This will be my last article for the foreseeable future. It’s been fun, but I feel that my work is done and it’s time to wrap things up. I’ve covered most of the important parts of nutrition, and provided examples on how almost every classic recipe can be modified to fit into a health-focused diet.
I’ve shown the pictures of my body composition from when I started at forty-two compared to what I am now at fifty-one. I do that because I was a big, husky-sized jeans wearing kid and even in my more active days later in the Navy and boxing, I never could shed the belly fat that I hated so much. I believed no matter what I did, that was just my body. I was wrong. Anyone can do this. It just requires education and dedication:
I hope that is proof that this is not just for young people, and you can vastly improve your health and body composition at any age. You just have to start and then stay consistent. Motivation is fleeting and cannot be relied upon for daily results. Showing up even when you don’t feel like it is the key. Don’t worry about tomorrow. Win today, and deal with tomorrow when it gets here.
There are some recipes that I did not get around to making that I regret. I have a key lime pie that is unbelievable, and I wish I had made my healthy version of Velveeta cheese, along with the chicken spaghetti dish that goes with it. Perhaps some future one-off articles will show up if those dishes are ever made again.
If I can leave you with a final list of bullet points to take from this column, they would be:
1. Focus on your health span instead of your lifespan. The final number you reach matters not. It’s how you feel while you are here that matters.
2. Aging gracefully does not mean your visual appearance. One look at older stars and media personalities with their surgery stretched Batman villain faces is proof enough. Aging with grace means staying strong and agile through conscious decisions regarding your own choices on nutrition and activity levels. Focus on those and your looks will take care of itself. There’s nothing wrong with a sixty-five year old person looking like they are sixty-five. That doesn’t mean they can’t feel like a thirty year old on the inside.
3. Find what makes you happy. Easier said than done, I know. When I was eighty lbs. overweight, I was convinced that if I ever obtained six-pack abs and my iliac crests were visible, I would be ecstatic. I was wrong. Getting fit will make your everyday life easier, but happiness grows from a more elusive place than your midsection. I wish I could tell you where to find it, but that is a path everyone must walk for themselves. I wish you luck.
4. Do not trust what a package says on the front. Read the ingredients list on the back. If you need an advanced degree in chemistry to pronounce the words, it’s best to leave it where you found it. Corporate regulations are soon to be rolled back industry wide starting next year, and billionaires care only about their bottom line. Whether a questionable ingredient will make you sick over time is not their concern, only if it drives their profit margin up a quarter of a percent.
5. Move after you eat. Take a walk, Do some chores. Give yourself time to decide if you are really still hungry, or if your stomach just has not communicated with your brain yet. You might find those seconds you thought must be had are no longer needed.
6. Eat your calories as early in the day as possible and give your immune system a chance to work on you at night instead of what you ate. If you combine a natural foods lifestyle with eating at least five hours before bed, you might find things like a runny nose, sore throat, and fever are things of the past. I haven’t had a hint of sickness once in nine years since I started this, and it might be the best result I’ve achieved from this lifestyle. Injuries heal seemingly overnight. The wolverine effect is real. You can obtain it with a little work and dedication.
7. Don’t start a program that you can’t picture yourself doing for the rest of your life. Fad diets do not work, and will only make you worse off in the long run. It has to be sustainable and enjoyable. If the program you are on is not those things, it is not the right one for you.
That’s a wrap for me. The back catalog should always be available if you need it. Take what I have shown and apply it to your own favorite foods or use the google machine to see what other ideas are floating around out there.
Don’t forfeit your own health and well-being to others. It’s not the easiest path to be on, but nothing worthwhile is ever easy.
I wish you well on your journey. Stay strong forever.
See the list of all the Shirtless Chef recipes at www.mysaline.com/shirtless.