Excel & Thrive

So let’s get to it

Have it all our way

Go back to where we blew it

And lose our heads along the way

Rattle that lock and lose those chains

David Gilmour

“Rattle That Lock”

In order to expand upon our foundational principle, YOU ARE WHAT YOU ATE, we need to talk about and define what you ate in very simple terms.

Concisely put, WHAT YOU ATE falls into either one of two categories:

FOOD

or

NOT FOOD.

Yes, earth-shattering I know, but this brings up a very important concept that people just don’t think about, and it is one that I am constantly teaching my kids:

NOT EVERYTHING YOU EAT OR ARE ENCOURAGED TO EAT CAN BE CLASSIFIED AS FOOD.

It doesn’t matter about that commercial you saw, if it can be bought in a grocery store, that “everyone is eating it,” or even that your doctor recommended it. There are thousands upon thousands of products for sale or sold in massive quantities in this country that are NOT FOOD.

How am I defining the word “FOOD”?

FOOD is material you eat that your body recognizes as essential nutrition and efficiently and joyfully assimilates into itself in an effort to support and maintain life.

Now that our definition for FOOD is established, we can easily identify what is NOT FOOD.

Material you eat that your body does not recognize as essential nutrition and inefficiently and regretfully assimilates into itself in an effort to support and maintain life is NOT FOOD.

So, if you want to live exceedingly and thrive abundantly, your action is very simple: Make sure the vast majority of the material you put in your mouth is FOOD. Your body will be much happier and will repay you with vibrant health, energy and longevity.

I realize that with all the propaganda thrown at you everyday by entities such as Big Food and Big Pharma, you may have lost your innate ability to recognize what is FOOD and what is NOT FOOD.

So let me provide some very clear examples.

That ribeye with all the fat intact that you thawed in your sink and grilled with butter and sea salt? FOOD.

That boxed low-salt low-Cal dinner, frozen rolls and pre-packaged low-fat cheesecake? NOT FOOD.

Or how about this.

That raw hamburger patty you cooked on your stove and topped with real cheddar, bacon and fresh avocado? FOOD.

That hamburger and french fries (or yes even that chicken sandwich and waffle fries) that you picked up because your kid had a game? NOT FOOD.

Let’s apply some reverse logic. If eating FOOD brings health, then eating what qualifies as NOT FOOD must bring the opposite. And that’s exactly what we find. If you look down at your own body and see chronic issues, this is not just “the way you were made” or “your lot in life.” This is your body doing its best to maintain life in spite of the material you keep feeding it, material that is NOT FOOD.

Let’s talk about the ways we determine what is FOOD and what is NOT FOOD.

FOOD has co-existed and nourished humans for as long as they have been on this planet. Humans were designed to eat FOOD, and are adapted to use FOOD to build extremely resilient and strong bodies.

Human-made material trying to substitute itself (insidiously or not) as food is still NOT FOOD.

On our site we will frequently be giving you concise lists that we will call “Top 5.” We will keep these lists prominent on our site as we build them so that you can reference this information quickly and easily.

Here is the first and probably most important:

NOT FOOD: THE TOP 5

Polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs): These are the oils extracted by man-made chemical means from seeds that were never designed nor used by humans (until recently) as fat sources. These are the “hateful eight” (identified by Dr. Cate Shanahan in her book, “Deep Nutrition”) - canola, corn, cottonseed, sunflower, safflower, soy, grapeseed and rice bran. These horrible oils are to be avoided with great prejudice, and unfortunately they are everywhere.
Processed and/or refined sugars: These are the unnatural sugars found in almost every processed food on our shelves, sodas and juices, pre-packaged teas and coffees, energy drinks and the like.
Processed and/or refined starches and grains: These are the carbohydrates found in the thousands of boxed and bagged products sold everywhere, such as bars, cereals, crackers, cookies, breads and chips. They are almost always accompanied by PUFAs and are contaminated by glyphosate.
Artificial sweeteners and fillers: Anything made by humans to replace a natural substance from our food chain.
Processed low-fat dairy: Dairy that has been subjected to high heat and homogenization and is stripped of its healthy fat and vitamins.

