Moderation is for the Birds...

Moderation...

We hear this all the time. Someone will say to me "I just ate a cheeseburger, do you want one?" and I say something like "No thank you, I don't eat cheeseburgers but I hope you enjoy it!" I could just say "No thank you," but it is usually followed by a parade of questions so I just try to keep things simple and honest. Can you tell by my posts yet?

This type of conversation usually ends up with the person wrapping things up by saying everything in moderation...blah, blah, blah.

I have a HUGE problem with this ambiguous word. What does it mean to you? Probably something different than what it means to me. And it would be no big deal except that we seem to be killing ourselves with moderation.

Let's use an example here shall we? We shall. Say you drink 3 diet cokes a day and eat a breakfast of eggs and bacon, a turkey sandwich with chips for lunch and a dinner of steak and a baked potato with maybe a veggie. Seems like a pretty standard diet for a lot of folks, folks I know...folks who are even in my family. So moderation to them may mean cutting back to only 1 diet coke a day and having cake once every month. Ok-so where does that leave them? STILL with high cholesterol, blood pressure and an increasing waisteline. YES? Yes.

Because the bottom line is that if you have a fundamental problem with your eating habits and you only make surface level changes-you will only see surface level changes if anything at all. Eating a diet rich in sodium, cholesterol, fat and sugar is still a diet rich in all those things whether you only eat cake in moderation or not.

So I say SCREW MODERATION. Yes. screw it. Instead, if you are looking for serious change in your diet, and consequently your health-you need to make fundamental changes in what you eat...then moderate.

For example, if you eat a diet rich in fruits, veggies, beans, nuts, seeds and grains you have a healthy base of meals to work from and are protecting yourself against many of the chronic diseases plaguing America today (obesity, Type II diabetes, Heart Disease, etc.) on a daily basis. Therefore eating a cheeseburger, piece of cake or, in my case a chicken finger sub, once a week or so probably won't kill you. Eating that stuff daily probably will. This is healthy moderation if you want to call it that. Making sure that 23 of your last 25 meals are healthy so you can enjoy the taste of a cheeseburger on your cheat day.

Don't settle for moderation or try to justify your bad eating habits with one word. Instead, understand your self worth and try to rise above moderation's mediocrity. Pretty please?