Healthy Tips from Aristotle

Over half of the adult population in the United States makes the decision to start each day with a vitamin supplement, and the numbers are growing. Sounds like a step in the right direction, wouldn’t you say? At the very least, the adults in our nation seem to be taking a genuine interest in leading a healthy life.

While I am not here to change your mind about those supplements (I am certainly not a doctor! Though most adults are taking supplements by personal choice rather than from doctor recommendation), I would like to encourage you to think about your vitamin intake from a new point of view.

 Rather going into great detail about the number of toxins available to American consumers through their vitamin supplements – nearly ALL of the Vitamin C supplements sold today are made with genetically modified corn products – I will instead share with you the wisdom of Aristotle.

The same philosopher from the 4th Century B.C. who taught us “Good habits formed at youth make all the difference” (one of the wisest sentences ever uttered, in my opinion) also planted a garden and wrote about it, sharing his knowledge of cruciferous vegetables and their health benefits.

Ban the Trail Tweets

You may understand a few things about my personality at this point; particularly the idea that I have my own personal set of rules and I expect no one else in the world to even understand them, let alone follow suit. My rules are elementary (to me), yet to others they seem full of antitheses. If you take the time to scrutinize more closely, you'll find my general rule of life be quite simplistic: Savor every moment.

That's why I'm a trail runner. 

And yes, savoring life can have different pictures within the same frame: I love the fitness involved within the art of running, but I'd like my aide stations to be filled with M&M's and my finish line to feature pulled pork sandwiches. I love morning runs, but I'd prefer them to start MID-morning. I love to start off a race with a group of new-found friends and my all-time very favorite runner in the world, then end up on my own in the middle of the wilderness. I use the road for running when I need to think something through completely...the trail is for thinking about nothing but the intensity of the moment. And I love to blog, but I have little use for social media.

Trail running invites you to become a minimalist, to focus, to test your personal limits in ways you never dreamed of before, and to truly, deeply understand that there is no room on the trail for worrying that you may lose both your dignity and your pride, especially if you showed up at the start line with too much to begin with. 

And that kind of place, compadres, has no room for Tweets or Instagrams.