Health & Happiness - Uncategorized

on food and fasting

nospam@example.com (admin) — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 18:55:00 -0500

The other day, one of my co-workers remarked,"For someone of your size, you sure can eat a lot." It took me a minute to figure out what she meant by "someone of my size". At first I was prepped to hear it as "for such a big girl", just like I'd been hearing for years how flexible I was "for a fat chick". Then I realized she meant that I didn't look like a fat girl at all, but that I sure did eat like one. Ouch.

Well, she's got me there. I've been eating like a pig this summer, and it shows. Not only have I gained over ten pounds, but it seems like my waist has swollen to twice its size. Europe didn't help. We ate out twice per day every day for three and a half weeks. We were staying in hotels and walking around a lot, so leftovers weren't really practical. Therefore, I practiced my plate polishing skills, the art of which I'd long since perfected as a kid with seemingly "hollow" legs. 'Cept when I hit puberty, when the darn things filled up and started spreading to my hips and boobs and butt and belly and everywhere else.

Even though I've never walked so damn much in my life, I didn't lose a single pound or inch in Europe. Instead, it was everything I could do to not gain more than 5 pounds. Everything would have been okay had I gone right back to my normal routine when I got back, except that then my beloved went in for eye surgery. As was prearranged, I stayed home to take care of him for the following two weeks. That's when it really got bad.

Once more with the two meals a day. Home cooked. With love. Lots of love. And butter. And bacon. And bread. Plus I was sort of trying to impress him, just a little bit, and mostly at first. I never get to cook for him. This was my big chance. He's also got a hearty appetite and specifically requested meat. So I made sure to deliver, as best I could. This wouldn't have been so bad if not for the way I was plating things.

Since his eyesight was impaired, I was literally making plates instead of doing more of a "serve yourself" buffet style service. Since the fridge was much fuller than usual, I was also doing everything I could to avoid leftovers. But I wanted to make sure he was full and that there was a good, attractive variety of food available at each meal. Anyone see where this is going?

Yeah, so picture some really big plates of food, much like we'd been splurging on in Europe. Lots of meat. Lots of bread. Lots of everything. Not only that, but I was making the portions more or less exactly equal. Which would be fine in theory if not for the fact that he outweighs me by about 50 pounds and a good foot in height. You'll notice that emhe/em didn't put on any weight this summer. Not a single pound. In fact, I think he even lost weight.

Excuses, excuses, excuses. The truth is, I was stressed. A lot. When I get stressed, sometimes I eat to cope. Especially if the things I normally do to cope aren't available, like weed and sex and stuff. It's not like I don't know I'm doing this. I can even feel the frantic desperation, the futile defeat, the hope and a prayer and willful ignorance that I'm gonna have to pay for this later. And I am.

It ain't so bad as all that, though. I finally have some time to myself and have cleared my schedule so that I can take the time to readjust my appetite through a series of mini switchel fasts. Once upon a time, I used to fast for 24 hours once a week but I find that for appetite reduction it works just as well to liquid fast daily through the morning and into the late afternoon, then eat sensibly after that. Already my appetite is going down, my waistline is disappearing, and I've lost a couple pounds.

More importantly, I feel lots better. For one, I don't hate myself and feel that lurking sense of shame at being out of control of my feeding urge. For another, it's about that time of month again. Not for the first time, I notice the connection between how much I eat and how heavy my flow is, or isn't. Not eating delays and lightens menstruation and cramps. Binge eating increases both, especially when I've already been eating heavily throughout the month.

Overeating just makes me feel heavier and lethargic, a cycle which just gets worse and worse the longer it goes on. Whereas intentional caloric deprivation literally makes me feel lighter, in not just a physical but spiritual way. I feel good. I feel optimistic. Vibrant. Healthy. Happy.

They say that the only proven method of life extension is dramatic calorie reduction. I find that not hard to believe at all. It seems like all this digestion stuff really does take a bit of work for the body to process, work that leaves the remaining systems sluggish and lethargic. At the end of the day, I don't think it's so much what you eat as it is how much you eat. At least as far as weight control goes. For general good health, it's important to eat nutritious wholesome food versus all those toxic corporate "foodstuffs" manufactured with profit vs health in mind.

All that said, I really hate dieting. I can't diet. I won't diet. Oddly enough, I don't consider these fasting episodes of mine to be dieting at all. I don't really look at them as detoxing, either. Instead, I look at it as just another tool - a mechanism I can use to remodulate my appetite and eating habits. It's not that I'm denying myself food, but that I'm intentionally fasting right now. It's its own thing, an experience in the now. Very zen. If I think about eating, I can easily ignore temptation by telling myself that "Oh yeah, I'm not eating right now. Maybe later." Then I drink some more switchel and the urge goes away. Pot helps, too.

things I thought were interesting at 3 a.m.

nospam@example.com (admin) — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 11:11:56 -0500

Stupid insomnia. Finally got sick of laying in bed going crazy so got up and went for a walk down to the Chain Bridge, around Parliament, then back upstream to the bridge bordering on the island. Forgot how much I enjoy climbing on statues and other public edifices in the middle of the night and perching. The photos of the chain bridge were taken from on top of and beneath the supports. Actually had a lot of fun. Tired now, but still not quite ready to sleep. I might not sleep at all today. Some days it's like that.

[cincopa 10487026]

floating in a Danube dream

nospam@example.com (admin) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:57:24 -0500

Wow. Lucked into a lovely boat tour of the Danube and its bridges, accompanied by one of the better buffets I've ever been treated to. Goodness gracious, but it's good to be me.

[cincopa 10487001]

After dark it got a bit difficult to take pictures what with the lack of light, the moving boat, and the rain. Not to mention six glasses of wine. Nothing daunted, I clicked away anyway. These remind me of some of my better acid trips back in the day.

[cincopa 10487004]

Best. Vacation. Ever.

adventures in grocery getting

nospam@example.com (admin) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 15:05:43 -0500

Got hungry so started wandering. Stumbled into a grocery store by accident. Score!

The cheese, yogurt & meat aisles were amazing. Dairy and meat in general were super interesting. I'm a total milk junkie and apparently all the milk around here comes in antiseptic packs, which is kind of weird. I had some last night from the gas station and I didn't like it, but that often applies to gas station milk. The produce section was nice and had lots of selection for being as small as it was. Very impressive.

You can tell that wine is important, as there were two full aisles devoted to its sale, as well as another row to beer and soda stuffs. Also impressive was the canned fish selection, as well as the fresh meat deli. Kind of makes me wish I had a kitchen. As is, I managed to pull together a terrific meal on the fly consisting of bread, meat, cheese, and fruit.

Interesting side note on the fruit - they turned me back at the checkout and made me go back to the produce department to get my banana and nectarine weighed and labeled. Not speaking a lick of English or Hungarian between us made this communication particularly challenging, but I figured it out eventually and left the store with a deep feeling of satisfaction for having successfully navigated the Budapest grocery.

