I am writing here from the viewpoint many others in my situation share, that of the slim person, trapped within a fat body, wanting desperately to escape this physical prison, but apparently bound by chains which, for many, seem unbreakable. These chains have titles, if you had not lready guessed, and though they only, really, in your mind, thier hold on you is very strong.

Chains like the one called habit, which really is a murderous son of a bitch, compelling you to do things you know you should not, but squeezing you ever so tight, if you fail to comply. Just one more iscuit can hardly hurt, that second chocolate ber ain’t so bad, the burger without the bread, sauce or cheese just is no burger, and anyway, i really am not that big yet. This habit chain,  keeping you fastened to the extra lump of lard you cart around, is only one, but it needs to be broken.

Try to imagine living ten thousand years ago, when wheat was an unknown quantity, cheese and dairy products were not something you were ever likely to see, and sweet things either came from nature or not at all.  That meant that stone-age people had but one choice. Go hunting and gathering, or starve.  They ate a diet of mainly protein, from meat and fish they could catch, and fruits, that would look for continuously. That is not to say that they were never likely to get fat.

The reason for that is almost certainly the same reason that so many people, especially in the western world, are carrying too much baggage. Paleolithic people would eat when they got the chance, quite naturally stuffing themselves, anytime there was an abundance of food, which probably was not that often. Laying down fat reserves, for leaner times, was something nature had programmed into our evolutionary heritage, so there would be times when these stone-age people might positively waddle, but they soon lost the excess again, because life was so hard.

The tendency toward this over-indulgence in available food is a genetic trait that still lives, unnoticed, in all humans, but we in the west pay too much lip-service to it. The fact is that we live, in our s0-called civilized societies, in a time of plenty, so the need for urgent stuffing of the cheeks with goodies simply does not exist, anymore, in our lives, yet many, far too many, still do it, in a lemming-like drive to get there before anyone else can. Our hearts never appreciate the extra work they have to put in, getting blood to extraneous body-mass, which is why so many fat folk have heart-attacks.

I was getting into the supersize bracket, when it occurred to me that, god damn it, I had given up the worst habit of all three years ago, when I smoked the last cigareete that will ever touch my lips. I was a 40 to 50 a day tobacco junkie, but hard as it was, and boy was it hard, I kicked that filthy habit. If, I reasoned, I was strong enough to do that, then giving up the things that stone-age man could never have eaten anyway should be simple, and truth be told, it was. I have never touched a piece of bread, or cheese, or chocolate, or anything that is processed, for nearly three months now. Protein and fruit, as much as you want, and I am never hungry, but I am 16 pounds lighter.

Think it over, the next time you go into Macdonalds or burgerking, to eat a ’snack’ that probably contains more calories than you would need for a whole day. If yiour waistline is creeping ever outwards, you can, to some extent blame the genes, but those chains of habitual behaviour are the real problem, and anyone CAN break them, if they truly want to. A leaner life could very well be a longer life, and from any way you look at it, a longer life has to be the more attractive option, so do something about it.