What do I eat? Where do I buy my food? Do I ever “cheat”? What are the foods I avoid? What foods do I eat a lot of? How do I cook my food? It seems as if not a day goes by that I do not have someone asking me about food.
My answer is simple. It is not so much about eating or avoiding specific foods for your mental and physical health; it is all about thinking right and eating real food. It is a completely “renewed” lifestyle, and it starts in your head (Rom. 12:2).
As we saw in part 2, the brain controls the body but the mind controls the brain. And for the mind to function optimally, it needs to be controlled by your choices, which in turn need to be led by the Holy Spirit. Eating right begins with following the wisdom of God’s Word. In this chapter, I shall summarize the fundamental principles outlined in parts 1 and 2 into practical, mind-driven lifestyle tips that will help you beat the MAD food system we are all confronted with today.
I have also included a selection of my favorite recipes, twenty-one in total, to get you started on your journey. Since it takes twenty-one days to begin reforming neural pathways in the brain, these recipes serve as a habit “kick-starter.” They do not need to be followed to the letter—if you want to change them, find alternatives, or create your own, go for it! Indeed, a true love of food comes from experimenting in the kitchen—whether the experiment fails or succeeds. If you can only do one recipe a day, that is perfectly fine. The key is to renew the way you think about food and thereby renew your food choices.
I am not offering an overnight, quick-fix, magic-bullet, or reductionist solution. I am not going to tell you it will be easy and that everything will start going right in your life. Although the mind can change (remember our neuroplasticity), true change requires hard work and consistent perseverance. I can, however, guarantee that if you choose to make this long-term commitment to changing your food lifestyle, you will be amazed at the results.
I am not going to give you a fish. I am going to teach you to fish, so you can think good thoughts and eat real food, just as God intended, thereby reaping long-term benefits for you, your family, future generations, and our beautiful planet.
Tip 1: Develop a Real Food Mindset
Our brains and bodies function well when we eat real food, since it is full of the essential nutrients needed to maintain everyday biological processes. Real food helps us think well.
Memorize the criteria for real food:
Find as many products as possible in your pantry that fulfill these criteria, and compare them with the products in your pantry that cannot be classified as real food. Avoid purchasing these products in the future.
Find as many products as possible that fulfill these criteria when you go to the store, farmers’ market, or any other establishment that sells food. If they do not fulfill the criteria, avoid purchasing them. Think about what you are buying and make deliberate, health-based food choices rather than following your cravings.
Prepare a delicious meal, using real food! Before saying grace, think of the way it was grown, raised, and prepared; how it got to your plate; and how eating this food allows you to be a good steward of God’s creation. Pray with a real food mindset.
Tip 2: You Are, and You Become, What You Think
Your mind controls your brain and your brain controls your body. If you want a healthy body, you need a healthy mind. You are, and you become, what you think.
1. Reexamine Rather Than React
The first, and loudest, unprocessed signal/information coming in through your five senses will dominate your mind if you permit it to, such as a flashing fast-food sign or the smell of popcorn at the movies. It is the signal that has had the most sensory information and the strongest emotions attached to it. It will dominate other signals.
This loudest signal may be an internal existing memory or an external sensory input or both, yet allowing it to dominate your conscious thinking and choosing can be dangerous for your mental and physical health. For example, if your first reaction to a soda commercial is a feeling of contentment and desire for the good life, practice reexamining your motive for reaching for that soda.
As you think about, shop for, and plan your meals, become aware of what signals and information are coming into your mind. Become aware of what memories are popping up from your nonconscious mind in response to this information. You may, for instance, have an existing memory such as Real food costs too much and takes too much time. Remind yourself of the true cost of cheap food and the true cost of convenience, discussed in part 1.
2. Take Those Thoughts into Captivity
If you randomly allow any thought into your mind, and do not bring those thoughts into captivity, damage can ensue on a mental and physical level. If you are not selectively paying attention to what you are thinking about when it comes to food and eating, then you will become reactive and driven by whatever thoughts (and their dynamic emotional energy) come into your mind. Don’t allow the fast-food thought to stay in your mind, for example, because then you will want to eat fast food.
The apostle Paul wrote that we have to bring all thoughts into captivity to Christ Jesus (2 Cor. 10:5). All means all. Never let any thought go unchecked through your mind. This goes for everything, including what and how you eat.
Bring those thoughts into captivity: when you are about to make a food-related choice, ask the Holy Spirit what you need to buy, grow, or eat. Ask yourself whether the food choice you are about to make fulfills the criteria of real food. Discipline your mind.
