Life is too short for not being healthy. Or do you consider "healthy" a bad word?

If someone would tell you that you are healthy, would you find it annoying?
What if someone would tell you that you are so healthy?
And what if everyone would tell you that you are just OMG so healthy?

Take care of your body. It's the only place you have to live.

Jim Rohn [1930-2009]

I don't drink coffee or alcohol. Usually, I don't drink soft beverages and I don't eat chocolate or other sweets really often. If I do it, it means that I am in a very bad mood or extremely stressed and tired. 

I am vegan. I follow a gluten-free and yeast-free diet. A lot of vegetables. A lot of fruits. Rice, corn, potatoes. Nuts. And seed, and algae. Green tea and herbal teas. No ketchup. No sauces. No sugar in my tea.

[How about a tasty and healthy snack?]

Which it is indeed my cup of tea, but it doesn't have to be yours.
Still, over time I had to learn that most people feel somehow attacked and intimidated if you eat in a different way. They perceive you as a threat, even if you don't say anything and if you don't try to change their minds. 

Merely the fact that you are there, alive and thriving, that you are fit, that you look great and that you are doing something completely different and inconceivable to them, it means a war declaration.

They make jokes. They ask questions about your diet. They say: "Oh, it's very healthy!". And for the first time in your life, you realize that "healthy" can be connotated in a negative way. That some people think that you are a snob or that you are too healthy, just because you care.

They imagine that you are some kind of non-human robot because in their opinion it is easier to eat junk food, drink a lot of Coke and do what everybody else does. "Commendable" is another adjective that I learned to be suspicious of.

[Healthy, commendable and delicious.

Vegetables, anyone?]

I do care, a lot. My body is everything I have and I want to be healthy as long as I can. And yet sometimes it is OK to eat a ration of French fries or to enjoy a little bit of dark chocolate. Missing out on a vegan gluten-free pizza has never been an option. 

Why are so many people afraid to be healthy and to be perceived as healthy?

Life is too short for not being healthy. But it is also too short for not allowing yourself some kind of delight, don't you think?

Ice cream? French fries? Pizza? Cookies? Pie? Which one is your favorite yummy sin?

Tags: Vegan, Diet, Gluten-free, Health, Being healthy, Quotes

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