Blessings and dangers surround this most central and significant event in our daily lives. Remember this; it was on the issue of food that the teenagers first stood up for God and His ways. Their clear stand here made all the difference later. Here they first began to prove "ten times better" than everyone else in the realm. Yet this initial test is the one key area so many young people fail when it comes to a choice between Babylon's program and God's. FOOD
THE THIRD WAY
Notice the way these boys witnessed. When faced with a choice between the Kings fare and that which they knew under God they neither compromised nor rebelled. They did not buy into Babylon, but they were also not seen as religious freaks or rebels. "Test us" they told their guardian. "Deal with us as you see the results."
The principle is simple and profound. God's laws are not inventions. They are descriptions of reality. How can you be the best you can be? Your task is to find out what He says and how He set up things to work. Then align your life to the truth you see. Match your life-style and your habits to His and you maximize your potential in everything. Walk away from truth in any area and you will pay the penalty.
And what is the truth about your body and food? "Man shall not live by bread alone" Jesus said "but by every word that comes from the mouth of God." (Matt. 4:4) In this saying Jesus links truth and food together. Just as bread is central to nutrition and we cannot live without it, so is His word and His speaking to us. The link between what and how we eat to sustain our physical life and what and how we hear to sustain our spiritual life is more profound than we realize. (John 6:35-51)
GOD'S GUIDE TO GOOD FOOD
God designed us. We are not accidents. He designed our sustaining ecology. He was the one Who first planted a garden for man and set him in it. He commanded all its foods and herbs (with the one exception of the tree of knowledge of good and evil) to be for his care and food. Not only did He make foods look good, He even made them taste good! Things we routinely process out of our foods and throw away today as waste or animal food often holds the very things we most need to help us in a high-stress, high-risk culture. We also face much greater toxin levels in our air, ground and water that we must compensate for whenever we can with heightened nutrition.
Fruit juices act as body cleansers; the blood, kidneys, urinary system and digestive tract. They provide natural carbohydrate sugars for energy as well as minerals and vitamins, especially C. Apple juice, freshly extracted is one of the best energy builders you can use. It is mildly laxative, helps treat nasal or sinus congestion and acts as a cleanser for the liver and gall-bladder. Its silicon is good for the skin, hair and fingernails. The best thing you can start your day with is nothing but some form of fruit or fruit juice.DIGGING YOUR GRAVE WITH A FORKVegetables and their properly extracted juices build and rebuild body tissues. Almost all of your needed enzymes and amino acids as well as vitamins and minerals are in chemical and preservative-free fresh vegetables. Raw juices like celery, cabbage and carrot are wonderful healers after illness or surgery. You will need a serious extractor to do some of these vegetables as juices, but this life investment will cost far less than one hospital bill!
Carrot juice is full in particular of the healing vitamin A for mucous membranes; sinus, lung or nasal conditions like asthma, hay fever or bronchitis. It is especially good for teenagers, helping your glands develop normally and minimizing acne problems. Raw cabbage juice in six-glass a day lots for 3 weeks has helped heal stomach ulcers; it can be mixed with a little carrot juice for better flavor.
Celery juice is high in minerals like sodium, magnesium, potassium calcium and sulfur, as well as vitamins A, B and C. It is one of natures best tranquilizers, promoting sound sleep and rested nerves. It also works to dissolve unwanted calcium deposits and is beneficial for arthritis and hardened arteries.
What foods can hurt you in quality or quantity? Whenever you have a choice, stick to things that are fresh, natural and unprocessed. The more that is done to a food, the less chance it has of helping you and the more chance it has of hurting you. Learn to eat healthy and give your body what it deserves to do its best for you. Many commercial foods, beverages and even bottled water today are contaminated by solvents, toxins and pollutants that will hurt your body over a period of time. If each time you ate a meal someone put a drop of paint thinner in it, how do you think you would feel after a month? Something like that happens with a great deal of off-the-shelf cereals or processed snack foods.
If Satan re-designed an orange he would first pick it before it was ripe, suck the juice out of it, fill it with antifreeze preservative and paint it with chemical dye to make it look the right color. Then he would label it "New, Improved" and sell it to you for three times what it would cost off a tree. The question is: why would you prefer one of his?
