Healthy Eating -- Sacrifice or Investment?

We all invest our earnings to secure our financial future. We invest time and energy in our closest relationships to make sure we’re covered emotionally. We invest in education to make sure we have the necessary skills to sustain a living. The wiser among us also ‘invest’ time and effort in exercising regularly to keep the physical body healthy, albeit the motivation is often rather short-sighted—staying fit and looking good. But what about ‘investing' in the food that powers our body and mind and, thereby, our very existence in this lifetime?!

No, choosing rice crispies over raisin bran, diet soda over regular, chicken over beef and pork, and 100-calorie ice cream over another dessert is not the kind of investment I’m alluding to; they’re all essentially the same processed trash--completely unnatural to our physiology. In fact, most leaner foods have more devastating effects on health than their plumper cousins. Think about it, how does a preparation get to have lower calories than its ingredients? Calories don’t vanish in thin air; the ingredients themselves are engineered.

Eating foods in their naturally available form and without hurting other sentient beings is the path Man has to lead to ensure prolonged sustainability of the entire Ecosystem. Very unfortunately though, we live in a culture where choosing a salad is seen as ‘sacrificing' ‘tastier’ foods, passing on processed snacks as being 'finicky', and being vegan often invites cautiously sympathetic comments like ‘oh poor you, there’s nothing for you to eat!’ from 'normal' folks who walk around devouring on dead animals and charred veggies... =(

But is it really a sacrifice? Or could eating wisely be a very prudent investment?! 

Let's start with the self. Usually energetic in the initial decades, we take good health for granted. The simple, yet profound, realization that vitality simply cannot co-exist with an ailing physical body doesn't dawn upon most people until their late 50's or 60's! One might argue that quadriplegics live fulfilling lives too. But that's only when their general health cooperates, not when life is an endless drag of waiting at doctors' offices, popping pills, and getting bypass procedures and implants...

That this body is ephemeral, fragile, and needs a continous investment is a realization that usually only dawns with the ambulance siren. Bill Clinton went vegan at 64 after two coronary implants; million others change their eating habits at a similar age. It is possible to start saving only from this paycheck but one cannot get back the money already spent. Likewise for health. Past negligence to our body simply cannot be undone with medical intervention and prescriptions at a later age.

Only a healthy body can be home to a healthy mind; only a healthy mind brings vitality and exuberance. All our hopes, aspirations, and dreams originate in the mind and are executed via the physical body. It is the individual dreams and aspirations that builds a society, nation, world, and eventually, shapes the future of humanity.

Moving on to world and humanity, we strive to invest money to send our kids to college and in research to find cures for the deadliest diseases known today. But these measures are both myopic and deceptive considering the rate at which our soil, water, and air are being polluted with toxic industrial by-products. Any guess on the single largest contributor to global warming, drought, and poisoning of our environment? It's the meat industry and the processed food industry! The time to be in denial was 50 years back...

Today, ironically--and naively--while we work day and night to 'save' enough for our kids and dream of them getting married and popping out grand kids for us, we continue to squander and deplete the very ecosystem that is quintessential to support them! It takes 1,799 gallons of water to make 1 pound beef and only 80 and 60 gallons each for 1 pound apples and oranges. Checkout out the excellent hidden water info-graphic published by National Geographic.

Further, think about the resources spent in packaging, transporting, and storing processed foods around the world. How many single-use plastic take out containers, spoons, forks, (non-biodegradable) packets of chips, soda cans, ZiCo bottles... does each person toss in trash every week?! How often do we take the time to sort these in appropriate compost. recycle and landfill bins? Ever wondered where this trash goes and who will excavate it from land and seas alike? Our grand and great-grand kids. =(

Alas, today's culture sees the environment and Nature as distant, indestructible, eternal elements instead of delicate threads that weave and sustain the fabric of all Life on Earth. Invest in that fabric and Life will flourish. Or sacrifice our grand dreams for the future of humanity.

So What Really is 'Processed' Food?

'Processed food' is the term we have all heard of--whether in the context of daily food choices or as an expletive used by grandma and health experts. In fact, the two most common questions I have been repeatedly asked in my high raw vegan lifestyle are 'What is processed food?' and 'Where to draw the line between processed and unprocessed foods?' So let's address them in this post.

Any food that has been altered from its natural form before consumption is processed food.

Note that this definition is broader than the conventional one we normally hear--any food that comes in a box is processed--in that it allows for varying degrees of processing applied to the different food items.

So how processed are the most pervasive food items? Sadly, most foods we eat from breakfast to supper in today's culture are anywhere between somewhat to highly processed; this also means that there's almost nothing we eat today that is completely unprocessed, or natural.

Highly processed: cereal, bread, milk, cheese, confectionery, all meats, burger patties (even veggie), pasta, oils and butters, all energy bars, snacks and packaged drinks, chocolate, all desserts, and most other 'edible' items. Highly processed foods often contain one or more of preservatives, colorants, flavor, and/or texturants.

Somewhat processed: all grains including rice and quinoa, legumes, sun-dried tomatoes, olive oil, frozen and canned fruits and vegetables, even pre-washed and pre-cut ones available at the supermarket(!)... you get the idea.

Wow! I do find it amusing that we like to be out in Nature to recharge ourselves but when it comes to the substance that powers our lives--food--we're content with eating it from packaged boxes with 'natural' slapped on them. We strive to live a 'simple' and 'spontaneous' life powered by 'complex' chemicals and 'preservatives'. Simply put, we want to be 'alive' on 'dead' food!


So why is processed food 'dead'?

This blog post of mine describes in detail how high temperature kills vital nutrients from food. Not only that, most processed foods contain by-products from other industries as their main ingredients to reduce cost of production and increase shelf life. For example, high fructose corn syrup instead of sugar and engineered flavors instead of actual fruit. These foods are also usually low in fiber, high in trans fats, and contain chemicals that hijack the biochemistry of the brain. The different brands of packaged food are all about coming up with that irresistible flavor that consumers eventually develop a dependency on.


But where to draw the line?

Well, there's no parallel to eating all unprocessed. But how far is that practical? It helps to distinguish between chemically and mechanically processed foods. While I'd avoid the former at all costs, mechanically processed foods might be unavoidable at times, unless you want to resort to pressing your own olives into oil, shell walnuts and pistachios on your own, grow and harvest your own quinoa, and ferment your own soybean paste into miso! :)

I'd be wary of cans of tomatoes and vegetables lined up on the supermarket shelf outside of the refrigerated isles but I have resorted to pre-washed and pre-cut veggies when time is short. Prepackaged frozen fruit isn't my recommendation; buying fresh, organic fruit and freezing it myself for longer, off-season storage is just as easy. And brings me peace of mind.

Buying food from the local farmer's market ensures minimal processing to a large extent--that food is not mass-produced or transported long distance, it sells fast, and is consumed quickly. Simply put, the need to use chemicals is largely eliminated.


Another important guideline I have come to use is to listen to my body. Did it feel the same when I fed it canned vegetables vs. fresh veggies I washed and cut myself just before consuming? Once you start living the unprocessed lifestyle, you start tuning-in to the signals sent by your body. That, perhaps, is the best guideline anyone would ever share with you...