When busyness is the key social currency, lives become poorer

When I was small, we used to spend so much time playing hop scotch or five stones, or visiting neighbours and friends to spend time leisurely with them. Today, things are a bit more tricky. I tried to invite my best friend for day spend and I had to wait for a month! And that's pretty typical. There are after-school lessons to coordinate, piano lessons to attend, swimming sessions to juggle, parental time to take off so the kids are supervised as both parents work and don't reach home until 7 pm, etc.

I hate to get into "good old days" territory, because I'm sure that my own parents had their challenges coordinating fun for my siblings and me, but it does seem like there's something distinctly new going on. And it's not something we can blame completely on modern parenting and over-scheduled kids either-- because the culture of "busy" extends way past our children. When I see my friends, it's often after months of traded whatsapp messages and at least a few cancellations and trying again. And again.

My friends, colleagues and I seem to over-promise on what we can deliver in terms of socialising-- we make plans and hope for the best, but inevitably, something comes up and plans fall through. Though that's OK--when you are immersed in the culture of busy, someone cancelling dinner is sweet, sweet relief.

When I talk to my college students, the same sort of things happens. You ask students how they are doing and what they are interested in, and they will rattle off more than a list of courses. They are club presidents, playing sports, involved in volunteering, bringing a speaker in, all while planning a semester abroad. I have had more than a student tell me that they schedule their sleep as much as they do their activities, to ensure that they actually get some once in a while. My colleagues tell me that busyness has basically become social currency-- the most overworked and over-scheduled students are the ones who are seen as succeeding, even as they are miserable.

It sounds just terrible, but the truth is that I recognise that strange sense of pride, I see it in myself sometimes when making small talk. How am I? Oh, I'm great, but wow, I am ever busy! I am involved in that committee, this club, volunteering on weekends, etc., etc. It is an 'insecure society'-- I think, for a lot of people; if you are busy, if you are overworked, it must mean that you're important somehow. But how sad is it that the cultural signal for success is demonstrating "overwhelmed with activities"! It is as if admitting that if you have time to spare it makes you a slacker.

I long for a time when our happiness denies "success" at all cost. Until then, I have plenty to do!

The Art of War

Sun Tzu was a legendary military strategist in ancient China and he is the author of the famous book, “The Art of War”. He was a master of “soft power” and the father of “agile warfare.” Whenever possible, he preferred to win without fighting or, at the very least, to win the easiest battles first. He wrote, “In war, the way to win is to avoid what is strong and strike at what is weak.”

The teachings of Sun Tzu extend far beyond the field of battle because they are focused on finding the easiest way to achieve a specific goal. His approaches can be applied to everything from business growth and goal setting to weight loss and habit formation.

THE BOOK IN THREE SENTENCES

1. Know when to fight and when not to fight: avoid what is strong and strike at what is weak.

2. Know how to deceive the enemy: appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak.

3. Know your strengths and weaknesses: if you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.

THE ART OF WAR SUMMARY

This is a list of key ideas including quotes from the book:
● “According as circumstances are favorable, one should modify one’s plans.”

● “All warfare is based on deception. Hence when able to attack we must seem unable. When using our forces we must seem inactive. When we are near we make the enemy believe we are far away. When far away we must make the enemy believe we are near.”

● “Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak.”

● “If he is superior in strength, evade him.”

● “Attack him where he is unprepared. Appear where you are not expected.”

● “The general who loses a battle makes but few calculations beforehand.”

● “There is no instance of a country having benefitted from prolonged warfare.”

● “A wise general makes a point of foraging on the enemy. One cartload of the enemy’s provisions is equivalent to twenty of one’s own.”

● “Supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting.”

● “The worst strategy of all is to besiege walled cities.”

● “There are five essentials for victory:
o He will win who knows when to fight and when not to fight.
o He will win who knows how to handle both superior and inferior forces.
o He will win whose army is animated by the same spirit throughout all its ranks.
o He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared.
o He will win who has military capacity and is not interfered with by the sovereign.”

● “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself, but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”

● “One may know how to conquer without being able to do it.”

● “In war, the victorious strategist only seeks battle after the victory has been won.”

● “In battle, there are not more than two methods of attack: the direct and indirect.”

● “An army may march great distances without distress if it marches through country where the enemy is not.”

● “You can be sure in succeeding in your attacks if you only attack places which are undefended.”

