More on Health

Are you sick and tired of being sick and tired?  Do you believe in enjoying yourself now, even if it costs you a few years later on?  When I was in my teens and early twenties, that was how I felt.  I enjoyed all the great tasting junk food and soft drinks all the time, was drinking probably 50 - 70 ounces a day of Pepsi and Coke, eating hot dogs and hamburgers and thinking everything was great.  I thought everything was great....until I got an ulcer from my diet when I was around 25.  I cut out the soft drinks and bacon, the ulcer went away, and I thought everything was good again.  Then at 30 I thought I got the ulcer back, went to the hospital for tests (which were extremely uncomfortable and painful), no ulcer, but they told me it was nervous stomach.  It wasn't much fun - stomach aches, cramps, and nausea every day.  The doctors offered no solution, so I began my research.  I totally cleaned up my diet - eliminated all sugar, artificial additives and colors and flavors, ate only natural food (no GMO) and drank mostly pure water.  Within 6 months, no more nervous stomach.  But I was still getting about 4 colds a year and the occasional flu.

I learned in a college photography class, that whatever you do, take it one step farther.  So my next step was to learn about vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and other supplements.  And then I experimented with different combinations of those, and with different schedules of taking some of them.  My colds dropped down to 1 a year, and only lasted a few days.  More research, and more trying other supplements, and now I'm just about free of colds and no flu in many years.

The moral of the story - If you think that by eating whatever makes you enjoy yourself now and all will be fine until the end of your time on planet Earth, and that you don't have to worry about what you eat, that is not how things work (unless you are extremely lucky).  It may be sudden, or it may be so gradual that you don't realize it, but your perfect health will no longer be perfect, and you will no longer be enjoying life to the fullest, as you should be.  And the cost could bankrupt you, literally.  The prescription medications you may take - well, listen to the ads to learn about some of the possible side effects (they don't list all of them, which can be 50 - 500 or more - you can go to Mercola.com to get some great information on this).

The side effects of a good diet, exercise, and proper supplements - for me, no more headaches, no more dandruff, almost no more colds (or maybe they are gone, as I haven't had one in several years - same for the flu), no nervous stomach, and several other problems I had are also gone.

One last comment for now - when you do eliminate all the sugar and other bad stuff, after a while, everything else tastes better.  I love my salads and smoothies, and am left without a bad taste after eating.

Why am I writing about this on a photography blog?  If I'm lucky enough to photograph you, I want to feel my best, and you need to feel your best, too, so we can get some really great images.  But more than that, it makes me feel good if I can help you to feel good, too.  The best thing you can do for yourself is to learn about diet, exercise, and supplements....and then make the appropriate changes.  And then fine tune them.  It takes time, but it is worth it.  You are worth it!

July 4th Weekend

Well, OK, July 4th came on a Wednesday.  So which weekend was the July 4th weekend?  Both, of course.  Why not - it's Summer, after all, and time to enjoy yourself.  I went down to Venice Beach on the fourth, checked out the bodybuilding competition, played paddle tennis, took some photos.  Glad I didn't go to the fireworks as they lasted, from what I heard, about 15 seconds or so - yup, big snafu, maybe a computer glitch?  The only thing I would have liked to have gotten pictures of were the faces in the crowd.  Even the next day, some who went still had that look of disbelief.  Life is like that - you never know what may happen next.  Lots of surprises.  Hopefully the good ones outnumber the bad ones.

Here are pictures of two of the competitors at the July 4th weight pen competition - not sure I need to say anything about the photos - think I'll let them speak for themselves.  At the time these were taken, the coastal clouds had not yet burned off, so that softened the light a bit.  If you click on the photos, you can see them in a larger size.

Hope you all had a great 4th of July and both weekends.