Why is it so difficult to eat right and taking in the right nutrients without exceeding the calories we need?  Fad diets always promise they’ll help us get it right. We need food and water to live; nutrients and energy are necessary to keep our bodies moving. After studying and working with health for the past four decades, I’ve noticed that one thing never changes: human beings always want to get better results with less effort.

We want to eat what tastes good, but not what gives us what we need. That is why there are so many fad diets appearing and disappearing every couple of years. The problem is that we are driven by desire, and eating is one of the simple pleasures we enjoy from birth to death.

We are always trying to find a way to eat what tastes good but is nutritious, without the excess of calories that the tastiest food usually has. So every now and then, someone appears with a magic solution in the form of a fancy-named diet, saying,  “With this diet, you can eat what tastes good without getting overweight or obese,” and fools everybody.

What we should do

There is only one way to eat right: to fight our desire to eat food lacking in nutrients but filled with excess calories. The rest is just marketing and industry profit-related.

I can show you what I’m talking about by asking you a simple question: How many diets that were created in the last four decades are still around and working well for most of us? The answer is simple, NONE!

If any of those diets worked well, obesity in the world would be decreasing instead of increasing. Because if there was one diet that delivered on its promise, we’d follow that particular diet and everyone would lose weight and be fit.

We are humans

I’m not saying that the problem is the diet itself, but rather the incapacity of a normal human being to follow a specific diet. This is also not about athletes that have achieved high performance through a diet aimed at always getting better and reaching higher levels of competition. I’m talking about the average person who has a regular job, an average family, and a normal lifestyle.

Everybody knows that a “homemade” grilled chicken breast with vegetables offers nutrition without chemicals, fat, and excess calories, especially compared to those chicken products from fast food joints. However, because we are human beings, we tend to buy something cheaper, tastier and easier to eat – instead of going to the supermarket, choosing our food, buying it and cooking it ourselves.

Besides, there are plenty of candy bars, chips, and other junk foods waiting for us right there on the corner of every street, in every supermarket, pharmacy or gas station. They are almost everywhere we go. So yes, it’s hard to resist junk food. Anyhow, our goal isn’t to be perfect but to be the best we can. But how? By eating as little as we can of food that packed with an excess of fat, sugar, and chemicals.

Skydiving and wind tunnel

We have the same dietary needs every day. Our needs change when we spend the entire day skydiving, flying in the wind tunnel, or doing any other sport. There are two main things we need more of when doing any sport:  food and drink. During any activity, we must pay attention to what we eat and how we keep our body hydrated.

Extreme sports like skydiving carry more risks than ordinary sports if we don’t keep hydrated and eat enough to keep our energy levels up. In 20 years skydiving and almost 10 years practicing indoor skydiving, I’ve witnessed people feeling bad. They usually report dizziness, nausea, and their flying skills impaired. These symptoms are usually caused by a lack of nutrients, energy, and water in the body.

“Eat light and easy to digest food every couple of hours.” – Mauro Jasmin

Athletes and regular people training for any kind of activity must give their bodies the vitamins, minerals, fibers, and other supplements they need to keep their body strong, clever, and alert. My advice is straightforward: drink plenty of water and eat well when you are skydiving, base jumping, or running a few kilometers. That way, you can avoid any weird feelings that can put your health and safety at risk.

Whenever you do any kind of exercise, you should also give your body what it needs to keep going, strong and alert. So please, drink plenty of water on a jumping day, eat appropriately light and easy to digest food every couple of hours, and pay extra attention if you feel dizzy, nausea, or any discomfort.

Keep coming back

Do not fool yourself into thinking that a special fad diet will change your life. It might change for a few months, but that isn’t enough! What we all want is to be as healthy as possible for as long as possible. Change your behavior long term, and start to look for healthier food.

If we cut sugar, fat, junk food, chemicals, and so on at the same time, we usually will feel deprived and abandon the effort quickly. However, if we begin little by little, we will be able to achieve very healthy eating habits. A slow modification of our eating habits is a plan that we can keep in our lives for the long haul.

If you like the article, please let me know. If you have anything to add to it, please leave a comment or send me an email sharing your experience.

Follow me on Instagram: @augustobartelle

Like the Fan Page on Facebook!