Here's To Your Health

Once again, it was a toss up as to what I would write about - health or photography.  Well, photography doesn't affect health (although it allows you to see how great you looked when in good health, and perhaps the difference if you are no longer in good health).  But health will definitely affect how you look in your photos.  Not to mention poor health affects every facet of your life.  I try to do whatever I can to educate you about health - to do that, you must understand the difference between good health and bad health.  You can't do that by relying on the evening news for your education.  So this is mostly about health, although I've included some of my latest photos at the bottom of this post.

Lately, the news has been extremely misleading.  It has been reporting that many things that are good for you really aren't (when, in fact, they are).  I'm talking here not about drugs, but about organic food, fish oil, vitamins, and other supplements.  They quote studies (or, more correctly, parts of studies that will catch the most attention so you will watch the news), many of which are funded by drug companies, and which are flawed.  They may use synthetic vitamins (as they did in studies with Vitamin A and E), or amounts that would not be expected to do anything, or use people in the studies whose other health habits are unknown, or whose vitamin intake can't be verified, etc.  In one of the latest reported studies, on fish oil, one study they quoted showed it had no effect on heart health.  Hundreds of other studies have showed good results for heart health.  The questions you need answers to:  what fish oil did they use (cheap, contaminated, what kind of fish, was it heated during processing, was it fresh or perhaps rancid, etc.)?  What was the diet of the subjects?  Did they have preexisting heart problems or in poor heart health prior to the study?

The point is, almost any study can be performed in a such a way as to show almost any result.  So you have to look at all the past studies on the topic, and come to your own conclusions.  One site that has excellent references and up to date info is Dr. Mercola's (his products on his site are a bit expensive, so I don't personally order from there):  http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/09/18/flu-shot-increases-flu-illness.aspx?e_cid=20120918_DNL_art_1  Explore his site and sign up for his newsletter - you'll learn a lot about your health and what to do to regain it or keep it.

Another excellent site is http://orthomolecular.org/

Here is a true story, that at first you may wonder why I put it here, but think about it for a minute.
My mother, brother, and a friend of my brother's went fishing. My brother's
friend was a fishing expert, and told my mother she was doing
everything wrong. My mother was the only one who caught fish that day
- 3 of them. Instead of learning what she did, he attributed it to luck.
I'm sure the same happens with your photography (or your health?). Instead of others
learning from what you've done, they say, "that can't work."

I've had doctors tell me the same about vitamins and supplements (they don't work, but if you want to spend your money....) .  And ask me almost nothing about my diet.  When I was growing up, if something was going around (cold, flu, bronchitis, etc), I caught it.  At least 4 times a year.  Plus I had an ulcer in my mid 20's, dandruff, and on and on.  At 30 I was diagnosed with "nervous stomach" at Kaiser.  The remedy the doctors told me was to stay out of stressful situations.  And that was when I realized I had to find answers on my own.  And I did.  A healthy diet WITHOUT sugar, fructose, artificial anything, no preservatives.  And then I also added supplements.  Now I have been sick just once in the past 5 years, and about 2 years since the last time I caught anything (it might have been food poisoning, even though I'm pretty careful).

One major difference between supplements and drugs - supplements extremely rarely have any side effects, and many times they are actually good side effects - i.e. something else gets better other than what you were taking it for.  One thing you may want to do - find a health practitioner who is an expert in vitamins and supplements, and diet - such as Dr. Mercola.  And do your research, due diligence, or whatever you want to call it - and get educated about your health - no less than the time you spend on your photography.

Now for my latest photos - taken Sep 14, 2012 at Venice Beach of a Dr. Bronners display that was set up near Windward Circle (BTW - Dr Bronners liquid soap it great - I use the Lavender to wash and shave with and it works great - not sure which product they used in these photos).

Hope you enjoyed the articles and the photos.  Have a great week.