[cincopa 10486969]

And the food? All very yummy. Food is good.

bitching in Budapest

nospam@example.com (admin) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 13:03:06 -0500

Left home at 3:00 o'clock Saturday morning. Don't usually go to bed until 1:00 or 2:00 anyway so stayed up Friday night. Flew out around 6:30 from San Francisco. Got about an hour of sleep on the plane before I woke up to the distinct feeling of blood running down my thighs, and not for the last time. I think I broke records for soiling my undies on this stupid trip. I haven't bled on myself so much in, well, ever. One of the hardest periods I've ever had with very limited abilities to do anything about it. Embarrassing, humiliating, and aggravating all at once. Color me red and completely unthrilled to be a woman.

Time starts getting foggy about the time we hit JFK in New York for a five hour layover. Promptly got separated. He went to look at timetables and I bee-lined for the restroom. Got out and he was nowhere to be found. Our flight to JFK had been going to Istanbul, so I somehow got it in my head that that's where we were heading so off I went to Gate 7 to wait for him. About an hour later I gave up and went back to look for him near the restroom. Sure enough, he was right where I'd been looking for him in the first place. The sleep deprivation was really starting to kick in at this point.

Five hour layover at JFK then an impossibly long ride across the ocean. Got the middle row so was completely impossible to sleep. Completely. Not fucking kidding. I can't sleep sitting up. I have to curl up on my side. Period. Meanwhile, Mr. Happy slept soundly next to me for pretty much the entire trip. But I didn't want to kill him or anything. Smug, well rested sonofabitch; I can't remember the last time I've resented someone so much.

It's 11:00 AM Sunday morning when we arrive in Budapest. The taxi ride was uneventful and I was struck by how not very different things were here. Everywhere we go, American music is playing. The cars drive on the right side of the road, although there is a white line in the middle of the road instead of a yellow, making it impossible for me to tell which roads were one-ways and which had oncoming traffic. Of course, the oncoming traffic made that pretty clear pretty quickly. The roads are a bit on the narrow side, too. I'm just happy I'm not driving.

So, um, yeah. The last time I remember sleeping is Thursday night. I've bled through my keeper and panties five or six times and I'm so tired I can't see straight and I'm starting to hallucinate. By all means, let's go tour the fucking city. Asshole. Did I mention that I hated his well rested ass for a day or so there? Needless to say, Sunday was not a happy day. Saw some cool shit but really couldn't muster the enthusiasm or energy to care.

[cincopa 10486941]

Moving right along, I got some sleep Sunday night. Thank god. Lots of sleep. Luckily, the forced march through the city the day before had pretty much pushed all remaining blood out of my body and into my poor panties, so that issue more or less resolved itself. Nothing like getting your period over in 2 days flat. Men. I hate them all right now.

Where was I? Oh yes, Monday. Monday was good. Refreshed, energized, and relatively cramp free; I was ready to explore. Good fucking thing, too, cuz I had no choice. There are an awful lot of hills here. Steep ones at that. Lots of stairs. But worth it. At the top of these particular stairs was a park. The first thing I found was the Philosopher's garden. Ah yes, Monday was definitely a reset point. This made me very happy. There were statues for Abraham, Jesus, Buddha, Lao Tze, and some Egyptian looking character who from behind looked like a 1950's housewife complete with bouffant hairdo. Very strange. There were also spots for Ghandi, Saint Francis, and the Bhodi Dharma. There were signs explaining why their statues were gone, but I couldn't read them. Anyone here speak Hungarian to translate? All I can make out is that something happened in April of 2007 and that money is somehow involved (the forint is the local currency).

[cincopa 10486944]

Further up the hill were more statues, these ones in miniature. I've never seen so many statues in my life as I have here. I love it. They are everywhere. This diorama was particularly interesting as it seemed to tell some epic tale of love, longing, and separation; as well as some cataclysmic world changing event which caused a rift in the world and between the man and woman. I wish I knew the story, but I don't mind wondering, either. Food for the imagination, and a wonderful presentation.

[cincopa 10486945]

At the top of the hill above the park was the Citadel, a fortress and hotspot for the last days of World War II. The history is a bit confusing, but it seems like Russia and Germany were basically fighting for the territory. Russia eventually won and promptly put up statues of communist victory everywhere. When Hungary broke away from communism, instead of destroying the statues, they moved them all into a special park as a memorial to communist ambition. I hope to visit later in the week.

[cincopa 10486947]

It was the first time I'd ever been in a World War II museum. It was rough. I never cared much for history, but this was real life, lived by real people. The pictures made me cry. Especially the children. War is so senseless, so insane, and so close. We are not above it, nor far removed. We create war and destruction today because we don't know, we don't care, we don't understand the horror. We've never seen it. We are spoiled, us Americans. Spoiled, blind, and arrogant. Meanwhile,we blithely destroy entire civilizations to better our bottom line. Civilizations with people. People like us. People who die. People who have children. Children that die. And for what, and why?

[cincopa 10486946]

Moving right along, we wandered the ramparts and grounds of the fortress, taking pictures of the ever present statuary and fooling around on the anti aircraft guns on the grounds. Nothing like sitting in a rusty chunk of heavy metal to put you in the place of the desperate soldiers futilely trying to defend their home. Apparently, the Citadel was supposed to be an anti aircraft defense station, but it didn't really work out that way. The few guns they had were ineffective and they never managed to install more.

Back down the hill, we walked across one of the many bridges over the Danube and hopped a trolley to take us a bit downstream. That's one thing I really love about this place. The public transportation system rocks, and is well used. We bought a weekly pass, which gets us on any form of public transportation we want, including the subway, buses, and trolleys/trams Â? all of which run every ten minutes or so. Very nice. You can get anywhere on public transportation here, and quickly, too. I have yet to see an empty bus, train, or trolley. In fact, it's often standing room only.

[cincopa 10486948]

Oh, that brings me to one of the better parts of yesterday. Actually, all of yesterday was just freaking incredible. I loved yesterday, especially in comparison to the day before, which I shall forthwith refer to as Â?mad MondayÂ?, cuz I was. Oh yes, but one of the highlights of my day was being able to help a fellow traveler. He was on the bus and I was kind of staring at him because I thought he was really hot. He came up to the front asking which doors to use for what and where to pay. We got off the bus at the station and I showed him where to go and how to get a ticket. It feels good to help people. Especially cute ones.

Had a lovely lunch on a boat on the banks of the Danube. The food was wonderfully rich and just downright decadent. Food here is kind of a crapshoot, but when it's good, it's amazing. Even when it's something I don't like, it's still amazing, and luckily there's two of us so it's pretty much a guarantee that one of us will enjoy it. Like I discovered that I do not like Roquefort salad dressing, but he does. I have difficulties with certain strong cheeses, while I love others. Like I said, it's a crapshoot. But I like to experiment and try new things, which makes traveling a delightful experience. Like an army, I travel on my stomach. It's all about the food tourism, baby...

[cincopa 10486949]

I kept seeing this awesome castle looking thing built into the side of a mountain and we finally got to go inside. It turned out to be a church, built into a cave. Wow. I wish I'd gotten better pictures, but pictures alone just can't convey the peace and tranquility of that cool, dark place. Curves and hollows and lamps and saints all mixed together to make a truly unique setting to worship. It's hard not to feel loved by god when enveloped in the embrace of the solid, unmoving earth. Fucking fantastic.

