And when you grow up in a culture that super-sizes meals of every kind it's a bit hard to know what to eat and what portions are appropriate.
This week a colleague pointed me to a newspaper article, where Arizona Schools Superintendent Tom Horne, was urging teachers to help teenagers learn the difference between apples and fries and which kinds of activities keep you aerobically fit.
I have to be careful what I eat. Traveling as much as I do, take-out and hotel meals are unavoidable. In the USA especially, it is almost impossible to be served smaller portions because the norm is:
* huge size servings, enough for two and sometimes three people.
* hidden sugars and fats in breads, biscuits, juices and soda drinks
* fries with everything
* salads awash in fatty dressings, and.
* giant sandwiches with super large servings of meats and cheeses.
The best way to kill yourself early is to eat lots of the foods that contain these fats and clog up your blood vessels, or consume sugar which is converted into fats and is stored, usually around the torso....just in case of winter or famine.
So here's the kind of conversation that young people need to have to change the way they think/feel about food and activity....
1. The size of servings in America are much larger than the size of servings elsewhere in the world. Knowing this, what could you do to reduce the amount you eat to just what you need?
2. Growing kids/teenage girls/most men/active women should consider at least four serves of vegetables and three of fruit each day. Teenage boys/active men should consider five serves of vegetables and four of fruit. Design an interesting vegetable salad combining 4-5 serves (cupfuls) of vegetables, e.g. tomatoes, asparagus and beetroot, that would be a taste temptation. Include some herbs perhaps like mint and coriander.
3. Design a delicious fruit salad in unusual combinations of the 3-4 servings of fruit e.g. oranges, blueberries and mango, that you would love to eat each day...the ones that you really like.
4. Thinking about the sugar in soft drinks and juices, imagine the sugar being converted by your body to fat and going straight to your waist, bum or thighs. What could you do to reduce the amount of sugar you consume via drinks?
5. Twenty to thirty minutes of exercise at the start of every day that raises the heart beat can help you stay fit and feel really alive. What kind of exercise do you like that you can reliably do every day?
6. Think of a fatty/greasy food that is solid at room temperature. Write a story about how fat or sugar in foods gets into your body and clogs up your arteries and kills you earlier than you'd like.
7. Choose an activity from this list and envision/describe yourself doing it and feeling good afterward. Where, how, with whom? Walk, run, swim, dance, skip rope, climb stairs, gym, weights...or add your own...remember it has to raise your heart beat. Note: Finger puppets do not count.
8. Create/invent/describe your own playground version of a reality TV/computer game you could play with your friends to discover hide/find stuff out in the playground/yard/neighborhood....that involves a mix of brain power and physical activity. And get extra points for more exertion?
9. Brainstorm a short story/mantra you could tell yourself so you say NO to foods containing lots of fat and sugar.
10. Imagine carrying around an extra 10 large bottles of soda every day. That's about 10 kilos or 14 pounds (one stone). Write a paragraph or two about the unnecessary effort required to carry around the extra weight.
To help kids explore the issues of growing up there's a Zing collaborative title Relating Well with 100 workshops just like this. See:
www.relatingwell.co.uk
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