Financial considerations

Today I saw my financial advisor.  He recommended I get disability insurance.  I said, what are the most common causes?  He said, mental problems, health problems, and car accidents.   For me I suppose it would be bike accidents.  But I said, no thanks.  He recommended I get a longterm health care insurance.  I asked what are the most common uses of this very expensive policy?  He said, stroke, chronic illnesses--e.g., heart disease, diabetes, cancer etc.  I said, nah.  He then recommended I move some money from here to there, bla bla bla. I said okay.  I figure it will all go away in the crash of 2025 anyway.  But it won't matter because I hope to be healthy and able to work until the day I die.  I like working and if I feel good, why should I stop?  So why do I need to save money?  Well, I'm not really, I'm giving it away to financial institutions.  hmm, maybe there's a better place to give it away?

This is a little bit tongue in cheek, but I do think the financial consequences of eating a truly healthy diet are truly liberating.

good blogs

There are more and more healthy eating blogs out there.  It's great!   I don't know if more people are eating healthy or if more healthy eaters are blogging (sigh, probably the latter)  but it's still a good trend.  Here's two that I discovered recently:

The Vegan Next Door, by Sarah Taylor, who is a motivational speaker.  She was master of ceremonies at Dr. Fuhrman's Getaway last year.  She also wrote a book, Vegan in 30 Days.  I like all of her posts, but her most recent resonates with me.  I had a rough year last year (for no good reason--I was struggling to be happy) and it showed in my overeating.  It is good to ask yourself what is really bothering you when you want to overeat.  She has another interesting post about motivation.  She says one of the best ways to motivate yourself is to "find something that has extreme leverage (or priority) over your current habits."  So for example, learning about how animals are turned into food turned her into a vegan immediately, as it did me.   I do not use willpower or self-control to keep me on the path of healthy eating--that is too hard!  I may go to extremes to modify my environment to make it easy to eat healthy (see yesterday's post!), but that's easier than using willpower and self-control.   A couple of other posts I enjoyed reading were Vicki's secret to weight loss, and What's your number?

Vegan hearts fruit, by Jasmin.  She is a young healthy eater.  They are so rare, I wanted to give her a shoutout.  Kudos to you for taking control of your health before it takes control of you.  Jasmine is a student living in Vienna.  She seems to like fruit a lot.  Me too!

tomorrow's food

Tomorrow is my all-day trip home, yea!  Trader Joe's makes it so easy!   Here's the food selection (sorry, bad lighting and old iphone):

That's (from bottom left going up and around) mushrooms, broccoli, spinach, romaine lettuce, seed mixture, strawberries, onion, orange, sugar snap peas (really good), cabbage and carrots.
The salad's are prepared in a jiffy:



I'll eat one before I go, and pour vinegar on the others in the morning.  For show and tell, I packed them in their bags,



and into the carry-on bag:




But for now they are back in the fridge until tomorrow.

I calculated this is 1100 calories, which is usually not enough for me, but today I had 1300 and was overfull.  I'll eat something when I get home if I'm still hungry.

Think I'm crazy?   You know, after seeing many of my colleagues on this trip that I've known for years and seeing their health problems, I don't care.  I am so happy eating this delicious food, and having my health.

The best food on this trip were the strawberries and sugar snap peas, so I had them every day.  It's really hard to beat that at any restaurant.

Positive Psychology, happiness, and motivation

I've been listening and reading a lot of books on positive psychology this year.  I heard about this fairly new field of psychology back in January and I've just been fascinated ever since.  After so many years of investigating what's wrong with people, psychologists started to ask what are the characteristics of thriving, happy people?  There's a lot to learn from these books. I guess the short answer is that meditation; getting immersed in your work or hobby; having a good relationship with your partner, or family, or friends; and feeling part of something larger (religion or community) are all key ingredients that lead to happiness.  It seems obvious but there are a lot of interesting things in there.  I didn't realize work was so important.  I thought I was mistaken to work so hard all my life but it turns out that was a good thing.  Last year I decided to work less and I was less happy.   I am a really lousy meditator, but I'm thinking I will make time for that and give it a try.  I have a hard time sitting still!

Why am I posting about this here?   Because I think there's a lot in the books that can help a person be motivated to eat healthy.  Dr. Fuhrman teaches us what to do, but it goes so much again the grain of our society, that it ends up being very hard for most people who try this.  I think these books really help.  Instead of feeling different and embarrassed about my food choices in public situations, I'm learning to feel  proud of my choices and accomplishments.  Here's a list of some of the books I've read so far, listed in order of my favorites (but it totally depends on your own geekiness and other personality traits which you would like most, and I like them all):  The Happiness Hypothesis, Flow, Authentic Happiness, The Happiness Advantage, and Positivity.  I'm listening to The Joy of Living right now.