[cincopa 10486950]

So, after an amazing day of historical, culinary, and religious stimuli; we were able to wind down and relax in a world famous Turkish bath. Dear god, but that was wonderful. I love to soak, and public baths are like a gift from heaven. These had less jets and cooler pools than the ones I visited in Taiwan, but the pools were bigger and they had several sauna rooms, which were intense. I found that I could tolerate the sauna better after immersing myself in one of the ice water pools first for a few minutes, but I still found it difficult to breathe deeply through my nose because the heat burned the living hell out of my nasal passages. So I settled for short, shallow breaths.

All in all, 'twas a wonderful day. Only problem was, it never really ended. Got back to the hotel last night. He went to bed after checking his email then I tried to upload some photos to FaceBook. The first small batch went well, but then it failed on me three times after that. Then I got into chat conversations with my mom and ex boyfriend and the next thing I know, it's five o'clock in the morning again. Fuck. Thank god he's in a meeting today and I can pretty much just fuck off on my own time. Let's hear it for leisure. I think I'll go back and see if the maid is done making up the room so I can get online and post this bad boy. With pictures. That should use up a couple more hours. I just wish the internet cable reached all the way to the bed. I could use a nap.

Oh shit. Skip that. I forgot that I had a final to do and classes to register for. Yikes. Fuck me running.

learned optimism & buddhism

nospam@example.com (admin) — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 21:42:10 -0600

This is the story of a book, a philosophy, and how the two are inextricably intertwined in my mind. The book is Learned Optimism by Martin E.P. Seligman, Ph.D. The philosophy is Buddhism. Both were initially first recommended to me by the first shrink I ever saw twice.

She recommended both book and philosophy highly. I didn't listen. For starters, optimists give me the willies. I consider myself to be a realist. There's an old saying that the pessimist sees only the overwhelming darkness of the tunnel; the optimist sees only the light at the end of the tunnel; but the realist is the one who recognizes that light as the headlamp of the oncoming train.

Buddhism was even less personally appealing. For some reason, its proponents seemed to consider the cessation of desire to be a good thing! Now, anyone who knows me at all will understand just how unappetizing that particular idea was to my sensibilities. I love my desires. I live for my desires. Hell, I am my desires. Desire didn't cause suffering, desire caused pleasure. The basic premise didn't make sense.

I was resistant to pretty much everything she told me and never bothered to follow either lead, even though other sources were to second her advice and recommendations in the years to come.

Finally, a copy of Learned Optimism found its way into my hands when I was right at the end of a junket of self-help book reading and right before I discovered The Secret. The timing was exactly right; I was ready to listen. Immediately I kicked myself for not reading it years before as I quickly realized what I held in my hands. It was a formula! This book contained a systematic process for making practical, immediate life changes.

Difficulties in life are discussed in terms of personal explanatory styles, or "habitual way(s) of explaining bad events", which stem directly from your view of your place in the world whether you think you are valuable and deserving or worthless and hopeless it is the hallmark of whether you are an optimist or a pessimist." (Seligman 44) People with pessimistic explanatory styles tend to "give up easily and become depressed." (Seligman 98) People with optimistic explanatory styles tend to bounce back and pick up again where they started. The difference is not in how we appear to others, but rather is a way "to talk to yourself when you suffer a personal defeat." (Seligman 207)

Explanatory styles involve choices centering around three areas of perception: permanence, pervasiveness, and personalization. When events happen, whether we perceive them as either negative or positive, we habitually filter them through these three dimensions, each which presents a distinct choice of its own; permanent versus temporary, specific versus universal, and internal versus external.

For example, when something bad happens to me, I can choose to believe its existence to be either permanent or temporary; i.e. "I never get things done on time!" versus "I let myself get distracted, this time." Thinking of bad things in permanent terms of never' or always' indicates a pessimistic explanatory style, whereas using qualifiers like sometimes' and lately' and blaming bad events on temporary or "transient conditions" marks one as an optimist. (Seligman 44)

Conversely, when something good happens to me, I also choose to believe its existence to be either permanent or temporary. "It's my lucky day" versus "I'm always lucky." (Seligman 45) Here, thinking of good things in terms of permanent causes indicates an optimistic explanatory style, whereas a tendency to view good things as temporary in nature is certainly pessimistic.

"Permanence is about time. Pervasiveness is about space." (Seligman 46) Pervasiveness, the second area of perception, pertains to how much we let our reactions to events bleed over into other areas of our lives.

For example, when something bad happens to me, I can choose to believe its existence to be either universal and widespread throughout my life or specific and confined merely to a particular instance; i.e. "My life sucks." Versus "I don't like my job very much."

Thinking of bad things in universal terms, making broad generalizations about such and applying them to life across the board is the mark of a pessimist, whereas isolating specific feelings of failure to the pertinent events themselves and not letting them spill over into other areas of life indicates a more optimistic explanatory style.

Conversely, when something good occurs, I choose to believe its existence to be either pervasive or situationally dependent; i.e. "I'm smart." Versus "I'm smart at math." (Seligman 48) Here, thinking of good things in universal terms indicates an optimistic explanatory style, whereas the tendency to view good things as isolated by circumstance is sad and certainly pessimistic.

The third dimension of perception, Personalization, involves blame and credit. For example, when something bad happens to me, I choose to believe its existence to be from either internal or external sources; i.e. "I'm insecure." Versus "I grew up in poverty." (Seligman 50) Thinking of bad things as internally caused not only indicates pessimism but also low self esteem, whereas placing fault externally is actually more optimistic and self validating.

Conversely, when good things happen, our tendency to credit either ourselves or others indicates healthy optimism or pessimism, respectively, as "people who believe they cause good things tend to like themselves better than people who believe good things come from other people or circumstances." (Seligman 50)

In summary, a person with an optimistic explanatory style would tend to interpret good events as permanent, pervasive, and personal and to interpret bad events as temporary, specific, and externally caused.

By contrast, a person with a pessimistic explanatory style would tend to interpret good events as temporary, specific, and externally caused and to interpret bad events as permanent, pervasive and personally wrought.

But what does all this have to do with Buddhism, you may ask? Good question. Where Seligman's book provided a simple formula for immediate application, Buddhism, as explained by Thich Nhat Hanh in The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching, provides a deeper explanation, an almost meta understanding of the same concepts. When discussing the Three Dharma Seals, the Buddha "offered us impermanence, nonself, interbeing, and emptiness to discover the true nature of reality." (Hanh 137)

In some senses, we can draw direct connections between the three areas of perception (permanence, pervasiveness, and personalization) and the Three Dharma Seals of impermanence (anitya), nonself (anatman), and nirvana. Indeed, Thich Nhat Hanh even uses near identical language to describe the nature of the first two seals, "From the point of view of time, we say impermanence', and from the point of view of space, we say nonself'." (Hanh 132) The comparisons stop matching up so neatly after that, but I believe the topics encompassed within The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching more than envelop those in Learned Optimism, taking us from mere practice and following of formula to a living understanding, to wisdom.

