I had mentioned in an earlier post how fitness was something I had always been fascinated with – even if I didn’t pay the closest attention to my internal health with the best food choices or habits. With that being said, can remember even in my teens, small health nuggets and tidbits would stand out in my mind – though it wouldn’t be until years later that I would begin to actively listen to and implement those nuggets. I guess inside I was always a bit of a health nut without being one outwardly. These little nuggets and tidbits would come randomly in the form of something mentioned on the news or a TV show or maybe something in a magazine article I happened across. I’ll use an example of a memory I have of an episode of a sitcom in which one of the characters said in passing that red meat speeds up the aging process. Now I don’t refer to this example as one being backed by science, but just to show how things like this stuck out to me and was worth researching.

Then came the 1995 Mad Cow hysteria. It was all in the news and was one of the main topics of conversation almost everywhere. This along side reading on the correlation/causation between animals products and cancer development caused me and a few friends of mine to at least give up the beef. You could say this was the start of my meatless/plant based journey though at that time I had absolutely no intent on going vegan. Now I had stopped with the beef, however turkey chicken and fish were still protein staples for me. Besides that, going vegan was crazy. I loved curry goat too much. (its the caribbean in me) In time, the more research I did, the more I wanted to try out the plant based thing. Eventually, I would go ovo (eggs only) and ultimately vegan. Now I’m not here to push the plant based or vegan lifestyle onto anyone, I only want to point out how it has worked for me. I have personally experienced benefits both in terms of appearance and the way I feel.

It turns out that there are a number of ailments that the plant based diet can help with immensely like cancer, cardiovascular issues, osteoporosis, skin issues etc. I’m not presenting veganism as a panacea for human health, but I do believe personally that it is the lifestyle most compatible with human anatomy/physiology and therefore many of the ailments that we are on medication for or that we believe we will just have to live with for life can be helped likely with this one life style change. When it comes to anything I personally practice such as being plant based I always tell others to try it for 30 days to see how they feel. If they feel it doesn’t work for them then hey….. they can say they tried it – right? I’ll say the same thing here. Give the plant based diet not a commitment but a test drive. I personally have found the long-term benefits both mind and body wise to be far more gratifying than the temporary gratification of my taste buds.