Diet/Gym Fads

Okay guys, seriously, I know we all wanna Look Good but some of these gym/diet fads are whack, and really bad for you…

Atkins/South Beach- okay, whoever thought eating bacon all day was gonna make you skinny forever?. Ya, when you put your body into shock and take away a vital nutrition source, youre gonna drop weight quickly, but it is not healthy to trick your body like that. Also, when you lose sight of your diet for just a moment, you will gain twice the weight because your body has been conditioned to the unavailability. The less you eat carbs, the worse they are for you. But I assure you [as a Sicilian], carbs are good for you (in moderation obviously). Pasta has a low glycemic index and releases sugar into your bloodstream slowly, whereas things like corn syrup release quickly giving a sugar rush and diabetes. I tend to think if it’s a food we’ve been eating for hundreds maybe thousands of years, like bread and beer, it’s probably okay for your long-term health. For healthy diet choose your carbs wisely, but depriving your body is not good.

Diet Pills- Give yourself a heart attack and take years off your life, get fat once your off them. Speed will make anyone lose weight, at the cost of their life.

So those are the obvious, but there are a lot of things out there that people trust without looking into the actual nutrition involved, and whether the results are temporary or good for their long term health. Even a lot of the gym fads out there are not necessarily good long-term.

P90X/Insanity- It is genius in its design, in its ability to sculpt your body quickly and efficiently. It breaks down barriers of plateaus and constantly challenges your body, sculpting it with such definition that has never even really been seen before recent times. Back in the day, men had muscles but their burly bulk was more of a hunk than a sculpted washboard. Today we want to etch every line, needing visual proof that the muscle is there. However, it is really not good to push your heart that hard all the time. You will get results quickly but it is because you are inflicting anxiety on your body. Athleticism doesn’t come from killing yourself every day for a month, but slowly building so that strength is more permanent. The best way to judge athleticism is by how low your resting heart rate is, or how well your lungs absorb oxygen. Breaking it down further, the best thing for your long term health is taking a brisk walk every day.

What has being “in-shape” turned into? Appearance? Athleticism seems secondary in this sort of approach. The fact that people get muscular implants is a bit horrifying to me. Although that is an extreme example of that mindset at work, I think many people have forgotten the value of just being healthy. Unfortunately, it is representative of the value placed on appearance. Beauty has been turned into a mold. But beauty is more than a mold, beauty is more than appearance. Beauty is the gut feeling of the sublime when you embrace something not perfect. It has character, it has feeling. Health and athleticism is beautiful, no picture image could grasp that.