Improving the diet

[ZhengLi]

I have been for a long time wanting to improve my diet choices. My big problem is occasional unlimited hunger and strong sugar cravings. If I can quit sugar once and for all, both of these problems I believe would go away. I've considered health problems to be of cause, but in the past of I have been mildly successful on holding out on sugars for a couple weeks at a time. It has just become a lot harder to do it out of sheer willpower with the circumstance of my new job, where I'll be stressed from customer service, on a 10hr shift, infinitely hungry, thus eating my entire lunch and all of the healthy snacks I bring, and still extremely hungry with the only option of food being full of sugars and starches (the "food" in convenience stores). Are there any herbs or OTC natural medicines that can assist me?

 

I think it will be useful for me to exercise "being hungry" more and hopefully cool the cravings that come from that instead of excite or feed them. The only cure I've found so far is my training. I also think taking vitamins and minerals will be of benefit, which I'll start doing today.

Edited November 2, 2010 by ZhengLi

[Gerard]

...My big problem is occasional unlimited hunger and strong sugar cravings...

 

Bingo! You have been awarded with the modern humans' disease: technology, mental work and alienation which triggers the mind (fire) and creates and overactive liver (wood). The mind is the responsible party for our health and wellbeing.

 

OK, your liver Qi is stagnant and has invaded your spleen (associated with taste of sweetness, hence it is trying to overcome liver fire).

 

Cure: detoxify yourself mental, physical, spiritual and emotionally because society itself has deviated from the Ancient Way. Drink plenty of Chinese teas (green, pu erh, oolongs, whites), exercise the Chinese/Indian way (Internal Arts, Qigong, Vipassana, Yoga), stress less, smile to everyting and anything whether it is good or bad, go to bed early and eat healthy organic food if you can plus introduce the consumption of Asian green vegies in your meals, eat more legumes, fish and non-treated meat. No to alcohol, spicy food, processed foods, sweets and other junk found in supermarket shelves.

 

This is just a general guideline. Hope you find it useful

 

Gluck.

[Mattimo]

I would like to think that I have researched a lot about what constitutes an optimal diet. I tried the raw thing for over three months and lost all of my body fat and was generally tired. I've also dabbled with vegetarianism. Here's the thing, most of us need animal fat/meat to function well. Additionally, cutting out refined carbs, sugar, etc is a good idea. Google "Weston Price" for more information.

 

It is especially noteworthy that in the Weston Price literature it states that if the body is not receiving enough nourishing animal fats, one will crave [paraphrase] junk food. Unprocessed animal fats are absolutely essential for optimal health. Indeed there is a lot of misinformation about fats i.e. you eat fat you get fat. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Have you ever watched a National Geographic documentary or footage of African tribal peoples still holding on to tradition? The first thing I notice is their perfect, white teeth and generally fit physique.

 

Do some research, you'll figure it out.

Edited November 4, 2010 by Mattimo

[Mal]

[Gerard]

Gerard, what do you mean, specifically, about going to bed early? Do you mean sleep more? Or, early to bed, early to rise? As recommendations to IMA/med practitioners are often: wake early to practice.

 

Thanks.

 

Like birds. Early bird catches the worm. The earlier the merrier...both sides Yin and Yang. Also I fully understand now why the Buddha recommended not eating any meals after 12 noon, but in today's world this is not practical unless you are a monk or a hermit. During Vipassna retreat in Thailand meals are 6am and 11am Therevadin monks and nuns do not east past 11am. Recently I spoke to young waitress from Tangshan near Beijing whose mum always taught her since she was a child not having any meals past 6pm. Traditionally in China no one ate late, but then the Cultural Revolution changes the face of China and it became more westernised.

[Mal]

[Astral_Anima]

Gerard, what do you mean, specifically, about going to bed early? Do you mean sleep more? Or, early to bed, early to rise? As recommendations to IMA/med practitioners are often: wake early to practice.

 

Thanks.

 

I heard somewhere that cellular rejuvenation is at it's best from 10pm-6am. dunno if it has validity however I and many others i've asked notice that the sunlight has the potential to give one much energy. So the concept of being awake when the sun is up and asleep when the sun is down (our natural bodily rhythm) has been a part of healing systems for a while, i believe.

[Astral_Anima]

To the OP, it depends on your beliefs and realizations to this point. Raw foods definately have more healing potential than cooked foods and I would even say they have more chi/life force as they are still alive and have enzymatic activity. For sugar cravings i've found RAW dairy to be my miracle cure. My guess is that the bacteria in my gut was unbalanced, perhaps candida?, idk. What i do know is that the Raw Milk and Raw yogurt cured it entirely. i kinda hate sweets now.