● “Military tactics are like water. For water, in its natural course, runs away from high places and hastens downwards. So, in war, the way is to avoid what is strong and strike at what is weak.”

● “Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move fall like a thunderbolt.”

● “Ponder and deliberate before you make a move.”

● “A clever general, therefore, avoids an army when its spirit is keen, but attacks it when it is sluggish and inclined to return.”

● “It is a military axiom not to advance uphill against the enemy nor to oppose him when he comes downhill.”

● “The art of war teaches us to rely not on the likelihood of the enemy not coming, but on our readiness to receive him.”

● “Make your way by unexpected routes and attack unguarded spots.”

● “If they will face death, there is nothing they will not achieve.”

● “The principle on which to manage an army is to set up one standard of courage which all must reach.”

● “If it is to your advantage, make a forward move. If not, stay where you are."

(Short summary by James Clear)

Turn Your Life Around at Any Age

Things can change if you want them to, at any age. Life changes every single moment, and so can you. “Turning Life Around” is a sweeping, open-ended proposition. Here is a short list of five timeless principles and strategies worth working on, regardless of your age or what you decide to do with the rest of your life:

1. Focus a little less on the future, and a little more on the present.
Yes, it’s healthy to plan for the future, but not at the full expense of today. The truth is no matter how smart you are or how hard you try, you can’t accurately figure out the future. Even people who have a systematic plan (steps to be a doctor, steps to be a successful entrepreneur, etc.) don’t actually know what will happen down the road. And if they have any certainty at all, they’re a bit naive.

Life rarely goes as planned. For every person that succeeds in doing exactly what they set out to do in the exact time frame they set out to do it in, there are dozens of others who start strong and get derailed. And if this happens to you, it isn’t a bad thing. New obstacles and opportunities may come along to shift your perspective, to strengthen your resolve, or to change your direction for the better. The destination you fall in love with someday may not even exist today. For example, just a few short years ago the esteemed career paths of working at Google, Facebook and Twitter didn’t exist.

So if you can’t plan out your future in its entirety, what should you do? Focus a little less on the future and focus more on what you can do now that will benefit you no matter what the future brings. Read. Write. Learn and practice useful skills. Test your skills and ideas. Build things. Be adventurous and seek real-world experiences. Cultivate healthy relationships. These efforts will help in any future circumstances that come your way.

One of the best ways to begin with all of this, I think, is to build something small in your free time. Most people fritter their free time away on things that don’t matter, like TV, video games, social media, etc. A year of that and you have absolutely zero to show for it. But if you painted every day, or practiced your web design skills, or wrote on a blog, or spent more time networking with the right people… at the end of a year you’ll have built something. And you’ll have some great life experiences too – experiences you can point to and say, “I built that, and I learned this,” which, sadly, most people can’t do.

Also, it’s important to mention that although it may seem easier for younger people to do these things, it’s 100% possible for all of us to take small steps in the right direction, day in and day out, for the rest of our lives.

2. Focus more on the journey.
The most prolific and beneficial experience is not in achieving something you want, but in seeking it. It’s the journey towards an endless horizon that matters – goals that move forward with you as you chase them. It’s all about the pursuit and what you learn along the way – the “moving.”

The most important reason for moving from one place to another is to see what’s in between. In between is where passions are realized, love is found, strength is gained, and memories are made. You can’t get any of that without first-hand living. In other words, the right journey is the destination.

3. Do hard things.
If you want to stunt your growth and feel stuck in the same place forever, make excuses. If, on the other hand, you want to stop feeling trapped, do things that make you uncomfortable – things you aren’t very good at. There’s no excuse for remaining stuck. There’s no excuse for making the same exact mistakes over and over again. Life is too short. You’ve got to stretch your boundaries and break free.

One of the most important skills you can develop in life is being OK with some level of discomfort. Because the best things are often hard to come by, and if you shy away from difficulty and discomfort, you’ll miss out on them. Mastering a new skill is hard. Building a business is hard. Writing a book is hard. A marriage is hard. Parenting is hard. Staying in shape is hard. All are amazing and worth every bit of effort you can muster.

How do you get good at this? Purposefully do things today that are uncomfortable, and start in small doses. Try exercising for ten minutes, even if it’s hard, and repeat this practice every day for a month before increasing your exercise duration by even the slightest margin. Try journaling or meditating every day for ten minutes. When you find yourself avoiding discomfort or procrastinating, push yourself just a little bit more, but don’t do more than ten minutes. It’s all about starting small and building a daily ritual that gradually strengthens your mind and body, and allows you to do hard things effortlessly in the long run.