3. Take the Time to Process Sensory Information
Deep critical thinking, which I have researched for years, involves asking, answering, and discussing incoming sensory information and existing internal thoughts as they move into the conscious mind. This means we consider all the options from as detached and informed a position as possible. This is what it means to think objectively, or in quantum physics terms, get into superposition. Superposition involves stopping, standing back, observing our own thoughts and the information coming in through the five senses, setting up a dialogue with the Holy Spirit, considering all the options, and then choosing which thoughts we want to implant in our nonconscious mind. This is discussed in depth in chapter 10.
There are a number of options we can choose, just as there are a number of dishes we can choose to eat! These options are called probabilities. The large group of options or probabilities we can choose from is called Schrödinger’s probability wave.1 This is a quantum physics principle named after Austrian scientist Erwin Schrödinger.2 It is a way of mathematically describing all the probable choices we could make, when in superposition, about all the information we come across and every issue we face, including what we put on our plates—even the information offered in this book.3 We should think carefully and deliberately about all the information we encounter and ask a lot of questions! Just because a professional dietician or “expert” calls something a fact does not mean it is a fact.
Likewise, when you are about to make a food-related decision, ask yourself why you are eating and why you want to eat a particular food. Are you really hungry? Are you just craving a snack or something sweet? Are you bored? Happy? Sad? Why? How will you feel later if you indulge now? Do not act reactively.
4. Choose Life
Choice is single-handedly the most powerful and creative part of the human mind. As soon as we choose, we collapse a probability into an actuality.4 Schrödinger’s probability wave therefore goes hand in hand with the observer effect, another quantum physics law, which states that it is the observer outside of the system (you and me, for example) who collapses probabilities into actualities. This simply means that it is through our choices that things happen. Nothing happens until we choose. This is the powerful, sound mind God has given us (2 Tim. 1:7). We set the observer effect in motion each time we think and make a food choice.
We have to understand that choice is real and will have real consequences, which is why Deuteronomy 30:19 is so powerful: “I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live” (emphasis added). It is imperative that we become informed, so that we do not become a “my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge” statistic (Hosea 4:6).
Ask yourself if your food choices will be based on health and life or on sickness and death. Choose life.
Tip 3: My Brain Didn’t Make Me Do It
Remember that the brain and mind are separate, and the mind controls the brain. We have to take personal responsibility for the way we think, speak, and act. We need to stop being victims of our biology, of what happens to us, and start being victors.
A neurocentric view of thought is, My brain is in control and made me do it, or My brain scan shows I have an overactive amygdala, so it is hard for me to control my emotions and that is why I cannot control my eating. Once you start down this path, you will ultimately have to question your belief in free will, since a predominant focus on the brain takes the control away from the individual and places the blame squarely on the brain.
I do not deny that very real changes will happen in the brain when we lead a toxic eating and thinking lifestyle, nor do I deny the fact that some individuals do have damaged brains through no fault of their own. Yet for the most part our minds (our thoughts and choices) come first and cause problems in the brain and body, which in turn feed back into the mind, making us feel awful if our mind is toxic. The only way weight will come off, and stay off, is through our minds: when we plant healthy food “trees” in our heads, we will eat healthy food in reality. To help with this I recommend my twenty-one-day brain detox.5
Do not blame your biology: your mind controls your brain. Regardless of your circumstances, you can change the way you think about and eat food. This does not mean you can eat every single type of food and not get a reaction. It does, however, mean that you can stop eating the MAD diet, and you can choose to follow a real food way of eating. Take responsibility for your food choices—past, present, and future.
Food addiction is not a disease. Our brains are wired to latch on to something, and that something is God. Any toxic addiction, whether it be food, drugs, or even a person, is the result of misplaced choice. Yet, as a growing body of research shows, the majority of people can quit addictions. Individuals who stay addicts usually subscribe to the biomedical model of “once an addict, always an addict.” Yet God came to set us free, not lock us in (Luke 4:18). Do not make food your idol, nor any other created thing. It will always disappoint you, but God never will.
Never forget that you are more than a toxic addiction. Even thinking I can’t give up soda is a toxic addiction resulting from choice. The toxic choices you may have made in the past do not define you. Your identity is in Christ alone (Gen. 1:27; 1 Cor. 6:17; 12:27; Gal. 3:27–28; Col. 2:9–10).
