It is no lie that America is turning into a land of excuses. As someone who has lived abroad, I noticed right away how much noticeably slimmer, better dressed, and happier people in Europe and other places abroad are compared to Americans. In Europe, most people can handle the truth and don’t need a trophy for things they don’t deserve or have worked to earn. You can tell someone in Asia or Europe that they are gaining weight (in a polite way of course) or heading towards a dangerous path and it’s not demonized. Instead, they appreciate you for telling them the truth so that they can take care of their health and work towards a better quality of life. Here in America, a lot of people simply don’t want to hear the truth and prefer a sugarcoated white lie instead in order to avoid changing their lifestyle for the better.
The obesity crisis in America is absolutely sickening and it's only getting worse. No, this doesn’t mean that every single American person is overweight or obese, but a huge majority of our country is. As a matter of fact, 30% of Americans are now considered obese and childhood obesity rates have more than tripled since 1980. It has been said that this generation is going to be the first generation that will have a shorter life span than the previous one…and that’s just sad.
So, what is causing this obesity crisis? Our lifestyle of course! We have greasy fattening fast food places at every corner, our food quality sucks (most of it is overly processed, filled with hidden sugars, and filled with genetically modified organisms), a lot of people here aren’t taught how to cook healthy at home, and a lot of us live a sedentary lifestyle. On top of that, we are stressed out and overworked because we are the only country that doesn’t require paid vacation time or paid leave to our workers. Come on America! I thought we were better than that.
Most people work office jobs that keep them sitting down all day (which of course leads to snacking on junk food and sugary coffees due to boredom), and spend way too much time watching television. Here in America, it’s all about convenience. Many people seem to want to do everything in their nature to avoid walking and I’ve seen people drive their cars to places so close to them that they can easily walk there in 15 minutes. These people use the excuse of having “no time” to work out or eat healthy, yet they have plenty of time (hours even!) to sit down and watch Netflix all night while gorging on soda and chips.
It’s interesting because when you watch television, you see a lot of commercials advertising greasy fattening super size fast food restaurants and at the same time, you see commercials advertising diet pills to obviously lose the weight you gained from eating at those fast food places. This is all done for the sake of money with little to no care for the health of the people, so it’s really on you to take matters into your own hands by educating yourself when it comes to healthy eating and healthy living.
You can easily avoid lots of future health issues by eating properly and exercising (or simply keeping active!) but it takes effort. Here are some of my tips:
If you work at an office job, avoid sugary drinks and prepare healthy meals to eat at lunch. Don’t snack on junk throughout your day. If you’re craving something sweet, bring some fruit or make a mixed fruit salad. Also, drink lots of water. If you want coffee or tea, that’s fine but don’t add sugar. Don’t fret if you really want your sugary drinks though. It's all about moderation. You can have your sugary drinks and junk food, but don’t have them more than once or twice a week. Before you go to work, set up your alarm clock half an hour early and do a quick run or a quick workout at home. During lunch, use some of that time to stretch or go outside for a walk or run. After work, go to the gym for 30-60 minutes a day or enroll yourself in an activity such as a dance class or yoga. If you can’t afford any of those, then do your workouts at home. YouTube has many free workout videos that will keep you sweating. Doing house chores such as cleaning and cooking also keeps you on your feet as well, so that’s always good.
With all that said, this doesn’t mean that people who are working a more active job are necessarily healthier than those who's jobs are more sedentary. When I worked in retail, I had a lot of overweight and obese coworkers and of course, they were eating junk food outside of working hours which had kept them fat. It mostly comes down to your eating habits and as stated before, you need to keep active. Keeping active is good for the body because we as humans aren’t built to be sitting down all day. By stretching and exercising, you can avoid a lot of issues in the future such as high blood pressure, osteoporosis, anxiety, back pain, neck pain, and more. By (mostly) avoiding junk food, you can avoid heart disease, strokes, type 2 diabetes, depression, kidney disease, liver damage, an increased risk of getting cancer, and more.
Yes, I understand that we all have different metabolisms and that it may be harder for one person to lose weight as opposed to another person with a faster metabolism, but no one is “genetically” fat. Seriously, I don’t want to hear that excuse. It’s easy to maintain a healthy weight if you know proper nutrition and make the effort to make health one of your top priorities in your life. You don’t need to starve yourself and I strongly don’t recommend fad diets because they don’t work in the long run. Just learn to incorporate healthy meals in your daily life and exercise for a good 30-60 minutes a day and you will see the weight drop. I’ll post about things to eat another time :).
Thanks for reading!
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