REVOLUTIONS BUBBLE OUT OF INJUSTICE. Social, political, economic, spiritual, and physical oppression drives people to rise up against violations of basic human rights. Working with Partners in Health this year, after the earthquake in Haiti, I learned from Dr. Paul Farmer that health is among the most neglected of human rights.
The injustices that violate our health as a human right occur not just in impoverished countries like Haiti, but are embedded in 21st century America. And we are exporting disease across the globe, where the overweight—now 1.7 billion large—outnumber the malnourished.
I would argue not only that health is a neglected human right, but that it is a right that has been taken from us.
Our health has been hijacked—slowly, quietly and often deliberately over the past century.
Our social, political and economic conditions support obesity and disease. Habits and the default choices in our society are built into the fabric of every segment of our society—families, homes, schools, workplaces, and places of worship, our government institutions and health care centers.
Our current food, social, and community environments make it hard for us to make healthy choices. In fact, staying healthy has become almost impossible, which is why almost three quarters of Americans are overweight and one in two Americans have one or more chronic diseases.
If you are healthy today, you are increasingly in the minority. But we can get healthy and reclaim our lives and wellbeing.
And if we do that, it won’t just benefit us as individuals, it will have some very positive side effects, such as preventing economic collapse, climate change, and environmental degradation. It will help re-invigorate our families, communities and faith-based organizations. And it will reverse the epidemic of obesity and chronic disease weighing on our planet.
No single change will help us take back our health. It is the hundreds of little choices we make every day, a hundred small revolutionary acts we can control that will transform our collective health.
It is time to take back our health, by every means available to us.
With that in mind, this week an extraordinary website — RevolutionaryAct.com—was launched by an extraordinary woman, Pilar Gerasimo, founding editor of Experience Life magazine (circulation: 630,000). The site, based on the idea that “Being Healthy Is a Revolutionary Act,” is dedicated to sparking and supporting a healthy revolution.
I wanted to share Gerasimo’s 10-point “Manifesto for Thriving in a Mixed Up World,” which is featured in the January 2011 issue of Experience Life. The manifesto is also available for download at www.RevolutionaryAct.com, which includes great Revolutionary Resources, plus a fun, interactive experience called “101 Revolutionary Ways to Be Healthy.”
Mother Theresa once said, “There are no great acts, only small acts done with great love.” Creating health for you and your loved ones, one small act at a time, can help us reclaim the most neglected of human rights: our health.
If you are healthy today, you are increasingly in the minority. But we can get healthy and reclaim our lives and wellbeing.
Being Healthy Is a Revolutionary Act: A Manifesto for Thriving in a Mixed-Up World
By Pilar Gerasimo
In case you haven’t noticed, we live in a society where the idea of health and fitness is wildly popular, but where actually becoming a truly healthy person can be mighty tough to pull off.
There’s a reason so many of us are sick, overweight, depressed and stressed out: We’re living in a society that is wired up to make us sick, overweight, depressed and stressed out.
We can change this mixed-up reality. We can reclaim our well-being and create a better, more blissful world. But it’s going to take some revolutionary moxie to make it happen.
This manifesto is a collection of ideas, reality-checks and insights designed to help those of us who value our health create and sustain healthy change—even in the face of some daunting challenges.
If you’re up for that, way to go, friend—and welcome to the revolutionary club!
Here are 10 revolutionary truths that a growing number of us hold to be self-evident . . .
1. The way we are living is crazy.
The United States currently produces more obese, chronically ill and depleted people than it does vital, fit, resilient ones—and this trend is worsening.
Two out of three U.S. adults is overweight or obese. At any given time, half of us are contending with at least one chronic disease. A growing number of us are reliant on pharmaceuticals whose side effects and interactions undermine our health and quality of life.
Our children, too, are becoming ill and prescription dependent at ever-younger ages, and their life spans are being shortened as a result.
Enough already! Our collective lack of vitality has become an oppressive source of misery and waste, one that threatens to impede our lives, our liberties, and our pursuit of happiness.