4. Embrace uncertainty.
A related skill to “doing hard things” is thriving in uncertainty. Starting a business, for example, is a remarkable thing to do, but if you’re scared of uncertainty you’ll skip it. You can’t possibly know exactly how things will turn out, and so if you need to know how things will turn out, you’ll avoid life-changing opportunities, projects, career moves, relationships, etc.

But if you can be OK with not knowing, you’ll open yourself up to an endless pool of possibilities. But of course they won’t come easy…Sometimes you will not be able to see where you are going; every step will seem uncertain. But know that as long as you follow your intuition and take baby steps, your soul’s inner GPS will guide you home. You will find that you will be the right person, at the right place, at the right time, doing the right thing on point. Trust your instincts. Relax. You know what to do. Living is about learning as you go.

And remember, living is risky business. Every decision, every interaction, every step, every time you get out of bed in the morning, you take a small risk. To truly live is to know you’re getting up and taking that risk, and to trust yourself to take it. To not get out of bed, clutching to illusions of safety, is to die slowly without ever having truly lived.

If you simply ignore your feelings and let uncertainty win, you will never know anything for sure, and in many ways this unknowing will be worse than finding out your hunch was wrong. Because if you were wrong, you could make adjustments and carry on with your life without ever looking back and wondering what might have been.

Bottom line: When you get good at handling discomfort and uncertainty, you can do all kinds of remarkable things that seem impossible now: travel the world and live frugally while blogging about it, write a book, start a small profitable business, relocate to a new city, learn to play a musical instrument, take a job with a start-up you admire, travel to “bucket list locations” with your family, and much more. All of these ideas can be achieved in a relatively short time, but you have to be OK with discomfort and uncertainty, and you have to start sooner rather than later.

5. Build and nurture quality relationships.
There are right people and wrong people for you. There are fake people and then there are those who are true friends and sincere companions on the path. There are people who take the heart out of you, and those who put it back. You have a choice of who to spend time with. True friends (personal or professional) have an honest heart and will go out of their way to help you when you need it most. Stick with the people who never let you down and keep their promises. You can’t fake that.

Truthfully, if your time and energy is misspent on the wrong relationships (personal or professional), or on too many activities that force you to neglect your good relationships, you can end up in a tedious cycle of fleeting friendships, superficial romances that are as thrilling as they are meaningless, and a general sense of wondering why you always seem to be running in place, chasing affection and admiration.

How do you build healthy, lasting personal and professional relationships? How do you find friends that lift you higher? How do you meet a significant other that belongs at your family reunions? Talk to lots of people every day, even if it feels uncomfortable. Bosses. Colleagues. Employees. Professors. Classmates. Social club members. Neighbors. Friends. Friends of friends. Everyone! Networking…

If you start building your network today, you’ll be set in the years ahead. Over time, you’ll continue talking to new people you meet through your current network and your network’s reach and the associated opportunities will continue to snowball for the duration of your life. Again, this may seem easier for young people, but it’s possible for all of us. It just takes effort.

The underlying key is to be trustworthy in your relationships. When someone gives someone an employment/business opportunity, the biggest fear is that this person is not trustworthy – that they’ll slack off and try to cheat the system. Someone who has established a positive reputation over the years will likely be more trusted, and more likely to be recommended. Learn to be trustworthy by being honest, admitting mistakes and fixing them, and generally going above and beyond the call of duty in your personal and professional relationships whenever you’re able. If you adhere to this, you’ll build a good reputation and people will appreciate and endorse you, which is the best way to get a job, a business investor, or another good friend.

If you follow the principles discussed above, you’ll be remarkable. You’ll be way, way ahead of most other people. And opportunities will gradually come your way: job opportunities, a chance to build something special with someone, an idea for a business that you can build yourself, a new skill to learn and grow from, etc. Of course, you can put all this off and take an easier, familiar path that keeps you hiking in circles…Or you can start down a new path today, turn your life around, and see what the rest of it has to offer you.

(Adopted from an article by Marc Chernoff)

Get Comfortable Being Uncomfortable

One of the reasons people don’t do what they know they really want to do is because they’re afraid to feel the fear, the pain, or the general feeling of unease that goes hand-in-hand with achieving success. Regardless of endeavor—both personal and professional—the most successful people know that excellence requires us to demand more of ourselves than others expect of us.

