One of the most common questions I get is how do I stay so thin? Well, the answer may surprise you. I don’t diet. Shocked? Let me explain. (But, bear in mind and remember that I am a model and musician. I am not a nutritionist or doctor. I’m simply telling you the results of my research and personal experiences. What works for me may not work for others so you should always check with a doctor or nutritionist before beginning any weight loss program.)

Let’s first discuss the body. Begin by visualizing your insides. That’s right. Think of your stomach, your other organs, and how they all work together. When you eat food, the food goes down into your stomach and then into the intestines. When you eat food, your body tries to digest it. “Tries?” you ask. Well, yes, tries. Our bodies were not made to digest more than one concentrated food at a time. Because of this, when you eat more than one concentrated food at a time, the food does not digest. Concentrated foods are anything that is not a fruit or a vegetable. Bread, meat, pasta, anything that isn’t a fruit or a vegetable, is a concentrated food. The reason most people have a hard time being thin or healthy is because somewhere along the way, people decided to twist the truth. Now, let’s just think outside of the box for a bit.

Everything out there everywhere you go is trying to get you to buy something. If they tell you to eat burgers and fries, you do it because they told you too. You are a consumer and they only care about your money. Once you are eating burgers and fries, you are gaining weight, so now you need diet pills or books. You then spend more money trying to fix your body by purchasing the books and pills. Your skin starts breaking out, so you buy creams to fix it. You’re overweight so you pay to get a gym membership. And, to top it all off, if you are overweight all your life, your chances of getting cancer are much higher. But, notice that everywhere you look there is another fix for your face, your weight, your skin, your hair, your mood. There are hundreds and thousands of diet books and millions of diet-related products. And all of them require you to spend money and the sellers of these programs, pills, books will do anything to get you to buy their products.

Now coming from the inside of the industry, the reality is that, yes, some models do eat junk food, but most don’t; some models also take pills, but most don’t. Most of the people I know who are at the top of their work or who do well all follow some of the guidelines or principles I will explain below.

Let me tell you about my personal experiences. I grew up in Middle America like most of you. I grew up eating burgers and fries and drinking soda and eating potato chips and ice cream and candy. When I started modeling, my skin was breaking out and I was overweight. I was told that I had to fix both of these conditions. So, at 15, I stopped eating and I started buying all these creams and products. I lost weight, but I was always tired and weak and depressed. I wouldn’t eat and then I’d eat a bunch of candy and then not eat again. I was trying to diet. I read books. I counted calories. The agencies kept telling me that I needed to lose weight. I tried to do it, but no matter how I tried, my body wouldn’t budge. I would eat less and wouldn’t lose weight. I would run and I would actually gain weight.

Then, someone offered me cocaine and said it would help me stay thin. I ended up doing cocaine when I was 16-17 and did this for about a year. I soon realized though that not only did it not keep me thin, but it was killing me, making me sick and it cost far too much money. I almost destroyed my career by doing cocaine. Eventually, I took time off and then started all over again. I stopped doing all drugs and stopped dieting. I was determined to find the best way to live healthy, but after stopping the drugs, I began to gain weight. With the pressure of having to stay thin as a requirement for modeling, I developed anorexia, which then turned into bulimia. For a year, I appeared to be eating healthy and everyone thought I was fine, but the truth was that I was in the bathroom after every meal. Not only was I not keeping my food down, but because of the pressure and the depression, I had to hide in order to continue working. I would binge, I would eat a whole container of ice cream, and then just to go to the bathroom. No one knew except me. I was the darling of the photo shoots, of the scene and I had friends, lovers, money and lots of attention, but I was unhappy and I was hiding my illness.

Then, one of my good friends discovered what I was doing and told me that I had to stop. So, once again, I was under pressure to try to find a way to be thin and not use drugs, or pills, or an eating disorder. I started to search for the answer. I knew there had to be a way to eat and live and be healthy and not be sick or use drugs or food depravation. I knew there had to be a truth and then I realized that the problem with all of the diets I read was that they all left you in a mess. Nothing was ever about a change in lifestyle.

