For kicks, here are some Bible passages about diet.
“So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. Do not cause anyone to stumble.”
“Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters. One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them.”
You basically wrote a food sermon.
Seriously, nice piece though! I agree wholeheartedly. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
Wow thanks Scott, this is awesome. I didn't realize I was writing a food sermon but I like that description and what you shared with me. I'm going to have to look those passages up and ponder on them as I'm a bit surprised at how much they align with what I was naturally tuning into.
Haha! This makes me think of an episode of the cartoon show "Danny Phantom." I used to watch it with my kids. It's actually pretty funny.
Danny has two friends, Sam and Tucker, who are fighting over the school lunch menu, because Sam (Danny's female friend) convinced the school board to stop serving meat.
They each stage a protest over night, the dialog is hilarious!
***
Danny - You guys put together two protests in one night?
Tucker - Meat-eaters, [we're] Always ready to fight. And our high-protein diets give us the energy we need to do it quickly.
Sam - Ultra recyclo-vegetarians are always ready to protest. And because we don't have to waste time cooking our food, we can move even faster.
***
I love it! People are almost this bad too.
It's odd how people get into their camps, echo similar ideas, and consider everything else nonsense. I guess we all do that to some extent, but it's best to keep looking at everything. You'll never really know what's going on unless you can get that 30,000-foot view.
In our family we're eating a diet that supposed to help with inflammation with the assistance of a book, more of a guide. So, we eat meat and veggies. Most of the time we're trying to stay away from processed foods. We make nearly all of our own meals, it's pretty tough to find things sometimes. But we do have a Whole Foods close to us, so we can find a lot of things there when nobody else has it.
I figure we'll give it a try, because it can't hurt us to eat better food that's not full of strange things added during the manufacturing process.
I would say the best thing about Keto, vegetarians, or any of that, is that once people start looking at what's in foods, they start to wise up a little. They say, "Why do they even put this stuff in foods!? If it's bad for us in large quantities, how is eating it all the time in smaller quantities OK? And then, in the aggregate what's the effect? A little poison here and there -- in everything, is not good."
That's precisely why so many places are going back to natural foods.
That is hilarious and so true. I've never heard of Danny Phantom, this is great and sums everything I was feeling up so well. Thanks for sharing! :) And yes, both sides are realizing that our food has been manipulated and poisoned yet instead of looking at the culprit and zooming to the bigger picture they are at odds with each other! I'm with you on this! It's not easy either, it's a process. I try to shop at the farmer's market, but when I can't, I have to drive almost an hour to get to a Sprouts that has healthier options available and that's not always possible, so I have to do the best I can with each day and some days it's a lot better than others.
I tell people it's like quitting smoking. People always say, "I've smoked for 20+ years. When's the best time to quit?" I always say, "NOW! If you know it's bad, you either come to grips with that and keep smoking, or find a way to stop."
Eating bad is the same way. But once people start feeling better, I think it becomes much easier.
It's getting to that point where the change is noticeable. Or even better, when someone else says you're looking better, out of nowhere! Then it's usually game on! 😉👉
I agree and people often start feeling better when they start eating real food on either side of the spectrum but then because they labeled it they become attached to the label like a holy grail of this is the only thing I can ever eat again, it's weird man!
Yeah! I did the Keto thing for about a year. It did help me to lose weight, but I wasn’t religious about it. I would still eat whatever vegetables I wanted, and I love peanuts already. The biggest thing about Keto is most likely staying away from sugar.
Sugar really does a number on people, and they don’t realize it. It’s not like you can never have it. But they add sugar to damn-near everything! They add it to things where it doesn’t even make sense. It’s like they have too much sugar laying around and just need to get rid of it. 😂🤣
I lost around 40 pounds in probably 8-10 months just by eating no sugars, meat, non starchy veggies, and mixed nuts.
The only bad part was that I lost all that weight, then they had a “Biggest Loser” competition at work, where the winner got $500! But the competition started AFTER I lost all the weight. 😑
I think that people becoming weird and cult like with it, tends to come from marketing. Because once you start doing it, and researching it, you can get swept into the “this is the only way to do it” mentality.
