MY NEW YEAR'S PRESENT TO YOU

As my readers start giving me feedback, many report being surprised that Diets and Other Unnatural Acts is not a diet book.  Unfortunately, the word diet sells and I used that four letter word to market my life changing concept.  Below is an excerpt from the intro of the book. 

“Make no mistake.  Diets and Other Unnatural Acts is not a diet book.  I hate diets!   Instead, what you will find here is a philosophy of life born from thirty years of practicing family medicine.  During that time, I’ve witnessed hundreds of fad diets, exercise routines, and high tech equipment come and go.  My patients have lost thousands of pounds, only to gain them back, often gaining more than what they had lost.  Not only did this seesaw effect damage their health, every failure made it that much more difficult to succeed. Every failure left them frustrated and depressed. Other people lose weight, so why can’t I?

Not only did failures result in an overall weight gain, some diets caused measurable physical harm.  Meanwhile, the diet craze continues; treadmills and exercycles gather dust.  New diets hit the market almost daily and old diets are reborn. We quickly forget our bad experiences. We are who we are and changing ourselves is difficult.  Because most diets demand that we become someone else for a while, we steal from ourselves, we deny and deprive ourselves, and often we lie to ourselves. We tell ourselves we can’t eat this or that or the other, and we promise we will never return to our old ways of eating. We set short-term goals for long-term problems until old habits pull us back.  As we falter, we feel hopeless and alone.  As our despair increases, we eat. The cycle starts all over again.”

Recognize yourself?  Many will as diets have been around for as long as I can remember!  The following is another excerpt:

“It’s the New Year. You resolve to diet tomorrow. For sure! Tomorrow you will feast on tofu lumps and carrot chunks and swear off nachos for the entire millennium. Never again will a chocolate éclair or an ice-cold beer greet your lips. At dinner, you will munch on fricassee of algae while dishing up crispy fried chicken for the family. When you go out to eat, you’ll graze on cauliflower and kale stalks, oblivious to the ambient aroma of sizzling sirloin and the mouthwatering sight of the chocolate truffles at the next table. In the evening, you’ll sip your second gallon of water for the day while you catch the news, the weather report, and the commercials for juicy burgers with cheese fries. You’ll quit smoking, give up the booze, and never cuss again.”

How many New Year’s resolutions have you made?  How many have failed?  This New Year, resolve to get healthy.  Resolve to read Diets and Other Unnatural Acts and learn how to be a better you!