WHATS THE DEAL
WITH FOOD?

What’s the deal with food?

We don’t eat what our ancestors ate, everything is now “genetically modified” because it’s easier to grow and looks better, and let’s be honest, who doesn’t pick the most beautiful looking apple on the pile?  It might be interesting to know that apples aren’t all the same size and color, we do that so they look more appealing but we’re not really sure what the health implications will be long term because we are a wait and see society.  We try something for a while and see how it works out and then change it later if it’s not going well.  Look at the “low fat” phenomenon.  In the 80’s we decided fat was the enemy so everything became low fat, interestingly we became more fat in the low fat insanity.  Now we are on the higher fat diet and in 10 years we’ll see how that works out for us, probably with similar results.  There’s a good chance we’d probably be fine if we let go of the all or nothing mentality and ate moderately but that doesn’t seem to be in our future for the moment.  Because we have changed everything so quickly our body doesn’t recognize the food we eat now, panics, reacts strangely and we end up with symptoms.  Add that to the fact that your food is probably lacking in the vitamins, minerals and antioxidants needed so your body can work effectively and you just don’t seem to feel as good as you could.

Without seeming like a fatalist let’s take a quick look at the problems with your food.
Animals are pumped full of hormones and antibiotics so they get grow faster and get less infections, if they’re exposed to hormones and antibiotics so are you.
We want to maximize the return of our crop investment so we either genetically modify food or we spray them full of herbicides and pesticides so the bugs won’t eat them.  Here’s a question, if bugs won’t eat your food and they’ll eat anything, should you be eating it?
Because of the fear of a variety of different organisms, obviously for good reason, we cook our food as much as we can to protect ourselves.  In the cooking process, a large amount of the nutrition is lost on already nutrition deficient food.  Can we afford to not cook our foods given the state of our planet? No, but we have to fill in the gaps for what is lost in the process.  
Additives and preservatives are added to food to make it taste better and allow it to last longer on the shelves both at the supermarket and in your pantry.  Food should contain enzymes that are used to help your body break down the foods, but they don’t only work in your body.  The enzymes are the structures in the food that cause the food to break down or “rot”, if your food doesn’t go bad on a shelf…. ever, we don’t know if it has any nutritional value for your body.  A good example of this is the twinkie.  Rumor has it that a twinkie can be left on a window sill for up to a year in it’s package without going bad because of all the additives and preservatives.  Food should go bad at some point in a timeline, probably sooner than later.  If it doesn’t, we don’t know if your digestive system can actually break the food down to its nutritional components as adequately as we would want. …. And that’s probably not what you want.
You need the vitamins and minerals to allow your cells to produce energy and clean up the waste once that energy is produced.  Minerals and vitamins come from the soil the crops are grown in.  If the soil is depleted of nutrients the chain continues and our food is depleted as well.  If cells can’t get rid of the garbage they produce at some point they’ll shut down energy production because they can’t afford to produce more.  Think about if your septic tank broke down and you had waste all over your floor.  If you couldn’t clean it up you’d have to shut everything down, pack up and move.  Your cells feel the same way so vitamins and minerals are needed in the cleaning and energy production processes.  At some point the waste can cause problems in the cells leading to disease.  We want to prevent that from happening.  

Bottom Line:  It’s unfortunate that we have problematic food concerns however, such is life.  How do you get past it?
Take a multivitamin or a greens product from a naturopathic doctor’s clinic or a health food store.  Are all multi’s created equally?  No, book an appointment to find out why.
Eat foods as close to what they originally started out as as possible.  For example, an apple is a better choice than apple juice.  Steak is a better choice than hot dogs.  Who really knows what hot dogs are anyways, all beef or not? 
Eat foods that have naturally occurring colors as these are the foods with anti-oxidants and anti-oxidants keep you young and vibrant.
Have a sense of humour about food.  Things aren’t changing anytime soon so expect your body to pick up the slack.  Most things have a mind over matter component, so assume your body will find the good in the food you are eating and work the details out later.  Worrying about all the things that could be are probably just encouraging them to happen.  When you’re driving in your car you assume that your going to get to your destination safely regardless of road conditions or cell phone addicts but you have insurance just in case.  Most of us aren’t fixated on whether we’re going to get into an accident that day, so do the same with food.  Think that the food is good for you and use your supplements as an insurance policy.  Assume it’s going to be ok because it has to be and expect our world situation to change in the near future.  You never know, stranger things have happened…..