We don’t have a food shortage, 40 percent of food produced is wasted every year. Food journalist Mark Bittman told us that “1 billion people in the world are chronically hungry. 1 billion people are overweight.”2 We need sustainable and regenerative agriculture and effective distribution.
EVERY TIME YOU EAT, YOU’RE EITHER BUILDING IMMUNITY OR BUILDING DISEASE
Breaking News: Modern agriculture got it wrong! Farmers were quite excited when they used chemical fertilizers for the first time; it meant high yields, less work, more profits! But then they began to see the negative consequences on the ecology and health of the local environment; frogs, birds, bees, and insects started to vanish. It turns out that these Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals (EDC) chemicals are not only poisonous for human consumption but also poisonous for all other living organisms.
Over time these chemicals began to deplete the soil of nutrients, lowering the nutrient value in the crops they were designed to help—go figure! Short-term gains were taken at the expense of long-term consequences. For over a century we have known that continually consuming food from nutrient-deficient soil results in us living in a state of energetic depletion.3 Way back in 1910 American physician Dr Curtis Wood Jr aptly described the average North American as, “overfed but undernourished.”4 It just took us 100 years to understand what he meant!
FOOD IS FOUNDATIONAL MEDICINE
So, before we get too deep into this food topic, let’s state the obvious—
Food is a foundational building block for the growth and function of a healthy human body; it is not a complementary or alternative medicine, it is foundational.
Everything you eat has an effect. In fact, “Every time you eat or drink, you are either feeding disease or fighting it.”5 Nutrigenomics is the field of medicine that studies how the food we eat can ignite and activate our human potential or suppress our human function by promoting disease and dysfunction.6
What we eat shouldn’t be complicated. Michael Pollan, a renowned lecturer on food, agriculture, health, and the environment, sums it up nicely with seven simple words to live by, “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants”—the last word being the most important.7
HOW DID WE BECOME SO CONFUSED?
To understand Food as Medicine, we need to shift the conversation away from nutrition “isms,” ideologies, fads, diets, superfoods, restriction based regimes (Ketogenic, Atkins, etc), and quick fixes, and tackle the key question:
How can everyone nourish their body every single day, so that their body can regenerate itself naturally?
It’s started by knowing what actually fuels and nourishes your body and why. What we consume each day; air, water, and food empower the body to regenerate fifty million cells every second—what clever engineering!
NOT ALL FOODS ARE CREATED EQUALLY
It must be understood that not all foods are created equally. Sad but true. Nature’s “food” has been overrun by packages of convenience and well-placed marketing on supermarket shelves. Farming practices, soil health, and inefficient food chain systems also contribute to the nutrient and chemical values that reach our tables.
Understanding what real food is and its function will help you make better choices in relation to your self-care. It will connect you with the realistic needs of your unique body based on your lifestyle, level of activity, and environment.
Athletes and office dwellers have vastly different needs. Learn to recognize your own fuel needs and how to find them naturally.
CALL TO ACTION
- Eat more plants! Reach for a juice or smoothie instead of an artificial drink.
- Be a compassionate omnivore! If you eat animal products, do your best to source them from compassionate and regenerative sources.
- Check your soil. Is your food from living, nutrient-dense, biodynamic soil that is not compromised with impurities? Could you visit the farm and see abundant ecology if need be? No compromise is the quality of anything you consume!
SUMMARY
From here you can move away from consuming “food-like” products and return to foundational food to heal, transform and grow. Food from natural sources, grown in living biodynamic soil and healthy natural ecosystems, free of synthetic chemicals that is low on human interference. Just like our grandparents’ day— simple! Lay down the building blocks now in order to reach the peak physical human body you’d like in 12 months' time and beyond!