For when one applies the understanding gained from Buddhist teaching to the layer of action based upon optimist formulas, we then "stop discussing things and begin to realize the teachings in our own life, a moment comes when we realize that our life is the path, and we no longer rely merely on the forms of practice." (Hanh 122)

I must have had more Buddhist teachers these last few years than I ever imagined. By the time I discovered the path, I found I was already walking it. Most startling was to find a personal understanding of the truth in statements like this, that "when we feel happy and peaceful, our happiness and peace radiate around us, and others can enjoy it as well." (Hanh 159)

I came to my own understanding of impermanence, interbeing, nonself, and emptiness through contemplation of the night sky combined with simultaneous study in astronomy, chemistry and human biology. It was easy to see the interconnected yet fleeting nature of all things when viewed from either the macro or microcosmic level, or both.

But there was still something missing. I still didn't understand all this nonsense about desire and suffering. Sure, I get that all life is suffering. I can accept that as a point of argument, even if it does seem somewhat, um, pessimistic. The problem was not with the philosophy as such, but rather, the oversimplification of the philosophy into what is, admittedly, a hot button term for me personally. Better, for me, than desire is to think in terms of non-attachment.

In a way, Buddhism can be considered to be that realism I was so fond of. Buddhism realizes and recognizes that everything pretty much sucks. In fact, the Five Remembrances spell it out quite clearly:

I am of the nature to grow old, have ill-health, and die. Everyone I love will change and die and "my actions are my only true belongings." (Hanh 124)

Rather than being depressing, these remembrances are liberating as they remind us to be mindful of the joys of the here and now.

In fact, that is the key to non-attachment, is mindfulness. Attachment is to things not of the here and now; past lost or future dreamed or dreaded, the inability to live in the present moment is what keeps us imprisoned and causes us anxiety, "the illness of our time." Yet, "letting go gives us freedom, and freedom is the only condition for happiness. If, in our heart, we still cling to anything anger, anxiety, or possessions we cannot be free." (Hanh 78) In fact, Thich Nhat Hanh goes on to say, "If we look deeply into our craving, we will see that we already have what we crave, because everything is already a part of everything else." (Hanh 79)

In The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching, Thich Nhat Hanh talks about habit energies, our mindless ways of being that sweep and push us along. He says that we must learn to simply stop. The three dimensions of perception in Learned Optimism may be thought of as habit energies that we must learn to stop, examine, and rearrange. Left unchecked, these habitual energies carry us along like a runaway horse. When asked where we are going, we may only refer the question to the horse.

Only by stopping will we be able to "touch the truth of suffering with our mindfulnessto recognize and identify our specific suffering, its specific causes, and the way to remove these causes and end our suffering." (Hanh 22) We must face our suffering. That therapist, the one who first introduced me to these ideas, she also told me to meditate. I told her I couldn't stop thinking long enough. She said that if I had a thought, to simply recognize it as such.

Her words could have come straight from The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching:

"To observe our feelings, we sit on the bank of the river and identify each feeling as it flows by. It may be pleasant, unpleasant, or neutralRecognize it, smile to it, look deeply into it, and embrace it with all our heart. If we continue to look deeply, we discover the true nature of that feeling, and we are no longer afraid." (Hanh 178)

This brings me back to my current position on the path, that of a writer constantly trying to overcome fear and live truly and deeply, because "non-fear is the basis of true happiness. The greatest gift we can offer others is our non-fear." (Hanh 212) I sure hope that's true, because that is the path I intend to take straight into the fear. I will love my fear and embrace it, and in it, find peace. And fear itself? I choose to view fear as temporary, situationally specific, and externally caused; whereas happiness will be considered as permanent, pervasive and intrinsic to my basic existence. And I will drink deeply of both as I watch them flow by.

tragedy and the tao

nospam@example.com (admin) — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 21:49:30 -0600

Walking in two worlds: Logos vs. Mythos

In his first book, The Birth of Tragedy, Nietzsche defines the greatest philosophical schism in history in terms of Apollo versus Dionysus, two Greek Gods who represented Order and Chaos, loosely. To me, this can also be seen as the struggle for supremacy of the conscious versus the unconscious, the rational versus the irrational, and reason versus emotion. As someone with equally strong right brain and left brain tendencies, I have been obsessed with this dichotomy all semester.

Since the time of the Greeks, the Western world has had its gaze firmly affixed upon the Apollonian path of logic, science and reason, insisting that everything must be proven and ordered in order to be valid. Nietzsche, however, insists that there is more to reality than reason alone and maintains that achieving a Dionysian ecstatic state brings one into line with the collective, with the communal, the universal, which takes one out of oneself and connects one to the greater principle, or the hidden, truer reality - "his own condition complete oneness with the essence of the universe."[1]

Reading the Tao, however, added to my suspicions that there was more to this dualism than I had seen even with Nietzsche. Specifically, the concept of yin and yang brought an even deeper level of understanding to the concepts of duality and balance, almost a meta level. I could now tie in the Apollonian with hot male yang controlling energy, anxious to put structure and meaning onto reality, whereas the cool Dionysian feminine principle instead seems to coexist effortlessly with the spirit of existence. From the Tao:

"The universe is sacred.
You cannot improve it.
If you try to change it, you will ruin it.
If you try to hold it, you will lose it.
So sometimes things are ahead and sometimes they are behind;
Sometimes breathing is hard, sometimes it comes easily;
Sometimes there is strength and sometimes weakness;
Sometimes one is up and sometimes down.
Therefore the sage avoids extremes, excesses, and complacency."[2]

The Tao also shed more light on what I suspect may be another way to tap into the Dionysian state of existence, aside from Nietzsche's single track focus on music. Each philosophical path seems to have a slightly different version of the same theme, an ecstatic, shamanic offshoot that rejects the path of reason and embraces instead the oft shunned path of intuition and faith. In Hinduism, it is bhakti yoga. In Buddhism, it is mindfulness. In Taoism, it is letting go. For Nietzsche, the Dionysian satyr "was man's true prototype, an expression of his highest and strongest aspirations. For the Greek the satyr expressed nature in a rude, uncultivated state:"[3] Lao Tsu also emphasizes nature and emotion, as "the sage is guided by what he feels and not by what he sees."[4]

Being back in college and living the life I do has put dualism in my face in a big way. Not only do I have the typical angst over choosing a major but I have had the misfortune of having my past rear its not so ugly head up at me, tempting me back into paths long forgotten. For years, I was a corporate whore; a depressed, technology addicted, fat, angry, anal retentive, pill popping, controlling, micro managing, bitter yuppie bitch. I had money. I had challenging work. But I hated everything about my life. I hated myself. There was this guy. He was the smartest man I'd ever met. I was the smartest woman he'd ever met. But we weren't necessarily compatible in a one-one relationship. It turned out he was happier without me. He decided to leave the country, to follow his dreams and go to South Korea for a year to teach English. I had no one. Nothing. I'd moved to Boulder with him because he'd gotten a great tech job there. It felt like he'd yanked the world out from under my feet. I tried to kill myself.

That was the turning point of my life; the division between the me' that was and the me' who is. In a very real way, I did kill that unhappy bitch that day. We have very little in common. I spent the last five years actively running away from my left brain and trying to cultivate my right brain instead. With great success, I have since managed to switch hemisphere dominance to become such a different person that I normally forget how much I've changed or how far I've come until events remind me of that distant past. I'm a happy, dreamy, giddy, free thinking, creative free spirit. I have friends now. I have a great life. I look ten years younger. I'm getting in touch with my body and my spirituality. No one who knows me now would ever guess that I once was so anal retentive that I literally didn't fart for five years.