I always tell people, “Look, people have been running around on this planet for a pretty long time without all this new, ‘this is the only way to do it’ nonsense. Of course, that’s not to say it’s all bad, but it’s much lower on the necessity scale than you’re probably led to believe.” 😉👉
I'm so glad I'm not alone because it sure has felt that way for so long. I was reluctant to post this one because I justs spit it out basically in a 30 minutes typing fest of feverish keyboard pressing. Food drama stresses me out, everybody spouts their sciency monologue and forgets so many other important things as part of the picture!
And also...BRAVO....typing it out in 30 min typing fest. YA GIRL!!
I had a vegan diet for 26 years, starting when I was 19. I had very good reasons for it~ many of which I still uphold. But during those years, I never stopped learning, as my ultimate goal was and is to optimize my health~ NOT be a cult member of a group with strict rules to follow. I didn't 'identify' as a vegan after the first two years or so when I noticed that any fucking label you stick on your forehead only ultimately ends up boxing you in and makes you a hypocrite. Now I eat whatever I want which 99% of the time is simply the food that makes me feel the best. :)
Over the past 30 years, I have heard every argument from every side of this polarizing conversation that you could imagine. I like living in the grey. I don't live in a box- I dance on the lid.
I love every word about what you just shared. It's the damn labels and cultish holier-than-though mentality that irks me to no end and ultimately drives the divide and confusion. <3 I'm dancing on the box with you!
I agree completely the extremes never end well, even when they "seem" positive. We may not ever fully find balance, but it is in seeking to keep that teeter totter in check that we certainly get closer to middle. :)
It's ironic, that in all things profit, influence or control driven, the systems breed radical acolytes, who end up doing the subversion and propagandizing for them.
Prior to large scale food production (read in the time when we were hunters and gatherers) there was no correct diet, except the one that was available to you - be that berries, animals, plants, roots, fungi or insects. Additionally, aside from the obligatory physical exertion required to procure said sustenance, one also had to mentally deal with the aspects of the hunting and gathering.
There was learned and inherent knowledge in knowing the flora to eat, where to find it in a given time frame, and then hauling and preparing it. Even more mental effort was needed for the strategy of the hunt, the kill and then the processing, preparation and preserving of the catch.
Meat was not a 3 meals a day prospect, because there were no "three meals a day" and there wasn't always meat available. Same with vegetation - because there were no 24/7 factory farms thousands of years ago.
There were no "experts", dieticians, influencers, brightly colored packaging, or catchy advertising and yet we thrived and prospered, unfortunately giving birth to this dysfunctional period in human evolution and development.
As you said, there is no right or wrong (maybe the twinkie diet is a wrong), there is only what works for you. And while that may work for 10 or 100 other people, it may not work for 500 or 1000 other people - in other words, in life, one size never fits all.
“ How about listen to YOUR body because it’s amazing, is always communicating with you to help you…it knows what it needs” — seriously!!! 🙌🏻🙌🏻 … so beyond tired of the it has to be this way or that way, constantly needing to OVER label everyone and everything.. listen to your intuition, get off of social media (and the news and anything else that is noise) and your mind, body and spirit will guide you
yes!!!! <3 Self-Trust. I'm OVER it too, all of the labels, new labels for old labels, twisting of labels, inverted labels, it's topsy turvy, it sucks the joy out of life.....the world won't end if I eat something someone else wouldn't.... heaven help us! :)
I’m thankful that I’ve finally let go of trying to figure it all out when it comes to food. Trying to research and process all the conflicting information out there about what’s healthy is a nightmare. I’m with you. I now think that how I eat my food matters far more than what I eat. Gratitude is essential! Here’s a Wendell Berry poem I thought of:
I’m posting that poem to Dr Berry ‘s chat . He one of the carnivore Dr’s . He is a former grossly over weight Doctor that looks wonderful now . He loves his meat for sure.
