“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” – Hippocrates
“The food you eat can either be the safest and most powerful form of medicine, or the slowest form of poison.” – Ann Wigmore
The above words, so accurate, were spoken centuries apart by two great healers. What exactly do they mean, and how do we apply them to today’s world?
There are two main causes of disease on a physical level: deficiency and toxemia. When we are nutrient deficient, health declines, and when we are toxic, and overloaded with poisons, our health deteriorates. Once either of these happens, there is a need to eliminate the poisons from our bodies, and a need to ingest a therapeutic amount of nutrition — more than you can ingest from a plate of food. In the world of chemistry, there is a concept known as pH, which is a measure of the acidity or the alkalinity of a substance. In our bodies, the blood needs to maintain a pH of 7.35 – 7.45 to keep the body in good health. Some of the only foods that create an alkaline chemistry after metabolism are fruits, vegetables, their fresh-squeezed juices or cold-pressed powders, sprouts, seaweeds and algae, raw sauerkraut and fermented vegetables, unpasteurized miso, almonds, quinoa, millet, and amaranth.
When our health starts to become compromised, whether we are having uncomfortable symptoms, or we are diagnosed with a full-blown disease, we need to immediately “use food as medicine.” This means taking in foods that alkalize our blood, increase oxygen levels, give us high levels of chlorophyll (from green plants), and nourish us with minerals and trace minerals, enzymes, vitamins, antioxidants, and essential oils. We need to ingest them in substantial amounts that we can easily absorb, so that they can give our bodies the fuel they need to heal and repair themselves, and to detoxify. Digestion requires more energy than any other body function, so when we lighten the amount of digestive energy needed by using nutrient-dense foods, we detoxify and repair so that the body can heal itself. The easiest, most pleasant, and most cost-effective way to do this is through the use of organic, raw, vegan, and non-GMO “superfoods” and food-based supplements. You can ingest a much larger quantity of life-saving, health-saving nutrients in an organic cold-pressed powder or juice than you could possibly extract from eating a meal. There is a remedy that can actually remove glyphosate, a toxin prevalent in our foods today, from the gut, and heal and repair it. The quality of your foods for your meals is essential to your health as well, but when your health is compromised, or when you want to maintain health, you need the whole foods, and the superfoods and supplements, as part of your daily lifestyle.
We are living in a culture that is obsessed with getting a diagnosis, to find out “what’s wrong.” The next step after that is either a pharmaceutical drug, surgery, or both. When we reach for either of those two options, we are engaging in a form of “suppression.” The problem remains within the body if we do not change the conditions that caused the disease. We have an inner biological terrain. If we have the proper blood pH, have abundant minerals and trace minerals and other phytonutrients, have the right balance of microflora to have a healthy microbiome (the genetic material of all the microbes that live inside us), and we have high levels of oxygen and enzymes, we can create health, maintain it, and we can reverse dis-ease conditions causing the “problem.”
Nature has given us an abundance of everything our bodies need. Our job is to educate ourselves, then break our addictions, destructive habits, and poor food choices. When you change the body chemistry, and eliminate poisons, cravings literally disappear. You find yourself actually craving “the good stuff.” The road to health can be simple, fun, and delicious!
Joyce Gerber is a certified nutritional consultant, colon hydrotherapist, and licensed massage therapist. She offers the best of functional medicine and naturopathy. She has been in private practice since 1982 and loves helping people on their health journey. Visit https://healthisaninsidejob.com/.
This article is a part of the 2019 DEC / JAN issue of Whole Life Times.