In short: excellence requires that we get comfortable with being uncomfortable.

Consider this: Building muscle is uncomfortable. When I go to the gym to lift weights, I know that if I want to grow my muscles, I need to place a demand on my muscle fibers. If I want to develop more muscle mass, I need to turn up the pain. I need to lift a little more than my last workout, or crank out at least one more rep than last time. This is uncomfortable. When you lift weights, you’re literally ripping apart your muscle tissue. So, I know that if I want to increase my strength and muscle, I need to increase the demand I place on my muscles. And what does this demand do to the muscles in my body? It tears them up, rips them apart, and breaks down my muscle fibers. But every torn muscle fiber is an opportunity for growth.

And your own life is no different. The gym is just a metaphor for life.

If you’re at work and you’ve been passed up for a promotion, use that pain as an opportunity for growth. If you lack the confidence to do something you know you want to do, use that pain as an opportunity for growth. Get comfortable with being uncomfortable…

Because just like there would be no light without darkness; there is no growth without pain. Challenge yourself today to do ONE thing you’ve been resisting because you think it’s too uncomfortable: Is it a phone call? Is it a conversation? Is it time to face the truth about something you’ve been avoiding?

What is it? Identify it. Take action on it. And prepare to experience massive growth and success once you decide to do so. Diving into an ice-cold pool is daunting. But the longer you wait, the less likely you are to just do it. And once you say, “To hell with it,” and dive into the water, you’ll realize it’s only uncomfortable for a few seconds. After that,you find yourself feeling comfortable in what was—just a few short seconds ago—incredibly uncomfortable.

(Source: This article by Dean Bokhari is taken from MeaningfulHQ.com)

Protein powder and turning cancer off

Today’s blog is inspired by The China Study by T. Colin Campbell, and it’s all about protein consumption…In case you’ve never heard about the book, The China Study is the largest epidemiological study ever conducted. In a nutshell: 650,000 researchers catalogued and analyzed the death rates for 880 million Chinese citizens—96% of China’s population. Dr. Colin Campbell then, took the findings from the study, and wrote this book so that people everywhere could benefit from the findings.

Back to the protein…Usually when people talk about protein, they’re talking about whether you’re getting enough of it. But in this book, the authors talk about whether you’re getting the right kind of it. Here’s why that’s so important…

In a chapter called "Turning Cancer Off,” they tell us that the #1 variable in turning cancer on or off is protein consumption. After looking at the research, they concluded: "Dietary protein proved to be so powerful in its effect that we could turn on and turn off cancer growth simply by changing the level consumed.”

BUT, here’s where it gets interesting—there’s one specific type of protein that did NOT promote cancer growth at all, regardless of how much of it was consumed: plant protein. “plant protein did not promote cancer growth, even at the higher levels of intake.”

“What protein consistently and strongly promoted cancer? Casein, which makes up 87% of cow’s milk protein, promoted all stages of the cancer process. What type of protein did not promote cancer, even at high levels of intake? The safe proteins were from plants, including wheat and soy”.

Bottom line? Animal protein promotes cancer growth. But plant protein doesn’t. Now, your actionable insight from this big idea is simple. Ask yourself: are you getting more animal-based proteins, or plant-based proteins? Adjust your diet accordingly. If you’re an active gym goer, definitely swap out your animal-based protein powder for a good quality plant-based protein powder.


(Source: meaningfulHQ.com)

How to separate learning myths from reality

There are some misconceptions about the brain which are embedded in corporate training programs and could be sabotaging their effectiveness. Over the years there has been much research in the area of brain science and you may have probably read how the brain works and the secret of maximizing your mental capacity. In the process, you may have read that after a critical period in childhood there is no hope for significant learning, that half of your brain is inactive at any given time, or that you’re capable of learning properly only in your preferred style. Each of these claims is what we call a “neuromyth,” a misconception based on incorrect interpretations of neuroscientific research. Bridging the gap between popular neuromyths and the scientific insights gathered in the past few decades is a growing challenge. Unless such misconceptions are eliminated, they will continue to undermine both personal- and organizational-learning efforts. Therefore companies should reevaluate their training programs in light of the latest scientific insights. This article is adapted from an article by Artin Atabaki, Stacey Dietsch, and Julia M. Sperling in McKinsey Quarterly issue of July 2015.