Olivia! So much YES!!! It's a nightmare of contradicting proportions, literally! I love this poem. "How I eat food matters far more than what I eat" so beautifully said. Thank you.
I’m a carnivore. But coffee addiction is real . I limit it to one very strong dark roast a day and do eat one apple puff turnover from the Chinese bakery near my work . The text of my diet is underdone cheap hamburger I get for $2.90 a pound in 10 lb packages cooked in my George Forman grill . I save the drippings and that Tallow is what I fry my orange yolk eggs in . If my daughter cooks me an omelette with onions , I enjoy it as a rare treat . The guy that screamed at me about Trump at work I got his friend and roommate to eat more meat as he was out of work losing ties to poor circulation. And now he is my friend.
I cook my eggs in tallow sometimes, tallow is awesome. That's nice of your daughter to cook for you! I love coffee. I did decaf once for a year to detox. Sometimes I do tea or chaga or dandelion but always come back to the deliciousness of a buttery coffee!
I love a good tasting butter , as I don’t use sugar for body fuel . I sometimes put a pat of my favorite butter in my mouth before I drink my dark coffee .
I’m carnivore because of my arthritis and if I stray too far my knuckles let me know it. The diet has let me use my hands again and regain my body strength, before I couldn’t open a bottle of water or shake hands without pain . So I’m not in it for any religious beliefs in it . Just the results which are far better than the other so called options lol
For kicks, here are some Bible passages about diet.
“So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. Do not cause anyone to stumble.”
“Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters. One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them.”
You basically wrote a food sermon.
Seriously, nice piece though! I agree wholeheartedly. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
Wow thanks Scott, this is awesome. I didn't realize I was writing a food sermon but I like that description and what you shared with me. I'm going to have to look those passages up and ponder on them as I'm a bit surprised at how much they align with what I was naturally tuning into.
How sad that people have been bickering about food in the same stupid way for literally thousands of years — dead on!
Haha! This makes me think of an episode of the cartoon show "Danny Phantom." I used to watch it with my kids. It's actually pretty funny.
Danny has two friends, Sam and Tucker, who are fighting over the school lunch menu, because Sam (Danny's female friend) convinced the school board to stop serving meat.
They each stage a protest over night, the dialog is hilarious!
***
Danny - You guys put together two protests in one night?
Tucker - Meat-eaters, [we're] Always ready to fight. And our high-protein diets give us the energy we need to do it quickly.
Sam - Ultra recyclo-vegetarians are always ready to protest. And because we don't have to waste time cooking our food, we can move even faster.
***
I love it! People are almost this bad too.
It's odd how people get into their camps, echo similar ideas, and consider everything else nonsense. I guess we all do that to some extent, but it's best to keep looking at everything. You'll never really know what's going on unless you can get that 30,000-foot view.
In our family we're eating a diet that supposed to help with inflammation with the assistance of a book, more of a guide. So, we eat meat and veggies. Most of the time we're trying to stay away from processed foods. We make nearly all of our own meals, it's pretty tough to find things sometimes. But we do have a Whole Foods close to us, so we can find a lot of things there when nobody else has it.
I figure we'll give it a try, because it can't hurt us to eat better food that's not full of strange things added during the manufacturing process.
I would say the best thing about Keto, vegetarians, or any of that, is that once people start looking at what's in foods, they start to wise up a little. They say, "Why do they even put this stuff in foods!? If it's bad for us in large quantities, how is eating it all the time in smaller quantities OK? And then, in the aggregate what's the effect? A little poison here and there -- in everything, is not good."
That's precisely why so many places are going back to natural foods.
That is hilarious and so true. I've never heard of Danny Phantom, this is great and sums everything I was feeling up so well. Thanks for sharing! :) And yes, both sides are realizing that our food has been manipulated and poisoned yet instead of looking at the culprit and zooming to the bigger picture they are at odds with each other! I'm with you on this! It's not easy either, it's a process. I try to shop at the farmer's market, but when I can't, I have to drive almost an hour to get to a Sprouts that has healthier options available and that's not always possible, so I have to do the best I can with each day and some days it's a lot better than others.
