by Frederic Patenaude
It seems like every time you turn your
head, you hear confusing and misleading
information from every corner of the
natural health movement. First, you
have mainstream “experts”
who rely on outdated and inaccurate
data to advise us on the subject. And
then there's the raw food or natural
health movement itself, within which
most people seem to disagree on what
constitutes the healthiest diet.
In this article, I will review 5 wrong
assumptions about natural living, spread
by conventional “experts.”
In the second part of this article,
I will expose 5 false assumptions being
spread by various raw-food advocates
and naturopaths.
From the mainstream, we hear the
following...
“You have to make sure you
eat enough protein”
Without a doubt, the issue of “getting
enough protein” is the number
one concern of anyone switching to any
kind of diet for any reason. Even though
decades of vegetarian and vegan traditions
and extensive research have proven that
our actual protein requirements are
fairly low and easy to meet - as long
as we eat enough food - most people
who will advise you about diet will
likely make a much bigger deal about
protein than it actually is.
Bodybuilders go beyond all extremes
known to humankind by consuming upwards
to 350 grams of protein per day, an
amount that is completely off the charts
and only possible through the consumption
of refined protein powders.
At the same time, most people on the
planet get by on less than 60 grams
of protein a day, and many people in
these cultures possess wiry and explosive
strength that would put most gym goers
to shame.
In the end, the evidence is still conclusive:
as long as you eat enough calories to
meet your needs, you will at the same
time consume enough protein, even if
all you eat are fruits and vegetables.
There is no reason to make protein more
important than it actually is.
“You need to eat a balanced
diet”
According to our nutritionists, a “balanced”
meal is composed of carbohydrates, protein
and fat in the right proportions.
A meal of bread (carbohydrate), with
cheese (protein), and a salad containing
a dressing of olive oil (fat) and a
desert (carbohydrate) would be, in their
opinion, a balanced meal.
That meal might be a digestive disaster
for most people, but that aside, we
don't find any evidence that our bodies
need to receive nutrition in such a
manner.
If we look all around the world, we
see different cultures that have enjoyed
excellent health eating far from “balanced”
meals. In China, rice with vegetables
is a meal. In the Great North, the Eskimos
have lived on almost nothing but meat.
The Hunzas regularly ate meals composed
of vegetables and some chapati bread.
If we look at wild animals, we also
see that they do not eat “balanced”
meals. A meal for an orangutan might
consist of nothing more than rambutan
(a tropical fruit) or durian (another
tropical fruit).
There is absolutely no need to worry
about eating a very simple diet where
most of our meals are composed of a
few foods only. As long as we eat a
large variety of food from week to week,
it doesn't matter if our meals are not
composed of “carbohydrates, protein
and fat”.
“You can't sustain yourself
on just raw foods”
Most nutritionists look at the raw food
diet and claim that it's “impossible”
to sustain ourselves from only fruits,
vegetables, nuts and seeds. Letting
alone the fact that hundreds of thousands
of people are doing just that and are
still alive to tell about it, there
is no scientific reason to believe that
we can't live on raw foods.
Nutritionists will claim that it would
be “very difficult” to eat
enough fruits and vegetables to consume
enough calories.
The problem is that they are still stuck
with the view of cooked nutrition and
its “balanced view” and
can't think outside the box and realize
that it is actually possible to consume
enough fruits and vegetables and get
the calories you need. It just is a
lot of food!
The truth is, eating a raw food diet
will mean that you'll be consuming more
fruits and vegetables in a day than
some people may consume in a week or
even in a month. But as you learn to
eat this way, you'll find that this
“huge” amount of fruits
and vegetables is actually the “right”
amount.
“You should never expose your
skin to the sun”
Although we know that too much sun isn't
good for us, the advice we get from
dermatologists these days defy all reason.
Apparently, we should never expose our
skin to the sun unless we are fully
protected by chemical lotions.
Did you forget the important fact that
sunlight is essential to our well-being,
and that regular sun exposure at safe
periods of the day are actually beneficial
to your health, even in 2006?
You need the sun. The question is just
how much!
“If it's natural it's good
for you”
The word “natural” has been
abused more than any other term in the
food industry. We now have “natural
potato chips”, “natural
coffee” and “natural beer.”
The fact that these foods come from
a factory should make it obvious that
they are definitely not natural, nor
healthy.
The truth is, even if a food were natural,
it wouldn't automatically make it healthy.
There are plenty of plants and mushrooms
that grow in the wild that are not only
“perfectly natural,” but
also deadly!
Let's be clear: for a food to be healthy,
it has to be a lot more than “natural.”
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