We can change this. We must change this—together.
2. There are powerful social, economic and political forces undermining our health.
Our culture didn’t get this unhealthy by accident. From the processed-food industry to pharmaceuticals, well-funded interests rake in huge amounts of money off our unhealthy population. They’ve been doing it for decades, and they pay billions of lobbying dollars to make sure they can keep doing it.
These special interests not only manipulate public policy and the media to our disadvantage, they conduct huge misinformation and marketing campaigns designed to keep us buying into products and behaviors that hurt us.
Their message? That their health-sapping options are wholesome, easy, appealing, cool, fun, affordable, delightful indulgences (or absolute necessities) that will make us and our lives oh-so-much better.
And we’ve taken the bait. We have been brainwashed into adopting daily behaviors and choices that poison our bodies, fog our minds and cost us billions in medical bills.
Here’s what those powers-that-be won’t tell you: Buy into what currently passes for “normal” in America, and you’re unlikely to stay healthy for long.
3. The time for complicity is over.
Tempting as it may be, we can’t blame this all on a conspiracy of health-sapping influences.
Yes, it is true that we’re surrounded by supersized junk foods and sedentary pastimes. Yes, we’ve been saddled with misleading labels and industry-influenced dietary guidelines. Yes, we’ve been bombarded by demoralizing media, manipulative advertising, and downright lousy advice.
But still. We’ve taken a lot of that sitting down.
For too long, we’ve allowed ourselves to be overprescribed, overfed, underinformed and overindulged. We’ve been quick to embrace superficial solutions and half-baked ideas.
We’ve permitted ourselves to be pandered to in the name of ease, convenience and “value”—and we’ve grown passive, expecting effortless cures to come from the outside.
Conspiracy theories notwithstanding, the greatest threats to our well-being lie in the health-sapping decisions we make every day by default. Because healthy choices have been rendered tougher than they ought to be. And because—like frogs in hot water—we’ve been willing to tolerate the intolerable. Until now.
4. The resistance is alive and well.
Every day, more and more of us are waking up to the realization that no one is going to save us but us. We’re getting clear that if we don’t want to get sucked into an unhealthy quagmire, we’ve got to start swimming against the tide.
So we are learning about our bodies and minds, and doing what it takes to keep them strong and well.
We are growing, buying and preparing more whole, nutritious foods and avoiding processed junk.
We are moving and sweating and exploring. We are resting and playing and connecting.
We are reclaiming control of our healthcare choices. We are dealing with the root causes of our health challenges, rather than simply suppressing our symptoms.
In short, we are treating our health like the fundamental priority it is.
We are rising up to take back the power for our own well-being. And we are discovering just how good that feels.
5. Being healthy is a revolutionary act.
Throwing off the chains of poor health and reclaiming our full vitality is both our individual right and our collective responsibility. And there is perhaps no more life-transforming choice.
Being strong and healthy in an unhealthy culture makes you part of an empowered minority. It gives you freedoms and opportunities that poor health and fitness prohibit. It endows you with the energy, clarity and resiliency to fully enjoy your life, and to make bigger, more meaningful contributions in anything you do.
Choosing a healthy way of life involves making some revolutionary choices, and it also has revolutionary results.
Because when you change your health for the better, you change the lives of everyone around you for the better, too.
In a very real way, you change your world.
6. This is not about six-pack abs and skinny jeans.
Sure, healthy is sexy and beautiful. A strong, fit body looks as good as it feels. But the most valuable rewards of good health and fitness have very little to do with rippling muscles or thin thighs.
You’d never know that by looking at conventional media, though.
All those sensationalized headlines, sexy images and instant-results promises may get our attention and appeal to our vanity, but they can also make getting healthy seem like a self-indulgent undertaking or a trivial, out-of-reach fantasy.
Worse, the unrelenting focus on largely unachievable ideals has a way of playing to our body-image insecurities.
Those superficial obsessions can also distract us from the deeper, lasting motivations that matter more.