So, again, I meet a guy. He's one of the smartest men in the world, a math genius. He's the god of the geeks, a legend among those in the know, the virtual king of Logos, and the very prince of Apollonian reason. I've got a touch of that myself. I've never met anyone who could understand my formulas before. He inspires me to want to develop that side of my brain because I want so deeply to be able to have those kinds of conversations. His lifestyle, his home, his work; everything about him, however; reminds me of the life I left behind. And I'm afraid.

I'm afraid of money, too. He didn't understand how I could think that money was poison and that I could meet a better class of people when poor. I told him that, while not necessarily being a "better class"; poor people, in my experience, tend to have more heart; they have less to give but give more, proportionately. I find that I am truer, more honest, more connected when I have to depend on others than when I am totally comfortable and self reliant. Sometimes I want to quote Nietzsche at him:

For Nietzsche, suffering is the real truth of reality. The problem with tragedy to the logically minded, within a framework of absolutes is that it "calls into question the boundaries of ethical judgment that every moralist must define or assume."[5] The process of striving to clearly define and fit everything into perfect abstract forms leaves little room for flexible judgments or moral relativism, sophistry, as it were. In his introduction to The Birth of Tragedy, Nietzsche queries whether the Western resolve to be so overly scientific about everything indicates fear, an avoidance of ugly reality, a certain inability to face the truth.

Nietzsche goes on to propose a society which he calls a tragic culture, where "wisdom takes the place of science as the highest end wisdom that, uninfluenced by the seductive distractions of the sciences, turns with unmoved eyes to a comprehensive view of the world, and seeks to grasp, with sympathetic feelings of love, the eternal suffering as its own."[6] I can almost hear him, and all those other logically minded types I love so much, laughing at the very idea.

But now I also want to quote the Tao:

"Give up learning and put and end to your troubles."[7] "In the pursuit of learning, every day something is acquired. In the pursuit of Tao, every day something is dropped. Less and less is done until non-action is achieved. When nothing is done, nothing is left undone. The world is ruled by letting things take their course."[8] I've learned to slow myself down and blow things off. This is good for me. I actually get much more done this way. But how do I explain this? Lao Tsu would say that "Teaching without words and work without doing are understood by very few."[9] So perhaps I stop trying to explain. I either just do or I don't. Time will show whether it is effective or not.

Even suffering has its proper and needful place as "everyone else is busy, but I alone am aimless and depressed. I am different. I am nourished by the great mother."[10] Empty, I am filled. Sorrowing, I am comforted. I touch my pain deeply and am flooded with healing in return. "Be really whole, and all things will come to you."[11]

My writing provides me justification and direction. Even if I know not what I intend to do with it, as Nietzsche would say, "Poetry does not lie outside the world as a fantastic impossibility begotten of the poet's brain; it seeks to be the exact opposite, an unvarnished expression of truth"[12]. It is my therapy, as is most of my lifestyle. My writing, like my body work, is another devotion or yoga, another part of the path;

"The pathological discharge, the catharsis of Aristotle, of which philologists are not sure whether it should be included among medical or moral phenomena, recalls a remarkable notion of Goethe's. Without a lively pathological interest," he says, "I, too, have never yet succeeded in elaborating a tragic situation of any kind, and hence I have rather avoided than sought it. Can it perhaps have been yet another merit of the ancients that the deepest pathos was with them merely aesthetic play, while with us the truth of nature must cooperate in order to produce such a work? "[13]

True art can not be created from a formula; it must instead come from the deepest of suffering, a communal sharing of pain, "... the artistic development of the individual..., through an ecstatic reality which once again takes no account of the individual and may even destroy him, or else redeem him through a mystical experience of the collective. In relation to these immediate creative conditions of nature every artist must appear as "imitator," either as the Apollinian dream artist or the Dionysian ecstatic artist, or, finally... as dream and ecstatic artist in one. We might picture to ourselves how the last of these, in a state of Dionysian intoxication and mystical self-abrogation, wandering apart from the reveling throng, sinks upon the ground, and how there is then revealed to him his own conditioncomplete oneness with the essence of the universe"[14]

Here Nietzsche begins to emphasize balance, as does the Tao. I need to retain or reincorporate a certain amount of Apollonian principles to maintain right living, if I may playfully sneak a Buddhist term into the mix. I need to master my procrastination and not use these philosophies to slack my committed duties. Action is still required, and has the added benefit of removing fear and anxiety because since the sage "always confronts difficulties, he never experiences them."[15] The sage knows to "Deal with it before it happens. Set things in order before there is confusion."[16] A personally humorous reminder is that "Good binding requires no knots, yet no one can loosen it."[17] Taking care to do things correctly the first time, in a slow and measured manner, is another form of mindfulness and living in the moment. Letting go is not to be mistaken for carelessness or sloppiness as the sage "takes care of all things and abandons nothing."[18]

Further, I am reminded that we are all on different paths, or merely different parts of the same one, and that it is good to have patience with those whose views may be different. "Knowing others is wisdom; knowing the self is enlightenment. Mastering others requires force; mastering the self needs strength. He who knows he has enough is rich."[19]

I periodically hitchhike to restore my faith in humanity because I think that, ultimately, the divine can best be found in the random kindness of strangers. It's a need I have. To take myself down to nothing, strip away everything, in essence, to submit myself to the universe. I put myself on the line, and therefore, everything becomes more meaningful. It's all perception. This misery restores my faith in humanity by contrast. Nietzsche ascked "How can the ugly and the disharmonic, the content of the tragic myth, stimulate aesthetic pleasure? ...Even the ugly and disharmonic are part of an artistic game that the will in the eternal amplitude of its pleasure plays with itself."[20] Without the disharmonic, the harmonic would sound less melodic and without the ugly, the beautiful would be without form.

Sometimes life has to get pretty bad before it can be beautiful. But then that beauty outshines all the pain it resides in. Life is more immediate, more real when you're broke. Choices are more meaningful. People's power over you is increased, whether positive or negative. Fight or flight means something other than an obsolete survival reflex. I suppose life just seems more precious when it's the only commodity you've got. Perhaps that is why "the sage seeks freedom from desire. He does not collect precious things. He learns not to hold on to ideas. He does not grasp and therefore does not lose."[21] After the initial shock, I felt much freer after tossing the bulk of my possessions because, "he who knows that enough is enough will always have enough"[22] and I really do feel much lighter without so many things to drag me down. Less possessions means less things to worry about, as it turns out.

Perhaps it is all a matter of vulnerability, just like in sex. True growth and love can only be found by making ourselves vulnerable, open, and needy. "Yield and overcome; bend and be straight; empty and be full; wear out and be new; have little and gain; have much and be confused."[23] I admit to my state of less than perfection and offer up my raw wounds for inspection and display. We can't be helped, or touched, when we have everything we need. To be filled, there must be a hole. "But I alone am drifting, not knowing where I am. Others have more than they need, but I alone have nothing. Oh, I drift like the waves of the sea, without direction, like the restless wind."[24] To throw oneself upon the mercy of the universe requires either an act of supreme faith or supreme desperation. But the universe provides, and always has. That's the lesson at the end of this. There is no end. There is no wrong way. There is no money. There is only the path. And I walk it with grace and faith because I know, somehow, that this is the way I'm supposed to go, and so I do.