The more you align your thinking with God, the more you will find eating correctly to be both possible and sustainable. We experience true reward when we do things God’s way, for his glory, including eating correctly. Faith is the substance (what we choose to wire into our brains) and the evidence (the physical thought that is built as a result of our thinking and choosing) of all that we are hoping for, which leads to physical changes in our brains and bodies (Heb. 11:1). Have faith in your ability to change your eating habits.
Tip 4: Change Habits over Sixty-Three Days
As I discussed in chapter 10, it takes around twenty-one days to rewire neural pathways and begin building a new way of thinking about food and forty-two days (another two sets of twenty-one days, for a total of sixty-three days) to establish a new habit.
The talk between the conscious and nonconscious mind requires discipline and practice, but if you put the above tips into action for just seven minutes a day, within three weeks you will have removed a toxic food habit and built a new way of thinking about and eating food—through your choices and perseverance!
Here is an example: for dinner tonight, prepare a pasture-raised chicken from the local farmstead, farmers’ market, grocery store, or your community-supported agriculture (CSA) box instead of choosing that convenient take-out chicken sandwich from the fast-food establishment down the road. (One of our favorite soup recipes with chicken can be found in the recipe section, if you want a delicious suggestion.) Think about why you are preparing dinner, what care went into your food before it hit your plate, the care you used to prepare it, and how thankful to God you are to have this food and the nourishment it will provide. Think about why you are preparing this meal and the positive eating habits you are establishing. Think about how your brain and body are benefitting. You are changing your epigenetics and your genetics by your choices! Think about how wonderful God is, who has given us such magnificent food, and the pleasure of eating well and enjoying good health. Perhaps discuss these thoughts with your loved ones at the dinner table and definitely enjoy your meal! This is real grace.
You will have to do this thinking at least once a day for a minimum of seven minutes over sixty-three days, when you are shopping, eating, or doing anything food-related, to establish a new habit. Remember, you are rewiring commercials, advertisements, billboards, tastes, and other sensory information that you would on average have seen sixteen times a day, or 5,900 times per year. It is going to take a further two cycles of twenty-one days (forty-two more days, for a total of sixty-three days) to make these new food choices a lifestyle habit. Practice these kinds of choices daily for sixty-three days. You are literally creating a new eating lifestyle, based on life, through the principle of renewing your mind (Rom. 12:2).
True change will take time and commitment. You have to choose to change. Constantly thinking about something or listening to something creates genetic change, and learning takes place. This happens—whether you like it or not—when we are constantly exposed to MAD food or real food. New thoughts become entrenched and implanted in your nonconscious mind. Be aware of what thoughts you are planting in your mind. Do they lead to life or death?
Tip 5: Evaluate Your Emotions and Attitude
Remember, the mind and the gut are intensely interconnected. The GI tract is very sensitive to our emotions and works closely with the hypothalamus in the brain, which responds to our emotions and the feeling of satiety. Yet emotional awareness in terms of your food choices goes beyond the gut-brain connection: a healthy emotional thought life is necessary to make every food-related decision, including what to buy. Emotions, choices, and actions cannot be separated, since they are part of the perfect circle of thinking in your mind, which in turn impacts your entire body. Your thoughts, with their associated emotions, determine what you choose to eat: you are what you eat and what you think.
Beware of how you are feeling when you make a food choice; become a strict observer of your emotions. Do not eat when you are upset, jealous, bitter, angry, or experiencing any other negative emotions. These will affect your digestion. Do not eat just because you are happy or excited. This, too, is an emotional form of eating. Make sure that you are hungry as well, as ridiculous as this may sound.
Eat in a deliberative and intentional, not reactive, way. Do not grab the ice-cream tub when you are stressed or upset, for example (even if it is organic, local, and grass-fed!). Calm down, and perhaps enjoy a bowl later with your loved one.
Deliberative, intentional eating requires that you deeply think about your food choices and the linked emotions when shopping for, preparing, and eating food. Make sure these decisions are based on positive emotions: love, gratitude, hope, happiness, contentment, satisfaction, excitement, peace, and similar emotions are the perfect condiments to any meal.
If you are stressed, view the situation as a challenge to overcome, not a threat to overwhelm. Stress is designed to work for you and not against you—including in your digestion. How you view a situation will determine this. Do not let toxic stress get the better of you—you can control how you react by your choices.
