and so it begins

Greetings friends and other friends' friends,

I've decided to set up a blog which purpose it is to be a one-stop center in regards to some of the most frequently baffling issues regarding health and nutrition (and thereby tangentially regarding fitness), in current North American society.

Why am I doing this? Well, I'm not quite (yet) someone you could describe as a “health nut,” but I've taken an interest in my personal health for a few years now and have eventually grown—to use a euphemism—severely annoyed at all the contradictory health and nutrition information that is floating around. So recently I sat down and researched the sources for a lot of health do's and health don't's. And because quite a few of my friends and almost everyone I know are concerned about their weight and looks, are on a diet or in-between diets, I figured it might help them out to know what I found out. At this point I'd like to explicitly state that I'm not advocating for or against any type of diet. The purpose of this blog is to present information in the vein of objectivity so that you can sift through your own mountain of misinformation and information and decide which course to take in regards to your health.

The second purpose, or rather hope, is that you can help me supplement or correct the information I present. I am not an authority in this field. Rather I'm simply a consumer and strive to be a highly educated consumer. Unless you have a slew of letters behind your name that are related to health and nutrition, we are peers, and as peers, I ask you to check and balance me. The ideal thing would be for this to become a dialogue, hence the name of this blog.

I'd also like to state what I will not do here. While I acknowledge that physical appearance is among the primary reasons why people hit the gym, buy diet books, starve themselves, or whatever else they do to lose weight, my focus here is on health, not explicitly weight loss. I do exercise 5-6 times a week because I do want to look a certain way, but above even that, I want be healthy, happy, energized and fully functional. Generally they go hand-in-hand, but I prioritize health above looks. So I will not write about exercise routines or any types of workouts. While I'm saying this with caution, it seems that the information floating around regarding exercises is not as confusing or contradictory as information on health and nutrition. I wouldn't be surprised if there were a positive correlation between the amount of money to be made in an industry and the degree of unclear information within that industry, but that's just speculation on my part. If you ever collect the data, let me know.

For those of you who do not know me and might want a reference point, check out the “about me” section.

My goal is to update this once a week so it would be lovely of you to tune in once a week.

Till next week ...

"It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver."--Mahatma Gandhi