Last week, like magic, I suddenly stopped buying or eating any ultra-processed foods. Instead of crackers and biscuits, I now only eat tomatoes, figs, nuts or other fruits for snacks.
It’s not often that I experience instant behavioural changes. This happened after I read the book “Food Rules” by Michael Pollan. There are very few books in my life that have this power (see below) and I had stumbled onto another spellbook.
I first discovered Michael Pollan from this phrase that I read in the New York Times on healthy eating: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” I then sought out the book where he expanded on this advice, and I was blown away.
“Food Rules” is a short book that you can complete in one hour. You don’t actually have to read the body text; you can just read the contents page to get the gist. Here are some chapter titles:
- Avoid food products that contain more than five ingredients
- Avoid foods you see advertised on television
- Don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognise as food
- Avoid food products containing ingredients that a third-grader cannot pronounce
- If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don’t
- “The whiter the bread, the sooner you’ll be dead.”
It’s not like I didn’t know any of these tips. But somehow, the book was written in a way that rearranged my brain cells to click, and I said, “Oh man, I really need to stop eating UPF (ultra-processed food).”
I told my daughter about the book while we were at the supermarket and we looked at the nutrition label of Cheezels – it had about 15 ingredients in it! I simply couldn’t bear to eat it anymore.
Words have power and they have the ability to change our mindset instantly. Do check out this book and see if it has the same effect on you.
FYI, the other books that changed my life:
- The Bible
- How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Dale Carnegie
- Spark Joy, by Marie Kondo
- 7 Strategies for Wealth and Happiness, by Jim Rohn
- Cultivating Ch’i, by Kaibara Ekiken