So if mass media is messing with your mind or sapping your self-esteem, tune out the hype and turn your attention elsewhere. Like the reasons being healthy matters to you.
Maybe you have your heart set on six-pack abs and buns of steel; maybe not.
Either way, connecting with your own authentic healthy-life vision and values is the best way to start.
7. Inaction is not an option.
The time for passivity is past. Today, nearly every U.S. household is touched by obesity or chronic disease. And most often, when one family member’s health is compromised, the whole family suffers.
It’s time for that suffering to stop. But simply suppressing symptoms and “managing” diseases is not the answer.
As you read this, approximately 75 percent of our healthcare dollars are being spent ineffectively on chronic conditions, many of which can only be resolved through lifestyle change.
These burdens of chronic illness are simultaneously gutting our economy, our communities, and our whole population’s ability to thrive. They’re undermining the lives of our children, and the potential of future generations.
It’s time to face the reality that unless we’re part of the solution, we’re part of problem. And the problem is plenty big already.
None of us can afford to sit this challenge out. None of us deserves to live less than the best, healthiest life at our disposal.
So raise your sights. Raise your standards. Restake your claim to a vital body and mind. And never, ever back down.
8. The best defense is a good offense.
In the battle for our well-being, the forces of ill health may have won the last few rounds. But we’ve got some crazy judo moves they aren’t expecting.
Like giving up on diets and self-denial, and focusing on nourishing our bodies instead.
Like giving up on spot reducing and calorie counting and finding feel-good ways to get active and fit.
Like investing in healthy foods, stress management and proactive health support now—instead of paying gigantic medical bills later.
The healthier and more clear-headed you are, the better your chances of fending off the unhealthy influences that besiege you on a daily basis.
The stronger and more resilient you are, the better your chances of weathering the challenges that come your way.
And the more of us healthy, happy people there are, the better our shot at creating the kind of world in which thriving comes more easily for everyone.
So don’t let your guard down, and don’t let anyone convince you to settle for less than full-throttle vitality.
Remain vigilant. Defend your right to be well with unflinching determination and all the mojo you can muster.
9. Forget about quick fixes.
No magic diet, powder, pill or elixir is going to solve the problems we’re wrestling with now. And forking over cash for quick fixes only lines the pockets of the quick-fix hucksters who helped get us into this mess.
So instead of squandering your valuable time and money on miracle cures, invest in making healthy life changes for the long haul.
If you’re having trouble with that, know that you are not alone. You are not a bad, weak, lazy or doomed person—you’re just up against some tough opponents.
If you’re willing and determined, you can defeat them. Handily.
It may require developing new skills, strategies and perspectives.
It might mean connecting with new support systems and role models.
It could mean nursing some healthy indignation and cultivating some well-deserved self-compassion.
Almost certainly, it will require connecting with your own deepest sources of healthy motivation and stoking them into revolutionary action.
All this takes time and awareness and a willingness to experiment. And there’s no better time to start than now.
10. Solutions in the mirror may be closer than they appear.
The scope and scale of our national health crisis is so massive that it may seem beyond all hope. But it is not.
In fact, each of us has an important role to play in solving these problems for ourselves, and for each other.
Every time one of us starts taking the steps necessary to build and protect our health, we rescind our support of the nasty systems that are breaking millions of us down.
And if enough of us start treating our own bodies well, we will create new norms of vitality and well-being.
If we band together to demand and embrace healthier options—in our grocery stores, cafeterias, homes, workplaces, schools, healthcare centers, neighborhoods — we can reverse the trends that have been depleting our life force for decades.
Most of the trends and public policies responsible for our country’s ill health have occurred over the past 40 years—in large part, by design. And they can be turned around in a fraction of that time by a swell of grass-roots insistence.
So if you can help make that happen, do. Connect with others who share your healthy convictions. Then go boldly forth and start thriving—one conscious thought, one empowering choice, one revolutionary act at a time.
101 Revolutionary Ways to Be Healthy
Here’s a few to get you started. Find the rest (and share your own) at RevolutionaryAct.com.