Foods to Minimize Or Avoid
You know it, but you still need to hear it; avoid as much as possible all junk food. If you just eat junk you'll feel like junk. Treat your body right and it will do a magnificent job for you. Rob it long-term of what it needs to perform well and it will one day close shop on you in one or more painful or life-threatening ways. Remember Humpty-Dumpty. Go high on all kinds of good grains and home-made breads and granolas. At least 70% of what you eat should be water-rich foods. Plenty of vegetables and fruit. Juices, water, milk. When you go to eat something ask yourself: "Is this going to clog me or clean me?"
Some kinds of meats can be bad for you long-term. The word unclean as used of creatures in the Bible does not mean evil. An unclean animal acts as an agent of judgment on humanity. To eat an unclean food is not evil, but it can definitely result in physical judgment! Meats from omnivorous animals (those that eat both carrion meat and plants) are much more prone to disease. Eat them, especially poorly cooked and you risk their acquired infections. Some meats, like pork, can carry in their flesh over twenty different kinds of worms and parasites including the deadly and usually fatal trichinosis. You can recognize them from Bible warnings - don't eat those that neither split the hoof or chew the cud. (Lev 11:3-26) Animals that do are always safer than those that don't. Lamb, beef, deer and other similar meats are O.K. as long as you avoid eating the entrails, blood or the fat - leave these to burn as a present to God! (Lev. 3:3-9)
Carrion fish are the rats and roaches of the sea. Likewise taboo to Israel in Scripture, they can be simply recognized as having no fins (tails) or scales (Lev. 11: 9-12; Deut. 14:9-10). Some forms of seafood carry greater risk. Shark, catfish and swordfish are all garbage collectors. Shrimp, crab, oysters, and other shellfish are more prone to disease and concentrate lethal seawater-dissolved toxins like mercury in their flesh. Bite for bite, undercooked or raw shellfish is the riskiest food you can eat. Focus on finnys. Good fish include trout, bass, flounder, snapper, perch, tuna, salmon, sardines. Make sure fish are fresh with little or no smell. Cook well in a pan.
Birds or flying creatures prohibited as unclean food in Scripture are again carrion-eaters like the eagle, osprey, buzzard, bat and owl. Duck, chicken, turkey, geese, pigeon and pheasant and other grain or seed-eating birds are fine. (Source: Gordon S. Tessler Ph.D. - Nutrition & Biblical Health)
Again make sure all meats are well-cooked and (even when refrigerated) not kept stored for more than a few days before preparing. All meats should be drained and cooked well, never eaten raw (Gen. 9:4, Lev. 19:26). Many meats carry hidden parasites which are only destroyed by cooking temperatures of at least 212 °F (100°C) for at least 20 minutes. Avoid the rare. Let meat fall off the bone. Use butter, olive oil, or lard but avoid all hydrogenated oils & margarine. Also remember that open-flame cooking like barbecue and toasting can produce carcinogens.
Even the way you mix foods when you eat affects your ability to get the most out of it. Different foods call out different digestive juices and some of these don't work well with each other at the same time. Bad food combinations result in only partial digestion that over time builds up in your body like left-overs in a refrigerator. If you have problems with gas, bad digestion, headaches, sour stomach or similar tummy troubles, eat foods in their proper order. Don't mix fruit with anything else and eat it first. It digests quicker. Some favorite combinations like meat and bread or meat and potatoes, eggs and potatoes or eggs and bread don't work well for the digestion. Don't eat starches and acidic foods together, like potatoes and lemonade. Don't combine carbo and protein in the same meal. Don't even drink fluids with your meal; it dilutes down your digestive process.
Sugar, candies, salt, coffee, tea, refined and over-processed foods can all hurt you long-term. Caffeine is a toxic alkaloid, a slow-working vegetable poison that directly affects your central nervous system like its close relative nicotine. If you're trying to kick a smoking habit, don't drink caffeine! Soft drink companies add it to most sodas; check the labels. Why? Not for its taste (it is quite bitter). Like any other narcotic, it can addict you. And does it? We drink over 50 million cokes alone every day! That's the real thing.
