FRANK: About diet and the ability to OBE

[kiauma]

SOmeone above mentioned soy, and while I don't think that is an entirely bad idea, I feel some caution is in order.

One of the big 'benefits' advertised from soy drinks are the 'isoflavones', a potentially beneficial substance alleged to aid metabolism and decrease the risk of heart disease and various types of cancer.

What the ads don't tell you is that isoflvones are a phytoestrogen - an estrogen-like plant compound - loaded with the stuff.  Human estrogen is about 400 times stronger, but thousands of times more isoflavones are ingested than in a standard HRT pill.

http://www.lef.org/prod_hp/abstracts/php-ab325.html

I'm not saying you can't enjoy soy, but if you start to sprout breasts, I suggest you cut down on your servings.

Currently, there is a lot of controversey over the real 'healthfulness' of soy;
http://www.propertyrightsresearch.org/articles2/billion.htm

[tdd]

Runlola,

While I made my own personal choice not to eat meat, and feel best on 100% raw fruits and vegetables - I do not believe that it "hurts the planet".. eating and being eaten was always part of this planet.. just that we "stopped being eaten" quite a qhile ago:))
I do believe however that it hurts the person eating it.

Soy is very very mucus forming and highly processed (when you buy soy based products in the supermarket) - I have seen lots of people that went vegeterian and started loading up on flour and soy based products - and looked and felt terrible:)  They kept justifying it by speaking of needing to transition still etc.. but they would just keep on feeling worse and worse from all that gunk in their system:)
No offense intended to people that do great on soy.. at some point if you are physically very very active.. it almost stops mattering what you eat since you will burn it up pretty much anyway (until you get a buildup of toxins and get sick) .. but why do it the hard way if there is food that is perfect for our system (raw plant based foods)

Best,
TDD

[Frank]

"While I made my own personal choice not to eat meat, and feel best on 100% raw fruits and vegetables - I do not believe that it "hurts the planet".. eating and being eaten was always part of this planet.. just that we "stopped being eaten" quite a qhile ago:))
I do believe however that it hurts the person eating it."

Yes, eating and being eaten but in nowhere near the scale that we now do and entirely unnecessarily. When it happens naturally, in nature, there is always a balance that is achieved. But in our inane and senseless bungling we break every natural rule in the book. Which you and others may well believe does not hurt the planet, but there are people who today still believe the world is flat.

The facts are there for everyone to see. But as I've said before, most people are more interested in what's happening in their favourite Soap, than the devastation that is being caused to our environment.

Yours,
Frank

[Nay]

quote:The facts are there for everyone to see. But as I've said before, most people are more interested in what's happening in their favourite Soap, than the devastation that is being caused to our environment.

Tehehehehe..dang Frank, you know how to make a girl feel good about herself..[]

I have one soap that I've watched for years, now come on...that doesn't make me bad does it?  []  I suppose I'm going to have to incarnate a few more times to get that true feeling in my heart..in all honesty I don't spend too much of my energy thinking about what is happening with the enviroment as a whole, I stick to what is around me, ya know what I mean?  I can teach my kids to respect nature and whatnot and my big pet peeve are litter bugs..[}:)]

It does sux that things are happening across the world, but what can I do..really?  I guess I only have enough in me to focus on what happens in my little world, that may sound really rude and selfish, but really, I would go crazy thinking about all the horrors of the world, I'd never come out of depression..[xx(]

It's obvious that there are people on ...I'll call it different levels, but just because I like soaps, gossip with friends, eat meat..etc..doesn't make me bad.  Please tell me I'm not bad..[]

*sniff, sniff* I always thought I was a pretty decent person.  But with your guidelines..yikes..I'm the devil..hehe

Nay

P.S. not picking on ya, just giving my thoughts freely.[]

[Gandalf]

I need a good answer here. I've told a few people that I'm thinking about switching to a meat and dairy-product free diet, primarily for health reasons but also for ethical ones.

However some smart-arses are asking whether 'killing' plants and vegetables is not just as cruel. People say its ok because plants are not sentient, but who are we to judge what is 'sentient' and what is'nt.

Of course, by this rational, we shouldnt eat anything and the human race should just die out, which is clearly stupid, so how do I answer this one?

