"If You're Going To Do It, Do It Right"

January 14, 2011

Today’s bit of advice is sponsored by my husband who is working hard to improve his diet and overall health.  The rest of the family is now obliged to listen to his daily lecture about our unhealthy eating habits and why he will outlive all of us.  Tonight’s recommended change to our diet was that the whole family must switch to wheat bread.  No more PB& J on white bread.  Bummer.  However, he gets his nutritional advice from a variety of hiking magazines that don’t always supply all the information one needs to make the right food choices.

Thus today’s Bit of Advice…..

“If you’re going to do it, do it right”

If you are going to eat wheat bread for the health benefits of increased fiber, lowered blood pressure, and a reduction in your cholesterol then you must make sure that your bread lists whole wheat flour as the first ingredient.  Just listing wheat flour is not enough.  You also want to avoid breads that include lots of words you can’t pronounce that end with –ose and –ase.  If you are going to do it, do it right.

A few more examples:

Don’t do your grocery shopping with proper planning.  Some people recognize that they need to shop for food and make the time to go to a store.  Once there they wander the aisles looking for items that appear tasty or that they think they might need.  They get home and try to put a meal together only to realize that they don’t have a full set of ingredients for anything.  And back to the store they go.  All the time.  If you are going to go to the store, take the time to plan out a few meals (even if you don’t know which days you will eat them), put the ingredients on a list, and take the list with you.  Your family will thank you, your stomach will thank you, and your wallet will thank you.  If you are going to do it, do it right.

On the food topic – If you are going to eat almonds for their reported health benefits, don’t buy the ones labeled “Honey and Cinnamon Almonds”.  I know, I know.  The Honey Cinnamon Almonds taste better.  How do I know this?  Well, you can figure it out.  Ten almonds a day is the recommended amount for blood pressure and cholesterol reduction.  The Honey Cinnamon Almonds go down so easily that you can easily eat 40 or 50, but the health benefits are then lost by the additional fat and sugar.  Just get the plain almonds and stop at ten.  If you are going to do it, do it right.

How about this one?  Want to avoid every having to tidy up your home?  Just put things away where they belong.  Sounds so simple and it is.  Don’t set something next to its assigned spot.  Put it away properly.   Do the laundry and put it away where it belongs.  Getting it into a laundry basket and setting on the stairs does not count.  Change your clothes after work and leave them on your bed or floor?  Nope.  Put the where they belong – either back in your closet or in the hamper.  Walk items to where they belong instead of half way there.  You open the mail at the kitchen counter, glance at it, then leave it there.  Right?  Recycle that junk mail as soon as it is opened.  Put the bills in your bill pile.  Add informational mail to your calendar.  Otherwise you have to touch that mail all over again.  If you are going to do it, do it right.

Life gives us 24 hours a day and seven days a week.  I, for one, don’t have time to do my work twice.  Some days I don’t even have enough time to do my work once!  If I am going to do something, I need to do it right.

Jump on the wagon with me.

Hope you enjoyed the read.