Tea and coffee are multi-billion dollar industries; coffee is Americas' largest food import. Everybody drinks it. Yet the amount of caffeine in just two daily cups of coffee not only can cause life-threatening changes in some heart rhythms but increases a woman's' risk of breast cancer ten times. Caffeine addicts you and will cause withdrawal symptoms if you try to stop - nerves, irritability, sleeplessness and even muscle shakes. Decafs are even worse. Caffeine is not removed. It is only reduced from 2-4 grains a cup to 2-15 mg. a cup. Methylene Chloride, the solvent used for this process, is a toxic solvent suspected as cancer-causing. That cup of coffee that gets you started in the morning may be ending your life - and sooner than you realize. (American Heart Association). Even tea is not exempt. A single tall glass of iced tea can give you over 20 mg. of kidney-stone forming oxalic acid. Cocoa and chocolate also contain oxalic acid. Some preachers of the past put coffee & tea right in with alcohol & tobacco. Yet you must drink a lot of fluids each day. Go with fruit juices, herbal teas, or just plain water - at least 8 glasses a day - whenever you can.
Sugars greatly inhibit your body's' ability to fight disease and depress your immune system. Check it out. Cut right back and you'll begin to get well again.
FASTING
"But the days will come when the Bridegroom shall be taken from them; then shall they fast." (Matt. 9:15)
Over-eating (surfeiting or gluttony) is a sin in Scripture. We eat far too much and too much bad stuff. Your waste disposal systems are incredible, but they have their limits. If your body is overloaded with bad or undigested food it toxifies. A toxin-loaded system reacts with various symptoms of sickness. Fever, headaches, chills, nausea and pain are all signs of a lowered immune system no longer able to keep the poisons and nutrition debts you have collected at bay. Disease can be a sermon to your system; listen carefully to what it says. A round of colds and flu usually follows right on the heels of huge Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners. Fasting is a great tool for both cleansing and regulating the body. Fast a meal now and then. Rethink your daily eating habits. Cut back on how much and how often you eat; you will not only look and feel better, but probably live much longer.
Try a longer fast (2-3 days) if your body needs a rest or recovery and you have time to do it. Daniel fasted and sought God for his nation and had a supernatural encounter from heaven (Dan. 9:3-23). While you can "fast" anything that is important to you, like sleep, friends, conversation or music, the Bible word for "fast" means to cover the mouth. FASTING for the Christian is simply the voluntary missing of a life need. It is not always food--it can be rest, sleep, friends, or drink. But used in the Bible it usually means not eating food for a certain time. It can help you in two ways: it can rest and clean your body by not weighing it down with food; it can draw your heart close to God since you are spending the same time you would usually give to eating in prayer instead. You can fast from anything that you are willing to temporarily sacrifice for God.
Before any big, important event in your life, when you really need to do your best with God's help, this is a Christian secret you might like to try. For an important speech, prayer, message, or game: FASTING may be a real help. It is an indication that you are EARNEST, that there is something you want so greatly, you will put everything aside to get it. It's honestly, sincerely--sometimes desperately--reaching out for God and His will. We put Him first, above food, water, friends.
Fasting is mentioned over fifty times in Scripture, always in context where people were getting serious with God. Besides Jesus, Moses, Ester, Nehemiah, David, Paul and other key leaders of the Bible took extended fasts. A FULL FAST is nothing but water; you should always drink more water when you fast, to help clean out your system. A food and water fast for 3 days in Scripture is a rare DESPERATION FAST, because it can actually threaten your life with the build-up of released toxins in your body. A FORTY-DAY FAST has been a life-changing experience for those who have felt called and strengthened of God to try it. Don't WORK and fast for any long periods; be sensible and discreet. Fasting is not self-hate, protest or calculated self-destruction (Is. 58:5). It is for power with God to break chains and set people free. It is a declaration act of utter devotion. Do it as to the Lord. (Matt. 6:16-18).
RULES FOR FASTING:
- It must be VOLUNTARY, something you choose to do yourself. There is no value in doing it because you are told to. God will not force you to fast, but if you really need that extra intensity, it is there to help.
- It must be PRIVATE. If you tell anyone you are fasting, so they will be convinced of your spirituality, God will not bless you for it. Fasting must be done for HIM. If you go around boasting about it to others, you already have your reward.
Of course, you may have to tell parents, or friends who know your eating habits, so as not to worry them; but this is different. When you fast, don't go around looking haggard, dead-on-your-feet, and wiped-out. (Matthew 6:18.)
- It must be SENSIBLE. You won't want to fast for weeks as a teenager, nor if you have a demanding or strenuous job to do as well. Holiday or weekends are best; you will be able to control your activity better. If you want to go on a long fast, start with a few smaller ones and then work up with rests in between. Long fasts need longer rest periods both during and after the fast.