Myth #1: The critical window of childhood
Most of us have heard about critical learning periods—the first years of life, when the vast majority of the brain’s development is thought to occur. After this period, or so the assumption too often goes, the trajectory of human development is deemed to be more or less fixed. That, however, is an exaggeration. Recent neuroscientific research indicates that experience can change both the brain’s physical structure and its functional organization—a phenomenon described as neuroplasticity.

Researchers studying the plasticity of the brain are increasingly interested in mindfulness. Practicing simple meditation techniques, such as concentrated breathing, helps build denser gray matter in parts of the brain associated with learning and memory, controlling emotions, and compassion. A team led by Harvard scientists has shown that just eight weeks of mindful meditation can produce structural brain changes significant enough to be picked up by MRI scanners.

Organizations such as General Mills, Facebook and Google are increasingly giving their employees opportunities to benefit from mindfulness and meditation. Most such programs have garnered enthusiastic support from employees, who often see a marked improvement in their mindsets and job performance.

Myth #2: The idle-brain theory
A recent European survey discovered that nearly 50 percent of teachers surveyed in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands believed that the idle-brain theory has been proved scientifically. This misunderstanding originally stemmed from inaccurate interpretations of activation of hot spots in brain-imaging studies. By now, more carefully interpreted functional brain scans have shown that, irrespective of what a person is doing, the entire brain is generally active and that, depending on the task, some areas are more active than others. People can always learn new ideas and new skills, not by tapping into some unused part of the brain, but by forming new or stronger connections between nerve cells.

This insight into the brain’s capacity becomes particularly relevant for the environment and context in which learning typically occurs. Everybody knows about the habit of quickly checking e-mails or planning for the next meeting in the middle of a training session. The problem is that such multitasking engages large parts of the brain’s working memory. Without freeing that up, we cannot successfully memorize and learn new information. In short, multitasking and learning cannot occur effectively at the same time.

Some organizations, recognizing this problem, are working to build immersive learning environments where distractions are eliminated. At McKinsey, they have created a model factory that participants can walk through to see operating conditions in action. But first, everyone is asked to place their phones and other distractive belongings in a locker, so they can fully concentrate on the learning exercise at hand. At many companies, removing the temptation of using mobile devices during learning sessions is becoming commonplace.

Myth #3: Learning styles and the left/right brain hypothesis
Almost everyone has encountered the theory that most people are either dominantly analytical (and left brained) or more creative (and right brained). However, this either/or dichotomy is false. The two hemispheres of the brain are linked and communicate extensively together; they do not work in isolation. The simplistic notion of a false binary has led to the misconception that each one of us has a strictly preferred learning style and channel. Recent studies have flatly disproved this idea, suggesting instead that engaging all the senses in a variety of ways (for instance, audiovisual and tactile) can help employees retain new content.

One organization that puts this idea into practice is KFC, which uses multiple forms of learning in customer-service training. Sessions begin with an after-hours board game placing the entire team of a store in the role of the customer. This is followed up by “gamified” learning that fits into roughly 15-minute windows during shifts. These video game–like modules put the employees behind the cash register to handle a number of typical customer experiences, including responding to audio and visual cues of satisfaction. At the end of the online modules, employees physically reconvene at the front of the store to hear feedback, report on what they’ve learned, and receive live coaching as reinforcement.

Although significant progress has been made, much remains to be done to eradicate neuromyths from the philosophy of corporate-training programs. Neuroscience research has confirmed some of the approaches that learning professionals already use, such as on-the-job reinforcement and engagement without distractions. Companies should draw on the newly substantiated insights and may need to rethink their training programs accordingly. At the very least, they need to improve their dialogue with, and understanding of, the scientific community.

Natural fats vs artificial substitutes

We are always caught up in the debate of which type of fat is better: natural fat or artificial substitutes? To get to know this with proper understanding, below is the excerpt from the book, "The Complete Book of Chinese Health and Healing-- Guarding the three treasures" by Daniel Reid:

Medical myths about fats have steered millions of Western people into self-destructive dietary folly in recent years. Natural unadulterated fats are not only highly nutritious, gram for gram they contain far more energy than any other type of food on earth, which makes them the most efficient fuel for essence-to-energy food alchemy. Natural fats contain nutrients which are absolutely essential for proper functioning of the brain, heart, and immune system, but despite this fact, the Western medical establishment, along with the media and processed-food industry, have condemned natural fats as killers and suggest instead that we all switch over to 'low-fat' or 'no-fat' products in which natural fats have been replaced by hydrogenated vegetable oils.

