If you’re interested in getting healthy, I suggest you get outside. We live in LA and the sun shines here more than other places. What that means is, not only are we fortunate, but even though I’m the whitest Armenian in LA, you will never see me caking on sunscreen unless I’m baking on a boat in Greece for 12 hours in the sun. And you will never see me in sunglasses when the sun is out, even if I’m baking on a boat in Greece for 12 hours in the sun.
LA found me 17 years ago when I was even more oblivious and ignorant then I am now. I would spend money on sunglasses, not Rodeo Drive money, but somewhere between there and Venice Beach money, enough that it mattered if I lost the tinted spects. Eventually I switched to the Venice Beach, less than $10 sunglasses, because I was drunk and stupid most of the time and ended up losing or breaking the shades.One day, through a Vegas buddy who could get me into any club between Trop and Sands, bypass the line and the cover, I met a guy who calls himself the Certified Health Nut, somewhere in Beverly Hills, they knew each other from their Miami glory days back in the early 90s, who told me I didn’t need to wear sunglasses anymore. Why I believed him was because he was f’ing nuts and intense and cured himself from the f’d up disease, we call drug addiction, and was now a supper health freak. I was 31, drug addicted, ate grilled cheese everyday and drank espresso every afternoon to fight the grilled cheese coma.
What he told me was when you expose your body to the sun, your body responds by producing Vitamin D, which actually helps reduce blood pressure and prevent cancer, not to mention invigorate your energy which I was strongly lacking. What was amazing to me was that the body is actually capable of producing a vitamin without having to go to the store to buy the drug. It’s a radical thought and “they” may like us to believe we need to buy “it” in order to receive “it”, but sometimes, “it” can be achieved by simply enjoying a few minutes of sun each day. You leave the sunglasses off because when they’re on they block important rays, which activate your body’s biological functions.
I hadn’t even seen the sun in nearly two years. I was working in an office, where I had just been bumped up from a cube, planning the lives of Hollywood celebrities. Everyday people from NYC would call me and tell me how great the weather was in LA and how lucky I was. I thanked them for letting me know because I didn’t have an f’ing clue since I was locked in an office Monday-Friday and slept the weekends away to recover from the Friday and Saturday night benders. The sun was something that happened out there and I was pissed I wasn’t getting a piece, so if you’re sitting in an office right now, forward your calls, step outside and take a sun-break. Leave the sunglasses in the office, stretch your arms and like Sheryl Crow, yes, I said it, like Sheryl Crow said, soak up the f’ing sun. It’s good and good for you.
Checkout this article for more technical information… www.newstarget.com,as for me, its near 70 degrees in January in LA, the sun is shining and I’m getting outside, before I get burned.
Featured photo via Flickr, Story photo by the author.
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4 responses so far ↓
1 Mali Elfman // Jan 20, 2008 at 2:40 pm
What about skin cancer?
2 Jones Hagopian // Jan 20, 2008 at 2:43 pm
Sunlight prevents skin cancer… http://www.newstarget.com/007632.html
3 Mali Elfman // Jan 21, 2008 at 7:42 am
I think that they’re saying is that in limited doses it helps people who don’t get any sunshine, but it doesn’t actually prevent it?
4 Jones Hagopian // Jan 21, 2008 at 11:33 am
What the article is saying is that exposure to sunlight creates Vitamin D in the body and Vitamin D prevents cancer cells from growing, so sunlight is more helpful to preventing cancer then it is a cause of cancer. Sunscreens contain chemicals that are more harmful in causing cancer then exposure to the sun.
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