Are we not cruel to plants by plucking them and eating them? do we not cause them pain by eating their leaves?

Douglas

[Eol007]

quote:Originally posted by Gandalf

I need a good answer here. I've told a few people that I'm thinking about switching to a meat and dairy-product free diet, primarily for health reasons but also for ethical ones.

However some smart-arses are asking whether 'killing' plants and vegetables is not just as cruel. People say its ok because plants are not sentient, but who are we to judge what is 'sentient' and what is'nt.

Of course, by this rational, we shouldnt eat anything and the human race should just die out, which is clearly stupid, so how do I answer this one?

Are we not cruel to plants by plucking them and eating them? do we not cause them pain by eating their leaves?

Douglas

Hi,

Is that not what fruitarians subscribe to? In that they only eat fruits, seeds and nuts and therefore avoid killing plants to be able to sustain themselves! But then I should not speak as a sad auld Ovo-lacto vegetarian!

Cheers,

Stephen

P.S. See www.notmilk.com www.madcoyboy.com for additional reasons not to eat meat or dairy!

[Rastus]

I used to say I've never meet a Vegatariun that wasn't a nutjob.  Now I find myself moving more towards a less meat diet.  It's mostly a subconcious decision, a result of meditation and study.  I eat red meat now only when I don't have a choice(it happens, sometimes that's all there is available).  I do more seafood (chickens have it worse than cows as far as mass production).  Fortunately I can get Organic chickens around here 9and they taste soooooo much better it's scary).

American agriculture is horribly inefficient, energy/resouce wise, but very efficient compared to the rest of the world.  You forgot to factor in transportation costs into all that, then it really gets out of scale energy wise.  I automatically discount anything with a political bias, which unfortunately is 98% of the information.  Sorry, but the Siera club is a political action group that doesn't care about the enviroment, it's just a tool.

Going to the extreme of nuts and fruits only is just that, extreme.

And has anyone brought up the difference between fresh/alive food and old dead food?  The greatest thing I ever ate was a perfectly ripe apple, plucked from a tree in the orchard on a chilly October morning with my daughters 1st grade class.  An apple from the same tree tasted 1/2 as good a week later after I picked it.

[tdd]

Runlola,

I am aware of those numbers and facts. I probably did not make myself to clear in my post. I was not referring to excessive meat eating.. nor the support of that sick indsutry. I was referring to the fact that some people are just not able to absorb nutrition from plant based foods to well.. and may need to suplement their diet with some animal protein.. and that can happen by supporting local.. organic.. small coops.. ecologically low impact raised farm stock.. etc etc.. that there is nothing (in my opnion) with a small amount of animal protein added to ones diet if really needed.

Frank - neither do I believe that the earth is flat.. nor that there is no harm done by this industry.. nor that EVERYTHING isn't being done in great excess that is not at all needed for ones life.
I merely indicated that in my opinion the meat eating itself - is not the real problem and does not hurt the planet - and that in my opinion there is nothing wrong with it - should you be a person that just needs occasional animal protein. The discussion was not the industry.. just the meat eating itself. There should be no guilt.

no tv here for many years - so sorry no soaps:)

EDIT: here is a very good reference site written by a person who has been on just fruit for years.. then raw food for years.. and researched various vegan.. raw.. fruit diets for many years and looked past the idealism that some people take as a reason to go vegan/raw etc.- http://www.beyondveg.com/    

Best,
Theodore

[tdd]

Nay,

In my opinion that is all one should start with - focusing on how their actions impact the world.. and improving themselves.. and only then moving onto other people.. their immediate family.. friends.. then neighborhood.. town etc..

But nothing good comes from saying how bad the state of the world is.. and nothing good comes from blaming people .. or telling them that they are doing wrong.. everyone is on their own path and often is not ready to understand.. and the more you yell the more they will be sure that they are right and you are just nuts. No matter how wrong they are. All that happens is you drive youself crazy with worry focusing on the whole world.

Yet by living your life the best you can.. you can become an inspiration for others to do the same.. and they then can inspire others to do the same .. and THAT is what can truly change the world IMO. One person at the time - starting with always yourself.