Quotes

[1] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, 2
[2] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 29
[3] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, 8
[4] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 12
[5] John D. Barbour, Tragedy and Ethical Reflection, The Journal of Religion (1983), 3
[6] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, 18
[7] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 20
[8] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 48
[9] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 43
[10] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 20
[11] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 22
[12] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, 8
[13] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, 22
[14] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, 2
[15] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 63
[16] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 64
[17] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 27
[18] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 27
[19] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 33
[20] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, 24
[21] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 64
[22] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 46
[23] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 22
[24] Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 20

Sources

Barbour, John D., Tragedy and Ethical Reflection. The Journal of Religion 1983. The University of Chicago Press http://mantis.csuchico.edu:2053/journals/ucpress.htm l

Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching. Translated by Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English. Vintage books edition, March 1997.

Nietzsche, Friedrich, The Birth of Tragedy. First publication, 1872: The Birth of Tragedy Out of the Spirit of Music. Second Edition, 1878: few textual changes. Third edition, 1886: "Attempt at a Self-Criticism," and new title, The Birth of Tragedy Or: Hellenism and Pessimism. Compiled from translations by Francis Golffing and Walter Kaufmann. Text amended in part by The Nietzsche Channel. http://www.geocities.com/thenietzschechannel/bt.htm

learned optimism

nospam@example.com (admin) — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 21:31:36 -0600

When things happen, we choose how to react.Â Usually, this is an unconscious choice that we make by default based on how weÂ?re wired.Â The wiring can be changed, however, with the addition of some basic logic:

Some events make me unhappy.
I canÂ?t change those events.
I can change the way I perceive those events.
Changing my perception changes my feelings.
I can change the way I feel about events by changing the way I perceive those events.

There are three basic ways of interpreting events:

temporary vs. permanent
specific vs. general
external vs. internal

When Â?negativeÂ? events happen, we choose to view them from one of two sets of filters:

Optimism Â? reacting to setbacks from a presumption of personal power

Bad events are temporary setbacks
Isolated to particular circumstances
Can be overcome by my effort and abilities

Pessimism Â? reacting to setbacks from a presumption of personal helplessness:

Bad events will last a long time
Will undermine everything I do
Are my fault

Conversely, when Â?positiveÂ? events happen:

The Optimist reacts from a presumption of personal power:

Good events will last a long time
Will shore up everything I do
Are due to my effort and abilities

The Pessimist reacts from a presumption of personal helplessness:

Good events are temporary happenstance
Isolated to particular circumstances
Can be sabotaged by my efforts and actions

These filters can be learned and gradually become habit, with effort.Â ItÂ?s sort of a spiral effect; the good keeps getting better and the bad just gets worse.Â Find the good.Â React from a position of power.Â ItÂ?s worth it.

Reference
Learned Optimism by Martin E.P. Seligman, Ph.D.

to be

nospam@example.com (admin) — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 21:54:40 -0500

The first verb we learn in Spanish is "ser" = "to be". Conjugated, it becomes: I am = yo soy, you are = tu eres. These words are the fundamentals of language structure and the basis for identity - our metaphysical grounding in the here and now.

I am
Yo soy
You are
Tu eres
We are
Nosotros somos

For without these basic statements of existence, what else is there? How can we build and interact past ourselves without acknowledging our ultimate uniqueness and connectedness? I imagine Descartes would translate equally well into any language: To be or not to be, Ser o no ser, that is the question. Wait, that was was Hamlet, wasn't it? What was it Descartes had to say on the subject? Oh yes: I think, therefore I am. There is that pesky "I am" again.

Consider for a moment the following experiment. Stand up, take a deep breath, and declare "I AM". How validating is it to simply say "I am"? Not "Here I am" or even "I am powerful" or "I am strong", but simply "I am"? Because, if you say "I am", and you open yourself up to believing it, that simple statement includes Everything.

I am, You are, We are...Everything.
Yo soy, Tu eres, Nosotros somos...Todos.

Gracias.

changing perceptions of fat

nospam@example.com (admin) — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 22:05:19 -0500

I have been noticing fat on other people lately. It looks like it has been placed there as an afterthought, almost as if there wasn't room for it in the original design. Like clutter hurriedly shoved into a closet before company arrives, it threatens the integrity of the bulging door seams before spilling out and encroaching upon the rest of the room. It makes me think of alien invaders, taking over a host body and distorting it beyond recognition. Only this attack of the body snatchers isn't sudden and external, rather it comes slowly and with its delicious friends: fat, sugar and processed foods.

When I see fellow losers of the battle of the bulge, I feel shock and pity for how much extra fat is hanging off their misshapen bodies. Simultaneously I find myself wondering if that is how I used to look while vowing to never look like that again. I shush the nagging voice that relentlessly reminds me that I still have more than my fair share of bloat remaining.

Part of changing bad habits is changing the way you see things. While I've never been one to judge or care about people based upon appearances, I am starting to see fat as its own entity, an unwelcome stowaway on hips, thighs and stomachs that must be rousted out and tossed over the side. It is ugly. It is invasive. It doesn't belong. It saps away health, vitality and life far better than any mythical device dreamed up some diabolic mastermind. Or is there a diabolic mastermind behind it all? Is there some evil genius behind the scenes, forcing unnatural and unholy foodstuffs down our gullets and onto our hips?

Certainly there is no lack of fingers to point and evil corporate monsters aplenty to blame for the sheer volume of white processed crud available on shelves today. Food production today is a science, a multi billion dollar government subsidized industry propping up our drooping national spirit and economy. Let us not forget the media for its role. How would we ever know what to think or eat or do without the benevolent guidance of advertising?

Mother Nature's products pale in comparison to the splendor and variety of food options available today. How can nature compete with science? It would be ridiculous to expect Mother Nature to step up to the needs of modern consumers by mass producing her bounty, systematically stripping it of all flavor and nutrients, then "enriching" it by adding the chemical equivalents of said flavor and nutrients before further mutilating it in a veritable torture chamber of preparation methods used in the industrial kitchen. She was thoughtful enough, however, to provide us with expandable waistlines to accommodate the greater abundance with which this progress has afforded us. Thank goodness for that because otherwise we would probably explode.

Is being fat a disease or a choice? In this modern age of product placement and media saturation, it may be more a lack of true informed choices about health and eating. When we depend upon the industry who makes the "food" that makes us fat to "educate" us about healthy eating, we sacrifice true choice and therefore offer ourselves up blindly and unknowingly to any disease that comes with these unsafe and unwholesome products. There is another choice, a profitless, and therefore invisible choice. We can just stop eating processed foods. It is much more fun and rewarding to find and consume organic or locally grown whole foods then eat them as close to their natural state as possible. Fresh food is amazing.

The "food" and drug companies are lying to us so they can make money. Food and medicine come from living things: plants and animals. Never forget that. No one can sell health. True health requires us to look for the truth behind the lies and start feeding our minds and bodies a new program. Turn off your TV. Eat something from a tree. Read a book.* Information empowers us to make better choices. Where is your information coming from?