First, let's discuss why the body requires fats and how it uses them, then take a look at the artificial substitutes.

Natural fats such as butter, nut oils, and fish oils contain important nutrients called 'essential fatty acids', which are required for many metabolic processes and vital functions. Among other things, fatty acids are required to build and repair cellular membranes, especially in brain, nerve, and white blood cells, and to keep blood vessels clean and well lubricated. Two of them--linoleic and linolenic acid-- cannot be synthesized in the body and must therefore be obtained from dietary sources. According to Dr Cass Igram, one of America's leading nutritional scientists, virtually all Americans are deficient in essential fatty acids.

Fats are about twice as efficient in producing energy as any other type of food, including complex carbohydrates and natural sugars. The essence-to-energy conversion of fats takes place in tiny power plants within each cell, called mitochondria, which prefer fat over all other fuels. But the fat must be natural and unadulterated in order to yield viable cellular energy. That means butter, meat, fish, nuts, seeds, and and cold-pressed oils. The traditional Eskimo diet included mounds of raw fat from whales, seals, and fish, but Eskimos never experienced problems with arteriosclerosis and heart disease until they switched from natural fats to processed American foods made with hydrogenated vegetable oils, sugar, and starch. The Japanese also eat a lot of natural raw fish oils in the form of sashimi and sushi, which contain abundant supplies of essential fatty acids. Cold-pressed olive oil has been a mainstay in Mediterranean diets for thousands of years, and these countries are known for their relatively low incidence of cancer and heart disease. In China, people traditionally used cold-pressed sesame and peanut oil for cooking and making condiments, and in India, essential fatty acids are obtained by abundant use of clarified butter called ghee.

During World War II, when butter became scarce, American chemists fiddled around with vegetable oils to produce a butter substitute and came up with margarine and 'shortening'. They did this by heating various vegetable oils to over 500 degrees F, then pumping hydrogen through it and adding nickel as a catalyst to harden it. The result of this is a solid fat substitute with a molecular structure very similar to plastic.

When natural fats are eliminated from the diet in favour of hydrogenated-oil substitutes, the body is forced to use these denatured fat molecules in place of the natural fatty acids missing from the diet. White blood cells, which are pillars of the immune system, are particularly dependent on essential fatty acids. Here's how Dr Igram describes what happens to white cells when hydrogenated oils replace natural fats in the diet, excerpted from his book 'Eat Right or Die Young':
These cells incorporate the hydrogenated fats you eat into their membranes. When this happens, the white cells become sluggish in function, and their membranes actually become stiff! Such white blood cells are poor defenders against infection. This leaves the body wide open to all sorts of derangements of the immune system. Cancer, or infections by yeasts, bacteria and viruses can more easily take a foothold...In fact, one of the quickest way to paralyze your immune system is to eat, on a daily basis, significant quantities of deep-fried foods, or fats such as margarine...No wonder that a high consumption of margarine, shortening, and other hydrogenated fats is associated with a greater incidence of a variety of cancers.

Besides cancer, regular consumption of hydrogenated-oil products, including non-dairy creamers and toppings and virtually all processed and packaged foods, is closely associated with an increased risk of arteriosclerosis, heart disease, autoimmune diseases, candidiasis, and high blood pressure.

The heart is particularly fond of natural fats as fuel, and heart cells specialize in the conversion of fats into energy. In order to do this, however, a nutrient called 'carnitine' is required to deliver fats into the cells for combustion. 'Fats cannot be properly combusted without adequate amounts of carnitine,' writes Dr Igram. Carnitine is an amino acid synthesized in the liver from two other amino acids-- lysine and methionine-- both of which must be obtained from dietary sources. If you have sufficient supplies of carnitine, you can eat all the natural fats you want, because carnitine helps burn fat, especially in the heart, which never rests.

The richest dietary sources of carnitine are fish, avocado and wheat germ. The best sources of essential fatty acids are deep-water ocean fish such as tuna and salmon, avocados, almonds, pecans, and pumpkin, pine, and sunflower seeds. The best choices in cooking oils are cold-pressed olive, corn, sunflower, sesame, and safflower oils. Clarified butter or ghee is better than ordinary butter for cooking because it can withstand higher temperatures without damage. Avoid all products made with hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated vegetable oils, including commercial mayonnaise, bottled salad dressings, margarine, shortening, and virtually all processed foods.