Change for me came when I was in Miami doing fashion. I was talking to a photographer who said I should try this program called “Fit for Life.” And I will explain this program now. Basically, if you follow this program on a daily basis, it will change your life. I know it changed mine.

Under this program, for breakfast, I try only to have fruit and fruit juices. In the morning your body is still cleansing from the night before so if you don’t let your body finish cleaning before you put more food for it to digest, you will clog your insides. If you clog your insides, food won’t digest and if food doesn’t digest, it turns to fat. So, one way to help stay healthy and fit is to eat fruit in the morning - fruit or fresh juice. Juice that isn’t fresh is not as good for you because they pasteurize it and when they do that, you lose all the vitamins and minerals. These are replaced with supplements, but it is not nearly as beneficial as having the natural vitamins and minerals. If you can’t find fresh juice (and nowadays it is pretty easy to find freshly squeezed juice if you go to places like Whole Foods), you can make it yourself if you buy a juicer. Eat as much fruit as you want in the morning. Eat till you are full, until you are content. Fruit is the only pre-digested food, so it doesn’t require any energy to break it down. Thus, your body uses it as energy and it burns it right up. Fruit is also full of vitamins and is one of the most life giving sources of food you can eat.

However, NEVER mix fruit with anything else, including coffee and milk. If you must have coffee, have it before you eat fruit. (I will talk about coffee later.) Now, in an ideal world, you will just have fruit and if you need caffeine, having Green Tea and or Yerba Mate are the best bets for you. They both contain caffeine for all of you out there who must have your caffeine, but they are much better in my opinion. I will explain why later.

Now back to fruit. The reality is that if you combine fruit with any other foods, it causes your stomach not to use it productively. Instead, it ferments (i.e., it rot in your stomach). It’s funny because now if I ever eat fruit after I get sick, and I don’t like being sick, I can feel it rotting in my stomach. If you always eat fruit alone, it will help you maintain your natural weight, but you must eat it alone or wait at least two hours after eating anything else before you eat fruit again. Oranges and apples are the most cost effective fruit. People tell me that it is too expensive to eat healthily, but you can get bags of oranges and apples at a very decent price. Watermelon, cantaloupe, strawberries, blueberries, and so on are also very good for you and are not terribly pricey. One word about bananas -- bananas are wonderful for you, but they do take longer to digest (up to 2 hours) so if you want to help your body, throw them in the blender with some water and make a banana smoothie. Just remember, eating fruit in the morning will give you energy and you won’t feel tired or slow.

One of the reasons people feel tired is because digesting your food takes more energy than anything else you can do, including running and sex, so you can imagine what amount it takes away from you. By eating fruit you are not using energy. You are feeding your body energy which means that you will have more energy, not less, if you only eat fruit till noon. People may say, “But I am hungry.” Well, let’s talk about this.

Our bodies crave nutrients such as vitamins and minerals. If we do not get the proper amount of vitamins and nutrients, your body says it is hungry. Fruit and vegetables have all the nutrients we need. Fruit and vegetables are high in vitamins, antioxidants, enzymes, and everything else we need. People who eat lots of fruit and vegetable tend to not be hungry as much because they are getting their proper amount of nutrients. Bread, pasta, cereal, potato chips, cookies, cakes, candy bars, ice cream, and other foods more often than not do not have any of these nutrients. This makes them empty foods that leave you hungry. The main reason we have a huge problem with obesity in America is, in my opinion, because we are eating too much empty food which tricks us into thinking that we are still hungry. Our body screams, “feed me! feed me!” because it is craving the nutrients which are not in these foods. Unless we get these nutrients, our bodies will keep screaming and making us feel like we are starving. People say things like, “But I need more food,” but the truth is that you just need more nutrients. Sure you can eat junk food and then take pills, and you may think you can trick the body, but the simple fact is that our bodies crave things and, yes, we can adapt, but at what cost?.