Complete nutrient information on 130 healthy and wholesome foods may be found at:
http://www.whfoods.com/foodstoc.php
-The World's Healthiest Foods

*Fast Food Nation, by Eric Schlosser

the importance of sunscreen

nospam@example.com (admin) — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 22:02:05 -0500

One of the questionable perks of my job is that I get to see a lot of naked old people. At first, this was a little uncomfortable and I would politely not look while I was helping them get dressed. After awhile I got kind of numb to it and now my curiosity is bringing me to make some observations.

When we think of naked old people, especially naked old people having sex; we all kinda shudder and cringe, getting a collective mental image of the California Raisins creaking their way through the act in slow motion.

Now, maybe this is obvious, but through my observations I have discovered that old people don't look like shar-peis everywhere. Most of the skin on their bodies looks perfectly normal (discounting a lifetime's accumulation of moles and a multitude of other strange dermatological issues). The only excessively wrinkled skin seems to be that which is visible outside of their clothes: the face, neck, hands, and forearms.

Reluctantly, I came to the logical and again, perhaps obvious, conclusion that the areas with the greatest concentration of wrinkles were those areas commonly exposed to sunlight. There, I said it. I don't like it and I don't want to believe it. I happen to like the sun. I want to pretend to believe that the sun is good and wholesome. It just doesn't seem right that the SUN could hurt us.

This denial is how I justify the fact that I still fry my skin every summer, futilely trying to get a tan; which is ridiculous considering my incontrovertibly fair skin. I'm a slow learner. I generally have to make the same mistakes over and over and over again before I somehow get slapped upside the head with some sort of wakeup call. Well, here it is in living Technicolor: naked old people.

It's odd what can motivate you to change your life. Even though summer is over, tomorrow I'm going to put a tube of sunscreen on my dashboard so I will put it on when I go out. I guess all this is just another symptom of adulthood, that magical time when you realize that not only can your body fall apart on you but that it will indeed do just that.

food combining for a happy digestive system

nospam@example.com (admin) — Sat, 12 May 2007 22:27:15 -0500

A blind man, a man with one leg, and a soccer mom walk into a bar. They bet the bartender a drink if he can correctly guess which of them is diabetic. The punch line is that they all are and what sounds like a bad joke is actually my family. We are fat and we are sick. This is my future and that of millions of Americans unless we completely change the way we think about food.

It is time to face the facts. We the people of the world's most prosperous nation are quickly becoming the unhealthiest. Our very prosperity has led to our downfall. Today there are endless options in food selection, more than at any point in human history. Manufacturers churn out pre-processed foods in the name of liberty, variety and convenience but in truth they are peddlers of poison, giving us each day our daily white bread. The body has no use for substances such as refined white sugar and bleached white flour yet these two substances are endemic to our food supply.

The problem is almost too big to believe. How can our entire food supply be wrong? Everyone knows that the way to health is proper diet and exercise. Yet what exactly is proper diet? The only thing the experts can all agree on is to eat more whole grains, fresh fruits, and vegetables and less processed foods. This advice sometimes feeds the belief that increasing the amount of good stuff one eats can somehow make up for all the junk consumed. This is the holy grail of the food and pharmaceutical industries: to find a pill that provides perfect nutrition so we may gorge ourselves on all the swill modern science is capable of creating under the guise of foodstuffs.

Society is preoccupied with cures, pills, and surgery. Prevention and nutrition are low on its list of priorities. Conversely, what if it were possible to avoid all the potions, pills, and poking by simply feeding the body just what it needs to heal itself and nothing else? We forget that the body is a self-healing mechanism. Our duty is to give it the proper fuel it needs to perform the job. All necessary vitamins and nutrients for health and vitality come from living foods: plants and animals. In theory, most items in supermarkets and restaurants originated from a living food. In reality, often the heavily processed gunk most of us think of as "food" today is a far remove both chemically and nutritionally from once living and nutritious whole foods.

Months of research for specific answers on how and when to eat produced a discovery: trophology. Trophology, a branch of science dealing with nutrition, is a big word for a simple idea: food combining. Food combining takes into account how digestion works and seeks to maximize digestive ability. Good health starts with good digestion. The body is designed to digest foods slowly and one type at a time. Eating food in improper combinations causes the entire concoction to ferment and/or putrefy in the stomach.

The theory is that certain digestive processes are alkaline (starch/pytalin) and others are acid (protein/pepsid), and to combine foods using opposing digestive processes will neutralize digestion, causing starches to ferment and proteins to putrefy. Oddly, I first ran across this concept when I was researching colon cleansing. It turns out that some of the long-term effects of overloading one's digestive system show up as nasty surprises later in the colon. "When the impacting of toxic mucus in the colon reaches critical pressure, it causes a pocket to balloon outward through the colon lining, causing a condition called diverticulosis. Colitis, IBS, and colon cancer are the next stages of colon deterioration caused by these conditions." (Reid)

According to the food combining "bible", Herbert Shelton's The Hygienic System, Vol. II, Orthotrophy; here are the basic rules:

ACID-STARCH
Never eat carbohydrate foods and acid foods at the same meal. Acids neutralize the alkaline medium needed for starch digestion, resulting in indigestion and fermentation.

PROTEIN-CARBOHYDRATE
Never eat a concentrated protein and a concentrated carbohydrate at the same meal. Proteins need an acid environment for digestion.

PROTEIN-PROTEIN
Never consume two concentrated proteins at the same meal.

PROTEIN-FAT
Do not consume fats with proteins.

ACID-PROTEIN
Do not eat acid fruits with proteins. "The acids of acid foods inhibit the secretion of the digestive acids required for protein digestion." (Healing)

SUGAR-STARCH
Do not consume starches and sugars together. Fruits (sugars) digest quickly and will ferment on top of slower digesting food.

STARCH-STARCH
Eat but one concentrated starch food at a meal. This rule is to prevent overeating and does not indicate digestive incompatibility.

MELONS
Do not consume melons with any other foods.

MILK
Milk is best taken alone or let alone.

The most common criticism of trophology is that it would require too much discipline to follow because it is so different from our normal eating habits. Given the current state of affairs, perhaps it is not too extreme to consider this historically viable and more natural way of eating. I have been unable to find any research disagreeing with trophology specifically as a digestive science, although there is widespread confusion over the use of its alternate name of food combining. Food combining also refers to the old vegetarian notion that beans and rice needed to be served together to make a complete protein. This "complete protein" concept is widely considered to have been debunked, and is not to be mistaken with trophology.

It is difficult to find current research on trophology, as it, and nutrition topics in general, are unlikely to attract new research money. Since research funding is so closely linked to future profit, corporate funding is unlikely to be forthcoming for studies on holistic nutrition so long as vegetables and fruits remain patent and profit free. There have been several books and diets based upon trophology, most notably "Fit For Life" by Harvey Diamond and "The Tao of Health, Sex & Longevity" by Daniel P. Reid.

It appears to me that many popular diets I have seen can fit into this method of eating. For example, the Atkins diet merely eliminates the starch category instead of segregating it from protein meals. I suspect many of the benefits of vegan and vegetarian diets derive from accidental trophology practices, since these diets are often high in raw foods and low in dense protein sources.