Another book that is more directly related to eating healthy is the Beck Diet Solution.   It uses Cognitive Therapy to make you "think like a thin person".  I translate that to "think like a healthy person."  You learn to change your habits through training and replacing "sabotaging thoughts" with "helpful responses."  An author I recently discovered who I think I like even better is Linda Spangle.  She wrote "100 days of Weight Loss" and "Life is Hard, Food is Easy:  The 5-step plan to overcome emotional eating and lose weight on any diet."   She offers a free 100-day workbook on her website.

Finally, another book directly related to eating healthy is The Pleasure Trap.  This is an excellent book about the physiology and psychology of eating healthy vs unhealthy foods; it discusses the difference between happiness and pleasure.  I've posted about it before here.

looks yummy

so many good recipes on the blogs these days!

Here's one for spicy African stew from Peas and Thank You. I don't have a slow cooker so I'd just cook it on the stove top burner. and since I don't ever make veggie stock, I'd probably just juice some carrots and celery for that. It looks yummy.

Healthy Girl's Kitchen has been cooking up some of Chef AJ's recipes. The latest is Sweet Potato Nachos. This looks easy and good! I gotta try this soon. I love sweet potatoes. next weekend!

Virtually Vegan Mama has another great cookie recipe (looks great, I haven't tried it yet): Sunflower Seed Butter Oatmeal cookies. I'd substitute raisins for the carob chips (after looking at the ingredients of carob chips, kind of icky and not vegan). You could substitute chocolate chips for a treat, knowing they are not health-promoting, but it can be a planned cheat.

Lastly, I just discovered a new blog called The Reduction Project. This gal is eating her way through a new cookbook by Isa Chandra Moskowitz called Appetite for Reduction. Isa is an amazing, creative cook who has embraced healthy whole foods eating. We are so lucky!

Dead Fat

I'm reluctant to post this because it's disturbing, but it's also powerful and I think compassionately done. This is a documentary by Stephen Nolan called Dead Fat. Stephen Nolan is a radio personality in northern Ireland. Here is a BBC article about the documentary--see this for more description of the film.

Here is the documentary in 4 parts on U-Tube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ajhi8...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJzNv...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQWxktrPL2g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6dve...eature=related

I think he does an excellent job presenting this. In fact, I think he's a hero. I am really impressed by him. He, like most other people, has no idea how to lose weight and get his health back (I only discovered it by accident). Several people from the Fuhrman forums have contacted him to suggest he look into Dr. Fuhrman's program. I hope he gets interested to have a look!

traveling

I'm on a whirlwind business trip to California. I've been working every waking hour for a couple of weeks and I am happy to say I have the evening off tonight. Even though I have to work this weekend, it will be easier than it has been the last few weeks, so I'm feeling pretty relaxed again. Food prep has been really easy. My hotel room comes with a nice sized fridge and there is a Trader Joe's grocery store not too far away. Trader Joe's is great when you are traveling because they have all this pre-packaged produce (not good for the environment I admit, but oh so convenient when you can't bring all your own supplies with you). I'm loving the salads I've been making. They only take about 5 minutes to make because everything is prechopped and in convenient-size bags. Here's my favorite right now:

This is romaine lettuce, spinach, edamame, mushrooms, onions, broccoli and cauliflower. The only thing I had to chop was the onions. I bought some balsamic vinegar to pour on top which is really good. This is a really hearty, filling salad. I've eaten two foods I've never had before, well, sort of: fresh edamame and fresh English peas. I've only had frozen before. The peas are very different fresh. Very interesting--more hearty in some way. The edamame is scrumptious fresh, but unfortunately, I discovered too late that they have salt, so I will not be buying them again, wah. If it were just a little that'd be okay but it's a fair amount. The other super yummy thing right now is fresh strawberries! They are especially sweet. I think this is peak season in California. I'm eating a pound a day. And I'm eating blackberries too. So I'm eating like a queen. I feel a little self conscious around my colleagues because I prefer to bring my own food and not eat the catered food (we're in meetings all day). It does make me feel odd and wonder if I'm crazy. But then I see something like what I'm going to post about next, and I really don't want to change. I do like fitting in, being the human social creature that I am, but it's just not going to happen in the eating department. Plus, I've been an oddball all my life so I should be used to it by now at the ripe old age of 51.