I was recently a guest on the Red Beard Radio podcast, where the host, Brian, asked me an important question:

“What do entrepreneurs do that makes us more likely to go to the treatment side of your practice, than the prevention side of your practice?”

In other words, what are the habits that result in business owners being on my operating table?

The answer is simple, and it’s not limited only to entrepreneurs and business owners.

The number one thing that gets people onto the treatment side of my practice is what and how they eat.

Too many people don’t realize that it’s impossible to outrun a bad diet. You can be thin, fit, and feel good, but still be destroying your body with how you eat. Being thin does not necessarily mean you are metabolically healthy.

Quite simply, food is the overwhelming cause of most of the problems I see with my heart surgery patients.

What about lifestyle factors?

Certainly, there are lifestyle issues at play as well

Stress, a lack of sleep, too much time hunched over a computer instead of getting adequate sun and exercise. These are all symptoms of our modern life, and they all matter.

Imagine you’re a bodybuilder, and your goal is to win Mr. Universe. In that instance, the number one priority to achieve that goal would be your exercise regime to first build muscle.

Food, rest, and supplementation are all vital components to build muscle, but without picking up some weights, they won’t get you to that trophy. Yet at the same time, lifting weights without considering a proper diet and recovery will also not get you to the trophy.

The same is true with improving your health. If you exercise regularly, sleep well, and reduce stress in your life, you still won’t be metabolically healthy if your food intake is mostly made up of processed foods, microwave meals, sodas and ice cream.

How can we tell when our metabolic health needs improving?

Unfortunately, the signs are not always obvious. Obesity and high blood pressure are two markers that indicate if we’re metabolically unhealthy, but the other markers require blood tests.

So, if you want to start improving your metabolic health immediately the first thing to do is only eat real, whole foods.

If it comes in a box or a bag, don’t eat it. You can go a step further and think of anything that comes in a box or a bag as not being a food item at all. Brian, the host of Red Beard Radio, refers to them as ‘near food objects.’ This is a perfect way to view them: Oreos, vegetable oils, processed foods, these are not food, they are nearly food.

The only foods that are truly safe for human consumption are ones that grow in the ground, or eat what grows in the ground.

You can take control of your health starting right now. Improve what you eat and you’ll take a huge step forward.