Coca-Cola vs Diet Coke – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing Coca-Cola to Diet Coke, we picked the Diet Coke.
Why?
While the Diet Coke is bad, the Coca-Cola has mostly the same problems plus sugar.
The sugar in a can of Coca-Cola is 39g high-fructose corn syrup (the worst kind of sugar yet known to humanity), and of course it’s being delivered in liquid form (the most bioavailable way to get, which in this case, is bad).
To put those 39g into perspective, the daily recommended amount of sugar is 36g for men or 25g for women, according to the AHA.
The sweetener in Diet Coke is aspartame, which has had a lot of health risk accusations made against it, most of which have not stood up to scrutiny, and the main risk it does have is “it mimics sugar too well” and it can increase cravings for sweetness, and therefore higher consumption of sugars in other products. For this reason, the World Health Organization has recommended to simply reduce sugar intake without looking to artificial sweeteners to help.
Nevertheless, aspartame has been found safe (in moderate doses; the upper tolerance level would equate to more than 20 cans of diet coke per day) by food safety agencies ranging from the FDA to the EFSA, based on a large body of science.
Other problems that Diet Coke has are present in Coca-Cola too, such as its acidic nature (bad for tooth enamel) and gassy nature (messes with leptin/ghrelin balance).
Summary: the Diet Coke is relatively less unhealthy, but is still bad in numerous ways, and remains best avoided.
Read more:
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The Easiest Way To Take Up Journaling
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Dear Diary…
It’s well-established that journaling is generally good for mental health. It’s not a magical panacea, as evidenced by The Diaries of Franz Kafka for example (that man was not in good mental health). But for most of us, putting our thoughts and feelings down on paper (or the digital equivalent) is a good step for tidying our mind.
And as it can be said: mental health is also just health.
But…
What to write about?
It’s about self-expression (even if only you will read it), and…
❝Writing about traumatic, stressful or emotional events has been found to result in improvements in both physical and psychological health, in non-clinical and clinical populations.
In the expressive writing paradigm, participants are asked to write about such events for 15–20 minutes on 3–5 occasions.
Those who do so generally have significantly better physical and psychological outcomes compared with those who write about neutral topics.❞
Source: Emotional and physical health benefits of expressive writing
In other words, write about whatever moves you.
Working from prompts
If you read the advice above and thought “but I don’t know what moves me”, then fear not. It’s perfectly respectable to work from prompts, such as:
- What last made you cry?
- What last made you laugh?
- What was a recent meaningful moment with family?
- What is a serious mistake that you made and learned from?
- If you could be remembered for just one thing, what would you want it to be?
In fact, sometimes working from prompts has extra benefits, precisely because it challenges us to examine things we might not otherwise think about.
If a prompt asks “What tends to bring you most joy recently?” and the question stumps you, then a) you now are prompted to look at what you can change to find more joy b) you probably wouldn’t have thought of this question—most depressed people don’t, and if you cannot remember recent joy, then well, we’re not here to diagnose, but let’s just say that’s a symptom.
A quick aside: if you or a loved oneare prone to depressive episodes, here’s a good resource, by the way:
The Mental Health First-Aid That You’ll Hopefully Never Need
And in the event of the mental health worst case scenario:
The six prompts we gave earlier are just ideas that came to this writer’s mind, but they’re (ok, some bias here) very good ones. If you’d like more though, here’s a good resource:
550+ Journal Prompts: The Ultimate List
The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
While it’s not good to get stuck in ruminative negative thought spirals, it is good to have a safe outlet to express one’s negative thoughts/feelings:
Remember, your journal is (or ideally, should be) a place without censure. If you fear social consequences should your journal be read, then using an app with a good security policy and encryption options can be a good idea for journaling
Finch App is a good free option if it’s not too cutesy for your taste, because in terms of security:
- It can’t leak your data because your data never leaves your phone (unless you manually back up your data and then you choose to put it somewhere unsafe)
- It has an option to require passcode/biometrics etc to open the app
As a bonus, it also has very many optional journaling prompts, and also (optional) behavioral activation prompts, amongst more other offerings that we don’t have room to list here.
Take care!
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Taurine’s Benefits For Heart Health And More
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Taurine: Research Review
First, what is taurine, beyond being an ingredient in many energy drinks?
It’s an amino acid that many animals, including humans, can synthesize in our bodies. Some other animals—including obligate carnivores such as cats (but not dogs, who are omnivorous by nature) cannot synthesize taurine and must get it from food.
