The Late Mark Whitney

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Coming Soon To A Trauma Center Near You

Dateline: Del Mar, CA — November 27, 2022

You have the ability to imagine a better future for yourself. We all do. But, creatively bringing your imagination to life, getting others onboard, wiping the slate clean and starting over is a practice. This is especially true when you boldly allow yourself to imagine a world that has never before been imagined, stating it publicly, and acting on it accordingly.

Anyone of us, at anytime, can find ourselves in the position where immediate, major change is required and imagination is forced upon us.

That is the world I embody in the wake (pun intended) of my recent death and resurrection from a heart attack.

As an entrepreneur and storyteller, I’ve been in the business of creatively implementing my imagination for more than 40 years. We have a lot to learn from each other.

In My Second Life, therefore, honors the power of imagination and the individuals who boldly dare to impose their imagination on the universe.

I died on National Fried Chicken Sandwich Day, and all I had was the salad.

Not even making this up. Eighteen days ago a heart attack killed me dead.

In my first life, exercise and diet was a hobby of mine, which is to say, not a priority.

In my second life, I treat diet and exercise like a new career.

My second life is already strictly governed by the following principle: Food is binary.

A carrot is life. Carrot cake is death. Choose life.

Berries are life. Cruch Berries are death. Choose life.

That’s the decision tree.

I never much worried about good health until I died.

Now I can’t stop thinking about it.

In my first life, my favorite thing to do was get on stage and run my mouth, telling amazing stories for 90 minutes in theaters from coast-to-coast. But, unlike life and death, the topics I chose were not universal. For that reason, when I was featured on the cover of Robert McKee’s Story Magazine with Drew Carey and Russell Brand, Hollywood’s storytelling industry was like: “Mark who?”

Coronary artery disease came after the wrong guy. Did it kill me? Yes. Did I stay dead? I did not. Now, it’s payback time and — fair warning — I’m going to be insufferable!

In the United States, a person dies every 34 seconds from cardiovascular disease. Every 34 seconds?! That guy is a glutton for punishment!

Half of you are reading this in nations that are not the United States, where we unfortunately have the worst numbers. 20,000,000 Americans age 20 and up have the same disease that killed me dead.

CAD kills 1,000 of us daily!

Thing is, CAD is a disease in the way that hitting yourself in the head with a hammer is a disease. At a minimum it’s 80% preventable.

Stop hitting and you’re good.

"Food Is Binary" (FIB) is the foundational belief that I invented. It keeps me on the life side of death. It’s a filter, not an equation.

Works like this: “Cheese is death. What’s the least deadly cheese? Some say Parmesan.”

In ,y first life, when I went for Italian, I’d unscrew the lid and dump the Parmesan on.

In my second life I’m Parmesan-free. Why it took a heart attack is beyond me, because nobody likes a cheesy comic.

Where was I? Oh yes — Yesterday, when I explained FIB to my integrative cardiologist, she was slack-jawed, commenting: “You’re giving me chills.”

Dr. Epstein’s response suggests that the greater integrative cardiologist community, spends 10% of its time re-piping arteries and 90% of its time attempting to persuade people to stop eating Crunch Berries.

I imagine the conversation goes something like this:

“There are no berries in Crunch Berries, no fruit in Froot Loops, and, 100% of doctors surveyed agree that the carrot on your carrot cake is orange-colored death frosting shaped like a carrot.”

Why do we play dumb when the doctor who went to school for 15 years tells us the carrot is not a carrot? Because that death carrot is delicious!

FIB is the perfect acronym, if I do say so. A-fib, defib, fib this, fib that. Cardiologists are all about fibs.

It is not hyperbole to say that the FIB Filter could save your life or the life of somebody you care about.

Skip the heart attack.

Choose life.

Mark’s integrative cardiologist, Dr. Elizabeth Sage Epstein, writes “Sage Cardiology” on this very platform. You do not need an appointment to follow her. Subscribe for free!