The reason I am laying it on so thick and heavy with the fruit and vegetables is because it is all about working with nature -- working back to your natural self. Most weight problems are caused by eating too much and not moving enough. Diets don’t work because your body is craving those nutrients, so the reason you feel hungry when you diet is because you are not getting enough nutrients. If you eat more wholesome foods like fruit, vegetables, nuts, seeds, grains, or soy, your body will not be craving food all the time. Sure, at first you’re going to see big greasy cheese burgers and candy bars and want them, but once your body is cleansed of all these things, which may take a few months of not eating them, you will adapt and not feel those cravings.

Let’s talk about soda and coffee. Look at it like this -- your body is craving sugar because it needs energy. It needs energy because it doesn’t have nutrients. Soda is mainly sugar and not the good kind of sugar that you get from fruit. If you need carbonation, try seltzer with lemon or lime squeezed in it. As for coffee, I don’t think that coffee is evil, but coffee has more pesticides and chemicals in it than almost anything else. If you must have coffee, try to get organic coffee which is much better for you. Yes, it is a little more expensive, but you only have one body. Now, I love coffee. I used to drink a pot or two a day and, in fact, now I have to be very careful or I end up drinking more than is good for me. Yes, coffee is a vice of mine, but it also makes me crash. Being as active as I am, I don’t have time to crash. I know coffee is bad for me because it makes me crash, but good coffee is addictive. I have found that tea is a healthy alternative to coffee. Tea has lots of good things in it. Green tea, Black tea, and Yerba Mate all have antioxidants as well as caffeine. Over time, try to replace your coffee with tea.

Now let’s talk about food combinations. If you eat a complex carbohydrate, your body releases one type of digestive juice. Bread, pasta, chips and other similar foods fall into this category. If you eat a protein, like meat, dairy or cheese, another type of digestive juice is released. Now, guess what? One is an alkali and one is acidic and do you know what happens when they are released at the same time? They cancel each other out. They neutralize each other. This means that nothing gets digested. In other words, if you eat a burger in a bun, the burger and the bun sit there and rot. Now the reason we have such a problem with weight is not only due to what we eat, but how we eat it, so let’s make a rule and follow it:

Don’t mix complex carbohydrates and proteins!

That means that from now on, if you are going to eat meat, have meat and a salad or meat and steamed vegetables. If you are going to eat bread or pasta, eat it with a salad and/or with vegetables. Never mix fruit with complex carbohydrates and/or meat or else it will rot in your stomach. None of us want food rotting inside; it’s not good for us or our body. It’s simple, it’s logical, and it works.

Let’s talk about vegetables and fruits again. Our bodies are made mostly of water. Now, fruits and vegetables are made mostly of water too, but fruits and vegetables are like Superman water because fruits and vegetables contain all the things our body wants -- energy, life, vitamins, sugar, carbohydrates, protein. Everything you need is within the fruits and vegetables. If you eat 70 percent water-based food, you will have not only increased energy, but you will be healthier because not only are you giving your body what it needs, you are also helping it clean out what it doesn’t need. Fruit and vegetables help your body fight disease; they help you stay strong; they are God’s original food for us. You may say that a diet of mainly fruit and vegetables is boring, but I can argue that fruit is amazing and that there are so many variations and so many flavors. And, the best part is when you eat it, you know it is good for you. Look at fruit. It is beautiful and it will make you more beautiful. Do the same for vegetables. Look at the colors and the sizes. They are beautiful, colorful, full of energy and full of life. Fruit and vegetables come from the ground -- from the earth and the sun. They are full of life, full of energy from the world and they are natural.

Now, look at fast food. It’s brown; it’s greasy; it’s ugly; it comes from places where they do bad things to make it. It is not natural. It is not full of life. It is full of chemicals, additives, flavors, addictive drugs made to trick the body into thinking it is good when, in fact, it isn’t. Be logical. We have nature’s way, which is beautiful and doesn’t need advertising packaged with lies, or we have the boxed chemicals that will leave you sick in forty years.

