Each day we are bombarded with messaging touting the secrets to longevity. Perhaps it is a new diet, new supplement, or new exercise program.

In the past year, I had to chuckle as I read stories of local centenarians associating their successful longevity individually to beer, bacon, and “belly bombers,” the affectionate term for White Castle hamburgers. As a Blue Zone trained coach, I have studied the hotspots of longevity, and can tell you that there is no secret. Blue Zones are the pockets in the world that National Geographic and the world’s best longevity researchers identified where people live measurably longer and better. They actually discovered that people in these regions reach age 100 at 10 times greater rates than in the United States and with much lower rates of chronic disease and illness. How is this possible? It is simply a fact that people in these regions have a plant-based diet packed with local fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, and grains.

As children, most of us heard about how important it was to eat our vegetables. I can remember my mom saying “eat up all the colors on your plate.” Unfortunately, as kids and as adults we often ignore the message. It is hard to think about healthy eating when we are seduced by the world of food TV where bacon, not basil, is the seasoning of choice and steak, not salad, is the main course. The good news is that Americans are starting to wake up from our food coma and beginning to look at food facts and not food fiction. But the challenge is deciphering all the marketing madness to uncover the truths, if there are any.

One of the best resources to find the facts is at the popular nonprofit, noncommercial website, Nutritionfacts.org. Its founder Dr. Michael Greger, is the author of the recently released NY Times Best Seller How Not to Die. He is an internationally recognized physician whose life’s purpose is to spread the ground-breaking science on how plant-based food choices help us live healthier, happier and longer lives. Dr. Greger’s mission kicked-off after his grandmother was diagnosed with end-stage heart disease. At age 65, her physicians told her there was nothing else they could do. Not long after she was discharged from the hospital, she watched a 60 Minutes segment about Nathan Pritikin, an early lifestyle medicine pioneer who had been gaining a reputation for reversing terminal heart disease. His grandmother made the cross-country journey to California and became one of his patients. Upon entry in the program, she was wheelchair-bound. Within three weeks on a plant-based diet and an exercise regimen, she was not only out of her wheelchair but walking ten miles a day. His grandmother lived to 96 years old.

With her story as his inspiration, Dr. Greger went on to found and run Nutritionfacts.org providing free daily videos and articles on the latest research. How can a plant-based diet help you stay healthy? Everyday new peer-reviewed scientific studies are finding the answers. Learning the truth about what science says about nutrition and longevity is the first step in living a longer and better life.

Spring is here, and it’s the perfect time to begin, enhance, or resume your plant-based journey as local farms open and family gardens start to sprout providing us with the natural flavors from the earth. Explore the possibilities of making food choices that positively impact not only your individual health, happiness, and longevity, but our local community and our world.

Janine Mori is the founder of Panoramic Living. Join Janine and Dr. Michael Greger at Panorama 16: Plants, Purpose, Peace on May 15th at Martha Clara Vineyards in Riverhead. For more information about this event and other Panoramic Living programs, please visit www.panoramicliving.us.