- It must be THOUGHTFUL. Don't inconvenience parents or friends by being difficult! On a long fast, you must drink MUCH WATER, at least eight GLASSES A DAY. If you want a real fast, don't drink anything else. Long fasts can last from two to three or even four weeks. The most difficult part is the first five to six days. You may feel headachy, sick to your stomach, and tired, as your body poisons are emptied out. Keep flushing your system out with water. After the worst peak is over, you can go many, many days without real appetite for food. STOP the fast if HUNGER returns; this is a sign that the body has used up all its reserves, and if you go on any longer you will begin to starve.
Use your normal action time, eating, pleasure, company time, for prayer instead. Talk to Jesus during this time. Read the Bible. You'll be richly blessed.
Be very careful in breaking a long fast; take as LONG TO BREAK IT AS YOU DID TO TAKE IT. Use juices, clear, non-milky soups, and so on, until you come gradually back to normal diet.
POWER FOODS
There are many special foods that you can buy to supplement your regular meals that are power helps to your general health. You may want to try some of these:
Alfalfa in tablets or powder is one of natures most complete nutritional foods. It has every essential amino acid, all the fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, E and K) as well as C and the entire B complex, almost all the key minerals and most of the key trace minerals. Its antitoxin powers exceed that of liver, brewers yeast and wheat germ. Studies show it provides resistance to and healing in all kinds of sinus and "-itus" diseases, like arthritis, neuritis, bronchitis. It has the ability to lower high levels of cholesterol. You can't OD on it, and can eat it raw as sprouts, as a tablet (6 or more a day) or drink it as a tea.
Blackstrap Molasses, the third extraction of a sugar refinery is both black and bountiful. It contains thiamin, riboflavin, niacin and pyridoxine (Vitamins B1, B2, B3, and B6), inositol, pantothenic acid, biotin, calcium, magnesium, potassium, iron, phosphorus and copper! Two teaspoons twice a day, morning and night have helped heal bad cases of skin rashes, eczema and shingles, stopped hair color and thickness loss, and anemia.
Brewers Yeast is one of the most powerful energy pickup foods you can eat. It has all the B-vitamins, 19 amino acids and 18 minerals! A heaped teaspoon to a tablespoon of the powder in a glass of orange juice is one of the most potent instant energy drinks you can make. Because it is high in phosphorus (which pulls calcium from the body) when you use it compensate with 1,000-2,000 mg. a day of calcium gluconate.
Brown Rice is another complete food, containing in its raw state a tremendous number of needed nutrients for your entire body. As with other natural grains it is cheap and tasty.
Golden Seal is one of God's most wonderful and powerful antibiotic herbs. It is a natural remedy for all sorts of skin, mucous membrane, stomach and toxic liver troubles, including colds, flu, open sores, boils, skin infections, ringworm, etc. It helps clear drugs from your system. Golden Seal is toxic to some bacteria and microbes, and reduces inflammation. It aids digestion and appetite, though no more than one/two capsules of the powder should be taken a day (250-500 mg.).
Honey is a great natural Biblical sweetener and comes in all kinds of flavors. Honey from a local area helps desensitize from local pollens. Add a quarter teaspoon Vitamin C to any store-bought honey to detoxify any ergot mold. Warm to mix and dissolve.
Lecithin is another wonder food great for your memory and cardiovascular system. As an emulsifier it keeps fat in solution, and hinders cholesterol precipitation in blood vessel walls. It lowers blood cholesterol, and with it high blood pressure. It helps distribute body weight better. Three 19-grain caps a day has effectively helped psoriasis within a three-month period. Again you can take as much as you want without harm.
Purple Coneflower (or Echinacea angustifolia) like Golden Seal has a long folk history of use in killing bacteria, inhibiting inflammation, stimulating the immune system and promoting wound healing; all great for acne! Use like Golden Seal 250-500 mg. a day.
Sea Kelp is the best known source of all the body trace elements in almost direct proportion to their balance in the human bloodstream. Loss of trace minerals can lead to painful leg cramps, easy bruising and brittle fingernails. Copper deficiency causes premature hair graying and loss, skin rashes and possible heart damage. Iodine shortage leads to apathy, listlessness and low blood pressure. Insufficient manganese can bring on all sorts of back problems as well as muscle fatigue and exhaustion. 1-3 tabs a day.
Wheat Germ is loaded with high-quality germination and growth nutrients; protein, minerals, vitamin B complex, fats and complex carbohydrates; its oil is high in Vitamin E. Besides its value in the heart and blood, it helps restore normal menstrual flow and fertility in women, and builds up energy and vitality. Mix it in cereals and drinks.
