As I look at all the messages, life lessons, and traditions that I have shared with my children, perhaps one of the most important has been the key to healthy living. My parents were pretty naive about food. The biggest imprint they left on me was to try anything and everything and to clean my plate.

So that got me to thinking about the messages that I send my daughters about food. To be honest I never really shared with them the knowledge I gained from the nutrition courses that were completed as part of my undergraduate education or the many diets that their mother and I had been on over the years as we both yo-yo’d up and down.

But the entire picture had never been as clear as it is to me now or as simple. Yes there is a lot of explanations about what I eat and what I don’t eat, in this blog and on my ever evolving food plan. The simple message I share with my daughters, the secret Sawyer Family tradition to looking great and feeling young as you age is:

“Eat Beans, Meat, and Vegetables Six Days a Week and on the Seventh Day eat whatever you want. On top of that MOVE, I do Yoga!”

That is the entire family secret to a healthy life and longevity. It is brief and to the point. There is no counting calories, though I do pay attention to calories. The is no measuring the quantity of what you eat, you simply eat a series of no-carb, a slow-carb or low carb days, following cheat day. Which series your going to follow depends on how much weight you want to achieve and how often you have been on the stage you are on. You should never go on the no carb stage of the diet for more than three weeks at a time.

But to keep the message simple I always start and end with the same old time tested and true advice from the annals of Sawyer Family legend.

We can be skinny, we can be vibrant, we can be healthy if we “eat our beans meat and vegetables”.