Brendan Brazier > Quotes

“Performance in an endurance sport, as with many things, is only as good as the weakest link.”
― Brendan Brazier, Thrive Fitness: The Program for Peak Mental and Physical Strength—Fueled by Clean, Plant-based, Whole Food Recipes

“Plant foods have several advantages, including easy digestibility and bioavailability (the rate at which the food is absorbed by the body and exerts an effect). Fatigue, bloating, cramping, and an upset stomach can often be attributed to poor digestion. Many whole plant foods have enzymes that facilitate quick and efficient digestion. The quicker nutrients are extracted from the food, the sooner the food can be eliminated—a key factor in optimal health. As well, insoluble fibrous plant matter (discussed in Chapter 5) speeds waste through our system, reducing the risk of toxins settling in the colon and then spreading throughout the body. Enzyme-rich foods help ensure the body makes use of the nutrients in the food.”
― Brendan Brazier, Thrive: The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life

“Having specific food cravings hampers ideas from flowing freely: If these cravings are constantly part of our mental functioning, meaning the brain is focused on getting something at the chemical level, it makes sense that the likelihood of having ideas “just hit us” is reduced. It’s like having a radio constantly on—even if it’s at low volume, no matter how hard you try, you can’t completely tune it out. If free-flowing thoughts cannot coexist with mental clutter, then new ideas, innovations, and ways to solve problems, generated by the subconscious, will not present themselves as readily or manifest as clearly. The path to an uncluttered mind begins with stress management, and diet is the number one consideration.”
― Brendan Brazier, Thrive: The Plant-Based Whole Foods Way to Staying Healthy for Life

“Exercise is a form of complementary stress. Essentially nothing more than breaking down muscle tissue, exercise is the best way to stimulate regeneration of the cells.”
― Brendan Brazier, Thrive: The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life

“Chlorophyll in particular has a cleansing effect, helping the body extract toxins from the liver. As toxins are removed, withdrawal symptoms will be intensified, but overall withdrawl will be shorter. Eating chlorophyll-rich foods have been shown to help people break the addiction to nicotine and stop smoking.”
― Brendan Brazier, Thrive: The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life

“If stimulation is used when it will not help you achieve something of value, it is an uncomplementary stress. I consider coffee drinking an uncomplementary stress. I view it as a form of credit, similar to shopping with a credit card. You get energy now that you don’t actually have, but you pay for it later—when the “bill,” or fatigue, hits.”
― Brendan Brazier, Thrive: The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life

“The Thrive Diet is not about perfection or idealism, it’s about progress.”
― Brendan Brazier, Thrive: The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life

“Since plants pull minerals from the soils—micronutrients essential for human health—they serve as a conduit, taking the soil—the environment—putting it into a digestible form, and passing it on to us. Each time we take a bite of food, part of the environment literally becomes part of our biological fabric, our bodies. At the risk of sounding like a hippy, the Earth is part of us.”
― Brendan Brazier, Thrive Foods: 200 Plant-Based Recipes for Peak Health

“Stressed people do not burn body fat as fuel as efficiently as do those who are not stressed.”
― Brendan Brazier, Thrive: The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life