Best,
TDD

[tdd]

quote:Originally posted by runlola



TDD,

like I said, I think some blood types have to eat meat but
I am not one of them. I haven't researched that. I still think
it hurts the planet the way it is today. I don't see many folks
going out to hunt & kill their own food. Fresh organic meat does
not compare to what the majority eats these days & that is what
hurts the planet IMO. You are not a bad person to me because of
what you eat, you may just have bad breath.

That is absolutely true.

"not bad because of bad breath" - LOL:) thats a good one  .. but even that they came up with how to masquerade and hide with all their fancy gums and mints and schmints and what not - doesn't stop the rotting though:)

Best,
TDD

[stephen~]

Animal waste washed into rivers and lakes causes increased nitrates, phosphates, ammonia, and bacteria, and decreases the oxygen content. This kills plant and animal life. - runlola

Hmm, well in regards to the UK at least, nitratres and phosphates get into the rivers because they are sprayed onto crops in the first place. I find it difficult to believe that 10,000 acres of sprayed crops would produce less quantities than a field of cattle the same size.

The reason we have been losing so many species (in the UK again) is because once grazed or largely untreated arable farmland has been turned into arable monoculture or 'improved' monoculture grassland. Native wild plants can't survive in the face of chemicals and competive imported or bred plant species. When habitat disapears all the species within disapear too, from microbial and plant life to invertibrates and birds. A change from one grass species to another can finish a species locally. The leeching of those mentioned chemicals from crop sprayed fields into rivers has resulted in some water based species going to the edge of extinction here.

Intensively farmed arable land quite obviously contains less species of any and every kind than the same land did a century ago when there was less tampering. And in a once heavily sheep and cattle orientated landscape there was no shortage of otters and other aquatic species, whereas they came close to extinction due to crops and the obsessive drive to improve them post WW2, so the animal and nitrate in the dung argument doesn't really hold water, at least here - maybe you have bigger shitters than us lol. Same cause of loss is true of many falcon species, whose egg shells are softened in direct consequence of pesticides on crops which get into insects, insect eating birds and mammels and bird and mammel eating birds. All round, arable is much more disasterous for the planet as a whole than pasture is because it is not as biologically diverse by design, or as contiuously in use all year every year as unimproved pasture is, and it is the main cause of pollution in our watercourses.

For me it is not an issue whether eating meat is right or wrong, how those animals are treated is. The whole planet lives in a precarious balance, natural disasters that result in climate and ulitmately habitat change we can do nothing about, are maybe even beneficial, we wouldn't be here now if they weren't. The loss of plant and animal life due to industry's idea of what they think we want and need to eat and how much we'll pay for it is something we can change, if we care enough.

Killing a lamb to eat would revolt some people, but what has been done to the countryside in the name of crop production has killed far more species. Unfortunatlely birds, insects, small and medium sized mammels, lizards, butterflies, moths, wildflowers and fish are not big and cuddly-wuddly like lambs so this goes unnoticed by the majority. Diversity is surely the main issue, because food chains are seriously complex and  cope badly with the loss of any one part of it, and if we don't care about life because it is not pretty or usefull to us, what does that say about us? Every time an old grassland is ploughed up to grow crops that's another group of interdependent species that cease to exist and won't return, if we don't care about that well we should.

What I say is you cannot easily do the right thing, nor should we be smug about being  vegetarian. It's a hard world, whatever we do something will suffer, just because you don't notice it doesn't mean it isn't happening. If you demand more crops, better fruit, better veg this will impact on species. The most naturalistic state for countryside across large parts of the world is trees and grass, trees and grass. That's it, any deviation from that and species start to disapear. People have got to eat, but whether they are meat eaters or potato eaters or nut eaters, our demands for perfect food all year round has got to stop. It's easy to blame farmers for this over intensification instead of ourselves. Caring about the planet and all its diversity means  putting up with having maggots in your apples again like they used to have, something which I doubt many of us are prepared to accept in practise.

[tdd]

Stephen,

Great post..

I for one prefer my apples organic with naturally occuring blemishes - and an occasional worm UNWAXED:) and not radiated:)

haha:)

[Frank]

I read the info on the "beyondveg" site and, in the main, it serves as a prime example of how people can become seriously screwed from not following a natural eating regime. Once you let yourself go beyond a certain point, it can become extremely difficult to get back on track... as the personal accounts demonstrate. Though I do note they tend to blame the "diet" rather than their own stupidity.