Nuts of all kinds - walnuts, peanuts, macadamias, cashews, pecans etc. are a delicious and instant source of snack energy. Especially powerful are raw almonds; between 9-11 of these eaten at once will give you one of the greatest bursts of instant energy of all the foods. Whenever possible eat nuts raw, but pass on any that have brown spots on them; they contain toxins. You can heat them to kill molds or use them for cooking.
Self-Hate - Anorexia & Bulimia
"..Your hideous obsession with celebrities, beauty and youth has made every single one of my friends convinced they are ugly and worthless." Crasher, U-S Talk Net
One of the great battles in many teenagers lives is with the idea of fat. Thousands of young people today, believing they are physically ugly, overweight and worthless either starve themselves in anorexia or binge and purge in bulimia. Some go so far in these forms of food slavery they feel like dying; and sadly, some actually have. To fight these terrible battles with something God designed not only as a need but a joy in our lives is an awful reversal of His design. Our culture makes a god of beauty and slimness. From a thousand subtle hints and pressures around us even from our families and friends, we can get the idea that we are the wrong weight or shape to be loved and valued.
And all this is nonsense. To take our image of our lives from a culture that changes its sense of value like a set of clothes is utterly wrong. Only from Jesus can we get a true picture of our worth. Only in Christ can we have our false and ugly self-pictures broken up and be given a new vision of value. Love Him and love your neighbor as yourself. SELF-LOVE is a command of Christ (Mark 12:31). It is the exact opposite of selfishness. If you have bought into a bad picture of your own body, the proper place to start is an apology to God for self-hate. There is much you can do to improve your looks if you need some help. But start right first. Don't put yourself down. Thank God for what you have and are now. Change can come but it must be God's way (Eph. 5:29; I Cor. 6:9).
GLUTTONY
The sin of gluttony in the Bible is not just eating too much. A glutton is not always fat. You can be totally skinny and be a glutton. It is making a god out of food. It is centering your whole life around what you eat. It is making food the most important thing in the world to you. Food is important but food is never to be the center or answer of your life (Prov. 23:21; Matt. 6:25; Rom 14:17). In the Bible, people who made a god out of food and drink actually courted death (Deut. 21:20; Prov. 23:2).
Perhaps you really do need to lose some fat. Perhaps you really do have a problem carrying around too much weight. It is true that being overweight carries its own penalty. But fat is not something bad. Fat is a key part of your bodies' energy storage system. Used right, fats can be your friend. You need to know what fat really is.
Why Fats Can Be Your Friend
"Their faces were fairer and fatter than all the others"
Fats are made of fatty acids and glycerol. Fatty acids are long chains of carbon atoms linked to hydrogen atoms. If all the possible spaces for hydrogen atoms are filled, we call it a saturated fatty acid. A fat with two empty hydrogen atoms spaces on its chain is monounsaturated. Fatty acids with room for more than two hydrogen atoms are polyunsaturated. All natural foods contain a mix of these fatty acids. Fats supply 9 calories of energy per gram whatever their saturation.
It is true that today we often eat too much fat. In the early twentieth century, the fat in an average Western diet was about 30% of our total daily calories. Now with our cooking oils, salad dressings, vegetable shortening and hydrogenated fats it is between 40 and 45 percent. (A single tablespoon of salad dressing contains 12 grams of fat.) The average American eats 155 grams of fat a day, much more than we need. 97% of the fat we eat is stored as fat. In the Far East, eating about 1/4 the amount of fat of an American diet they have much lower heart disease and colon cancer rates.
Much of our food fat is from obvious sources: butter, oils, salad dressings and fatty meats. But 2/3 of the fat we eat comes from "hidden sources". These are foods like whole milk, ice cream, luncheon meats, avocados, olives, nuts, cheese and chocolate. Nutritionists think calories provided by fat should be no more than 30% of your daily total. If your aim was 2,000 calories a day you would eat 67 grams of fat at most. The bottom line is this; if you don't want to get fat, eat less fat. Fat makes you fat. To cut down, eat everything else but fat. You will always have the same number of fat cells in your body, but fat cells can grow to 20 times their normal size.
