in search of Good Deals
Mar 10, 2022
When you walk into the supermarket, you see all kinds of deals, right?
Endcap soda and cookie displays, seasonal candy deals, buy one/get one free party size snack deals! Bold new flavor or texture!
Or, drive down the road and see billboards for the new ranch style crunchy chicken burger on sourdough, at the drive-through, only $1.99!
If we only have a limited amount of impulse control every day, we use it up by simply driving to work in the morning!
Lucky for me, when I was a kid, my mom saw through this hype. She barricaded our home from this nonsense.
No soda in our house. It was a safe space. As a joke, she would even wrap up stuff like Devil Dogs, Twinkies, and Wonder Bread, as Christmas gifts.
I still got into junk food, of course, especially after I got a car and began working at a supermarket! And I got into the consequences: migraine headaches.
The onset of these debilitating, nightmarish headaches, though, spurred my early study of nutrition. I figured out that food was a big part of my migraines.
Eating pizza and doughnuts at the wrong time of the month (female hormone spikes) would bring on crippling nausea, vomiting, and shooting pain into my eyes.
Curled up in bed, curtains blocking the light, you could find me suffering horribly for a day or two. After the migraine passed, the mere smell of the culprit foods would turn my stomach. I was a teenager, but I was paying attention.
When I ate my mom’s lentil soup, brown rice, and veggies, my stomach would feel calm, and I would barely get migraines at all.
I didn’t have to look far to learn that science backed up my observations that healthy eating leads to feeling a whole lot better!
It helped that my Mom had books like Sugar Blues and Diet for a Small Planet lying around the house.
Thanks, Mom! You made it really easy.
What I learned early on is that the “best deal” foods are whole plant foods.
We’re looking at legumes (lentils and beans), whole grains, vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds. Part of the savings comes from less trips to the doctor, less trips to the drug aisle, less missed days from work.
These are the foods that made my migraines go away, and stay away. Interestingly, one significant common denominator with these foods is their high fiber content. More on that to come.
The simple rule is, eat as much whole, unprocessed food as possible. Not overnight, though! Take small steps, so your body has a chance to adjust to the new foods. Over time, add in veggies. Switch out refined sugars and flours, and add in fruits and whole grain products. Check out that new bean soup recipe you’ve been wanting to try. Swap out refined oils, and add some nuts and seeds.
A little bit at a time, move the needle toward foods in their natural state, and watch your general overall health improve.
It’s up to us to figure out the real “good deals” in the store! The ones that keep us feeling good!
Bring a shopping list and keep your blinders on, so you don’t get swayed by all the dubious deals hitting you from all sides.
Fill your home with your highest vision for yourself. Make it a safe place for you to relax.
If we want to have a decent chance of feeling good now, and being healthy into old age, we gotta make it happen, and educate ourselves about healthy food choices.
It can be a bit of a swim against the mainstream. For some reason, healthy food options are never cool. Marketing won’t help, the government doesn’t help much (too much lobbying by the big food corporations), and most doctors don’t have the training to help with nutrition.
Some doctors, though, promote “lifestyle medicine”, using food, exercise, and lifestyle factors to regain and maintain overall good health. One of my go-to resources is Dr Michael Gregor’s nutritionfacts.org. It’s a searchable website, packed with science-backed videos on a range of health topics.
For example, in this short video he talks about his favorite foods, the Daily Dozen. Check it out!