1. Defy convention. Do the healthy thing, even when it’s challenging, inconvenient or considered weird. Take pride in that.
2. Repossess your health. Reclaim responsibility for your well-being; own your daily choices; minimize your reliance on the broken sick-care system.
3. Aim for 85%. You don’t have to make 100%-healthy choices all the time. It’s what you do most of the time — day in, day out — that counts. The healthier you get, the easier and more automatic healthy choices will become.
4. Beware the USDA Food Pyramid. It is a whole lot healthier for Big Ag and Big Business than for humans. Fill two-thirds of your plate with an array of vegetables, add in some other whole foods you enjoy, and don’t let the rest of the Pyramid’s propaganda confuse you.
5. Go easy on the sugar and flour. These two ingredients (combined with unhealthy industrial oils) have a starring role in most packaged foods we eat. More than any other culprit, they fuel inflammation, obesity, diabetes, high cholesterol, heart disease and cancer.
6. Redefine your goals. If you’ve been trying to lose weight and are struggling, make it your goal to get superbly healthy, well nourished, fit and energetic instead. Don’t be surprised when the excess weight starts melting off.
7. Rest up. Rest = recovery, repair and resilience. Exhaustion = illness and messed-up metabolism. Prioritize sleep time as the health essential it is.
8. Invest in your health. Money spent proactively on your health delivers far better returns than money spent reactively on treating illness and disease. When healthy choices seem “too expensive,” consider the long-term costs of health-sapping alternatives.
9. Focus on action, not outcomes. Live the life of a healthy person, and the results will take care of themselves. Every healthy step is a victory. Every day is an opportunity to feel, live and be better than the day before.
Join the Healthy Revolution at RevolutionaryAct.com.
This is one of the most empowering articles on health and lifestyle change that I have ever come across. Without people like Pilar, Dr. Hyman and others in the functional and natural health industries to remind those of us abiding by a healthy lifestyle that it’s the wise thing, the right thing, and the best thing for each of us and our planet, it can oftentimes be a lonely venture to embark upon. I like how Pilar emphasized the importance of each person focusing on undergoing a paradigm shift in thought to reach true health, rather than on being motivated by some goal that has an end-point like losing X number of pounds, eating Y number of calories, or abiding by poorly-researched recommendations (like the USDA Food Pyramid). I also loved the “the best defense is a good offense” quote; so true.
Health is NOT a RIGHT that everyone deserves just because they exist.
Health is a desirable condition that is EARNED by acting
in a HEALTHY way.
Eating, drinking, exercising, relating in a healthy way.
Dr. Joel Fuhrman’s book: “Eat To Live,” spells this out, clearly.
Read and Understand.
thanks,
KAbr.
Well said. Health is a choice, a responsibility (to not become a burden on others). It takes time and effort to educate oneself, wade through the garbage, and make the correct choices…and some common sense. It is by no means a right endowed to us.
This article comes on the heels of Congress passing the corrupt and phony S.510/HR.2751 “food safety” bill this week, a bill that will effectively put local farmers out of business in favor of Big Ag and Big Biz, impair the competitiveness of US farms, shift farming jobs out of the country (primarily to Mexico), and thus increase the pesticide residues that enter the country in the form of unregulated, imported produce that will be sold in the US at skyrocketing prices.
I applaud the Dr. Hyman’s attitude and his approach for staying healthy in a day and age when the US Dept of Health & Human Services and the US FDA, 2010 have stated: “There is No Right to Consume or Feed Children Any Particular Food; There is No Generalized Right to Bodily and Physical Health; There is No Fundamental Right to Freedom of Contract.”
In 1781, Thomas Jefferson warned us of this effects of such danger when he said: “If people let the government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as are the souls of those who live under tyranny.”
Victory with Vegetables! Organics oorah!
The article is ok, but simply does not go far enough. Sugar, what kind of sugar, and why. Let’s get honest it is the high fructose corn syrup made from GMO corn which is one of the main problem’s our society is fat. It is in most process foods. Not unless you go to a health food store, and read the labels.