What use is fat? Most of your body energy is from carbohydrate (glucose) and fats (fatty acids). Protein pitches in if you don't get enough of these. Yet by far your most abundant energy source is fat! One molecule of fat yields about 460 molecules of ATP (adenosine triphosphate, what your muscles use to work.) Glucose yields only 36 molecules of ATP. Fat stored in a healthy adult 150lb+ male is 100,000 kilocalories of energy. Glucose stored as glycogen can give only about 2,000. If you learn to burn fat, you can tap into long-term endurance energy. You can get 80-90% of your energy from these fat stores if you train your body by right eating & exercise.
You get enormous benefits. You store less fat (leading to weight loss). Endurance improves. And you "spare" your glycogen for when you need it most: short high-intensity efforts. Within the first five minutes of short term high intensity exercise, you pull glycogen directly from your muscles and liver. You can only store a limited amount of glycogen in your body, though training, conditioning and good nutrition can increase it. (It takes about 90 seconds for your muscles to recharge with ATP after a short energy burst. That is why in high-intensity, short-exchange sports like tennis, a 90-second sit-down break between change-overs really helps.) A by-product of glycogen burn is lactic acid, one cause of muscle soreness.
Longer endurance oxygen-burning events draw progressively more on your fat reserves, and do not create lactic acid as a by-product. (Melaluca markets the Access Bar, a patented food that bypasses the body's fat storage system and allows you to directly utilize body fat during workouts for energy.)
Phillip Maffetone, an applied kinesiologist and athletic trainer says that while it is obvious that too much fat can hurt you, the key is to balance your intake. Just as you mix aerobic and anaerobic workouts, you need to combine dietary fats. Try for twice the amount of unsaturated (Omega 6) to saturated fats.
(A) Omega 6 (monounsaturate) fats are in vegetables, peanuts, peanut butter and olives, margarine, vegetable shortening, and most nuts. You find them in many oils like olive, safflower, peanut and corn oils, and concentrates of black-currant seed, borage, and primrose oil. They elevate cholesterol levels, but not as high as saturated fatty acids.
(B) Saturated fats (with the essential fat arachidonic acid) Mainly in meat and dairy products like cream, cheese and butter, egg yolks, chocolate, coconut and palm oil. Most are solids at room temperature. These all help build up cholesterol. We know it for its bad role in blood vessel walls deposits that can lead to heart attacks and stroke.
(Cholesterol is a yellowish, wax-like substance closely related to fat. You only get it from eating animal products. Foods particularly high in cholesterol are red meats, lobster, shrimp, oysters, liver, kidney, veal, lamb, crab, beef heart, and egg yolk. Yet it is a normal part of our cell structure. It makes building blocks for bile acids, vitamin D, sex and adrenal gland hormones. If there was no cholesterol in your diet, your body would create what it needs to function properly. Insoluble in water, our blood stream carries it by a protein in a combination called a lipoprotein. The ratio of cholesterol to High Density Lipoproteins is important. People with higher levels of some HDL have less risk of heart disease. Even saturated fats don't have to be "bad" in a balanced diet.)
(C) Omega 3 fats are polyunsaturated, usually liquid at room temperature. These are in beans and plant oils like corn, safflower, cottonseed, and sunflower as well as in linseed (flaxseed), sesame, soy, and walnut oils. You find them in fish and fish oil concentrates called EPA. There are mixes of all three fats in all natural foods.
What is the key in getting fats to work for you? Aim for equal amounts of all 3 each week or month. It is easier than you think. Most foods contain a combination of all three types. (If you're a vegetarian and eat very little "B" fats then eat equal amounts of "A" and "C." Your body will convert some to "B.") Follow this ratio. Stay within the 30% limit of total fats in your diet, and you won't have problems with excess fat.
Pro-Protein: Athletes need an increased level of protein. It lets you use the proper amount of calories without boosting your fat or carbo percentages. (Think of it as creating an optimum fuel mix for a race car.) Protein prevents muscle breakdown, and mental and physical fatigue. It also regulates body workout functions.
A hormone derived from protein increases the carbo your muscles can store after hard exercise. Your protein balance also controls serotamin, a chemical that influences how tired you feel.
Cutting Down on Carbos - Besides balancing fat intake, you must stop your body from turning off its fat-burning mechanism. It will do so if you eat too much carbohydrate. Carbo stimulates insulin release, which causes a drop in blood sugar. To compensate, your body sends more blood sugar to the muscle cells to increase glycogen storage. Your body tries to use more carbohydrate as fuel. But because you only have a small storage space for glycogen, insulin changes about 40% of that carbohydrate into fat. High-carbo diets - those including refined carbohydrate such as pasta or rice - result in more insulin being released and less fat being burned.