The article entitled The Calorie Paradox of Raw Veganism gave me a good chuckle. According to them I should be a pasty-faced anorexic. But therein lies the flaw of counting the value of food merely in terms of its calorific value.

Now this did make me laugh, and I quote: "just how the raw-food "experts" can claim to maintain weight, energy, and muscle on modest daily volumes of raw food".

Anyone who has met me could easily attest to the fact that I am of adequate weight for my height. I'm 5ft 9" and weigh 172lbs, carry around 4% bodyfat, so my bodyweight is mainly composed of muscle (which is rather obvious).

I have no problems whatsoever maintaining this!!! According to the website, I should have to eat around 20lbs of vegetables a day. What a load of rubbish. I eat normal-sized meals at around normal times. The simple difference being, my digestive system has NEVER been abused to any great extent.

I have never let myself go, and all my life I have never eaten sugar in any quantity. If you do that, you get seriously screwed to the point where it becomes very difficult to get back on track. In other words, it takes EFFORT over quite a long period of time... which most people in western society just cannot comprehend anymore.

And as for the cooked food argument, well, that's just too ridiculous for words. Name one animal that cooks its food? The argument is senseless to the extreme. It's like Douglas' friends who come back with notions of plants suffering in the same way as animals. Are there any limits on the depths of human ignorance? I always hoped there was a limit. But each year, as a race, we hit a new low to the extent where now I'm seriously beginning to wonder.

Yours,
Frank

[tdd]

quote:Originally posted by Frank


I read the info on the "beyondveg" site and, in the main, it serves as a prime example of how people can become seriously screwed from not following a natural eating regime.....
I have never eaten sugar in any quantity. If you do that, you get seriously screwed to the point where it becomes very difficult to get back on track.

Thought you would enjoy the site:)

That was my point exactly - that many many people have lived for SO long on very bad diets.. that they just cannot go back to soemthing totally natural and do well on it. It required years of dedication to cleansing and lots of unpleasant things along the way.. that many people just can't do given were they are today.

And you can't blame them - they will just need more time... inspiration.. etc.. and some may still not be ready. Everyone has their things to work out.

quote:Now this did make me laugh, and I quote: "just how the raw-food "experts" can claim to maintain weight, energy, and muscle on modest daily volumes of raw food"...

Yup thats a funny one:)

There is a swedish body builder (fdon't remember his name) who is a 100% fruitarian.

I think its that many people just cannot absorb nutrition from the raw foods due to their intestines being totally gunked up.

quote:But each year, as a race, we hit a new low to the extent where now I'm seriously beginning to wonder.

I call this a "healing crisis".. things have to get a lot worse before they can get better... IMO

Best,
TDD

[Tisha]

http://www.astralpulse.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=13999

(the above link is to a topic on fasting)

Hello Frank, all:

Some of us have discovered diets that have helped us tremendously with our ability to OBE.  Let's talk about it . . . []

Examples:

1. I recently discovered my immune system reacts badly when I eat wheat/barley/rye, dairy, and eggs, so I've cut these foods out of my diet.  I did not notice an immediate improvement in my ability to OBE. However, over a period of several months, my level of relaxation deepened (probably because I was feeling better!), thus aiding my ability to get to an OBE state.  (some independent online research revealed that food allergies attack the nervous system, causing anxiety and depression, even seizures!)  SO, I'm throwing out to the world this suggestion:  If you have ANY chronic health issues, seek out hidden food allergies and adjust your diet accordingly.  The main culprits tend to be dairy, grains (including corn), fish/shellfish, soy, and citrus.

2.  I find heavy meals, specifically high-protein ones, very grounding.  If I eat meat before bed I can pretty much forget about having an OBE.  However, being chronically anemic (I try to donate blood but the Red Cross will have nothing to do with me!) and of the "caveman" blood type (O+), I do very poorly on a vegetarian diet (trust me, I've tried).  It's therefore my challenge to factor in high-iron animal flesh sparingly and at the right time of day (i.e., morning), so I may "fly" at night.

3. I know fasting can lead to altered states, but in my experience, it's no fun.

Frank, thanks for agreeing to pass on your wisdom!!!!!!!!!  Everyone else, feel free to pitch in .................