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Jack
La Lanne preaches 'Pride and discipline!'
Sept. 25, 03
Suzanne Havala Hobbs
Note:
To read an edited transcript of my interview with Jack
La Lanne, click here.
Jack
La Lanne must be doing something right.
He's mentally sharp. He gets up at 5 a.m.
each day, works out vigorously for two
hours and maintains a schedule that
includes work, travel and public
appearances.
How does he do it?
First, La Lanne says, it takes hard work.
"Pride and discipline!" he
likes to say.
"Dying is easy. Living is
tough," La Lanne told me over the
phone from his home in Morro Bay, Calif.
"You've got to train like you do for
an athletic sport. You've got to eat
right, think right, exercise."
Where diet is concerned, La Lanne keeps
it simple: "If man makes it, don't
eat it.
"That's what's killing people -- all
the cakes, the pies, the candy, ice
cream, the soda pop -- the man-processed
foods. You've got to stick to nature as
much as possible," says La Lanne.
And he does.
"I get 10 raw vegetables every day
of my life," explains La Lanne. He
also eats five pieces of fresh fruit
daily -- whatever is in season.
He and his wife, Elaine, eat out every
night, and he has a strategy for that,
too.
According to La Lanne, most people who
eat out go into restaurants not knowing
what they want. They don't know what's
healthy and what's not.
Not La Lanne.
"I bring the chef over. I say: 'I
want the best. Here's what I want. I want
a salad; very little lettuce. I want bell
peppers, carrots, avocados. I want at
least 10 raw vegetables.' And I make them
chop them up real fine."
Oil and vinegar go on that. The salad is
so big that he doesn't always finish it.
He eats a small serving of fish --
usually salmon -- brown rice and a cooked
vegetable. He likes lima beans.
At home, he's just as discriminating.
After his morning workout, he has a high
protein drink mixed with soymilk.
He eats fresh fruit and four boiled egg
whites for lunch. Absolutely no snacks
between meals.
La Lanne has never used caffeine -- no
tea nor coffee. He drinks wine with
meals, not before -- one or two glasses,
usually a blend of white zinfandel and
red.
He eats neither meat nor poultry, and he
holds his portions of fish to 3- to
4-ounce servings.
Though he doesn't begrudge anyone a
little bit of nonfat milk or yogurt, he
doesn't eat any dairy products himself.
"I'm not a suckling calf," he
says.
He uses no white flour or sugar and eats
no commercial sweets.
It's not hard to understand, according to
La Lanne.
"Would you get your dog up in the
morning, give him a cup of coffee, a
cigarette and a doughnut?" he asks.
"But do you know how many millions
of Americans got up this morning with a
cup of coffee and a doughnut?
"They wonder why they're sick, why
they're tired, why these kids can't
study, why people are irritable,
constipated, fat."
La Lanne says he isn't tempted by junk
foods and has no trouble sticking to his
routine, one that would seem severe to
most of us.
His advice boils down to this: Figure out
what's good for you, then create a liking
for it.
It's a formula that's worked well for
Jack La Lanne.
"You've got to work at living,"
he says.
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