Fear of food is also a negative emotion. Fearing fat, just like fearing carbohydrates or gluten or salt or sugar, is not the right way to approach a healthy diet. Instead, we should fear the way our current industrial food system has transformed our foods into MAD food-like products. It does us good to remember that official dietary recommendations are not always reliable, based on the latest scientific research, or bias-free, and should never just be taken at face value.
Being obsessed about healthy eating and panicking about what you eat will also affect your ability to digest food—no matter how healthy it is! If you bake a chocolate cake (with real whole foods, of course), enjoy it! As Oscar Wilde notes, “Everything in moderation, including moderation.”6 We were created to enjoy our food, which is a gift from God.
Get “dressed” mentally for dinner. Before eating, listen to your favorite song, watch your favorite movie, or read your favorite book. Talk to a loved one. Pay it forward with a random act of kindness. Put on your favorite song and dance like no one is watching. Read the Bible and think of how much you have to be grateful for. Whatever you love, whatever makes you happy, do it; this will get a whole host of positive chemicals running about your body and prepare you for a great meal.
Tip 6: There Is No One Diet
As we saw in part 1, there is no one particular way of eating that works for everyone. God created fat, carbohydrates, and proteins, as well as all the other important nutritional building blocks that make up the food we eat—all perfectly and intricately balanced within the real foods we eat. Stick to real foods, and avoid the MAD diet and diet fads. Learn to listen to what your body needs.
To help identify what your body uniquely needs, plan to do a fast. (See chapter 12 for more on fasting.) Start with intermittent fasting (skipping a meal), giving up a specific type of food or drink for ten or more days, or something like the Daniel Fast.7 If you have been eating the MAD diet, your brain and body will be confused by all the food-like products you have been consuming. Fasting helps clear the confusion in your brain and body. When you add a type of food back to your diet after several days, you can see how your body responds to it. (Obviously, if you have allergies, first consult with a medical professional.)
The different types of fasting are excellent lifestyle choices for our brain, body, and mental health, and, of course, have many spiritual benefits. As we discipline our mind and choose to reduce our bodily food intake as we focus on God, our spirit develops. Jesus wants us to be integrated spirit, soul, and body (1 Thess. 5:23).
Any diet that promises instant results should come under our intellectual radar. Real, permanent change always takes time and effort. Do not expect immediate results. Do expect difficult days. But always remember that you are more than a conqueror through Christ, with whom all things are possible.
Tip 7: Buying Food
When purchasing any food item, make sure it is real food insofar as possible, not a food-like product. Try to shop outside of the supermarket: visit local CSAs, farmers’ markets, and farmstead stores, or start growing or raising your own food.
Get to know the people who produce your food: ask them questions and learn the story behind your food. Generally avoid food producers who are evasive about how the food is grown, raised, or made, or do not allow visitors (such as on a farm). Ask your local and seasonal food producers what they have a lot of, and buy it. This helps prevent food waste and supports local businesses.
Buy local, organically produced foods: they support your community and ecosystem and they reduce fossil fuel use, as well as ensuring that you get food that is as fresh, synthetic chemical–free, and nutritious as possible, especially in terms of fresh produce.
Buy whole foods, such as wheat grains and whole produce, which can be “processed” in your kitchen. You will also find that buying whole foods and processing them at home can be a cheap way to make your diet healthy. Potato chips, for instance, can cost $8 per pound, where an heirloom potato variety at a farmers’ market costs less than half that.8
If you eat out, support establishments that serve local, farm-to-table, and organically produced foods as much as possible. If you visit a grocery store, be aware of the structured environment and how the layout is designed to grab your attention and get you to buy and eat more processed MAD foods. Healthier products are often put close to the bottom of the shelves, while the healthiest foods are on the perimeter, such as fresh produce. The center aisles are usually filled with processed and refined MAD foods. And remember, avoid impulse buys at the counter!
Buy wild foods: these are generally more nutritious and make a meal both exciting and impressive. This tip applies to all food types. If you buy animal products, they should ideally be pasture-raised or grass-fed (aim for 100 percent grass-fed, not just grass-finished), organically raised, free of added hormones or antibiotics, and always humanely raised. It is a good idea to buy these meats in bulk and freeze them for future use. Often several individuals buy shares in a whole animal from a local farm.
Try to avoid purchasing too much muscle meat: go for bone broths, organ meats, and other parts of the animal that are more nutrient dense.
Buy a diverse range of foods. If you try to shop as seasonally as possible, you often eat a more varied diet. Farmers’ markets are particularly good places to begin. Japanese turnip and kohlrabi with your heirloom purple potatoes, anyone?
