You may have seen the viral video from a while back that featured the phrase “Ain’t nobody got time for that!” If not, it’s below.
It’s true. There are things that we don’t have time for, and when it comes to fitness and nutrition, we have to make decisions about how to prioritize our life’s agenda items every day.
What’s more important?
- Spending time with my son OR working out?
- Being polite and eating Aunt Martha’s famous chocolate cake OR staying away from sugar?
- Reading the book I am currently into OR doing yoga?
- Eating the same thing as my family OR eating what I know is better for me?
- Spending time preparing fresh food OR eating processed food
There are plenty more examples, but you get the idea.
So, then, how do we go about making those decisions? Some of the choices above may seem obvious to you, some of them not so obvious. Some of them may even present false dilemmas, which is the logician’s way of identifying an “either/or” situation that doesn’t account for other valid choices.
For example, couldn’t you:
- Work out with your son?
- Eat just a bite of Aunt Martha’s cake?
- Every once in a while, at least, have the whole family eat a healthy meal?
Sure you could. I would, personally, choose not to eat the cake, but I would be all for — at least once in a while — working out with my son, if I had one. I would love to try to encourage my family to eat healthier meals by preparing them in such a way that they’d enjoy them every so often.
The yoga versus reading example above gets me pretty often, and, honestly, I usually opt for reading, but the example above that I live with most is whether or not to take time to prepare fresh food.
The meal I just ate for lunch gave me the idea for this post. It was a Morningstar Farms Black Bean Burger (processed) with bottled sriracha (processed) and cut up tomatoes (fresh) and kale (fresh), plus some balsamic vinegar (processed). It was really good, and, admittedly, not the worst thing for me.
However, had I had time, I would rather have made my own bean burger and sriracha. (The vinegar, I’ll leave to the experts.)
Ain’t nobody got time for that.
I’m busy. I have things to do. I’m not talking about sitting in front of a tv — although I do that, too, because relaxation is important — but I mean real things. So, yeah, I eat processed beanburgers and bottled sriracha. Every once in a great while I’ll make up some burgers and freeze them, but generally I eat the Morningstar ones, and I’ve yet to make my own sriracha. Are you kidding? Have you tried that rooster sauce? How could I beat that!
Would my health and fitness be better without processed food? Sure, and I am conscious of that. In fact, as I was cooking the burger, I purposely thought about what I could eat to balance the meal with something fresh.
So, yeah, I choose to spend my time on other things, rather than use it all making food from scratch. Maybe when I retire — if that ever happens — I’ll make more of my own food. Hell, I may even have a garden!
However, time in my life is currently at a premium. So when it comes to eating processed foods, I do it, but I try to make good choices. Fresh food? I prepare and eat a lot of it, but 100%? Ain’t nobody got time for that.