Eating for Life review

[Guest guest]

I read eating for life last night. Here's my review. Andy

The first 78 pages explain the concepts of Eating for Life. This is

a great expansion of the nutrition chapter of the Body for Life book

with more detail. A background is given of the obesity problem in

the US. An important point is made in asking parents " Am I poisoning

my children, or am I helping them eat for life as well? "

An entire chapter is the problems caused by consuming so much fast

food. The next chapter makes a good case about why dieting industry

is a failure and 95% of diets fail.

then discusses whether or not we have the power to change.

It is our will to change and no one is ever perfect. Don't let

unresolved emotional issues stop you from changing. says

that if he carried around a pound for every unresolved issue in his

life, he'd be as big as a Buick.

The next chapter focuses on separating myths regarding eating right

and losing weight from the facts. An important point is made that

low-carb diets are not the best way to get in shape. The next

section will sound familiar to those that have read Body for Life

since he explains why foods (protein, carbs, and vegetables) are

important. He also explains the importance of essential fats,

vitamins and minerals, and water. Then he goes on to explain how to

eat the right amount using the palm/fist method, the right food

combos, and eating at the right times six times per day. He sites

numerous studies that support eating frequent meals to increase fat

loss and retain muscle.

An entire chapter is devoted to free day and explains the

importance of free day. He says to eat whatever you want, in

whatever amount, and combination that you desire. He gives lots of

personal examples of what free day means to him and what it may mean

to others. He talks about planned and unplanned free days. If you

mess up in a big way, you can use the day as an unplanned free day

and skip your regularly planned free day. Your birthday should

always be a free day. He says we shouldn't deny that we celebrate

big events with food. Other plans are so strict that you aren't

every allowed to eat your favorite foods which may not be part of

their diet. With free day, you are never deprived of any food that

you desire. He also discusses how the free day can end up being self-

regulating and how we need to be honest with ourselves on free day.

If we really want something, we need to eat it.

Next, he discusses how to put it all together, planning meals,

exercise routines, what to eat, and when to eat. What happens if you

miss a meal due to poor planning and why it is important not to miss

meals. He gives a detailed explanation of how he personally applies

his Eating for Life principles.

Another chapter is devoted to questions and answers with several

questions on low-carb diets. says that low-carb diets suck

if your priorities include being strong, energetic, and

mentally " there. " Some other questions are what are average results,

and do I need to exercise? Another question involves adjusting

recipes so they are low-carb. He says you can't crossbreed different

nutritional theories like Atkins and Eating for life without ending

up with a form of mutated mush of extra nothing. Go with one or the

other. If you want to do low-carb, get a copy of one of Atkins books

that he published before he died.

The next chapter focuses on people's attitudes towards cooking. Lots

of people say they don't have time to cook and he explains why people

do have the time. He explains how to use the recipes in the book,

get your kitchen ready, make recipe selections, grocery lists,

portion sizes, altering the size of recipes, and to prepare your

planned meals.

The next section of the book includes the recipes. With 150 recipes,

it should be easy to find 10-15 that you can use for your standard

meal groupings. Many of the recipes even have pictures of the

ingredients to make it easy to figure out what to buy at the store.

Although some pictures are name brand, I don't feel that promotion of

a specific product was intended. This was meant to be helpful and

you can purchase any brand that you desire. The sections include

dinners, desserts, breakfasts, lunches, midmeals, and nutrition

shakes. He also includes a section with an entire 12-week meal plan

using the recipes. There isn't nutrition information for the recipes

in the book, but this information can be found at

http://billphillips.net/recipes/nutrition.asp

There is a complete detailed grocery guide divided by types of foods

and sections of the store. Five appendixes include success stories,

nutrition definitions, cooking terms and tips, kitchen essentials,

and conversion charts. There is also a list of scientific

references, a recipe index, and a tasteful tip index.

I felt like is taking a different approach and trying to

motivate more people into action with this book. He gives easy to

understand explanations as to why these recommendations work and why

people need to follow them. The first section before the recipes

should take less than 2 hours to read. If you can get someone to

read it, I think there is a good chance they will be motivated to act

upon the advice if they have any desire to change their eating

habits.

As for sticking to the plan which seems to be a problem for a lot of

people, I think the key is to start cooking the recipes and it will

become habit. If you mess up, he makes it very clear that no one is

perfect. Forget it, and move on. The recipes for the meals are real

and the ones that I have tried so far are tasty and should help those

of us that quickly get bored eating the same old thing like chicken

and brown rice. The recipes are simple, healthy, taste good, and can

be made fairly quickly. We should take the time if we can to

actually cook one meal per day. For the rest you can do something

simple like a chicken breast and rice, or shakes and he does not

promote a specific shake brand in my opinion. He just mentions that

he really likes Myoplex, no longer owns the company, and stands in

line at GNC to buy. If eating out, he mentions that you can also

learn to make good choices. It is my opinion that this book will

help get you organized and ready to go if you have a desire to be

healthy. This book is a must have for people following Body for

Life. It will help keep you moving forward. If it also a great

motivator for those that have fallen off the wagon and would like to

restart the program.