Buying bulk in season, and freezing or preserving the foods, can save time and money. For example, buy berries or tomatoes in the summer when they are widely available and less expensive, and freeze or puree them for the winter months.
Try to buy whole nuts, seeds, and grains and process them at home. For example, make your own wheat flour for your own homemade bread, or make your own almond milk. There are countless recipes online for free. If you buy bread, make sure it is fresh, whole grain, with optimally a few simple and well-known ingredients—it should start going stale after a day. Buy fats that are unrefined, unfiltered, extra-virgin (when possible), and cold-processed.
Remember, “If it ain’t decomposing in your kitchen, it ain’t decomposing in your tummy.” Avoid all food that does not rot (with certain exceptions, such as honey). Avoid MAD foods, foods with added nutrients, and/or foods that make health claims. Think of an apple: Does it have any health claims plastered on its skin?
Tip 8: Respect the Environment
The apostle Paul declares, “Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31 NIV). As stewards of God’s creation, we glorify him when we steward the earth’s resources well and we eat food that nourishes us and glorifies the creation of our own bodies.
Before you purchase any food, think deeply about how that food was produced. If you purchase it, ask yourself whether you are stewarding God’s creation well. Each day, make an effort to think about how the food in your basket or on your plate got there. Perhaps say a prayer for the people who produced it, and thank God for the opportunity to glorify his creation with your food.
Volunteer at a local farm, farmers’ market, farmstead store, or CSA, or start a garden and begin raising chickens. By coming face-to-face with your food, you will develop a deeper appreciation for God’s creation and the gift of life.
Think of ways you can reduce food waste. Compost leftover foods or regrow vegetables from food scraps, for example. Start raising chickens and feed them kitchen scraps as a supplement to their diet. See Folks, This Ain’t Normal: A Farmer’s Advice for Happier Hens, Healthier People, and a Better World by Joel Salatin and Waste: Uncovering the Global Food Scandal by Tristram Stuart for more suggestions.
Think of ways you can vote not only with your fork but with your political vote as well. Get involved in grassroots movements that promote local, sustainable, agroecological farming methods. Get in touch with your local and state representatives to fight for a better food system. Send letters to the government officials handling dietary guidelines. There are many, many ways you can make a more sustainable food system a reality for not only you but every person on the planet, while stewarding God’s creation well and bringing “heaven to earth.”
Be a “hipster” and start an agroecological garden, or even a farm—even if you have just one chicken and a zucchini shrub in the beginning. As is often said, “Little by little, one travels far.”
Tip 9: How to Cook
Often, diet books are so concerned about what you eat that they do not explain how you should prepare these meals to preserve the most nutrients possible. Cooking is not just about nutrient preservation, however; it also entails the bioavailability of nutrients, or how readily these nutrients can be absorbed. The following points are cooking tips we use as a family.
Tip 10: How to Eat
Our fast-paced modern lifestyles have produced the mindset of I am too busy to sit down to a home-cooked meal. If you value your health and your relationships, begin changing this mindset. A home-cooked family meal has more benefits than just bodily health!
Modern technology has made it easier in many respects for us to work all the time. Do not fall into the trap of living under an unnecessary sense of urgency, which can put you in chronic toxic stress and make you ill—and give you terrible indigestion. Remember the gut-brain connection!
Eat less from a box and eat less in front of a box: avoid TV, reading, or listening to the radio while eating. These forms of entertainment make you pay less attention to how you are eating and how much you are eating.
The joy of preparing a meal and sharing it with people is incredibly powerful and therapeutic. Do not view cooking as a task; see it as a fun adventure and an opportunity to spend time with those you love, family and friends, as much as is possible in your lifestyle.
Eat slowly. If we eat too fast we will eat more, since it takes up to twenty minutes for our body and brain to signal satiation and for us to realize we are no longer hungry.21 Make sure that most of your meals last more than twenty minutes. And remember, the first two bites of any food are the most flavorful, so take time to enjoy them!
Hara hachi bu! Take this Okinawan saying to heart: stop eating when you are 80 percent full.22 Eighty percent is not a strict calculation per se—it just means that if you feel quite full, you have eaten too much. It is based on calorie restriction and, paired with fasting, can help maintain a healthy lifestyle. The Okinawans live in one of the seven identified “blue zones”—areas that have the highest life expectancy—and thus their advice is worth taking to heart. The key is eating less, which will be different for everyone. We have somewhat adapted this saying in our house: only seconds for salad, or you will make a hara hachi “boo boo.”
