How should I eat?

For those of us who are primarily focused on building muscle or losing fat we often taken on a macro focused approach with the foods, supplements, and activities that we choose in the hope that they will deliver our goals with hasty efficiency. 

ex. 'if you want to build muscle you need to consume massive amounts of protein, so you eat tons of meat, lots of calories, hundreds of protein shakes, and numerous other supplements'......'but you also neglect the impact of all of this on your insides'.

Most often, this type of shotgun approach is met with a positive feedback loop where we do see positive results and which falsely lead us to believe that such an approach is the right approach. It is only after many months, years, or decades for some, that this approach shows it true failures and costs.  In other words, such a narrowly focused approach neglects the health of our gut, in exchange for a more immediate affect on our external appearance. Such an approach has long term affects (negative-internal) that don't show up for a long time, whereas the short term affects (positive-external) show up in a relatively short time. This is akin to taking cocaine to improve how you function in social situations (external and immediate) without any regard for the brain damaging affects that come with its regular and repeated use (internal and delayed).  Damage to your brain will affect your gut, and likewise, damage to your gut will affect your brain. Moreover, the gut, like the brain, and most organs in the body, is very resilient, and has a great capacity to recover, and this is the same reason it usually takes so much longer and so much damage on our part for the affects to start showing very loud external signs that a clearly visible and can no longer be ignored. Unfortunately,  by the time the signs are loud an clear, unable to be ignored, and bring us to a point in our lives where we have no choice but to address them (IBS, Celiac, Chron's Colitis, Fungal Infections, etc), a serious amount of damage has been done.  At best, and if caught early, this type of gut damage impairs your ability to pursue your once prized external goals and only interferes with normal daily life,  but at worst, it completely compromises your ability to lead a normal life through a more serious and aggravated state of disease.  The road to recovery, if at all available, is a long and painful one that one would not wish on their enemy, so don't impose it on yourself.  Take a wholistic approach to your health and fitness goals. Find a wholistic mentor to guide you. Consider your inside health before your outside appearance. I highly recommend a CHEK Certified Holistic Health Coach (for my recovery protocols I have used Mark at www.migraineprofessional.com).

The goal should always be to do more with less, to take out before adding in. Be mindful of your health, respect your body, and show kindness to your insides....Until next blog.....Be Better!