 

Anyway I'd like to introduce a new possibility. What i've come to notice in myself (and this is PURELY a SELF realization) is that the less I eat the better I feel and the "hunger" that I feel is actually the stress of my body eliminating undigested matter from improper digestion, along with the stomach shrinking to it's original size. What i've noticed is that when I eat solid food or things that are hard to digest All of my energy goes to my stomach and my self awareness is lower DRAMATICALLY. I notice especially in the cold that when I eat junk (like I did today) I was less aware of the cold sensation, along with emotions, thoughts, everything, i was just less aware. I remember I was on a fast drinking only 9 oz of coconut water a day and jogging quite a bit, It was almost unbearable because I was FULLY aware of EVERYTHING that was going on inside of me. I could taste the pollution in the air, I could see and feel the misery and the air of sadness and anger everywhere. Also I experienced a bit of "heartbreak" during that time...I noticed that I could really FEEL my emotions, like I was feeling for the first time, it was nuts. When I first ate solids again I noticed it felt like I was going to sleep, and that all the pain, sadness and such became less

 

Anyway my idea that I propose is that solid food...or food in general has become an addiction, a sedative, a way to lower self awareness to cope with this world. I believe that the body doesn't NEED food and that the only reason we experience discomfort is either due to increased awareness of shit we never dealt with or were previously aware of or because of the body circulating stored up toxic material from a near lifetime of sedation.

 

By that paradigm a raw food diet consisting of mainly fruits, preferably just liquids would be ideal. I found that a liquid diet combined with qigong (i mainly do kunlun, but i'd like to try SFQ) and sum mental deprogramming (Check out Arnold Erhet's "Mucusless Diet" if you want your mind blown. I keep it with me everywhere i go), made a quick and fairly simple transition to be able to fast for extended periods of time with little or no fatigue watsoever(quite the contrary, i've never been able to exercise so much!). I also noticed my energy was completely free and stronger than ever, like the diff between a water pistol and a super soaker

 

Nutrition, to me, is a myth. It seems the only things we can use nutrition for is to help counteract unhealthy habits that are already in place, like using vit C for cancer, etc. Not that there's anything necessarily WRONG with food or eating or vit C, but from my own personal self awareness this seems to be the case.

 

-Astral

[Mal]

[Taomeow]

I see that Taubes has released Why we get fat: and what to do about it. Unfortunately it's a shorter version of Good Calories, Bad Calories with less detail for non-medical professional readers. Since Taubes is a science journalist, his presentation of the history of the research was what I liked most about GC,BC. So I was looking for more nutritional science info, not less

 

There is no "nutritional science" as pertaining to health because Western medical science does not have a definition for "health" (sic) and only understands it as "the absence of a diagnosed illness." If you want to review scientific literature on the subject of nutrition, keep in mind it is all designed in this manner, i.e. as related to illness that can be supposedly brought about or prevented by this or that food consumption. (The lists of foods keep changing though... eggs used to "cause" then "help" then "cause" again problems with cholesterol... High fiber used to "prevent" then "cause" then "the jury's still out" colon cancer. Soy used to "prevent" then "cause" breast cancer, "aggravate" then "relieve" thyroid problems -- till all of a sudden neither one is the issue, the issue is whether it "causes" or "alleviates" brain damage. And so on. Same food, same illness, different studies, different "results." I really, really stopped wondering why.)

 

This said... if you still insist... A book you will find most comprehensive coming from this perspective would be "Nutritional Influences on Illness" by Melvyn Werbach. It is a rather thorough overview of a helluva lot of scientific literature on, well, nutritional influences on about 100 "popular" illnesses. There's also a "Nutritional Influences on Mental Illness" arranged in a similar fashion.

 

For nutritional science of health, however, you would have to choose a modality to study that has actually developed a particular paradigm of "health" that does not rely for any of its definitions on "illness." (Within this paradigm, a food is good or bad for a particular purpose, for a particular person in a specific situation, during a certain period of time... and the same food is going to be no good for another person, in a different situation, during a different period of time, etc.. You will find that such and such items are good for pregnant women for the duration of the first trimester, or for hard-working students for the winter semester, but that something altogether different may be needed if the pregnant woman AND the hard-working student are the same person.)

 

I'd say go with TCM or Ayurveda, either one would be a complete system of this nature; there's no Western counterpart. For the Western counterpart, there's numerous schools, sects, and fad enclaves of nutritional thought of course, some of which are better than others (nearly all of which I have studied diligently, until summarily abandoning them all as grossly pathetic), but if you want a systemic understanding, consider going with one of the complete traditions available for study.

[JustARandomPanda]

ZhengLi,

 

Go buy some Gymnema Sylvestre supplements. This is a well-known, ancient herb with a long history in Aryuvedic medicine. It's known as the "sweet-killer". Get it ASAP. Because it WORKS. I've used it on plenty occasions and it has never failed to do exactly that. Kill the taste of sweets. There is some sort of biochemical process taking place because after you take the supplement anything sweet suddenly becomes quite bitter. Obviously the herb does something to the tastebud receptors on the tongue. Take GS, wait about 10 - 20 minutes - then try to eat a donut - it takes like cr*p. Talk about giving a big disincentive to eat sweets.

 

GS also has many other health benefits for the body. It helps control insulin levels - basically it smooths them out so you don't experience huge highs followed by crashes that often comes with a typical American diet. It also apparently has some anti-cancer properties. There are other benefits too to long to list.

 

Just thought I'd mention something you can implement immediately. The other suggestions are good but they take time and I gather you need help NOW. So try the GS then relax a bit and try some of the other poster's suggestions too.

[Non]

To the OP, it depends on your beliefs and realizations to this point. Raw foods definately have more healing potential than cooked foods and I would even say they have more chi/life force as they are still alive and have enzymatic activity. For sugar cravings i've found RAW dairy to be my miracle cure. My guess is that the bacteria in my gut was unbalanced, perhaps candida?, idk. What i do know is that the Raw Milk and Raw yogurt cured it entirely. i kinda hate sweets now.

 

Anyway I'd like to introduce a new possibility. What i've come to notice in myself (and this is PURELY a SELF realization) is that the less I eat the better I feel and the "hunger" that I feel is actually the stress of my body eliminating undigested matter from improper digestion, along with the stomach shrinking to it's original size. What i've noticed is that when I eat solid food or things that are hard to digest All of my energy goes to my stomach and my self awareness is lower DRAMATICALLY. I notice especially in the cold that when I eat junk (like I did today) I was less aware of the cold sensation, along with emotions, thoughts, everything, i was just less aware. I remember I was on a fast drinking only 9 oz of coconut water a day and jogging quite a bit, It was almost unbearable because I was FULLY aware of EVERYTHING that was going on inside of me. I could taste the pollution in the air, I could see and feel the misery and the air of sadness and anger everywhere. Also I experienced a bit of "heartbreak" during that time...I noticed that I could really FEEL my emotions, like I was feeling for the first time, it was nuts. When I first ate solids again I noticed it felt like I was going to sleep, and that all the pain, sadness and such became less

 

Anyway my idea that I propose is that solid food...or food in general has become an addiction, a sedative, a way to lower self awareness to cope with this world. I believe that the body doesn't NEED food and that the only reason we experience discomfort is either due to increased awareness of shit we never dealt with or were previously aware of or because of the body circulating stored up toxic material from a near lifetime of sedation.

 

By that paradigm a raw food diet consisting of mainly fruits, preferably just liquids would be ideal. I found that a liquid diet combined with qigong (i mainly do kunlun, but i'd like to try SFQ) and sum mental deprogramming (Check out Arnold Erhet's "Mucusless Diet" if you want your mind blown. I keep it with me everywhere i go), made a quick and fairly simple transition to be able to fast for extended periods of time with little or no fatigue watsoever(quite the contrary, i've never been able to exercise so much!). I also noticed my energy was completely free and stronger than ever, like the diff between a water pistol and a super soaker

 

Nutrition, to me, is a myth. It seems the only things we can use nutrition for is to help counteract unhealthy habits that are already in place, like using vit C for cancer, etc. Not that there's anything necessarily WRONG with food or eating or vit C, but from my own personal self awareness this seems to be the case.

 

-Astral

 

I get allergies from fruit or any sugar now. Ie the sneezing runny nose and asthma type.

[Mal]

[dwai]

I have been for a long time wanting to improve my diet choices. My big problem is occasional unlimited hunger and strong sugar cravings. If I can quit sugar once and for all, both of these problems I believe would go away. I've considered health problems to be of cause, but in the past of I have been mildly successful on holding out on sugars for a couple weeks at a time. It has just become a lot harder to do it out of sheer willpower with the circumstance of my new job, where I'll be stressed from customer service, on a 10hr shift, infinitely hungry, thus eating my entire lunch and all of the healthy snacks I bring, and still extremely hungry with the only option of food being full of sugars and starches (the "food" in convenience stores). Are there any herbs or OTC natural medicines that can assist me?

 

I think it will be useful for me to exercise "being hungry" more and hopefully cool the cravings that come from that instead of excite or feed them. The only cure I've found so far is my training. I also think taking vitamins and minerals will be of benefit, which I'll start doing today.

IF you want to quit sugar you have to quit all forms of sugar first. No fruits, no vegetables with sugar in therm Eg carrots, tomatoes...

Also you need to get off carbs during at peqriod. Usually two weeks work just fine when you are on a no car no sugar mode

[Christoph]

I would also recommend that you read Weston Price Nutrition and Physical Degeneration. It is an excellent starting point to use critical thinking and experimentation to find the right diet for you.

I find most people are severely deficient in proper fats thus causing cravings especially late night.