One of my biggest inspirations for healthy living is my cousin, Rachel. Growing up we always joked that I was the "city girl" and she was the "country girl", and it's true. She lives in the middle of the country, on a farm, with her brother and wife as her neighbors on the farm next to her, and her parents on a farm just down the street.
Rachel’s parents own a butcher shop called Moody Meats. The difference in their product is that it's "free-range chicken, eggs, beef and pork, using land that had once been dedicated to corn and soybeans". No hormones, no antibiotics, no pesticides...pure, meat. If you saw the Jamie Oliver episode where he demonstrated what a processed chicken nugget is made out of, you would never eat one again. The biggest argument against eating organic is that it's more expensive. Processed food is cheap. Frozen processed food is cheap and it lasts a long time. Seems like a no-brainer... go for the cheap stuff.
But, here's the thing:
Cheap, processed food equals unhealthy eating habits. Unhealthy eating habits lead to unhealthy people. Unhealthy people lead to more medicine and doctor's visits. More medicine and doctor's visits lead to higher insurance costs. Higher insurance costs equals millions of people without health insurance. (I know, you're thinking "Wow! Jill is a genius! But, I didn't think of this myself...just another seed dear ol' Rachel planted in my head.)
Yes, eating healthy can be expensive. So is health insurance and medical bills. Dustin's job offers benefits, but for family health insurance through his company it would cost us $900 a month for insurance - so, we do without. Therefore, we have to learn to take care of ourselves in the first place, which means spending just a little bit more money each month on better food. Want to know the secret to lowering medical bills and insurance premiums? Take care of yourself to begin with! "Take care of your body. It's the only place you have to live." (Jim Rohn)
Anyway, my little rant about healthy eating was to tell you about our visit to the farm while we were in Indiana. When Jon and I were little we used to LOVE to stay on the farm. Truthfully, one of our favorite things to do was pee outside and run around naked – simply because we could! Don’t worry, I didn’t run around naked or pee outside this time. But we did get to see their sheep, baby lambs, chickens and cows, play in the big open fields, breathe in the sweet, fresh air and play in Oliver’s sandbox with the blissful sounds of nature surrounding us.
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