Another key issue is GMO foods in general. It has not been tested by the FDA. Austria, and France have not done study’s, and it shows more illness in the animals, and sterility in the mice after the third generation.
Finally let’s look at the nation’s water supply which is fluoridated. There have been multiple study’s which are now conclusive that fluorine cause’s a lower IQ in our children, bone cancer, etc, etc.
No, Pilar must stop being politically correct and get to the real problems . She is circling the wagon with only words. Healthy sounding, politically correct words that do not solve the problem. Someone must speak truthfully of why we are overweight, and ill as a people, until them the general public can not get well.
Hey Matt, thanks so much for those kind words. And right on! I think the more of us who speak up for and model this shift, the faster it will happen!
Dr. Hyman is a huge inspiration and such a powerful force for positive change, and it’s so cool to see there’s a whole community of people who really get what he’s talking about. Because you’re right, it CAN be a lonely venture to embark on. Right now, healthy choices can seem so “weird” (and be so inconvenient) in so many contexts that unless you’re super committed, it can be tempting to just go with the unhealthy flow. I really believe we can change that, though!
That’s a big part of why we created RevolutionaryAct.com. I hope you’ll come connect with fellow healthy revolutionaries there, and at our Facebook site (facebook.com/revolutionaryact). Really appreciate your comment and would love to have you share with others! Much appreciation!
We are a reflection of the world around us – we are culture – taking our health and wellbeing into our own hands and helping others to do the same changes the world and changes culture. It’s amazing to see that many great shifts in culture started with a few hundred inspired, committed, passionate people who cared more about truth than anything else and weren’t afraid to align themselves with that truth and express it. A a culture Americans have come to value superficial, easy, and cheap alternatives to life liberty and happiness. And we are all responsible for that – whether we are a corporation or an individual. I admire what Pilar Gerasimo and Dr. Hyman express in their work – they are defining a new set of values, higher than the ones we currently have, that are a better, truer expression of what life is about and what being an American should stand for.
With all due respect, a timely article, but rather tame, don’t you think?!?…
I totally agree with the many points you outline, but the fact of the matter is we are being poisoned daily with: 1) GMO food (it’s up to 85% of our food system); 2) MSG (and it’s 40 other names that few individuals even know how to pronounce), 3) synthetic sweeteners that tweak our hypothalamus and are a major culprit in obesity, 4) food concoctions of sugar/fat/salt that play havoc with our “Hedonic Hotspot” and make us slaves to the fast food and restaurant industries (where 50% of our food dollar is now spent!), and finally 5) totally de-natured and minerally deficient food that is sold under the guise of being “enriched.” A classic case of 1984 verbage…
Anyone doubting the essential need for a revolution in our food/drug/sickness industries (all carefully nurtured and protected by the FDA, btw) need only understand the underhanded & deceitful ways that Congress passed the “Food Safety Bill” (S.510) in the last three weeks. I’m embarrassed to be an American following that travesty of justice and legislative process.
The time is now for action and the vast majority of citizens is totally asleep. They are mindless to the basic liberties being stolen from them like the fundamental right to choose our own food. I might add, senior officials at the FDA feel strongly that Americans do not deserve that right and that liberty. Is this really America?
Kudo’s on the post and the well-intentioned article. I personally am a bit more passionate about the need and timing for a wholesale revolution in all three industries: Food, Drug & Sickness (aka “healthcare”). It can’t happen too soon!
This is an edit of my previous comment, in which I found a couple fo typos. Please publish the comment in this finished version, Thank you. . .
This article comes on the heels of Congress passing the corrupt and phony S.510/HR.2751 “food safety” bill this week, a bill that will effectively put local farmers out of business in favor of Big Ag and Big Biz, impair the competitiveness of US farms, shift farming jobs out of the country (primarily to Mexico), and thus increase the pesticide residues that enter the country in the form of unregulated, imported produce that will be sold in the US at skyrocketing prices.
