I think I’ve skipped one important question I know a lot of you are asking: WHY SHOULD I CARE ABOUT EATING HEALTHY IN THE FIRST PLACE?
Um, so you live longer? So you don’t get adult onset diabetes? So you can be there for your family?
The percentage of adults who develop diabetes is absolutely staggering, gentlemen. Look it up—there are probably figures on it in this book, or in the first one. My great-grandmother had diabetes, and my father developed it late in life, so I’ve seen it. It’s not fun, and it CAN happen to you, and WILL, if you don’t quit eating poisonous bullshit.
Need more reasons? Okay, I’ve got ‘em. Everybody wants to lose weight and be stronger, right? Get those visible abs, bigger guns, a trimmer waist, boulder shoulders ... all that. But maybe you’ve let yourself go a little, maybe you’ve got a spare tire—or two—around your midsection, and you don’t remember the last time you ran any farther than from your car to the front door of the mall because it was raining. God knows, you might have big arms, but that shit ain’t muscle. Yeah, I’m talking to you. I’m talking to myself, too. That was me. I had a growing belly, flabby arms, weak legs, no muscle, no energy.
And then I took a magic pill and it all melted away overnight, right?
Wrong, obviously. I didn’t go soft overnight, and I won’t get hard and strong again overnight either, and neither will you. There’s no magic to this. No secret. No miracle pill. But if you want to lose the excess weight and put on muscle and get those abs visible and have energy, and possibly even see your various ailments fixed, this is the way forward.
Go to the front of this book and read the testimonials—none of those people were paid to write any of that. They’re real, true, and honest results. Diabetes, Crohn’s, and chronic back pain have been healed or made manageable, pounds and inches have been lost by the hundreds, clothing sizes have gone down, and their quality of life has improved.
Again, we’re not selling anything except this book—which you already have in your hands. All you have to do is read it. Listen to your wife. Support her. Do this with her. And when you don’t understand why you can’t eat this or that, just go with it.
“But I don’t like salad. Or veggies. Or sweet potatoes. Or salmon. Or avocado.” Yeah, neither did I, and I wrote a chapter in this book on the subject of how your tastes WILL change. The same poisons in the food you’ve been eating that have clogged your arteries and turned to saggy fat have also dulled and trained your taste buds to only want those things. You know why? Because the “food” companies designed them intentionally so that you’d want more. This is no joke, and it’s not an exaggeration. These companies knowexactlywhat their “food-like product” is doing to your body, they just don’t care ... all they want is your money, so they design their products to be addictive.
Break the addiction. Eat the damn salad. It won’t hurt you, and yes, you can put dressing on it, and have meat in it. I’m no advocate for a bowl of dry lettuce and a few bland carrots, because that’s bullshit, if you ask me. Besides, neither you nor I are bunnies.
Yes, this requires change. It requires you to think about what you’re eating, and when, and why. Yes, it means no more fast food, no more delivery pizza, no more Coke. But there are still burgers—just without the bun, which means you can actually eat MORE MEAT because you don’t have that thick heavy bread filling you up. You can have pizza, and soda. Yes, real soda, in a wider variety of flavors than you can probably imagine.
There’s also a section in this book with a few quick workouts, one for beginners, one intermediate, and one that’s more advanced and challenging. How many pushups, sit-ups, and squats can you do right now? Right this very moment? Put the book down, shove the coffee table or your office chair out of the way, get down on the floor, and do pushups until you can’t do any more, and then do sit-ups until you can’t do any more, and then do squats until you can’t do anymore.
Did you run out of breath and energy before your muscles actually gave out? Is the number embarrassingly low? Are you thinking about how many you used to be able to do in high school or college?
Can you run three miles? Try. Lace on those old Aasics sitting in the garage gathering dust, put on a pair of gym shorts and a T-shirt, and go out and start jogging. If you can’t make it to the corner without huffing and puffing and feeling like you might die, then guess what? You’re absolutely normal. That’s most of America, guys.
You’re meant for more. You’re designed for more. You’re made for strength. Your body is engineered to lift heavy loads, to pull weight, to run, to jump. Right now, though, your body is clogged and weak and soft. Because you’ve been eating garbage. I know this, because I was clogged and weak and soft from eating garbage. Within a couple months of this new lifestyle, I was doing pushups and pull-ups and sit-ups and squats and running three or six miles several times a week, and deadlifting nearly 300 pounds and benching nearly my own weight. And I’m not trying to be a bodybuilder or a runner. I just learned to love moving, I learned to love challenging myself. I LOVE the feeling of finishing a killer workout and being totally smoked. I finish a hard run, and my legs are shaky and I can’t breathe, but I feel like a badass.
Maybe you do lift, maybe you can bench me plus another fifty pounds, maybe you can back squat half a dozen 45 plates or even more ... but you know you have a layer of pudge covering those muscles. You have the muscles, you have the strength, it’s just ... buried, hidden. Maybe you play hockey or football or baseball in a men’s rec league, but you’re just not as fast as you used to be, you don’t have the endurance you once did ...
Guess what? Eat the right foods in the right proportion, quit eating processed garbage and bleached flour and quit drinking a liquid that candissolve metal(Coke). You know what will happen? That extra fluff will melt away. Those muscles you already have will start to pop, your shape will taper to that killer wedge, you’ll be able to lift more and run faster and for longer. It’s not magic, it’s not a gimmick, it’s just the incredible power of clean eating.
Give it a try. What do you have to lose? Give this book, this Wilder Way, a few months. Stick with it, give the foods you’re not sure about a few chances. More importantly, if your wife shoved this book in your hands and demanded you read this chapter, just givehera chance, and give her your support. Chances are, she wants you to try this with her because she wants you to be healthier. She already loves you and is attracted to you—she married you, after all—but what do you think will happen if you lose weight and gain muscle and have energy and power and stamina?
Yeah,that. Alotmore of it. Trust me on this one. Sexual performance—stamina, testosterone level, and refractory period—is directly tied to proper nutrition. All that will get better too. Which makes her happy, which in turns meansmoreof it ... I swear I’m not making this up or just blowing smoke up your ass. It’s real, and I’m living proof of it.
Point is, just give it a try.