So, as humans are very versatile omnivorous frugivores by nature, we have choices:
- Synthesize it—no need for any conscious action; it’ll just happen
- Eat it—by eating meat, which contains taurine
- Supplement it—by taking supplements, including energy drinks, which generally (but not always) use a bioidentical lab-made taurine. Basically, lab-made taurine is chemically identical to the kind found in meat, it’s just cheaper and doesn’t involve animals as a middleman.
What does it do?
Taurine does a bunch of essential things, including:
- Maintaining hydration/electrolyte balance in cells
- Regulating calcium/magnesium balance in cells
- Forming bile salts, which are needed for digestion
- Supporting the integrity of the central nervous system
- Regulating the immune system and antioxidative processes
Thus, a shortage of taurine can lead to such issues as kidney problems, eye tissue damage (since the eyes are a particularly delicate part of the CNS), and cardiomyopathy.
If you want to read more, here’s an academic literature review:
Taurine: A “very essential” amino acid
On the topic of eye health, a 2014 study found that taurine is the most plentiful amino acid in the eye, and helps protect against retinal degeneration, in which they say:
❝We here review the evidence for a role of taurine in retinal ganglion cell survival and studies suggesting that this compound may be involved in the pathophysiology of glaucoma or diabetic retinopathy. Along with other antioxidant molecules, taurine should therefore be seriously reconsidered as a potential treatment for such retinal diseases❞
Read more: Taurine: the comeback of a neutraceutical in the prevention of retinal degenerations
Taurine for muscles… In more than sports!
We’d be remiss not to mention that taurine is enjoyed by athletes to enhance athletic performance; indeed, it’s one of its main selling-points:
See: Taurine in sports and exercise
But! It’s also useful for simply maintaining skeleto-muscular health in general, and especially in the context of age-related decline and chronic disease:
Taurine: the appeal of a safe amino acid for skeletal muscle disorders
On the topic of safety… How safe is it?
There’s an interesting answer to that question. Within safe dose ranges (we’ll get to that), taurine is not only relatively safe, but also, studies that looked to explore its risks found new benefits in the process. Specifically of interest to us were that it appears to promote better long-term memory, especially as we get older (as taurine levels in the brain decline with age):
Taurine, Caffeine, and Energy Drinks: Reviewing the Risks to the Adolescent Brain
^Notwithstanding the title, we assure you, the research got there; they said:
❝Interestingly, the levels of taurine in the brain decreased significantly with age, which led to numerous studies investigating the potential neuroprotective effects of supplemental taurine in several different experimental models❞
What experimental models were those? These ones:
- Taurine protects cerebellar neurons of the external granular layer
- Effects of taurine on alterations of neurobehavior and neurodevelopment key proteins expression
- Neuroprotective role of taurine in developing offspring affected by maternal alcohol consumption
…which were all animal studies, however.
The same systematic review also noted that not only was more research needed on humans, but also, existing studies have had a strong bias to male physiology (in both human and assorted other animal studies), so more diverse study is needed too.
What are the safe dose ranges?
Before we get to toxicity, let’s look at some therapeutic doses. In particular, some studies that found that 500mg 3x daily, i.e. 1.5g total daily, had benefits for heart health:
- Taurine and atherosclerosis
- The Anti-Inflammatory Effect of Taurine on Cardiovascular Disease
- Taurine supplementation has anti-atherogenic and anti-inflammatory effects before and after incremental exercise in heart failure
- Taurine Supplementation Lowers Blood Pressure and Improves Vascular Function in Prehypertension
- Taurine improves the vascular tone through the inhibition of TRPC3 function in the vasculature
Bottom line on safety: 3g/day has been found to be safe:
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Using the”Task Zero” approach
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“Jonathan Frakes Asks You Things” Voice:
- Do you ever find yourself in a room and wonder what you’re doing there?
- Or set about a to-do list, but get quickly distracted by side-quests?
- Finally get through to a person in a call center, they ask how they can help, and your mind goes blank?
- Go to the supermarket and come out with six things, none of which were the one you came for?
This is a “working memory” thing and you’re not alone. There’s a trick that can help keep you on track more often than not:
Don’t try to overburden your working memory. It is very limited (this goes for everyone to a greater or lesser degree). Instead, hold only two tasks at once:
- Task zero (what you are doing right now)
- Task one (your next task)
When you’ve completed task zero, task one becomes the new task zero, and you can populate a new task one from your to-do list.
This way, you will always know what you’re doing right now, and what you’re doing next, and your focus will be so intent on task zero, that you will not get sidetracked by task seventeen!
Happy focusing
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Break the Cycle – by Dr. Mariel Buqué
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Intergenerational trauma comes in two main varieties: epigenetic, and behavioral.