The only known recent study, done at Tennessee State in 2005, indicated that trophology might not be effective for weight loss; however, I do not believe that is its primary benefit. Rather, the benefits are more subtle and systemic. From what I have read about the relation of food to the body, it appears that digestion takes an enormous amount of bodily energy and resources away from healing and regeneration. Ignoring and abusing the vital function of digestion will most likely lead to ill health somewhere down the line from excessive build up of improperly digested materials in the GI tract.

An internet search on trophology will render detailed charts of food combinations that at first may seem daunting. Instead of being intimidated, consider the following guidelines: Eat a meal of just fruit each day. Eat one or two big salads of fresh vegetables every day accompanied by either a protein or a starch, with some cooked veggies on the side. It helps me to think of it as a low-carb diet at one meal and a pure vegetarian diet at the other, with fruit meals in between. The important thing is to serve opposing foods far apart in the day and to avoid continuous eating. If you absolutely must have dessert, eat it as a separate meal. Otherwise, it will just sit on top of the rest of your meal and ferment.

My Sample Menu:

Early Meal
1 Banana
Several fresh dates

Snack
1/2 basket of cherry tomatoes

Afternoon Meal (consider making this the biggest meal of the day)
Large green salad or cooked greens
Steamed cauliflower
Salmon steak

Early Evening Meal
Large green salad (a simple "salad" can consist of a stalk of celery, a red bell pepper, and some broccoli spears)
Baked potato (olive oil combines better than butter or sour cream)

Snack
Entire basket of strawberries

As you can see, these are very simple meals to prepare. In fact, the only hard part is figuring out what not to eat together. To make that part easy, print and hang some charts (see links at bottom) up in the kitchen. This is a diet of simplicity and is easily adapted for the single person. Instead of chopping vegetables for a salad, why not consider the radical approach of eating that carrot or radish whole? Each time you slice a vegetable, it loses nutrients to the air through oxidation. You can save time and nutrients simply by preparing food less. Cooking also leads to nutrient loss. Many things taste just as good raw or lightly steamed.

Other simple digestive guidelines include never drinking water with meals. You can "drink all the water desired ten to fifteen minutes before meals, thirty minutes after fruit meals, two hours after starch meals and four hours after protein meals" (Shelton). Chew food until it is as close to a liquid state as you can get it because digestion starts in the mouth. Eat as close to nature as possible. Try to eat raw vegetables every day. Avoid processed white anything. Living foods are superior foods, including animals and grains but especially vegetables and fruits. In proper combination, eating a wide variety (over time, not daily) of wholesome foods, in appropriate amounts, will abundantly nourish the body and prevent much dis-ease. Complete nutrient information on 130 healthy and wholesome foods may be found at: http://www.whfoods.com/foodstoc.php.

The human body does not need anywhere near the amount or variety of food we now insist upon giving it. Throughout most of our history, our bodies have evolved to maximize upon the meager amount of food we have been able to procure for ourselves through hunting, gathering or small plot cultivation. Traditionally, most of humanity did not have the option of feasting upon multiple varieties of food at every meal. Starvation was much more of an issue than gluttony.

Only of late has humanity had access to the vast array of foods now available. Globalization and cheap transportation now brings the food of the world to our swollen tables. The era of the idyllic family farm has evolved to that of the laboratory. Corporate chemists in pristine lab coats constantly strive to design new concoctions to tempt our spoiled palettes. Meanwhile, the advertising department provides public education and nutrition information about their "new and improved food" while we are left to wonder what was wrong with the food we had. Television advertising creates cravings where none previously existed. Like the Romans and their vomitoriums, in modern day America, we often eat not to fuel our body but instead to pleasure our jaded taste buds. Endless new combinations and super sized portions fuel our looming shared future of chronic disease and illness.

If nothing else, we must relearn how to eat simply and only when hungry. Wait to let food digest before eating again. Different foods take different times to digest but a good rule of thumb is to wait 30-60 minutes for fruit, 1-2 hours for vegetables, 1-3 hours for vegetable proteins & starches, and 3-4 hours for animal proteins. (OHI)

In my personal experience, these principles seem to work. My primary evidence is the absence of that "too full" feeling after eating. I feel lighter and sharper when I eat in proper combination. I do not get heartburn when I move quickly. If I eat poorly for a few days, my energy level drops significantly and I feel lethargic. When my digestion is unencumbered, I literally feel lighter on my feet.

An unanticipated benefit to strictly following this regimen was that I suddenly became quite acutely aware of what I was putting in my mouth. Regardless of how one feels about the act of focusing upon food decisions, making them with absolute health and digestibility in mind leads to the beginning of a completely new relationship with food. The discipline of eating simpler foods, less of them, and never more often than 3 hours apart made me immediately much fussier about what I put in my mouth. It is the waiting that really requires discipline waiting at least 2 hours to drink and 3 to eat, generally.

How do we institute these changes into a "normal" eating pattern? We do not. Normal is a lie advertised and sold to us by Kraft and McDonald's. We must instead completely change the way we think about food and commit to consistently eating just what the body needs to fulfill its biological and cellular functions, and in a way that is easy to digest. The catch phrase of the day in health advice is lifestyle changes. In order to change a life, the mind must first change. Think about it. Print some charts for your kitchen. Experiment. Eat. Enjoy. Discover real food again, and keep the future from becoming a bad joke.

Sources

Diamond, Harvey and Marilyn. Fit for life. New York, NY : Warner Books, c1985.

Hawkins, Melanie. THE SCIENCE OF TROPHOLOGY. Advisor: Terry Silver. Tennessee State University. Department of Human Performance And Sport Sciences. http://www.tnstate.edu/research/researchsymp2005/F10 .pdf

Healing Daily.com. Food Combining. 2002 by Marc Leduc. http://www.healingdaily.com/detoxification-diet/food -combining.htm

Internet health library 2000: Diet and Lifestyle: Food combining http://www.internethealthlibrary.com/DietandLifestyl e/Food_combining.htm

Marine Corp Fitness Training. Food Profiles - TROPHOLOGY - THE SCIENCE OF FOOD COMBINING. http://marinecorpfitness.tripod.com/id12.html

Optimum Health Institute. http://wiliweld.com/food/food.jpg

Reid, Daniel. TROPHOLOGY - THE SCIENCE OF FOOD COMBINING. HPS-Online Guided Cleansing: Food Combining. http://www.hps-online.com/food/index.htm#science

Shelton, Herbert M. The Hygienic System, Vol. II, Orthotrophy. San Antonio, Texas: Dr. Shelton's Health School, Sixth Edition, 1975. First published 1935. http://www.soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyglibcat/020126 shelton.orthotrophy/020126.toc.html

Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Food combining. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_combination

Charts

http://wiliweld.com/food/food.jpg

http://www.happycow.net/images/food-combination-char t.gif

http://www.mydr2.com/figures_used/trophology_chart/t rophology_chart.jpg

http://www.thewolfeclinic.com/images/foodcombining.j pg

http://www.hsu.com/images/food_combining/food_combin ing_charts_small.jpg

http://www.alderbrooke.com/images/chart.jpg