Diet & Nutrition ??

Another conversation -- in another venue -- I promised to post yet another older piece from the archives. The specific subject line -- "Are you acting bad because you feel so crazy? Or are you acting crazy because you feel so bad?" -- comes up a lot in elementary school work. Enjoy!


The things that make you feel good
Are not the things they’re selling you.
They’re not the things they promise and
Guarantee will make you feel
Young, happy, healthy and good.

Yes, my brothers and sisters,
Once again,
They’ve psyched us out.
You can take my word for it.
(‘Cause I feel great!)

You see, the things that make us feel good
Were here before the IOL* ever got here.
People knew how to “get high”
(on life)
And how to “cure what ailed them”
(with exercise, rest and diet)
Long before IOL* started selling
Prozac, aspirin and PCP, you know.

Hey!
Are you acting bad because you feel so crazy?
Or are you acting crazy because you feel so bad?
Either way, there’s nothing
NOTHING
That they can sell you that’s gonna make you feel any better.

Not a boat or a car or a house,
(Only happy children know what to do with toys.)
Not a pill or a shot or an ointment,
(‘Specially if it’s your life that’s making you sick.)
Not a meal or a drink or a cigar/cigarette
(Over time, you’re back to the medicine chest.)
Not new clothes, new hair, or new nails.
(It’s you, not your mask, that needs the boost.)

It’s not what you buy that makes you feel good
At least not for more than a minute.
It’s what you do that makes you feel good.
Your work, your love, your kids.

Just take a look at pride, for instance –
The real pride that comes from work.
You raise a baby and then a child
To become a teenager and then an adult
Whose words and actions (not sneakers and cars)
Make you go
“YES!!!
That’s MY kid!!!”
You feel good – you want to laugh all over yourself.
Not because you worked enough to
Buy the right things –
But because you bit the bullet and
Did and taught the right things.