Avoid snacking, as your body will not have had time to digest your previous meals and you may end up eating too much.23 Generally, eat when you are hungry, which requires that you learn to listen to your body’s demands. Limiting your food intake to three meals a day is a good start. If you overeat, you will carry on eating—the more you eat the less able you are to judge how much you have eaten.
Let your mind, not your eyes, be your guide—it is not a good idea to decide visually how much to eat, since you will have a tendency to finish what is on the plate rather than stopping when full.24 Put less food on your plate or use a smaller plate.
Be aware of habits you may have developed over time, such as eating when you are sad or excited (but not hungry), or coming home and going straight to the fridge or pantry out of habit (even if you are not hungry).
Prepare and eat meals together as a family and/or with friends as much as possible. Not only will this help your health but it has added benefits for your children: research shows that family time over meals is associated with lower drug and alcohol abuse, less depression and suicide risk, and even better grades in school.25 Moreover, good company is associated with positive emotions, which aid digestion and promote mental wellbeing.
Do not eat in your car and on the run. Make your eating habits as deliberate as your thinking habits. Also, your posture is important to digestion, whether you are at the table or going about your daily tasks.26 Pay attention to the way you sit and stand.
Whoever cooks should not clean, if possible—divide the tasks and the work will be finished in a shorter amount of time. You can even draw lots; it certainly makes mealtime fun.
Tip 11: Sleep, Schedules, and Digestion
The brain and the gut are connected in many things, including sleep and schedules. Healthy sleeping patterns contribute to healthy eating patterns.
Do not go to sleep worrying about your circumstances; this can upset your sleep cycle, digestion, and weight. Hand all your issues over to God—even if unsolved—and fall asleep quoting a Scripture or thinking of all the good things that have happened to you or anything that makes you happy and feel at peace. Write your cares down before you sleep and read the promises in God’s Word. A good Scripture to memorize is 1 Peter 5:7: “Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you” (NLT). Give him your fears.
Everyone has their own sleep cycle, a cycle that is as unique as everything else about them. You have to sleep—that is a no-brainer—but there is no agreement among scientists on exactly how much sleep you need or when you should sleep. You will do damage to your health if you worry about your sleep, wondering what will happen and then panicking that you are not getting exactly eight hours of sleep and are not going to digest your food properly and will get sick and fat and have brain damage. These fears will cause more brain damage and worsen your sleep pattern, so just relax, read the Bible, and pray if you cannot sleep. Even start a discussion with the Holy Spirit about whatever you want to talk about.
Give your eating habits over to God each night before you sleep. Ask him to guide your food decisions. Pray over your brain and your body before you go to sleep.
Ask the Holy Spirit to help you with your schedule. You are designed to “do busy well,” but only if this “busy” is led by God. Not doing busy well will affect your sleeping patterns and your food choices, including how much you eat, since a lack of sleep is associated with a greater intake of food the next day. Healthy, peaceful sleeping patterns and balanced schedules mean you will eat well, and this will help maintain good health.
Tip 12: Exercise
Eat less, move more: we have all heard this saying at some point in our lives. Not only does exercise make our blood circulate more efficiently through our bodies, bringing the chemicals of life to the cells and removing the debris of metabolism, but it can also improve all areas of cognitive function, including thinking, learning, and memory, especially with age. The older you get the more you need to move, even if it is for short bursts or just walking up those stairs instead of going in the elevator.
Research indicates that aerobic exercise in particular (such as cardio and walking) creates improved and flexible cognition and maintains good bodily health. When you exercise, your cognition becomes more flexible, your metabolism increases, and great hormones flow! Remember, however, that exercise can never make up for unhealthy food choices. Both regular physical activity and a healthy real food diet are necessary for a healthy lifestyle. Unhealthy lifestyle habits, such as the MAD “TV” diet with little or no exercise, will speed up the process of senescence, or cell death.
As you are running, power walking, spinning, doing high-intensity training, lifting weights, or whatever you choose to do, these exercises are changing your DNA, hormones, brain, and your entire body for the better. And to enhance your exercise routine, you can add a cup of organic, freshly roasted, fair-trade and whole bean coffee. Coffee can change your genetic expression in the same way exercise does—but obviously does not replace exercise.27
Your mind makes exercise much more effective. After all, exercise is a choice you make with your mind, so when you exercise, put your mind behind it! Be as deliberative about your exercise habits as you are about your eating habits.