My number one reason for loving the Paleo lifestyle is…
Just thinking of the word, Paleo, makes it easy to follow.
Paleo stands for Paleolithic. This is a period in time when humans were hunter/gatherers. We were cavemen and women. We didn’t have Woolworths or Safeway or Subway to get our food. As humans, we had to be athletic enough to hunt for our dinner and carry it back to the cave. We had to expend energy to get our meals, unlike today.
So when I’m in the grocery store doing my food shopping , just the word Paleo reminds me that I need to pick out foods that are closest to what a cave man would recognize. If I am out and I’m looking for a meal or a quick snack, would a caveman recognize that meat pie or muffin? Or, would he or she choose the piece of fruit, and maybe a chicken breast or a steak. The hamburger without the bun. The cave woman wouldn’t recognise coco pops or nutrigrain, she would recognize the eggs, and look for fruits and vegetables.
We had to climb trees for our fruit. We had to expend energy to get our food, lifting, bending, carrying, squatting and walking. And the food we ate was natural, organic, from our ecosystem and not from a laboratory.
And grocery shopping is so much quicker & easier because I only need to shop on the outside isles. That is where all the fruit, nuts, fish, veggies, chicken and meat are located.
Reason number 2…
I get to eat bacon. Who doesn’t love bacon? You get to eat fats when you eat paleo. Healthy fats. Avocados, macadamia nuts, bacon, butter (real, natural fat full butter) coconut oil, olive oil. If you see a label that says “fat free” run from it. It’s been processed, and probably has preservatives and a high sugar content. You shouldn’t eat things with labels, or in a box anyway.
Don’t worry, the fats won’t make you fat. They don’t feed cows fat to get them fatter, they feed them grains, carbs. To get cows fat, they put them on a low fat, high carb diet. Sound familiar?
And there’s plenty of research and scientific evidence to point out that healthy, dietary fats are not going to clog your arteries. It’s the oxidised fats and cholesterol that stick to the arterial walls, not the healthy dietary fats.
http://thepaleodiet.com/dr-loren-cordain/
My third reason I love the Paleo lifestyle is because…
I lose body fat and I don’t have to count calories. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2007014/Caveman-diet-voted-best-way-lose-weight-readers-report-effective.html
I pretty much eat until I have had enough and that is it. My nutritional requirements are met. The protein and the fats keep me fuller for longer, so I don’t have those energy crashes that I used to get when I ate a lot of carbs. And best of all, the food tastes great.
You can eat as simply or as extravagantly as you want. There are tons of recipe books, websites and blogs that have great meal plans. Here are couple links to get you started.
http://www.marksdailyapple.com/primal-paleo-recipes/
http://robbwolf.com/what-is-the-paleo-diet/meal-plans-shopping-guides/
The Paleo lifestyle has been shown to reduce your risk for chronic disease such as heart disease, diabetes, obesity, inflammatory diseases and many other chronic health problems.
I would love to hear your comments and questions below.
Until next week, live primal!
Dr Brian DC