Dr. Peter J. Weiss

A lot of peo­ple I meet seem con­fused about their dia­betes, obe­sity, high cho­les­terol and other “lifestyle dis­eases.”

They won­der, “How did I get this?” and  “Where did it come from?”  Well, let me clear up any con­fu­sion.

If you have one or more of the lifestyle dis­eases, in all prob­a­bil­ity THEY COME FROM YOUR LIFESTYLE!

I’m sorry to shout and I’m not try­ing to blame you, but if you’re ever going to get bet­ter you will need to look at your own role in the sit­u­a­tion.

Know that you’re not alone; col­lec­tively, we Amer­i­cans have cre­ated a national lifestyle that’s lit­er­ally killing us.  As Walt Kelly wrote, “we have met the enemy and he is us.”

I don’t want you to berate your­self, but please don’t fight the idea that you’re play­ing a role in your own health prob­lems.  Most of us are too.

Get­ting bet­ter starts with real­iz­ing that you are in con­trol.  So until my next post, I just want you to con­cen­trate on the fol­low­ing two state­ments:

• I don’t have to be sick.
• My lifestyle is caus­ing me prob­lems.

Med­i­tate on these ideas.  Write them down over and over again until you believe them, until they really sink in.  Talk about them with sup­port­ive friends.

Resist the temp­ta­tion to blame your­self, but get it through your head that these are true.  Own your ill­nesses and your lifestyle.

You can do it.