This book covers both. There’s a lot more we can do about the behavioral side than the epigenetic, but that’s not to say that Dr. Buqué doesn’t have useful input in the latter kind too.
If you’ve read other books on epigenetic trauma, then there’s nothing new here—though the refresher is always welcome.
On the behavioral side, Dr. Buqué gives a strong focus on practical techniques, such as specific methods of journaling to isolate trauma-generated beliefs and resultant behaviors, with a view to creating one’s own trauma-informed care, cutting through the cycle, and stopping it there.
Which, of course, will not only be better for you, but also for anyone who will be affected by how you are (e.g. now/soon, hopefully better).
As a bonus, if you see the mistakes your parents made and are pretty sure you didn’t pass them on, this book can help you troubleshoot for things you missed, and also to improve your relationship with your own childhood.
Bottom line: if you lament how things were, and do wish/hope to do better in terms of mental health for yourself now and generations down the line, this book is a great starting point.
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Chickpeas vs Black Beans – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing chickpeas to black beans, we picked the black beans.
Why?
They’re both great! But we consider the nutritional profile of black beans to be better:
In terms of macros, black beans have a little more protein, while chickpeas have more carbohydrates. Generally speaking, people are not usually short of carbs in their diet, so we’ll go with the one with more protein. Black beans also have more fiber, which is important for heart health and more.
In the category of micronutrients, black beans have twice as much potassium and twice as much calcium, as well as twice as much magnesium. Chickpeas, meanwhile are better for manganese and slightly higher in B vitamins, but B vitamins are everywhere (especially vitamin B5, pantothenic acid; that’s literally where its name comes from, it means “from everywhere”), so we don’t consider that as much of a plus as the black beans doubling up on potassium, calcium, and magnesium.
So, do enjoy both, but if you’re going to pick, or lean more heavily on one, we recommend the black beans
Further reading
See also:
- Why You’re Probably Not Getting Enough Fiber (And How To Fix It)
- Easily Digestible Vegetarian Protein Sources
- What Matters Most For Your Heart? Eat More (Of This) For Lower Blood Pressure
Enjoy!
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Toasted Chick’n Mango Tacos
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Tacos aren’t generally held up as the world’s healthiest food, but they can be! There’s so much going on in this dish today, healthwise, in a good way, that it’s hard to know where to start. But suffice it to say, these tacos are great for your gut, heart, blood sugars, and more.
You will need
For the chickpeas:
- 1 can chickpeas, drained
- 1 tbsp ras el-hanout*
- 1 tsp red pepper flakes
- ½ tsp MSG or 1 tsp low-sodium salt
- Extra virgin olive oil
*You can easily make this yourself; following our recipe (linked above in the ingredients list) will be better than buying it ready-made, and if you have strong feelings about any of the ingredients, you can adjust per your preference.
For the tahini sauce:
- ⅓ cup tahini
- 2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- 2 tbsp finely chopped fresh dill
- ¼ bulb garlic, minced
- 1 tsp red pepper flakes
- ½ tsp black pepper, coarse ground
It may seem like salt is conspicuous by its absence, but there is already enough in the chickpeas component; you do not want to overwhelm the dish. Trust us that enjoying these things together will be well-balanced and delicious as written.
For the mango relish:
- ½ mango, pitted, peeled, and cubed
- 2 tsp apple cider vinegar
- 2 tsp cilantro, finely chopped (substitute with parsley if you have the “cilantro tastes like soap” gene)
- 1 tsp red pepper flakes
For building the taco:
- Soft corn tortillas
- Handful of arugula
- 1 avocado, pitted, peeled, and sliced
- ½ red onion, sliced
Method
(we suggest you read everything at least once before doing anything)
1) Heat a sauté pan with a little olive oil in; add the chickpeas and then the rest of the ingredients from the chickpea section; cook for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently, and set aside.
2) Combine the tahini sauce ingredients in a small bowl, stirring in ¼ cup water, and set aside.
3) Combine the mango relish ingredients in a separate small bowl, and set aside. You can eat the other half of the mango if you like.
4) Lightly toast the tortillas in a dry skillet, or using a grill.
5) Assemble the tacos; we recommend the order: tortillas, arugula, avocado slices, chickpeas, mango relish, red onion slices, tahini sauce.
Enjoy!
Want to learn more?
For those interested in some of the science of what we have going on today:
- Eat More (Of This) For Lower Blood Pressure
- Our Top 5 Spices: How Much Is Enough For Benefits? ← we hit all five today! Yay!
- An Apple (Cider Vinegar) A Day…
- Coconut vs Avocado – Which is Healthier?
- Lettuce vs Arugula – Which is Healthier?
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
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