Our bodies were not created to process the amount of sugar and fat that is being added to our food. Do you know where your meat and dairy comes from? Do you know the chemicals that are pumped into the animals to make them produce? Do you know about all those hormones that you ingest when you eat fast foods and meat? The reason the youth today are getting so big is a combination of the chemicals within the meat and dairy they are fed. The reason there is such a huge movement of people turning vegetarian and vegan is that more and more people are finding the truth. You need to find the truth so go do your homework and understand what you are putting into your body. If you must have dairy, try to do organic; if you must have meat, try to buy organic meat.

I used to be a huge meat eater and I don’t see anything wrong with fish for the most part, but once again, do your homework and make sure you’re not eating a bunch of chemicals that will give you cancer later. People have eaten meat for years but not in the quantities that they eat it today. Now let’s just be logical. Get a piece of meat -- steak, chicken, whatever -- and look at it, really look at it and feel it. Then, think of your digestive system trying to break it down. It takes up to six hours to break down meat. Guess what else? There are no vitamins in meat. None.

So now you say, “But I need protein.” Have you ever heard of someone dying from not enough protein? I haven’t. Have you heard of people dying from too much? Yes, all the time. You see, our bodies are like machines and, just like a machine, if we work it and work it, eventually it will break or be damaged. I think that eating high amounts of meat is one of the reasons we have such a huge amount of cancer. What happens if our bodies were not made to handle the amount of work it takes to digest meat? Multiply this several times a day or even once a day. Over years of pushing our body to do something it wasn’t created to do, it weakens the insides and makes it vulnerable to disease. One of the reasons vegetarians and/or people who just have fish live longer is because they don’t overwork their insides. The reason meat isn’t good for you in high amounts is because it overworks the body and also most the meat now is so full of hormones and chemicals. Eating fish or meat on occasion is one thing, but, as I said, just look at it.

As for protein, nature has answered that question already and provided the answer. We have nuts and seeds and also we have tofu and soy which are also good for you. Soy milk and tofu don’t require much breaking down for your body and they give you the protein you need but in a way that won’t tax your body. It is just a better alternative and it’s going to make you more productive and happy.

I am not against meat, but I am against the chemicals and the hormones in meat that you are eating and that no one tells you about. If you eat mostly fruit and vegetables and properly combine your food, you will return to your natural weight. So, if you are hungry late at night, eat fruit. Use fruit to replace junk food, but don’t eat it after junk food. When I started following this program of eating and not mixing my proteins and carbohydrates and not eating fruit except on its own, I ended up losing a lot of weight. It wasn’t because I was dieting though. It was because my body didn’t have build up, it wasn’t clogged, and I returned to what I would have weighed without having build up and chemicals in my body. My skin also stopped breaking out; my mood swings became less exaggerated; I slept better and I had more energy. These changes were worth it and the change in my eating habits was painless. The pay off was that I was happy, fit and healthy. I felt good and I continue to feel good.

Today, whenever I eat junk food, I feel tired and heavy and lazy. I don’t want to feel that way so I stick to eating and living healthy. If you apply these things to your life, you may improve your health too. I can’t remember the last time I was sick. I always have energy (as long as I sleep) and my grocery bill is less. Plus, I believe my chances of getting cancer is less too. Most importantly though, I feel good and I look good. It’s not about pills or counting calories. It’s about eating foods that feed you life and energy. It is about having a healthy lifestyle.

It’s simple. Just a few things. Speak to your doctor or nutritionist first and then use them. Maybe then you too will feel better and live healthier.

one one note spirutien is what i have been using for 2 years to replace meat- in those two years the only time i got sick was when i didnt use it: it has all the things you need minus the chemicals and the fat that clogs and kills:::::yes i have gotten a few people hooked on it:: that and organic COffee it is sooooooo much better for you