These substances should be radically reduced in your diet. In other words, don’t eat them except by accident. Do not willfully purchase a product at a grocery store that contains these items. They can cripple your body and cause damage and are likely the source of many chronic issues. Any product or item that contains these materials falls into the category NOT FOOD.

If you immediately went to your cabinet and had a hard time finding a product that did not contain one or more of these items, you see what a pervasive problem this is in our country. The companies who developed and created these materials really REALLY want you to keep buying them. They are cheap and give them a huge profit margin. They can make a lot of them in a lab. They have done a great job convincing most of America that they are safe and even “natural.”

If you are doubtful of their evil, and are wondering WHY these items made it into the TOP 5, I promise that I will explain each of them in a later article.

For now, let’s talk about what to replace them with, immediately.

FOOD: THE TOP 5

Animal meats: These are exactly like what they sound. Animal meats are such things as grass-fed beef, pastured pork, and grass-fed organ meats. Organ meats and bones can be bought desiccated and in pill form if you don’t like to eat them (but if you found some great recipes I bet you would be surprised at their tastiness). Think of organ meats as your daily multivitamin. Also, bone broths and collagen are key.
Wild-caught seafood: These are extremely nutritious and include SMASH (sardines, mackerel, anchovies, salmon and herring), plus occasional shrimp, mussels, oysters and roe. Enjoy raw when you can trust the source.
Animal eggs: Pastured chicken eggs (or eggs from other poultry such as duck) are some of the best whole foods out there.
Animal fat: Your main source of fat should be the saturated fat from the cut of meat you have chosen to eat. Other fat sources needed for cooking should be butter, ghee or beef tallow or in limited amounts, bacon grease or lard. Included to a lesser extent are grass-fed whole milk (preferably raw if you can find a safe source, which is fairly easy) and grass-fed cheeses. Heavy cream or yogurt (or other fermented dairy) made from grass-fed animal milk can be added.
Fruits and Vegetables: Olives and avocados, and their corresponding raw and virgin oils, are a great garnishing addition to your meal. Also seasonal fruits, such as berries and apples, can sometimes be consumed. Tubers and other low toxicity vegetables can be added, once you are able to tolerate them well. Sprouted and fermented foods are a plus!

As you can see, animal foods should be the center (and majority) of your diet. If you do not have access to grass-fed or pastured meats, do not panic. There are countless ways to get these prized meats online delivered straight to your door at a very affordable price.

You may have also noticed that I did not include poultry, and there is a very good reason for that. Most poultry in America, even organically-raised birds, are fed grains of some sort and thus their meat will be very high in PUFAs. If you want to radically reverse your health problems, you MUST reduce these insidious oils by any means necessary, so save the poultry consumption for the holidays.

Here are some other wonderful FOODS that are not in the TOP 5, but you may occasionally still be able to consume them depending on your own health and individual makeup:

Real homemade fermented bread from sourdough starter from ancient grains (I love my Einkorn starter - post coming on that soon!)
Raw and unfiltered honey (get local if you can)
Dark Chocolate (85% or higher, no soy)
Coffee (freshly roasted beans, coffee beans mold quickly)
Dry-farmed or natural non-US wines

We will talk more on these and other incredible FOODS out there that you can begin to incorporate into your life in future posts.

But first you must change your mindset on what is NOT FOOD. Just because something is a delicious and tasty material does not mean is it FOOD. And yes, you can program yourself unknowingly into craving a thing that is NOT FOOD.

But look around you. Did you know that studies have shown that as a nation, we eat less and exercise more than we have ever done as a people? Let me repeat that. As a nation, we are EATING LESS and EXERCISING MORE THAN WE EVER HAVE. And yet, we are more overweight, more obese, more diabetic, more heart-diseased, and more cancerous, and more chronically ill than we HAVE EVER BEEN.

So it seems to me that this has been a 50+ year experiment on America doing what it was told to do. The government TOLD AMERICA to cut back on meat, cut back on saturated fat, replace it with vegetable oils, cut the calories, and get out there and exercise, and it promised that this would solve all our problems. AND AMERICA LISTENED AND AMERICA DID IT. But guess what? The experiment FAILED MISERABLY. Americans are sicker than EVER BEFORE. We are literally the fattest nation on the planet.

And our government still can’t admit that it screwed up enormously.

This experiment is a sad story, and I’ll tell you about in my next segment.