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January is a time of the year when people think about shedding weight and making resolutions to get healthy. However well-meaning, most people who make such resolutions don’t stick with their "new" healthy commitments for very long. For many, it’s too difficult to keep up. Others grow impatient when the results they seek take longer than they want. Unfortunately, becoming truly healthy is not a quick fix. We need to go beyond New Year's resolutions.

As we plan menus for this year's Thanksgiving dinner, consider that a vegetarian lifestyle awakens our spirit of compassion and guides us towards a kinder, gentler society in which we exercise a moral choice to protect animals—not exploit them.

So why not celebrate this year’s Thanksgiving with a turkey-free dinner? Each year, over 5 million turkeys are raised under horrible conditions and then slaughtered for holiday feasting. What a great opportunity to protect animals, by reducing so much pain and suffering. Just skip the buzzard!

Food is often overlooked as a component of our carbon footprint, yet what we choose to eat is one of the most significant factors in the personal impact we have on the environment. A recent study examining the impact of a typical week’s eating showed that plant-based diets are better for the environment than those based on meat.¹ A vegan, organic diet had the smallest environmental impact while the single most damaging foodstuff was beef. Likewise, all non-vegetarian diets require significantly greater amounts of land and water resources.

February is American Heart Month, so it is fitting that we take a moment to consider the impact of Heart disease on society and our personal health.

According to the American Heart Association and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, “…the cost of cardiovascular diseases and stroke in the United States in 2008 is estimated to be $475.3 billion!”¹ This staggering annual cost is more than half of the cost of the one-time economic stimulus plan approved by Congress this past weekend. It’s almost unbelievable, but it’s true.