In some ways, it was hard to start from where I am today. It was a difficult decision that there would be no quick diet—no diet at all!—to regain the svelte body shape my rational brain insisted I needed to have before I even thought about creating this website. So at this moment I’m nowhere near perfect. Every day I eat something that’s not on my list of great foods. I drink wine. Occasionally I polish off a piece of chocolate (sort of inhale the whole block, actually). That makes me somewhat less than a great role model for a healthy lifestyle. So, how dare I even think of writing about the subject? When I’m not exactly the best advertisement in the world? When I don’t really look the part?
Because this isn’t about what we look like. This is about what we are made of. Good quality plant food and some protein versus calorie-charged, nutrition-poor rubbish. This is about making better choices, and we can do that from whatever spot we’re presently residing on along the health continuum. Eventually we will look better. Weight will stabilise. Skin will improve. The mind will start to work without brain fog. Physical energy will return.
This isn’t about looking up to people who know it all and who have it all under control. This is about being real humans who are changing the way they eat for the better, one bite at a time. Mostly this is for the ones who’ve gone astray, like me. Anyone who’s made it, yay, you’re perfect. Go away. You don’t need this.
The thing is, I’ve had this knowledge for years. But you know what? Knowledge without action is pointless. So this site is a call to action. The knowledge isn’t hard to come by, once you peel back the many layers of self-interested businesses, clueless governments and well meaning but wrong practitioners. Really, it’s pretty intuitive.
Eat more vegetables. Eat less rubbish. (Rubbish doesn’t really need defining. Deep down, we all know what’s good and what’s not.) If you do that every single day, even the smallest change at a time, you can start from the worst place in the world and pretty soon you’ll have fantastic eating habits.
How hard is that, really? You just have to keep your eye on the ball, and the ball is … vegetables. Fruit. Real food from real plants. Fresh vegetables, simply prepared. Easy to shop for. No reading miniscule small print. No agonising over different brands, sugar and sodium content. No agonising at all, really.
When I get home from shopping and I unpack chocolate and lollipops (how did they get in my trolley?) as well as my bags of fruit and vegetables, seeds, meat and dairy, I know I’m not perfect and my diet isn’t either. But I comfort myself with the knowledge that I came from a place far, far worse and now, at least, vegetables make up a huge proportion of what I eat.