Recent Article in Local Press

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=100 BGCOLOR="#999980" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <FONT SIZE="7" COLOR="#FFFBF0" FACE="Book Antiqua" ><I><B>Harmony Earth</B></I></FONT><B> </B><B>   </B><A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="HARMONY EARTH"><U><B>Home Page</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id142.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="LEARNING THE TRUTH"><U><B>LEARNING THE TRUTH</B></U></A><B>   |   </B><A HREF="id81.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="HEALTH"><U><B>HEALTH</B></U></A><B>   |   </B><A HREF="id80.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="ECOLOGY"><U><B>ECOLOGY</B></U></A><B>   |   </B><A HREF="id83.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="BOOKS"><U><B>BOOKS</B></U></A><B>   |   </B><A HREF="id105.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="SUCCESS"><U><B>SUCCESS</B></U></A><B>   |   </B><A HREF="id106.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="FREE ADVICE"><U><B>FREE ADVICE</B></U></A><B>   |   </B><A HREF="id136.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="COACHING"><U><B>COACHING</B></U></A></div> <div> </div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" width=310 BGCOLOR="#000000" TEXT="#F7F7FF"> <div> <TABLE BORDER="6" CELLPADDING="2" CELLSPACING="1" WIDTH="256" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#999980" BORDERCOLORDARK="#999980" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" > <tR> <tD VALIGN=TOP HEIGHT= 308 ><NOBR><div> <I><IMG SRC="2d7c82d0.jpg" border=0 width="200" height="301" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></I></div> </NOBR></tD> </tR> </TABLE></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id113.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Jim Hicks Bio Summary"><U>Jim Hicks</U></A></div> <bR> <div> Click below  for my newest offering to help you take charge of your health:</div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <A HREF="id136.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="COACHING"><U>Health Coaching Program</U></A></div> <bR> <div> After gradually learning the truth about nutrition, I have summarized some of the more enlightening information in these articles...Jim Hicks</div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id112.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="My Top Ten Truths"><U>My Top Ten Truths</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id115.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Simple Easy Path"><U>Simple & Easy Path</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id114.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Gradual or Fast Change?"><U>Gradual or Fast Change?</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id129.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Dealing With Barriers"><U>Dealing With Barriers</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id122.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Eating Away From Home"><U>Eating Away From Home</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id131.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Animal Protein, a Poison?"><U>Animal Protein, a Poison?</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id118.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Mainstream Medicine?"><U>Mainstream Medicine?</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id121.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="E.D. Can Save Your Life"><U>E.D. Can Save Your Life</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id117.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Lean and Green"><U>Lean and Green</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id123.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Analyzing Your Diet"><U>Analyzing Your Diet</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id126.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Health Care Monster"><U>Health Care Monster</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id128.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="WorldChanging Power"><U>World-Changing Power</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id111.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Thirty Minutes to Live"><U>Thirty Minutes to Live</U></A></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> ***********************</div> <bR> </td> <td valign="top" height=380 BGCOLOR="#000000" TEXT="#F7F7FF"> <div> <B><U>Recent Article in Local Press</U></B></div> <div> <TABLE BORDER="10" CELLPADDING="4" CELLSPACING="9" WIDTH="665" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#999980" BORDERCOLORDARK="#999980" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" > <tR> <tD VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR=#FFFFFF HEIGHT= 1665 WIDTH="617"><div> <B>Appeared in the Westerly Sun on Christmas Eve, 2009</B></div> <div> <B> and in the Mystic River Press on New Years Eve</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Planting the Seeds of Change</B></div> <div> <B>Jim Hicks is in the process of leaving the business world </B></div> <div> <B>to become an advocate for plant-based nutrition.</B></div> <bR> <div> By LESLIE ROVETTI / Sun Staff Writer</div> <bR> <div> Editor's Note: This is Part 1 in the Faces of Change series.</div> <bR> <div> When Jim Hicks made a change in his diet several years ago, he put himself on a path that not only altered his lifestyle, but his life mission and career.</div> <bR> <div> The event that started Hicks' life shift was inauspicious - the executive recruiter began researching health issues for a job-finding seminar he was planning. Now, after seven years of research, he has his own Web site full of dietary information, a nearly complete book, and a desire to help others learn about plant-based diets.</div> <bR> <div> "I basically just stumbled into the power of whole plant-based nutrition," he said.</div> <bR> <div> Unlike some people who have thrown over steaks in favor of fruits, vegetables and nuts, Hicks wasn't motivated by a massive heart attack or another health crisis.</div> <bR> <div> "I was always a pretty healthy guy. I thought I was," said the 64-year-old Stonington resident. "I wasn't a sick puppy to start with, compared to a lot of folks."</div> <bR> <div> Instead, he was motivated by his research, tales of reversing heart disease and avoiding cancer. But once he switched, the changes were huge, he said. He dropped 30 pounds off his 180-pound frame and improved other aspects of his life as well, such as sleep and concentration.</div> <bR> <div> He feels so healthy, he said, that once he's eligible for Medicare insurance coverage he will drop his private health insurance plan and keep only catastrophic coverage.</div> <bR> <div> "I'm a believer that one can take charge of his health," Hicks said, adding that his target is to live to the age of 110 with his health and vitality intact.</div> <bR> <div> He resists labeling himself a vegan, or even a vegetarian, saying those monikers don't describe how he eats, only what he doesn't eat. His diet consists of plant-based foods, such as fruits, vegetables, beans and seeds. Some of his diet contains oils, he said, such as avocados, nuts, and olives.</div> <bR> <div> If he's at a party, he may even have a piece of cheese on a cracker, or a mini quiche. But he said the vast bulk of his calories come from whole, plant-based food, and about half of it is consumed raw.</div> <bR> <div> The book he's working on - tentatively called "From Polo to Plant Food," which refers to his former job as a senior executive with Polo Ralph Lauren - is different from other books on the topic because he writes from the perspective of a businessman, Hicks said, instead of a doctor, nutritionist or medical researcher. One of his roles at the fashion-industry icon's company was process improvement - the art of finding new and better ways to do things.</div> <bR> <div> "The way we feed ourselves is the single greatest process improvement in the world," Hicks said.</div> <bR> <div> Another way his book is different: others tend to focus on only one benefit of a plant-based diet, he said, while his own covers 10 areas, including health, the environment and animal cruelty.</div> <bR> <div> "It's the only book that has the big picture," Hicks said, with pride. "I've never seen them all in one book."</div> <bR> <div> A preview of his work is available on his Web site, www.harmonyearth.net. He said he hopes to have it completed by February.</div> <bR> <div> As he discussed his work and the life changes that resulted from his dietary shift, Hicks sat surrounded by the books that have influenced him, and papers he has written on the subject. Although he had past success as a corporate executive and entrepreneur, he claims he never had the same fervor for those jobs as he does for his book.</div> <bR> <div> With newfound passion for extolling the virtue of plant-based diets, he said he hopes the text will springboard him to a new career as a paid speaker, or performing corporate nutritional intervention.</div> <bR> <div> For those who would argue that modern society does not fit well with this diet, Hicks said there is strength in numbers.</div> <bR> <div> "We're voting with every mouthful. If we demand plant-based foods in the marketplace, we shall have them," he said.</div> <bR> <div> And for skeptics of his claims, he has the following advice: "Try it in your own body, your own lab, and see if it works."</div> <bR> <div> He did, and he knows it changed his life.</div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> lrovetti@thewesterlysun.com</div> </tD> </tR> </TABLE></div> <div> <B>Eating for Health and Ecology on Planet Earth</B></div> </td> </tr></table></body>