control.




5. Focus on ingredient labels. Clean food is recognizable, easily utilized, digested and fully eliminated by your body. I do my best to pay attention to ingredient labels when I’m out shopping and buy foods with ingredient names I recognize – knowing of course, that the best foods for health don’t necessarily come with labels.




6. Organic when possible. I do my best to use organic produce whenever my budget enables me to do so. At times, however it can be difficult and in these situations I will try and buy only that produce which is most susceptible to pesticide absorption like lettuces and apples etc. If there is generally not a hard skin, and you can pretty much eat the entire fruit or vegetable – it’s best to go organic when you can. I have found some great deals by shopping at my local farmers market.




7. I eat healthy, raw fats and avoid the low-fat craze. Good quality, uncooked fats like avocados, extra virgin olive oil and coconut oil are great to incorporate into your diet, helping to metabolize fat. These raw fats store as energy in your body rather than fat and actually help us lose fat in the long run. Obviously, as with all good things in life, you can’t eat ten avocados a day, but one or two is terrific. Also just as a random side note, I tend to over eat nuts (especially cashews), so I try and enjoy those sparingly! Anyone else?




8. Be Prepared. For me, one of the biggest parts of eating well consistently is to be prepared. When I’m traveling I always try and have a few apples and oranges with me. Lara Bars also travel well.



9. A simple, yet flavorful cooking philosophy Eating clean regularly is full of challenges. Being inspired by “good for you” foods is key. I often don’t have a lot of time during the week to make labor and time intensive recipes, so I more “prepare” my meals. It just takes a little out-of-the-box thinking. These five detox-diet friendly dishes are some of my favorite go-to meals, some parts of these meals (like the quinoa) I make in advance and enjoy in a few different meals throughout a given week. I leave time intensive and ingredient heavy recipes out of my repertoire mid-week, and save those for when I can really enjoy the meditative art of cooking.
   
   

10. Exercise. Get moving. You’ll just feel better. In my experience the sweat, and the sun during an outdoor run, for instance, just feels amazing. Exercise also enhances the feel good effects of a healthy diet.

Conclusion: No one way of eating is right for everyone. As I have poured myself into learning more about a natural, whole food diet, I have been presented with a broad spectrum of diets and individuals within this movement. The key is to have fun and play around with the many different ways of living and enjoying this cleansing and rejuvenating lifestyle and see what feels right to you. What feels right will often change based on the season, your emotions, your workload as well as other demands, so just relax and enjoy the journey equipped with the right tools.