Recently I went and heard Cindi O'Meara speak at a Changing Habits seminar (www.changinghabits.com.au). Some of the things she said blew my mind! I had no idea just how naive I was when it came to food. I learned so much from that one night, here's just a few things...
Did you know....?
- The average Australian takes 46,000 medications in their lifetime?!?! - woah! This one blew me away. And was also very confronting. Being asthmatic, I've been taking medication for it every day, many times a day since I was 7 years old. I reckon I've probably already reached the 46,000 - and I'm only 30! It also made me think about every time I just pop a panadol for a bit of a pain. Hmmm... time to re-think...
This t-shirt made me laugh...and wonder...how easily we grab a 'quick fix' rather than treating the source of the problem.
- Food manufacturers have been using marketing, advertising and false science to sell us products that are unhealthy and when consumed long term, potentially unsafe. We live in a world obsessed with what Cindi call's 'nutritionism'. An obsession with low fat, low salt, low calorie etc.
Question : How do you chose your foods? Do you chose them by their nutritional value or by what your culture or family traditions have dictated?
- There are six food colours that have been banned in the UK due to their direct link to hyperactivity - and they're still available in Australia!!!
- Vegemite was banned by Denmark in 2003 because of iron fortification. The same kind of iron fortification that is used in breakfast cereals fortified with iron. Did you know that if you take a breakfast cereal that is high in iron, add water, crush it in a blender and stick a magnet in it, the iron particles will literally come out on to the magnet. Gross! Seriously. It's a science experiement - google it!
- The heart tick of approval scheme may seem like a good thing - but it only has a few criteria. They look at low fat, low sugar, low salt etc. Now that all sounds good right? But what they don't consider is the amount of chemical processes it took to get those products to meet those criteria. It also doesn't consider the ingredients that aren't even actually food!
Now I'm not saying that we should all rush out and buy everything organic & go cold turkey on the not-so-good stuff... it takes time to make a change.
This is just about creating a little awareness.
This is just the tip of the iceberg... there's so much more to it and I'm just learning.
Think BIG. Start small.
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