I applaud Dr. Hyman’s attitude and his approach for staying healthy in a day and age when the US Dept of Health & Human Services and the US FDA, 2010 have stated: “There is No Right to Consume or Feed Children Any Particular Food; There is No Generalized Right to Bodily and Physical Health; There is No Fundamental Right to Freedom of Contract.”
In 1781, Thomas Jefferson warned us of the effects of such danger when he said: “If people let the government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as are the souls of those who live under tyranny.”
Victory with Vegetables! Organics oorah!
I hope people who are sedentary read this!
I am utterly inspired by this manifesto. Turns out I’m living it. I have a serious digestive condition Western Medicine had no answers for. I am in the process of healing myself through good food and clean living and have saved myself from a feeding tube. I created a blog to help others and I shared the manifesto this morning. http://www.mygutinstincts.blogspot.com
some of the problems like social, political, economical leads people towards they take an action on it
I love this! It puts into words what many of us are feeling and doing. Maybe it will inspire many more to try. Good work!
While I absolutely agree that much illness and lack of wellness comes from diet choices, I strongly object to this being a rights issue. We absolutely do NOT have the “right” to: health, home, car, job, wealth, insurance etc. We certainly have CHOICE and the ABILITY to MAKE choices that determine a variety of outcomes, INCLUDING failure.
With that in mind, it is important that people CARE enough and are INFORMED about what we feel are good choices in health and wellness. We need to continue to work towards understanding what, in fact, is healthy- remember the low fat diet and how we thought it was important to minimize all fats? We learned that that was not quite correct and now better understand.
What is dangerous about this article is the undertone of RIGHTS and the eeeevil of corporations. Products are produced to fill demand- folks are demanding their quick and easy McMuffin. Stop buying them and they will go away. On the other hand, Wholefoods has become more popular and has grown much larger over the years due to increased demand.
I will not accept the angle that the is a RIGHT and we must FIGHT the eviiilllll corporations to enforce OUR view of what is best for people. In a constitutional republic people are NOT all victims. We do NOT (as Americans) “export obesity” – which is just another attack on America. We produce and sell product that responds to demand. People choose to eat pseudo-foods and so create conditions for cardiometabolic chaos and decline. We ALSO “export other goods and services ie- some fabulous supplements, research data, electronics that make information accessible, and the web itself- ALSO “exported” to the world.
We only have the RIGHT to make good choices. In this great country, you DO have a right to start your OWN company. A RIGHT to create products and services that support your OWN idea of what is best (like the folks did in creating Revolutionaryact.com). That is where our efforts should be focused.
Enough of this thought that everything you desire is a RIGHT. It’s not. It only leads ultimately to your have restricted or no rights at all. After all, that is why our constitution is based on having limited government with restricted enumerated powers.
We are not guaranteed Health as a right under our countries BILL of RIGHTS. But what has happened is the result of looking to the government to solve all the problems. We have lost the idea of ‘personal responsibility’. We have taken the easy way. We know longer read books but look to TV and therefore see ad that pay a good deal of money to convince you what you need. No one can make you do anything but you. You have to take responsibility and that will force changes in what stores offer etc. It is not for the government to do. Stop this country from being a ‘entitled’/nanny state. Pay attention to who is in office that wants to have power over what you eat. They think they know best because you are just to stupid. Show then they are wrong.
This article is the tip of the iceberg as others have commented on but a much needed wake up call to those who need to get started. If you come at them with too much info you scare them away and I believe that Dr. Hyman has done a great job on this article. The biggest reason for people having a hard time changing their eating habits is the world is on 24 hour screech, tying to get more done in a day and if they can reach for the fastest food that is where they are going to reach. Once they try the foods and the get hooked on the nasty ingredients that make their tongue go crazy, they can not stop. There was a huge article on 60 Minutes and the FDA even agreed that what they put in all this fast food, packaged junk is addictive. Our mouths can not stop eating it. Then we become addicted like we would a drug or alcohol. When we try to eat real food after eating the processed junk our tastes buds are unable to taste the real food. So before we know it we’re right back to the bad, addicted junk food. Then our bodies begin to fall apart, prescription drugs are giving and the drugs are as bad if not worse than the processed foods. That’s makes the FDA very happy because they make tons of money on the junk food and even more on the drugs!!! Such a horrible system. So bad, it’s scary. Hopefully people will attempt real food changes and give their taste buds time to change over. It will take a few days for it to happen. At least 30 days. But it is so worth it once you are off that nasty fake food! And stop finding excuses why you don’t have time for exercise and just do it. Everyone can find time for a 30 minute walk if you put it into your schedule and work at it, it will become a habit by the end of the month. Thank you Dr. Hyman!!