There's more: If you don't provide your body with enough fat to use as energy, you force it to use more sugar. This lowers your blood sugar. Your body compensates by raising it again. This roller-coaster can create mood swings in athletes on high-carbo, super-low-fat diets, and bring fatigue, clumsiness, headaches, depression or allergies.
For centuries people ate mostly meat and vegetables. We have only recently tried to digest large amounts of sugar and starch. Many people can't. Up to half the population may be "carbo intolerant." This intolerance (called insulin resistance, hypoglycemia, or hyperinsulism) can make you tired, crave sweets or caffeine, get bloated, sleepy, fat and even depressed. Long-term problems may be increased triglycerides and high blood pressure. Does it affect you? Try a 10 day diet that eliminates most breads, pastas, sweets, fruit and fruit juices, potatoes, milk, and yogurt. Do it with a doctors help. If you feel better, suspect carbo intolerance. Add a few carbos to your diet until symptoms reappear. Your optimal amount of carbohydrate is just below this. (Phillip Maffetone)
VITAMINERALS
What can help you stay well in a sick world? Vitamins and minerals are micro-nutrients that help keep your body working at high performance. But you cannot live on them. They are not pep pills or food substitutes. They stimulate, but do not act as nutritional fuel. At cell level they act as catalysts or co-enzymes. They regulate your body fuel processes to change proteins and carbohydrates to tissue and energy.
Even though your body needs only small amounts, vitamins are absolutely necessary for you to grow, stay vital and resist disease. Even a tiny deficiency long-term can endanger your whole body. Sadly, it takes weeks or months for signs of deficiencies to show as your body uses up its supply. You may not see a developing problem, because your cells will still keep working, but less and less efficiently. They either get proper nourishment or get hurt beyond repair. Here are the key vitamins and minerals you need, why they are important, and recommended units:
VITAMIN A is the key to strong protective cell-tissues of your body both inside and out, from your skin to your stomach lining, eyes and bone cells. It is a key factor in healthy skin, hair, teeth and gums. It helps prevent both zits and rough or itchy skin. Vitamin A is like an internal gas-mask for your lungs; it fights the effect of city or airborne pollution that can lead to emphysema and chronic bronchitis. It lubricates all membranes and keeps them strong. . Shortage of vitamin A brings eye dryness (inability to tear), night blindness, asthma, poor bone growth, weak tooth enamel, chronic diarrhea, and frequent colds or respiratory infection. Food sources are vegetables, apricots, leafy greens, yams, pumpkin, sweet potatoes, cantaloupe, winter squash, watermelon, fruits, liver, fish and eggs. Vitamin A is fat-soluble. Your body needs fats and zinc as well as other minerals and enzymes to absorb it. Pregnant women should consult a doctor before taking extra vitamin A, but unless you plan on huge doses (more than 100,000 units a day over many months) it is harmless. 20,00-50,000 units a day corrects most problem conditions. Vitamin A and C are the two key vitamins most young people don't get enough of.
BETA CAROTENE converts to vitamin A in the liver as your body needs it. A powerful anti-ineffective and antioxidant for immune health, beta carotene also helps protect you from pollutants. It also helps slow the aging process and aids in allergy control. Supplements protect against respiratory diseases and infections. Food sources are green leafy vegetables, green peppers, carrots, and other range and sea vegetables.
VITAMIN C is your "life-machinery oil" an anti-poison to keep your immune system strong and alert. It helps protect against cancers, viral and bacterial infections, heart disease, arthritis and allergies. A strong antioxidant, vitamin C helps to prevent free-radical damage. It safeguards against heavy metal toxins, environmental pollutants, stress and early aging. Vitamin C accelerates healing after surgery, increases infection resistance and is essential for forming new collagen tissue. It works on deep and chronic infections with no response to antibiotics, as well as simple colds and flu. It is a great detoxin; direct injection of 12,000 mg. of C has reportedly neutralized even monoxide, barbiturate and snakebite poisoning! It boosts adrenal and iron sufficiency especially when the body is under stress. Low backache, tight neck or shoulders respond to C dosages. It enables you to work or play harder by boosting the amount of glycogen your liver and muscles can store, stave off tiredness longer and keep you more mentally alert.