There's about where we're at.
I tell people it's like quitting smoking. People always say, "I've smoked for 20+ years. When's the best time to quit?" I always say, "NOW! If you know it's bad, you either come to grips with that and keep smoking, or find a way to stop."
Eating bad is the same way. But once people start feeling better, I think it becomes much easier.
It's getting to that point where the change is noticeable. Or even better, when someone else says you're looking better, out of nowhere! Then it's usually game on! 😉👉
I agree and people often start feeling better when they start eating real food on either side of the spectrum but then because they labeled it they become attached to the label like a holy grail of this is the only thing I can ever eat again, it's weird man!
Yeah! I did the Keto thing for about a year. It did help me to lose weight, but I wasn’t religious about it. I would still eat whatever vegetables I wanted, and I love peanuts already. The biggest thing about Keto is most likely staying away from sugar.
Sugar really does a number on people, and they don’t realize it. It’s not like you can never have it. But they add sugar to damn-near everything! They add it to things where it doesn’t even make sense. It’s like they have too much sugar laying around and just need to get rid of it. 😂🤣
I lost around 40 pounds in probably 8-10 months just by eating no sugars, meat, non starchy veggies, and mixed nuts.
The only bad part was that I lost all that weight, then they had a “Biggest Loser” competition at work, where the winner got $500! But the competition started AFTER I lost all the weight. 😑
I think that people becoming weird and cult like with it, tends to come from marketing. Because once you start doing it, and researching it, you can get swept into the “this is the only way to do it” mentality.
I always tell people, “Look, people have been running around on this planet for a pretty long time without all this new, ‘this is the only way to do it’ nonsense. Of course, that’s not to say it’s all bad, but it’s much lower on the necessity scale than you’re probably led to believe.” 😉👉
You probably inspired the work competition! Marketing is powerful, indeed....sometimes for good, sometimes for bad.
Again, LOVELOVELOVELOVE!!
I've found myself thinking a lot of these same thoughts sister. XO
I'm so glad I'm not alone because it sure has felt that way for so long. I was reluctant to post this one because I justs spit it out basically in a 30 minutes typing fest of feverish keyboard pressing. Food drama stresses me out, everybody spouts their sciency monologue and forgets so many other important things as part of the picture!
Trust me when I say you are NOT alone! ;)
And also...BRAVO....typing it out in 30 min typing fest. YA GIRL!!
I had a vegan diet for 26 years, starting when I was 19. I had very good reasons for it~ many of which I still uphold. But during those years, I never stopped learning, as my ultimate goal was and is to optimize my health~ NOT be a cult member of a group with strict rules to follow. I didn't 'identify' as a vegan after the first two years or so when I noticed that any fucking label you stick on your forehead only ultimately ends up boxing you in and makes you a hypocrite. Now I eat whatever I want which 99% of the time is simply the food that makes me feel the best. :)
Over the past 30 years, I have heard every argument from every side of this polarizing conversation that you could imagine. I like living in the grey. I don't live in a box- I dance on the lid.
I'll do me, you do you. Let's co-exist. BAM!! 🔥
I love every word about what you just shared. It's the damn labels and cultish holier-than-though mentality that irks me to no end and ultimately drives the divide and confusion. <3 I'm dancing on the box with you!
The bullying and these extremes reflect so much in society today. Scary..
The gluttony, the reaching for pills instead of a change in lifestyle ...
The answer is always balance. That works for all areas in life.
Other than honesty ... LOL
Thank you!
I agree completely the extremes never end well, even when they "seem" positive. We may not ever fully find balance, but it is in seeking to keep that teeter totter in check that we certainly get closer to middle. :)
Totally agree!
There never will be perfect balance but right now, people seem to have forgotten all common sense and wisdom.
Very good post.
It's ironic, that in all things profit, influence or control driven, the systems breed radical acolytes, who end up doing the subversion and propagandizing for them.
