Off the Urban Grid

Work Toward Improving Your Diet

Making strides to improve your diet isn’t just beneficial for the environment, but it’s also wise for maintaining your overall health too. Now that summer is coming to a close, kids as well as adults will be returning to school so a whole new chaotic schedule may ensue for some of you out there. Along with this added stress, it’s difficult to complete tasks in a timely manner let alone feeding yourself and your family a thoughtfully prepared meal. Although times are changing and the seas ahead may be rough, there are ways to improve your diet in the midst of it all.

Assess Your Lifestyle

Before you can change anything, you need to look at your life from an objective point of view. What things can you stop doing? There are probably several activities you engage in that only waste your time and prevent you from tackling what’s more important. For example, reduce the amount of television you watch so you have more time to create weekly meal plans. Or create a daily schedule to make room for recipe hunting and grocery shopping. Thinking ahead can help you stay on track.

Reduce and Add

While on the path to reducing those activities that hold you back, you have to consider the foods you eat too. With factory farming, meat and dairy products do more harm than good for your body, because they contain hormones and steroids. Plus, foods like cheese and milk only increase inflammation and mucus in the body. If you can cut down the amount of times you eat these foods per week, you’re on the right track. However, eliminating them is even better for you and the world, as factory farming causes soil degradation, pollution, water contamination, etc. Then you will have more room for nutrient rich foods such as cabbage, kale, pears, spinach, blueberries, garbanzo beans, lentils and other fruits and vegetables.

Eating healthier meals does take effort, but it’s all worth it when you notice the energy increase, strong immune system, glowing skin, etc. When you have your own garden, your journey to wellness also positively affects the earth.

Tags: dairy free, raw food vegan diet, vegan diet, vegetarian diet