This is so well written. Kudo’s to this author! I’ve been teaching the social conditioning with the branding of the fast food chains and the consumerism mentality since the mid 80′s. I was the ‘witch’ in the 70′s when all I could talk about is natural health. I am dating myself, but that is when health food stores had that ‘funny’ smell when you entered the store. Remember? Too young?
Well, here we are. Just as I knew would happen. Out of 100 people I spoke with to warn them, every single one of them listened accept 98 of them. 
When I do talks to wake people up my first sentence out of my mouth is:
“Health is an active pursuit, not a passive result” !
Awesome job, Pilar!
The tennents of this manifesto are so powerfull that we need to pass it along to anyone we can to let them help themselves to the full health life they can have.
I had the ‘good fortune’ of gaining 17 lb’s, & 3 ” around my midsection when I was only 29 yr’s old. IT was a wake-up call ! That was 1969. I immediately started seeking un-prosessed/natural/organic/real foods. I also had the good fortune to secure a full-time career in Technical Live Theater. That kept me away from primetime TV with it’s commercials for 42 yr’s ! I was able to study privately and learn true healthy food / fuel for my health. At 68 yr’s old in my retirement I completed 5 months of apprenticeship on a 19 TH. century Sailing ship. Because I ignored the “popular american diet” I am able to live that second dream of my life.
I have printed the 10 ‘revolutionary’ statements to give to my friends in their 20′s/30′s who don’t understand how I can keep doing what I do and not spend large amounts of money on drugs and medications at 71 yr’s old !
Dr. Hyman; et / al. Keep up the good work.
Thank you all. Jeff: (sailormon)
We must take responsibility for the state of our lives in order to improve them. In the world we live in this means becoming politically active to some degree. The world will change around us whether we like it or not. So lets get active and make those changes ones we want to live with so that all of our healthy choices will not disappear into a corporate hell of our own making
RevolutionaryAct is amazing!! Thank you!
Pilar, I salute your effort to get something going. First steps are usually the hardest to take, and are a test of our endurance. If we can’t survive our initial steps, we lose momentem and hope. There is always the time to iron out the disagreements and fine points being debated here. What seems ultimately important, however, is, that we all make an effort to get as many people, from every angle, every point of view, etc., involved in the project. Disagreement is not an obstacle, it’s an opportunity to learn and grow, and we should never be discouraged because others disagree with our views. What we have a “right’ to, should be defined by “us.” It’s “our” future we’re talking about. We can determine for ourselves, what our rights are. If “health” has not yet been seen as a right, let’s endeavor to make it a right.
pilar, a beautifully delivered message. i agree that a peaceful but serious revolution is required to take back what has been insidiously robbed from us on many levels. just giving face to one woman’s revolution on my following post.
http://lifeseedsnutrition.com/2011/08/24/lose-14-pounds-in-three-years/
thank you.
Thank you for your work Elyn!
In good health,
Lizzy
It is inspiring to find others of like mind. I find the similarities between the 60′s (that would be the 1960′s to the youngsters out there) anti-war and counterculture movement, uncanny and fun. I knew I’d be part of the solution as well as part of the problem (We have met the enemy and he is us!) It will be enjoyable and challenging to recognize our own complicity and rebellion, laziness and hard work, ignorance and insight as the battle for the “hearts and minds” unfolds around the world and as participants collaborate and evolve.