Prior to large scale food production (read in the time when we were hunters and gatherers) there was no correct diet, except the one that was available to you - be that berries, animals, plants, roots, fungi or insects. Additionally, aside from the obligatory physical exertion required to procure said sustenance, one also had to mentally deal with the aspects of the hunting and gathering.
There was learned and inherent knowledge in knowing the flora to eat, where to find it in a given time frame, and then hauling and preparing it. Even more mental effort was needed for the strategy of the hunt, the kill and then the processing, preparation and preserving of the catch.
Meat was not a 3 meals a day prospect, because there were no "three meals a day" and there wasn't always meat available. Same with vegetation - because there were no 24/7 factory farms thousands of years ago.
There were no "experts", dieticians, influencers, brightly colored packaging, or catchy advertising and yet we thrived and prospered, unfortunately giving birth to this dysfunctional period in human evolution and development.
As you said, there is no right or wrong (maybe the twinkie diet is a wrong), there is only what works for you. And while that may work for 10 or 100 other people, it may not work for 500 or 1000 other people - in other words, in life, one size never fits all.
Wonderful comment, thank you and I agree completely!
“ How about listen to YOUR body because it’s amazing, is always communicating with you to help you…it knows what it needs” — seriously!!! 🙌🏻🙌🏻 … so beyond tired of the it has to be this way or that way, constantly needing to OVER label everyone and everything.. listen to your intuition, get off of social media (and the news and anything else that is noise) and your mind, body and spirit will guide you
yes!!!! <3 Self-Trust. I'm OVER it too, all of the labels, new labels for old labels, twisting of labels, inverted labels, it's topsy turvy, it sucks the joy out of life.....the world won't end if I eat something someone else wouldn't.... heaven help us! :)
I’m thankful that I’ve finally let go of trying to figure it all out when it comes to food. Trying to research and process all the conflicting information out there about what’s healthy is a nightmare. I’m with you. I now think that how I eat my food matters far more than what I eat. Gratitude is essential! Here’s a Wendell Berry poem I thought of:
“I have taken in the light
that quickened eye and leaf.
May my brain be bright with praise
of what I eat, in the brief blaze
of motion and of thought.
May I be worthy of my meat.”
I’m posting that poem to Dr Berry ‘s chat . He one of the carnivore Dr’s . He is a former grossly over weight Doctor that looks wonderful now . He loves his meat for sure.
Olivia! So much YES!!! It's a nightmare of contradicting proportions, literally! I love this poem. "How I eat food matters far more than what I eat" so beautifully said. Thank you.
I’m a carnivore. But coffee addiction is real . I limit it to one very strong dark roast a day and do eat one apple puff turnover from the Chinese bakery near my work . The text of my diet is underdone cheap hamburger I get for $2.90 a pound in 10 lb packages cooked in my George Forman grill . I save the drippings and that Tallow is what I fry my orange yolk eggs in . If my daughter cooks me an omelette with onions , I enjoy it as a rare treat . The guy that screamed at me about Trump at work I got his friend and roommate to eat more meat as he was out of work losing ties to poor circulation. And now he is my friend.
I cook my eggs in tallow sometimes, tallow is awesome. That's nice of your daughter to cook for you! I love coffee. I did decaf once for a year to detox. Sometimes I do tea or chaga or dandelion but always come back to the deliciousness of a buttery coffee!
I love a good tasting butter , as I don’t use sugar for body fuel . I sometimes put a pat of my favorite butter in my mouth before I drink my dark coffee .
I mix the butter into the coffee and froth it up with some cinnamon
I use heavy whipping cream sometimes. But my wife likes to put some cinnamon in hers. It is good, but I'm usually all FAST about it. 😉👉
I’m carnivore because of my arthritis and if I stray too far my knuckles let me know it. The diet has let me use my hands again and regain my body strength, before I couldn’t open a bottle of water or shake hands without pain . So I’m not in it for any religious beliefs in it . Just the results which are far better than the other so called options lol
I love that, you know what works for you and stick to it, bravo!
^toes , thanks iPhone for editing me again.