The Mediterranean diet, also known as the Prasouda diet, has proven to be one of the healthiest diets on earth. Despite all the advances of modern medicine and nutritional science, people eating this traditional diet live longer and healthier lives than most Americans.

Given the state of modern science, the fact that we’re sicker and fatter than ever comes as quite a shock. Americans are the most health conscious people on the planet and the richest people on the planet, with the most access to necessary nutrients, yet we continue to get sicker and fatter. Also strangely, the not-so-health-conscious Cretan people following the Prasouda diet avoid most of the health issues we currently have.

If you ask most people these days they’ll blame the rising obesity and heart disease rates on sedentary behavior and all those “other people” who are just lazy. While that’s a factor, there’s a lot of people who desperately want to be thin and healthy and just can’t seem to figure it out.

The truth is that we simply have a misguided way of looking at things. Americans are still continually searching for the miracle cure – the one thing fit and healthy people are doing that they aren’t – but we never find it. We buy buy antioxidant-filled sugar waters, then when that doesn’t work we try gluten free fast food. We jump on the newest buzzword and debate the pros and cons of different omega-3 supplements or different ab workouts.

And that’s exactly the problem. We debate the minutiae rather than looking at the whole picture. The Mediterranean/Prasouda Diet works because it focuses on a holistic approach to health and weight loss. Successful dieters ignore the current hype and newest buzzwords and focus on the fundamentals of health and weight loss: eat a balanced, nutrient rich diet and stay away from the junk. No snake oil, no timed meals, no nonsense. Just doing what has worked for hundreds of years.