Aspirin, oral contraceptives, smoking and tetracycline both inhibit and deplete C levels. Your body can only store a few grams of C a day. With a vitamin C deficiency you bruise and bleed more easily and heal more slowly, or develop receding gums, fatigue or rough skin. C & E reduce muscle damage in exercise. Food sources are citrus fruits, green peppers, papaya, tomatoes, strawberries, kiwi, potatoes, greens, cauliflower and broccoli. Like the Bs, it is harmless, water-soluble and must be restored every day. (100-1,000 mg. a day) Too much can only give you a bit of an upset stomach or diarrhea but if you have had kidney stones, make sure you take adequate magnesium and Vitamin B6 as well, as C helps precipitate out oxalic acid. At least 2,500-5,000 mg. or more a day is corrective; a large dose lasts from 6-8 hours, so it can work all night if taken before you sleep. It is cheaper bought as ascorbic acid powder; mix with water or juice. Add a little of the powdered crystals to ats and zinc as well as other minerals and enzymes to absorb it. Pregnant women should consult a doctor before taking extra vitamin A, but unless you plan on huge doses (more than 100,000 units a day over many months) it is harmless. 20,00-50,000 units a day corrects most problem conditions. Vitamin A and C are the two key vitamins most young people don't get enough of.
BETA CAROTENE converts to vitamin A in the liver as your body needs it. A powerful anti-ineffective and antioxidant for immune health, beta carotene also helps protect you from pollutants. It also helps slow the aging process and aids in allergy control. Supplements protect against respiratory diseases and infections. Food sources are green leafy vegetables, green peppers, carrots, and other range and sea vegetables.
VITAMIN C is your "life-machinery oil" an anti-poison to keep your immune system strong and alert. It helps protect against cancers, viral and bacterial infections, heart disease, arthritis and allergies. A strong antioxidant, vitamin C helps to prevent free-radical damage. It safeguards against heavy metal toxins, environmental pollutants, stress and early aging. Vitamin C accelerates healing after surgery, increases infection resistance and is essential for forming new collagen tissue. It works on deep and chronic infections with no response to antibiotics, as well as simple colds and flu. It is a great detoxin; direct injection of 12,000 mg. of C has reportedly neutralized even monoxide, barbiturate and snakebite poisoning! It boosts adrenal and iron sufficiency especially when the body is under stress. Low backache, tight neck or shoulders respond to C dosages. It enables you to work or play harder by boosting the amount of glycogen your liver and muscles can store, stave off tiredness longer and keep you more mentally alert.
Aspirin, oral contraceptives, smoking and tetracycline both inhibit and deplete C levels. Your body can only store a few grams of C a day. With a vitamin C deficiency you bruise and bleed more easily and heal more slowly, or develop receding gums, fatigue or rough skin. C & E reduce muscle damage in exercise. Food sources are citrus fruits, green peppers, papaya, tomatoes, strawberries, kiwi, potatoes, greens, cauliflower and broccoli. Like the Bs, it is harmless, water-soluble and must be restored every day. (100-1,000 mg. a day) Too much can only give you a bit of an upset stomach or diarrhea but if you have had kidney stones, make sure you take adequate magnesium and Vitamin B6 as well, as C helps precipitate out oxalic acid. At least 2,500-5,000 mg. or more a day is corrective; a large dose lasts from 6-8 hours, so it can work all night if taken before you sleep. It is cheaper bought as ascorbic acid powder; mix with water or juice. Add a little of the powdered crystals to food to help detoxify it.
Vitamin C also needs BIOFLAVONOIDS (part of the C complex) to function well. Bioflavs prevent arteries from hardening, and help make your blood vessels, veins and capillaries strong. They guard connective tissue integrity, helping to control bruising, internal bleeding and mouth herpes. They help lower cholesterol and stimulate bile production. Bioflavs act as anti-microbials against infections. They also help reduce cataract formation and guard against diabetic retinopathy. Your body does not produce its own bioflavonoids; you must get them regularly from your diet. The strongest supplementary form is quercitin. Effective food sources include the white part beneath the skin of citrus fruits, herbal sources, buckwheat and most vegetables.
VITAMIN D - Calcium absorption. If you work or play in a lot of sunshine your body can make its own D, but if you live where the sun is a real event or if you rarely exercise outdoors, you may need to supplement. Food sources; fish like sardines, tuna, salmon, herring. Some milk is D-fortified. Up to 400 IU a day supplement.