Wear Sunscreen! (and watch this video)

Watch this Video!

(5 minutes well spent...)

Eat, Move and Laugh

Conveniently Local 

Ways to Get Healthier 

 

We're always on the lookout for ways to make your life easier and get healthier at the same time.  Here are a few of our top local picks:

1.  Be Free Bakers: a gluten-free vegan bakery ~ cookies, cupcakes, flour mixes.  Persistence is the name of the game. Founder Jennifer Ward just kept at it in her search for great-tasting, equal-opportunity treats that didn't exclude anyone or their allergies.  These truly are the bomb!  (Really...that's the name of one of her cookies - try it!)  Find out where to buy here.

2.  Scott Fitness:  a gym with fewer meatheads and hardly any...well, you can read more about it here.  No screaming, no grunting, no beating of chests! Finally...a 24-hour gym where you can check your fear, insecurities, and mipples at the groovy, hand-scanning door.    

3.  Roving Imp Theater: in the spirit of laughter really being the best medicine, my long-lost, short-lived days as a comedic improviser taught some of the best lessons in life ~ all while laughing my arse right off.  Once trained by Roving Imp's Nifer Honeycutt who went on to study at the Second City Conservatory in Chicago, I feel like I'm 6 degrees from Jason Sudekis (wait...he's a KC native).  Anyway, let go and laugh now and then.  

Quick and Healthy Breakfast Ideas

3 Quick  & Healthy Breakfast Ideas

 

We love that you are enjoying our meals for your lunches and dinners.  You asked!  Here are some quick, healthy breakfast ideas to give you an energizing start to your day:

1.  Hash Brown Scramble:  1 cup (Woodstock Farms) organic hash browns, 1 cup veggies (we like onions, peppers, tomatoes, zucchini), 2 slices (Lightlife) organic Smokey Tempeh ~ less than 200 calories; saute for 10-15 minutes.

2.  Chocolate Chip Oatmeal:  1/4 cup (Bob's Red Mill) Gluten-Free Steel Cut Oats, 1 tsp agave, 1 tbsp (Enjoy Life Foods) vegan chocolate chips, sprinkle of cinnamon and nutmeg (optional shredded coconut) ~ approx 250 calories; approx 15 minutes.

3.  Yogurt Parfait:  6 oz (So Delicious) Plain Coconut Yogurt, 1/4 cup Enjoy Life Foods "Not Nuts-Mountain Mambo" mix (sunflowers, pumpkin seeds, raisins, apples, chocolate chips, cranberries) ~ approx 300 calories, 2 minutes

Healing Path

Kim and I are taking a few days to relax, evaluate, and plan. Reflecting back on where our journey started, I sit back, close my eyes, and vividly recall the absolute hell brought into our newlywed apartment some 8 years ago.  What started as intense chest pains led me to the Fort Carson ER where I was immediately taken back only to discover strong acid reflux - a symptom that would plague me for years and force me to sleep in a recliner for most of my first year of marriage.  People can describe intense chest pain and acid reflux, headaches, irritable bowels, insomnia, gut inflammation, and mood swings but it just doesn't do justice to the lived experience. 

A year later, taking 6 pills a day and feeling like a lab rat undergoing experiment after experiment, no relief was in sight.  My lap nisson fundoplication surgery (basically wrapping my stomach around my esophagus) gave me hope, despite the required all-liquid diet for the month to follow.  (Thanksgiving dinner just wasn't the same out of a blender...)  Fast forward 6 years after having tried all of the diets out there from Paleo (cave man diet), the Specific Carbohydrate Diet (SCD), Food Rotation Diet (keeping a journal of everything you eat and not eating it again for 72 hours - that was tough), Low fat, Low Sugar, Low Carb, Blood Type Diet - all of them.  Only to discover my eventual path to healing almost by accident - one in which could have prevented all those pills and perhaps even surgery.  A simple whole foods plant-based diet.  If you had told me even just a year ago that I would become a vegan and be running a plant-based meal delivery business, well I'm not sure what I would have said, but probably can't repeat it here...Here is where we are and I am proud to say I am a healthy man today because I changed the way I eat and the way I think.  No more pills.  No more sleepless nights.  No more pain. 

You deserve to feel great all the time too.  Our bodies were made perfectly and to exist in harmony and health.  Your pain is simply telling you to make a change.  The start of fall marks a chance for a new beginning.  YOUR new beginning.  Your new life.  Start yours today. 

Nature vs. Nurture

Do You Have Good Genes or Bad Genes...Or Does It Matter?

That old "Nature vs Nurture," "Genes vs Environment" question.  At Conveniently Natural, we are not doctors, but we support the epigenetic theory that while genes do control biochemistry and physiology, they have no autonomy regarding whether or not they get read or expressed.  What controls the expression of genes is determined by environment - specifically what we eat, how we move, and how we think.  See research links below and research for yourself!

The purpose of this email is not to discuss the validity of the epigenetic theory, but rather to encourage thought about how YOU live your lifestyle.  Whether or not it is true that you can impact your health by how you choose to live...

Isn't it more powerful to believe that what you do makes a difference in the outcome of your life?

Brain Balance and Epigenetics - discusses kids with ADD/ADHD and Autism Spectrum and role of environment 

"Why Are Humans So Sick?" - audio discussion between Dr. James Chestnut and Dr. Bruce Lipton

Why DNA Isn't Your Destiny - Time Magazine article

Manly Plants

Is Your Food Manly?

  

It seems silly to classify your food in some sort of gender-specific terms (though if it once walked, moo'd, or had a mom and dad, it actually did have a gender).  But why do we think of some foods as "manly" and others as "lady food?"  You know, that image of a large man holding a drumstick tearing into it with his teeth...or that Stepford wife daintily holding her cucumber sandwich while sipping tea.  

So, the college football season is upon us starting this Thursday. Growing up, college football (specifically the Fighting Irish football team) was like a religion.  Though I grew to become equally passionate about the game along with my 3 older brothers and ND grad Dad, my favorite part about Saturdays was the food!  

Gameday food (usually an all-day affair) included BBQ, Nana's baked beans, Mom's potatoes, and endless bowls of chips and dip.  There's just something about this menu that brings back memories of family feasts and yelling at the TV. If I'm confessing my sins (as the Irish Catholic would). I don't want to give up my gameday fare.  

Hats off to our chefs who created a great "Gameday Menu." Now we don't have to choose!  Take these meals tailgating - whether outside the stadium or in the comfort of your own HDTV'd home.  And as to whether or not an organic whole foods, plant-based diet is manly or not, I'll let Tony answer that (see below).

  

In 2007, former Chiefs tight-end, Tony Gonzalez switched to a plant-based diet after finding out about The China Study.  Though not 100% vegan, he considers his change in diet a major contributor to feeling better, recovering faster, gaining endurance and having more energy and focus.  Why not try it...What could you lose?

Healthy Heart

What Would You Do if You Knew a Fool Proof Way to Prevent a Heart Attack?

Make Yourself Heart Attack Proof

We're not doctors or dietitians, but we know what it's like to try to make a change.  Does knowledge change behavior?  Most of the time - no.  The single factor found to determine successful long-term change is MOTIVATION. If someone offered you $1 million to eat a whole foods, plant-based diet, would you? Or what if someone kidnapped your kids and told you they wouldn't be returned until you stopped those bad habits and engaged in a wholly healthy lifestyle? How long would it take you to get started?  

Believe me, we get it.  This stuff is not easy.  Our hope is that we can help you on whatever part of your journey you'reon.