We are what we eat
Tags: Paleo, Low Carb, Fitness Tips, Vegan, Keto

What Is A Vegan Diet?

A vegan lifestyle is one in which the person undertaking it is conscientious about the origins of the products they use and the foods that they eat. A vegan views the world with a particular passion to be as animal-friendly as possible. The unfortunate truth about the

world is that some practices utilized in order to feed the masses are inhumane and can cause needless suffering to animals. Vegans aim to try and stop that suffering by refusing to support the industries that allow it to exist in the first place.

For example, a vegan who is living the vegan lifestyle will likely do a lot of research before purchasing any products. They will most likely want to know where the product’s origin is located and ensure that no living creature was needlessly harmed or suffered for the making of the product.

They want to live with a clear conscience. Many vegans are also humanitarians, who will go as far as researching their clothing and coffee to make sure that the businesses they support are not causing harm to less fortunatepeople or communities. How far you take your lifestyle is up to you, but ignorance is a choice that can be difficult to live with. To answer a few other questions, vegans do not eat meat at all.

They also do not eat any byproducts of animals. Animal byproducts are foods that are produced with animals involved, such as milk, cheese, eggs, and other dairy items. They choose not to use animal byproducts because practices can often be cruel. Take the egg industry, for instance. When the baby chicks are born, they are sorted into categories of male and female.

The female chicks are taken to farms, where they are often fed growth hormones or forced in pens that are lit with artificial daylight 24/7 so they will lay eggs constantly. The male chicks are disposed of in dumpsters, left there to starve to death or suffocate. This is an inhumane practice. It doesn’t take much to understand how horrifying these conditions are. Vegans do not want to support anything that can cause harm and suffering of this caliber.

They do not want to support factory farms or dairy farms where animals are mistreated and not allowed to live their fullest, healthiest lives. The goal is to show the rest of the world that such mistreatment does not need to happen and will not be tolerated. Money talks, and vegans use theirs to support businesses that align with their personal moral code. It may seem trivial to some people. They may say it’s pointless, because there is no way we will ever change the world enough that people will voluntarily give up their diet choices in lieu of veganism.

The animals will still be slaughtered, everything will go on as it was before because there will always be a high demand for meat. And in ways this may be true. But even if the whole world continues to eat meat and support inhumane practices, the choices you make will always make a difference to the animals you chose not to eat that day. And that’s what veganism is all about.

What Exactly Is The Paleo Diet?

If you don’t know what the Paleo diet is or you’ve never heard of it before, no worries — within this first chapter, we’re going to explore exactly what this way of eating is all about.

At its core, Paleo is a lot more lifestyle than it is a diet. A Paleo lifestyle is about eating real, whole, natural foods and avoiding all processed foods.

You see, the modern diet is exactly that, it’s modern. Humans ate in a Paleo style since the beginning of time before starting the agricultural revolution where we started to eat grain and sugar-based foods, as well as processed foods.

The idea behind Paleo is to eliminate those processed foods, chemicals, vegetable oils and other new additions to the modern diet that can be detrimental to our lifestyle, from how we move to our energy levels to how we feel on a daily basis.For all those years that we ate Paleo, humans were hunters and gathers. They ate meat and they ate fruits such as berries when they were in season. Which also meant they moved a lot and were very active. They needed to be strong and fit in order to survive. Their bodies were conditioned to efficiently use fat as fuel and energy, not carbohydrates.

Eventually agriculture came into being and the human diet changed dramatically.

The Agricultural Revolution occurred about 10,000 years ago and introduced grains, such as wheat, and breads into our diet.

Today’s modern diet contains things like significant quantities of gluten. Gluten was non-existent in Paleolithic times. Things like wheat, rye, many cereals and barley, contain gluten. Gluten has been recognized to cause inflammation in the gut and has been given widespread attention through celebrities like Kelly Ripa, who have famously gone gluten-free.It’s also been theorized (not proven) that gluten could play a role in an increased risk of some cancers as well as heart disease.

Another ingredient in the modern day diet that is linked to possible health problems is that of lectins. Lectins are present in grains. They cause wear and tear on our gastrointestinal tract, making it very difficult to heal.

Let’s not forget sugar. Sugar is everywhere and in everything nowadays. Sugar needs to be burned but another aspect of modern times is how sedentary people have become.

Everyone sits. They sit at work, they sit on the couch watching television, they sit at their computers, they sit checking out social media and texts on their smart phones. People do not move the way they used to and so they don’t burn calories the way they used to. This becomes a big problem when talking about sugar consumption.

In the Paleolithic period, humans were lean, strong and fit. They moved, pretty much all day every day. They didn’t farm or grow crops. As I mentioned above, they hunted and gathered. They followed the food. They didn’t sit around playing on their Apple iStone Tablet. If they did, they’d starve!

What Is A Low Carb Diet?

We often hear about low carb diets and how successful they prove to be in losing weight, but what is a low Carb diet exactly?

The term “low-carb” means low in carbohydrate. Carbohydrates are usually found in foods like pasta, potatoes, fruit, bread and rice. A low carb diet does not entail any specific diet nor does it include well-defined steps to losing weight.

It is a rather loose term that varies according to the person who uses it. Some common features though, include consuming foods that are low in carbohydrate and glycemic. The consumption of carbohydrates leads the body to excrete insulin.

As carbohydrates get digested, glucose -the effect of insulin excretion- either gets burned by our body if it we need immediate energy or else gets stored as fat. More seriously, after consuming a meal that consists mainly of carbohydrates, the level of insulin in our body goes suddenly up and after a short time suddenly down. This effect causes us to be hungry only after 2 or 4 hours from our last meal, leading us to a vicious circle of being hungry, then eating and finally storing fat.

The main ways to define a low carb diet, following the initial question “What Is A Low Carb Diet?”, is to clarify whether you are talking about the actual carbohydrate that an adult consumes daily or about the percentage of the calories in a person’s diet that comes from carbohydrates.

The usual amount of calories that are allowed in an adult’s diet is about 50–60%. So any percentage of calories coming from carbohydrates that is below that, can be thought of as low carb.

The most common misconception about low carb diets is that people who follow this kind of eating plan are actually striving to consume a zero amount of carb. That is not only untrue but it is also near to impossible considering that carbohydrates are hidden in most of the food we consume, especially processed food.

A diet low in carbs, as the name itself demonstrates, tries to reduce the carbohydrates in a low level, not eliminate them completely.

Another common myth is that a low carb diet forbids you from eating fruits and vegetables. The truth is that this food category is rich in carbohydrate, but that does not mean one should eliminate them from their diet. Fruits and veggies are the carbohydrates one should consume in a diet that is low of, but not deprived of carbs.

Among the benefits one could gain from following a low carb diet, is first and foremost the loss of weight and the increase of energy. People find themselves to be less sleepy and have better concentration and some cases have shown that people are experiencing a better mood.

Bad thoughts and feelings seem to be seriously reduced or lifted away. One cannot overstate the beneficial results of low carb eating habits. People have noticed improvements in their metabolism, a benefit that is considered to be a kick start for a diet focused on losing weight, even if the weight loss is initially insignificant. A shift in the metabolism is indispensable on the road to a healthy way of life and weight loss process.

What is Ketogenic Diet?

If you want to choose a healthier way to eat. Diets that will bring you improvements in your life, that will help in your goals. If you want to have a healthy lifestyle you have to feed for that. We are what we eat.

Subscribe to receive the free diet ebook: