Conscious Eating Part 21

CHANGING ONE'S DIETARY PATTERN is not a search for a perfect diet because the only thing that is perfect is beyond the body-mind complex. The only thing that is perfect is the Truth of G.o.d, in all, as All. We are already imbedded in this perfection except that most of us are not aware of this reality. A healthy diet is an aid in clearing our consciousness and body so that we can be more receptive to the experience of this absolute level of truth. However, it must be remembered that despite all the emphasis and importance I have placed on right diet, one cannot eat ones way to G.o.d. Diet is not the key to spiritual life, but it is a positive helping factor that a.s.sists in opening the door to communion with the Divine.

Besides enhancing our communion with the Divine, an appropriate diet can help us reach stages of health in which we can fully enjoy life and live more youthfully, longer. Diet is not religion or an obsessive form of searching for G.o.d. Diet is simply one part of a balanced, harmonious life that is in attunement with universal laws. As has been mentioned, an appropriate diet can also help bring one into harmony with the social, ecological, and political issues of the planet. Interestingly enough, although coming from a different perspective, this intuitive, individualized dietary approach of conscious eating yields about the same results in terms of total daily calories and body weight as Walford's scientifically approached, calorie-counting diet. With the harmony of wholeness approach, however, you never have to look at a calorie counter.

This conscious eating approach is the reflection of, and contributor to, our state of internal balance and external harmony with ourselves, our society, and our planet. It is part of the unfolding process of being in tune with the primary natural laws of the universe. A healthy diet is most appropriately developed not as a mechanical process separate from our life, but in a full spiritual context of right livelihood, good company, loving our neighbors as our true selves, meditation and/or prayer, and starting each thought, word, and action with love. It is through this perspective that we are best able to develop an individualized diet that reflects the highest state of awareness and is completely appropriate to maximal function in the world.

Transitioning.

IN THE WESTERN, INDUSTRIALIZED, mechanized, left-brained lifestyle of today's world, our relations.h.i.+p with nature has become confused, exploitive, and very fragile. How else could the FDA have approved such an obvious health-destroying process as the irradiation of fresh fruits, vegetables, wheat, spices, herbs, pork, and poultry products as a way of preserving them? This decision of the FDA reflects the extent to which many of us have broken our ties to nature.

What seems normal is abnormal and vice versa. According to an article in the East-West Journal by Becky Gillette and Kate Dumont on Roy Wal-ford's research, fully two-thirds of Americans die from diseases caused by a poor diet. Approximately 1.5 million people died of diet-related disease in 1987. One has the choice to avoid these diet-related diseases by adopting the type of diet that both cures and prevents the chronic degenerative diseases from which so many suffer.

Vegetarians and a vegetarian diet are sometimes considered extreme. And this is true if your goal is to be "extremely" healthy and feel extremely good. It is difficult to change a dietary pattern, even if it is unhealthy, when it means swimming upstream against social pressure and our old, programmed habits and belief systems. Nevertheless, it is necessary to examine one's programming and be willing to abandon what is no longer appropriate for maintaining one's state of total well-being of body, mind, and spirit. In this unfolding process, one learns to abandon what does not keep one in health and harmony. This gentle approach also helps to guide the rate of transitioning so it is in harmony with the body's physiological changes, the clearing of mind, and the subtle opening of spirit in one's life.

Planning one's own individualized diet and rate of transition requires some artful intelligence in the application of the principles and concepts I have shared. The process is real and basic rather than esoteric. It is a self-discovery process of trial and error to see what works to maintain the experience of the One. The hunger for the Divine can serve as a guiding light behind the appet.i.te and direct one's choice of diet.

The place to start is with one's immediate dietary pattern. This involves learning to eat, by trial and error, the right amount of food that energizes the mind, body, and spirit. This will ideally maintain and enhance the present flow of cosmic energy into the body, thus sustaining the present level of love communion. One aid to the digestive system is to limit one's food intake to a maximum of three meals per day, with only juices or an occasional piece of fruit between meals. The exception to this is if one has a strong fast-oxidizer physiology, or hypoglycemia, which requires frequent snacks until the condition is stabilized or cured. Chewing food well and creating a peaceful, joyful atmosphere in which to eat or digest the food will immediately improve digestion.

Four Transition Stages.

THERE ARE SEVERAL MAJOR STAGES of dietary transition. Each stage may take as little as one season in a yearly cycle. The concept of "transitioning" allows one to be receptive to the continued progress of one's evolutionary growth, no matter what the time frame. More detail will be provided about these stages in later chapters, but for now it is sufficient to foreshadow this material by way of a brief description of these four dietary stages. Stage one is a transition from all bioacidic foods to natural, whole, organic foods. This means letting go of all processed, irradiated, chemicalized, pesticide-ridden and fungicide-containing, adulterated, fast, and junk foods and other sorts of "Hostess Twinkie"-type foods. In this stage we also begin to give up red meats.

The second stage is letting go of all flesh foods, such as poultry and fish. It also includes not eating eggs.

Stage three is a vegetarian diet with the inclusion of dairy at the beginning and then moving to an 80% live-food intake by the end.

Stage four is vegetarian without dairy and may be as much as 95-100% live foods by the end. Not eating flesh or any dairy products is not technically defined as a vegan because to be a true vegan means the absolute avoidance of any animal products in the total lifestyle. This includes the avoidance of leather clothing, honey, and gelatin capsules.

Preview of Chapter 21.

THE FIRST CONSCIOUS EATING STAGE is not becoming vegetarian. It is simply becoming conscious of what you are eating, from pesticides to nitrates. It is learning to read labels and ask the right questions to protect yourself. In this stage junk foods and commercially produced foods are given up for the most healthy and cost-effective organic foods. One also gets a chance to look at the viral, bacterial, and parasitic dangers of eating beef and chicken. In this stage, we let go of red meat. The time for action has begun. Are you ready to make this first step in the commitment?

I. Biocidic food II. Protecting yourself from chemicalization A. Major source of pesticide exposure comes from animal foods B. Avoid commercial foods to be safe III. Learning to read labels is good for your health IV. Au naturel- buy organic V. Dangers of eating flesh A. Chemicals in factory-farmed animals.

B. Estrogen-injected animals-problems manifested in people who eat that flesh.

C. Leukemia in children linked to diseased milk.

D. Detrimental effects of fats in the diet.

E. Unhealthy chickens and chicken processing.

Stage One: I Have No "Beef" with This.

THE FIRST STAGE IN THE TRANSITION PROCESS is mental acceptance and an understanding that a dietary reorientation is necessary. Stage One is a time to begin thinking about the acid-base ratio of the foods one eats and its effect on the body the practice of food combining, regular exercise, and cultivating healthy eating patterns. Eating more fruits, vegetables, grains, legumes, nuts, seeds, and raw dairy as the central focus of one's diet is a big departure from the typical American diet, but most everyone finds this new world of health-giving foods exciting and rewarding. After an initial adjustment phase, these foods generally taste better in the long run. Stage One can be considered the first major step in one's gradual re-education and s.h.i.+ft to healthful eating patterns.

This means significantly reducing one's intake of tamasic, health-destroying, biocidic foods. Giving up biocidic foods-processed, commercially grown, fast food and junk foods-means no longer offering oneself up as a sacrificial guinea pig to the pesticide, herbicide, additive, fungicide, food processing, food irradiating, microwaving, fast food, and junk food industries. Stage One eliminates such deleterious foods as white sugar, white bread, candy, TV dinners, soft drinks, any meats that have been treated with nitrites and nitrates, pasteurized milk and cheeses, baked goods containing refined oils, foods containing additives, and prepared foods that have been stored in the refrigerator for more than two or three days.

Actually, almost all cooked foods become biocidic approximately twenty-four hours after preparation. Whether it takes one to four days to become contaminated with bacteria or mold is not the point, for all stored foods have lost their vital energy even if kept in the refrigerator. This is significantly less so if the food is quick-frozen. As early as 1930 Dr. Kouchakoff found that the intake of processed foods so disturbed the white blood cell pattern of the immune system that it looks the same as a white blood cell pattern that is seen with infections. Eating highly processed, nitrate-, pesticide-, and additive-filled meats, like hot dogs and salami, gives the white blood cell pattern that one typically sees with severe food poisoning. Pesticides, herbicides, and additives in the foods have been linked with cancer, weakened immune system, allergies, neurotoxicity, hyperactivity in children, and brain allergies.

Another category of common pathological effects from these toxins is varying levels of neurotoxicity to the brain and rest of the nervous system, which has more subtle symptoms, such as reduced mental functioning, decreased mental clarity, and poor concentration. Although the hard statistics of cancer are mentioned frequently in the discussion of pesticides, increased cancer rates is just one of the most extreme results of toxins in our food and water.

Unless one eats organic fruits and vegetables, one is continually exposed to pesticides. One of the most significant effects of an organic vegetarian diet is the tremendous health benefits of stopping the chronic poisoning from pesticides. In 1985, nearly one thousand people in the western United States and Canada were poisoned by the pesticide Temik in watermelon. People had a variety of reactions, including grand mal seizures, cardiac irregularities, and even several stillbirths. Next the dangers of alar in apples were exposed. In 1987, the National Academy of Sciences concluded that in our lifetime pesticides in American food may cause more than one million additional cases of cancer in the United States. Laurie Mott and Karen Snyder of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) reported in the Amicus Journal that each year 2.6 billion pounds of pesticides are used in the United States and nearly all Americans have residues of the pesticides DDT, chlordane, heptachlor, aldrin, and dieldrin in their bodies. A1987 Environmental Protection Agency Report indicated that because of the ma.s.sive agricultural use of pesticides, at least twenty pesticides, some of which are cancer-causing, have been found in the groundwater of twenty-four states. Between 1982 and 1985, the FDA detected pesticide residues in 48% of the most frequently consumed fresh vegetables and fruits. In 1975, the sixth annual report of the Council on Environment stated that dieldrin, which is five times more potent than the outlawed DDT, was found in 99.5% of the American people, 96% of all meat, fish, and poultry, and in 85% of all dairy products. Dieldrin is one of the most potent carcinogens known. It has caused cancer in laboratory animals at every dosage ever tested, no matter how infinitesimal. Low-level exposure in humans has been known to cause convulsions, liver damage, and destruction of the central nervous system. Fortunately dieldrin was banned in 1974, but who knows how lethal the next new line of pesticides may be. It's a form of American roulette. The drug companies are the only winners.

Dioxin (2,4,5-T), an active component of Agent Orange, is considered by Dr. Diane Courtney, head of the Toxic Effects Branch of the EPA's National Environmental Research Center, to be the most toxic chemical known. According to Diet for A New America, millions of pounds of 2, 4, 5-T have been sprayed on American soil. The EPA has officially recognized that cattle which graze on land sprayed with dioxin acc.u.mulate it in their fat. According to pesticide authority Lewis Regenstein, those who eat beef get a dose of dioxin that has been concentrated as it moves up the food chain. Dioxin has been shown to produce cancer, birth defects, miscarriages, and death in lab animals in concentrations as low as one part per trillion. It is no wonder, according to David Steinman in Diet for a Poisoned Planet, that deaths from cancer in this country have risen from less than one percent in the beginning of the nineteenth century to one in four American men and one in five American women today. Although there are other factors besides herbicides and pesticides that play a role in increasing the incidence of cancer, such as nuclear radiation and cigarette smoking, I wonder how much the cancer rate would drop if we stopped actively putting these and all the other pesticides in our food chain. Even if their toxicity is discovered and they are banned, once they have been introduced into the environment, the chlorinated hydrocarbon pesticides are extremely stable compounds that do not break down for decades or longer.

I do not think scientists have discovered the full extent of the damage pesticides have already done to the nation's health. The types of cancers that are statistically emerging suggest that they are originating from the specific effects of certain pesticides. According to Diet for a Poisoned Planet, between 1950 and 1985, urinary bladder cancer increased by 51%; kidney and renal pelvis cancer increased by 82%. These types of cancers are directly a.s.sociated with toxins in the drinking water. Testicular cancer, which occurs in significant proportion among farm workers and manufacturers of pesticides, has increased 81%. In 1985, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, which is linked with pesticide exposure, increased by 123%. The Surgeon General's Report on Nutrition and Health in 1988 estimated that as many as 10,000 cancer deaths annually could be caused from the chemical additives in food. This estimate does not even include pesticides. It is extremely difficult to know the exact percentage of the cancer increase due to pesticides, additives, and other environmental factors in our food, water, and air, but it most likely is significant.

In addition to the single pesticide factor effect which can be directly tested in the laboratory, there is often a more powerful synergistic effect from the multiple use of different toxins working together in the environment. This synergistic effect is difficult to a.s.sess. The c.u.mulative effect of widespread, chronic, low-level exposure to multiple pesticides is only partially understood. One National Cancer Inst.i.tute study found that farmers exposed to herbicides had a six times greater risk than nonfarmers of getting one specific type of cancer. Research at the University of Southern California discovered in 1987 that children living in homes where household and garden pesticides were used had a sevenfold greater chance of developing childhood leukemia. The Amicus Journal article ent.i.tled "Pesticide Alert" reported that in 1982 a congressional report estimated that 82-85% of pesticides registered for use have not been adequately tested for their ability to cause cancer. In addition, 60-70% of pesticides were not tested for creating birth defects, and 90-93% were not tested for the possibility of causing genetic mutations.

In addition to the absence of single-factor data, there is almost no data to show how these pesticides work when combined. In the Journal of Food Science, one of the few studies on the synergistic effect of pesticides reported that when three chemicals were each tested separately on rats, there was no obvious ill effect. When two of the three chemicals were added together, the health of the rats diminished. When all three were used synergistically, the rats all died within two weeks. This synergistic pesticide porridge of our food and water is probably creating the most overall damage to the health of all living forms in our environment. People who do not use purified water or organic food are exposing themselves significantly to this danger. The lack of available data on the health-destroying effects of pesticide use, both individually and synergistically suggests the EPA has to be regulating more out of ignorance than knowledge. More than no different pesticides were detected in all foods between 1982 and 1985. Of the 25 pesticides detected most frequently in our foods, nine are known to cause cancer. This is a serious situation.

'90s Update on Pesticide Use.

SINCE THE FIRST EDITION OF Conscious Eating, the tide of pesticide and herbicide use has continued to increase rather than ebb. The following data come from a report in Pesticide Action Network published by Californians for Pesticide Reform (CPR). In California, which uses 25% of all the pesticides in the US, the trend is toward an increasing use and dependence on toxic pesticides and herbicides. California literally puts hundreds of millions of pounds of chemicals on our crops, soil, water, homes, schools, and work places each year. The environmental protection laws simply are not strong enough. Six and one-half pounds of pesticides per person are used in California, which is more than double the national average of 3.1 pounds per person.

Pesticide use in California increased 31% from 1991 to 1995, a jump from 161 to 212 million pounds per year. The increase occurred primarily in the intensity of pesticides per acre as the number of agricultural acres stayed about the same. The use of cancer-causing pesticides rose 129%-to more than twenty-three million pounds-what is now 11% of the total pesticide use in the state. Use of acutely toxic nerve poisons increased 52% to about nine million pounds. The use of restricted pesticides-those which regularly cause damage to people, crops, and the environment-increased 34% to forty-eight million pounds in 1995. The total volume of carcinogens, reproductive hazards, endocrine disrupters, category I acute systemic poisons, category II nerve toxins, and restricted-use toxins increased 32% between 1991 and 1995. This is approximately seventy-two million pounds, or 34% of the total reported pesticide use. Strawberries and grapes were the two most heavily pesticided crops. Strawberries received about three hundred pounds of active pesticides per acre, and grapes received a total of fifty-nine million pounds of pesticides in 1995.

A report by Californians for Pesticide Reform (CPR) shows that 87% of the forty-six California school districts surveyed used highly toxic pesticides in their routine building and lawn maintenance. These forty-six districts serve one and one-half million children. Seventy percent of these school districts used suspected carcinogens; 52% used pesticides that are known to cause birth defects or impair normal mental and physical development; 50% used pesticides suspected of disrupting the human hormonal system; and 54% used nerve toxins. This data was typically unavailable to parents, teachers, and the public. CPR had to use legal counsel to obtain these simple data.

According to the Environmental Working Group, every day one million US children under the age of five consume unsafe levels of pesticides that are known to harm their developing brain and nervous system. An a.n.a.lysis of the federal information is that most of the risk comes from five organophosphate insecticides: methyl parathion, dimethoate, pirimiphos methyl, and azinphos methyl. The foods most likely to contain toxic levels are peaches, apples, nectarines, popcorn, and pears. The baby foods most likely to have unsafe levels are pears, peaches, and apple juice. This study found that approximately one in four peaches and one out of eight apples had levels of organophosphates that are unsafe for children. Can we afford not to protect our children by not buying organic produce?

If you think this increase in pesticides and herbicides is just a bunch of statistics and has no effect, think again. The incidence of childhood cancer increased 10.8% from 1973 through 1990, according to the EPA. (Cancer now kills more children under the age of fifteen than any other disease.) A child born today has a one in six hundred chance of developing cancer by the age often, according to the EPA. By a child's first birthday, the combined cancer risk of just eight pesticides on twenty foods they may have eaten exceeds the EPAs lifetime level of acceptable risk. Children eat more food and take in more water relative to their size than adults and thus have elevated exposures to pesticides and other contaminants. Industrial pollution is a form of domestic violence. With these kinds of statistics, do you have any wonder why I so strongly stress the importance of feeding ourselves, pregnant mothers, and our children as close to 100% organic foods as possible?

Pesticide Pestilence.

PESTICIDES CAN AFFECT EVERY LIVING ORGANISM. Human beings are no exception. The more detrimental effects of pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides include cancer, nervous system disorders, birth defects, alterations of DNA; liver, kidney, lung, and reproductive problems; and an overall disruption of ecological cycles on the planet. According to Dr. David Pimentel, an entomologist and agricultural expert at Cornell University, pesticides cost the nation $8 billion annually in public health expenditures, ground water decontamination, fish kills, bird kills, and domestic animal deaths.

The potential for health problems depends on the extent and type of pesticide exposure and the susceptibility of the individual. Children and the elderly are the most susceptible, the latter because their immune systems and organ function decline with age. Children's bodies are smaller and they receive proportionally higher doses of toxins per body weight; their organs can be damaged more readily because they are not fully developed. Furthermore, many of the most frequently used pesticides affect the nervous system, and children are more susceptible to neurotoxins than adults. The National Cancer Inst.i.tute found an increased risk of leukemia in children whose parents used pesticides in their home or garden.

Among the effects of pesticides, cancer is the most studied. Between 1969 and 1986, several types of cancer increased significantly among people ages 64 to 84 in six leading industrial countries. These cancer types are multiple-myeloma (a cancer that starts in the bone marrow and spreads to other bones), melanoma of the skin, and cancer of the prostate, bladder, brain, lung, and breast. Although farmers' general lifestyle is healthier than city folks, with lower risks for most cancers and noncancer diseases, they were found to have some specific cancers, including multiple-myeloma, lymphomas, skin melanomas, leukemia, and cancer of the lip, stomach, prostate, and brain. Work-related exposures were theorized to be causing specific cancers among farmers.

Evidence has acc.u.mulated that many industrial chemicals (including many common plastics and pesticides) mimic estrogen hormones, thereby disrupting reproduction and development in humans, mammals, birds, and fish just like diethylstilbesterol (DES) did to mothers and fetuses who received the drug in the '60s. These estrogenic-like chemicals may be the cause for the increasing incidence of cancer of the breast, t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es, and prostate. According to the American Chemical Society: (1) sperm count in men worldwide is 50% of what it was fifty years ago; (2) the incidence of testicular cancer has tripled and prostate cancer has doubled in the past fifty years; (3) in 1960 the incidence of breast cancer was one in twenty and in 1998 it is one in nine; and (4) young male alligators in pesticide-contaminated lakes in Florida have such small p.e.n.i.ses they are unable to function s.e.xually. Estrogen-mediated hormonal imbalances can create all these changes and more.

Estrogen is usually considered a female hormone, but males produce estrogen in small amounts. In the developing fetus, a specific ratio of androgens (male hormones) to estrogen must be maintained for proper s.e.xual differentiation to occur. If the hormone balance is disturbed, the offspring may be born with two sets of s.e.xual organs or a single set that is incompletely developed. Diminished sperm count and possible predisposition to cancer may be set at this stage.

Examples of estrogen mimickers are DDT, DDE, dieldrin, dicofol, methoxychlor, some PCBs, alkyl phenols from penta- to nonylphenol, as well as bisphenol-A (the building block of polycarbonate plastics, used in many common detergents, toiletries, lubricants, and spermicides). Many of these estrogen mimickers resist breaking down in the environment and are highly soluble in fat; thus they acc.u.mulate in the bodies of fish, birds, mammals, and humans. Nonvegetarians obviously acc.u.mulate a higher amount. One study showed that the mothers' milk of vegetarians contained only 1% the amount of pesticides as the milk of meat-eating mothers. Many of these estrogen mimickers will cross the placenta barrier and pa.s.s into the developing fetus.

Even the conservative Journal of the American Medical a.s.sociation has reported that estrogenic chemicals have an effect. Ana Soto, a researcher at Tufts University, combined ten estrogenic mimickers, each at one-tenth the dose necessary to produce a minimal response. She found that when all ten were combined, they were strong enough to produce an estrogenic response. This is significant because the US government has been regulating based on its testing of individual chemical effects. They have almost no data on the synergistic effects of the many pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, plastics, PCBs, etc., working together.

Scientists can pretend to discern "safe" levels for an individual chemical, but they have no idea of any safe level for combining chemicals. In fact, there are no "safe" levels. Political decision-makers need to understand that we have to abandon the chemical-by-chemical regulation approach and regulate whole cla.s.ses of chemicals. Furthermore, instead of setting standards according to pesticide effects on healthy adults, their effects on children should be used to set maximum exposure. Certain categories of dangerous chemicals need to be immediately discontinued if we are to survive as a species.

There are at least nineteen major chemicals used on US crops that are a.s.sociated with disrupting the human hormone system. According to the Was.h.i.+ngton, DC-based Environmental Working Group, about 220 million pounds of these hormone disrupters are applied to sixty-eight different crops annually. In 1992, Frank Falck, M.D., Ph.D., a.s.sistant professor of surgery at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, examined the tissues from suspicious breast lumps in forty women and found that those which were cancerous had higher levels of PCBs, DDT, and DDE (a DDT byproduct) than the benign tissues. Dr. Wolff, professor of community medicine at Mt. Sinai Medical Center in New York City, a.n.a.lyzed blood from more than 14,000 women and found that those who developed breast cancer had higher levels of DDE. He found that the women with the highest levels of DDE had four times the risk of breast cancer than those with the lower levels.

Since the 1960s, most researchers in the US have expressed the opinion that the findings which connect the estrogenic pesticides with breast and other cancer are only preliminary, but the Israeli government has already acted on the evidence with exciting results. From 1976 to 1986, Israel was the only country among twenty-eight countries studied where the breast cancer death rate dropped. One explanation was that in 1978, Israel banned three estrogenic pesticides. Within two years after the ban, lindane levels in the tissues dropped by 90%, DDT by 43%, and BHC by 98%. By 1986, the death rate for breast cancer among Israeli women below the age of 44 had dropped by 30%.

The amazing observation is that pesticides don't even achieve their stated purpose, yet we still are willing to risk our lives to use them. Dr. David Pimentel, one of the world's leading agriculture experts at Cornell University, estimates that more than 500 species of insects are now resistant to pesticides. It is no accident that crops destroyed by insects have nearly doubled during the last forty years in spite of an almost tenfold increase in the amount and toxicity of insecticides. One study showed that recent pesticide usage by Filipino rice farmers costs the individual farmer more in medical bills than it generates in increased rice production. Even on a cost-benefit versus health approach, the use of pesticides comes out on the negative side of things. Aside from increased rates of certain cancers, farmers in the Philippines who were not organic growers suffered nearly double the kidney and respiratory problems compared to organic farmers and were five times more likely to experience eye problems. Farmers who used pesticides had considerably more skin complaints, gastrointestinal problems, neurological problems, and hematological problems.

In 1986 the Indonesian government sponsored a plan to decrease the use of pesticides. The rice production since then has increased by 10% and there is much less capital outlay for pesticides and their concomitant medical problems. In Bangladesh, farmers using integrated pest management spent 75% less money on pesticides and increased their crop harvest by 14% over those using high levels of pesticides.

Pesticide usage is a major public health problem worldwide. It reflects a consciousness that is completely out of touch with the laws of nature. The National Academy of Sciences estimates that pesticides are responsible for 20,000 cancer cases per year. Cancer in the US is a serious concern, but what about the increased neurological problems, learning disabilities, and hyper-activity our children are experiencing on what appears to be a ma.s.s basis? How many environmental allergies and other detrimental effects on the immune system are being created?

What sort of consciousness does it take to continue to deliberately poison yourself and your family in order to get less effective crop outputs? What sort of consciousness does it take to manufacture these poisons and sell them? (Especially to sell banned poisonous chemicals to third-world countries where the people do not understand how to minimally protect themselves because of ignorance and poverty) Pesticide usage not only leads to disease but directly destroys the life force of the soil. I do not understand how people can choose to spend money for something that not only doesn't work, but poisons humans and the environment.

We can protect ourselves and change the situation by buying only organic produce. This not only helps us avoid pesticide poisoning, but supports the organic farmers who are rebuilding the soil. The more organic farmers there are, the less the organic produce will cost, and the more the soil is brought back into balance. According to a study at Tufts University, organic produce has a nutrient content approximately 88% higher than commercially grown produce. This means that by buying organic produce we actually get more for our money and for our health. Another way to oppose pesticide madness is to stay abreast of legislative attempts to undermine protection. For example, we all need to support bills like the Pesticide Food Safety Act. Presently, there is a movement to deregulate environmental protection on many levels, including pesticide regulation. Let the politicians know it is time they awoke and became more responsible to themselves and to their const.i.tuency.

Regardless of what Was.h.i.+ngton does, ultimately it comes down to us taking responsibility for our own health and the safety of our families and communities. We have the power to refuse to consume what is detrimental to our health and to the planet. This power of the marketplace is stronger than that of Was.h.i.+ngton politics. Let us put our money where our mouths and health are. Buy organic produce whenever possible. This simple act can help heal the Earth and all its inhabitants. We have the power to restore the world to one that is aligned with the healing harmony of the universe. Let us do it.

You Can Protect Yourself Against Food Chemicalization.

SINCE THERE is VERY LITTLE REAL CONTROL and monitoring by the US government or by the chemical companies, the responsibility for our health lies with us, as it always has. One has to avoid excess exposure to these poisons the best one can. According to the Pesticide Monitoring Journal published by the EPA, the major source of pesticide exposure comes from foods of animal origin. Diet for A New America points out that 9599% of all the toxic chemical residues come from meat, fish, dairy, and eggs. One can substantially avoid this high toxic exposure by choosing to eat vegetarian foods such as fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and grains, which are lower on the food chain and thus have less acc.u.mulation of these poisons. As mentioned earlier, The New England Journal of Medicine published a finding that the breast milk of vegetarian women has only one or two percent of the pesticide contamination that is the national average for breast-feeding women on a flesh-centered diet. This is a significant indication of how much effect one can have on one's pesticide exposure by becoming vegetarian. It is possible to further decrease exposure by only eating organically grown vegetarian foods. Sometimes, one is in places where it is not possible to obtain organic, vegetarian foods. It is still a safer choice to eat commercially grown fruits, vegetables, grains, nuts, and seeds rather than flesh foods. The body can detox a little pesticide exposure but becomes overwhelmed if the exposure is chronic or too high.

David Steinman, in his book Diet for a Poisoned Planet, has done an enormous amount of work in studying exactly which fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and grains have the lowest toxic residues. He a.n.a.lyzed foods for more than one hundred different industrial chemicals and pesticides, using laboratory detection limits that were five to ten times more sensitive than the normal FDA detection standards. He did this by taking his food samples from four different geographic regions, a.n.a.lyzing them exactly as they would be eaten, and repeating this for four years ending in 1986. This gave him a total of sixteen samples per food to a.n.a.lyze and average. Each of the foods was rated according to which toxins it contained and how much toxic residue was present. The combination of these two figures was factored into a cancer risk a.s.sessment. These findings were placed into three categories according to their safety. Safety was determined by the amount of pesticide residues and their cancer risk a.s.sessment. What I label as "relatively safe" are commercial foods which have minimal toxic effects. The next category, "marginally safe if eaten sparingly," is for foods to be avoided regularly. The third category is for commercial foods so potentially toxic that it is best to completely avoid them. I've turned his data for fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and grains into several graphs shown on the following pages. Using these charts will minimize one's toxic exposure if, and when, organic produce is not available (see the following tables).

The best way to be safe, of course, is to avoid commercial foods. If enough people care about themselves and their children to buy only organic foods, the law of consumer demand on the market will force a s.h.i.+ft that will increase the amount of organic farming and make more organic foods available at lower prices. Fortunately, a subtle s.h.i.+ft toward organic farming and produce is happening in many parts of the US.

Learning to Read Labels Is Good for Your Health.

WTHEN ONE DOES DECIDE THAT FOOD QUALITY and health are important, one enters into a whole new world of organic food and the healing lifestyle that goes along with it. There is great delight in learning to eat whole, natural, organic foods. Part of this dietary s.h.i.+ft requires learning to read labels. One has to be clever at this. The U.S. News and World Report 6/18/90 issue points out that the FDA found 47% of domestic and 76% of foreign foods did not live up to the nutrient billing on the product label. I want to caution that shopping in a health food store does not mean one should not read labels. Not everything in a health food store is necessarily healthy.

The word "natural" these days can mean almost anything. The safest thing is to look for the words "certified organic." By insisting on organic foods whenever possible, we are not only protecting ourselves and our families but also encouraging support for organic farming and, therefore, directly supporting the regeneration of our degenerating soils. A Harris poll showed that 80% of Americans want organic fruit and vegetables and over half are willing to pay for the small added cost of buying organic. Not only is organic food safer, but because it is grown in organically prepared soils, some initial research has suggested the organic food usually contains a greater concentration of nutrients, such as vitamins, minerals, and enzymes, than pesticide-grown foods. For example, in the Firman Bear Report on research done at Rutgers University, organically grown foods were much richer in minerals than the "look alike" commercial produce. For example, organic tomatoes had greater than five times more calcium, twelve times more magnesium, three times more pota.s.sium, 600% more organic sodium (organic sodium does not necessarily increase blood pressure like table salt), sixty-eight times more manganese, and 1900 times more iron. Organic spinach had more than double the calcium, five and one-half times the magnesium, more than three times the pota.s.sium, seventy times the sodium, one hundred and seventeen times as much manganese, and eighty-three times the iron. Organic lettuce had three and one-half times the calcium, three times the magnesium, three times the pota.s.sium, thirty times the sodium, one hundred and sixty-nine times the manganese, and fifty-seven times the iron. The overall estimate of the Rutgers research suggested that organic foods had 87% more minerals and trace elements than food that was commercially grown. Although organic foods may cost more, mineral for mineral they are more than worth their price. Even though I do not have data about increased vitamins in organic food, I am sure it is also the case.

Au Naturel.

Dr. Paavo Airola, in his popular book How to Get Well, points out that it has been scientifically proven that health and longevity are directly related to the naturalness of the food one eats. He notes that in areas where indigenous people eat whole, natural, unprocessed foods, they experience good health and longevity. When denatured, refined, processed, and canned foods such as white flour and white sugar are introduced into these cultures, acute and chronic degenerative diseases become rampant. Knowing this, one can make a choice to reverse this process by starting to eat whole organic foods. This is further explored in Chapter 8, "Deficient Diet: A Cause of Physical and Mental Degeneration."

Part of making this s.h.i.+ft involves buying one's food in different places. It means getting familiar with health food stores which have organic produce sections, finding supermarkets which have added organic produce sections, or even asking your local supermarket to add an organic produce section. In certain parts of the country, farmers' markets are frequented by organic farmers selling their produce at prices extremely compet.i.tive with commercially grown produce. If one can find organic produce at local farmers' markets, it is worth talking to the organic farmer about how his or her soil is prepared. This way one develops a feeling for the meaning of organic produce and also gets to know the person who is producing the food. It is a way to personalize the process of food "gathering." The food and the food provider are no longer anonymous with this approach.

Dangers of Eating Flesh.

STAGE ONE INCLUDES DROPPING RED MEAT from the diet. If one is not ready to completely let go of red meat, one may consider eating organically raised flesh foods until one is ready. Letting go is much easier to do if one is well-informed about the health dangers of red meat, not to mention the moral issues connected to eating meat, which have already been addressed in previous chapters. The first thing to keep in mind is that farm animals, primarily cattle, chickens, eggs, and milk, are not of the same quality or as safe as they were one hundred years ago. In the past, the animals were a lot healthier because their food was largely unadulterated, since most of them were "free range" animals.

The livestock industry has depersonalized today's farm animals into "products" that are ma.s.s-produced in an a.s.sembly line fas.h.i.+on. Farm animals have a considerably higher percentage of fat today due to lack of exercise and the chemicals and hormones added to make them grow bigger and faster in as cheap a way as possible. In 1975, the World Conference on Animal Products reported that factory-farmed animals have about thirty times more saturated fat than pasture-raised animals. Since World War II, these farm animals have been inundated with an insidious brew of pesticides, hormones, growth stimulants, insecticides, tranquilizers, radioactive isotopes, herbicides, antibiotics, and other a.s.sorted drugs and colorants. All these substances are considered legal. Other illegal hormones are sometimes added to increase weight.

There are so many problems a.s.sociated with eating flesh and animal by-products such as milk and eggs that it would literally take another book in itself to describe these hazards. A few outstanding pieces of information must be mentioned, however. For example, Dr. Saenz, a pediatrician, reported in the February 1982 issue of Journal of the Puerto Rico Medical a.s.sociation that an epidemic of premature s.e.xual development was connected to the eating of hormone-rich animal products. The segments of the population primarily afflicted were female children age one and up. Infants and young children began to develop mature b.r.e.a.s.t.s and uteruses, v.a.g.i.n.al bleeding, and other signs of p.u.b.erty. One fourteen-year-old boy was reported to have mature female b.r.e.a.s.t.s that needed to be surgically removed. Dr. Saenz's findings showed that the appearance of abnormal breast tissue in infants was related to local, whole milk consumption. In the older children, it was related to consumption of whole milk, beef, and chicken flesh from animals given estrogen to increase their weight. The doctor consistently found that when these foods were removed from the diet, the symptoms usually disappeared within a short time. According to Diet for A New America, one English medical journal reported that hormone traces in chemically fattened livestock were causing British school girls to mature s.e.xually at least three years earlier than the previous national average. There is reason to believe that to some extent this high estrogen intake from beef and dairy products happens in the US as well.

Modern science has found a variety of diseases and parasites that can be transferred from animals to man, such as trichinosis, toxoplasma gondii, fungi, and even viral infections and salmonella, which is the main cause of acute dysentery. There is also the problem of severe infections from antibiotic-resistant bacteria growing in the meat as a result of the heavy use of antibiotics in livestock.