Why I Take the Long Road
How it started, what I’ve learned, how it’s going, what’s next. Intro to Healing Foods
I’ve been pondering what to talk about next on here. For years, I’ve taken the long road, the harder path, when it comes to food choices. After all, I could have a simple life by buying all the convenience foods at the grocery, eating fast food and dining out when I wanted. Instead, I go out of your way to avoid these things, for the most part. Even to the point of making my own cleaning products. This has been my life for many years.
How Did I Get Here?
I’ve always loved to cook. I learned first from my mom and then from my sister, Conni. They both cooked from scratch though for different reasons. Mom learned to cook that way, in a time when there were very few, if any, convenience foods. Over time, though, she began adopting the more convenient and highly processed foods available in the middle of the average grocery store. Conni, on the other hand, knew the value of quality ingredients. So she chose to cook from scratch in an era when there were more convenient, though less healthy, options.
I started out mostly cooking from scratch. For many years, I adopted some convenience foods, but not others. I would often buy bread rather than make it. There were, though, some things that I juste never bought.
Pancake mix comes to mind. Years ago, I was babysitting a friend’s daughter, Lori, for the weekend. Lori was 5 or 6 at the time. On Saturday morning, I asked her what she wanted for breakfast. She said, “Pancakes!” then went to the pantry and was disappointed when she didn’t find pancake mix. See, I don’t make pancakes very often, so I just use a recipe to make them from scratch. Lori got her pancakes that morning. And hopefully a lesson in cooking.
Being sensitive to fragrances since age 16 meant that my life would be more complicated. When something gives you migraines, you tend to want to avoid it, you know? Over time, I became more sensitive, and that’s when I started using safer cleaning products, and even making some.
I also developed some new food sensitivities. It’s a long story how I figured it all out, but let’s just say that I became a reader of labels. I have to avoid MSG (monosodium glutamate), most all artificial sweeteners, most nuts, and a few other things.
The more I learned about the ingredients in food, in personal care products, in cleaning products, the more I realized that there was a problem with our system. I wanted to tell others, too. To show others that there is a healthier way of being. And that’s when I decided to become a health coach.
What I learned
What I learned, what I’ve come to believe is this:
The System is Rigged Against Us.
This is not a conspiracy theory.
And it is not to say that it is something that companies set out to do, at least not because they are out to make us sick.
It's about money. The Love of Money. Which truly is the root of all evil. Money and profits matter more to many corporations than the health of the people who buy their products. Which, to me, seems highly counter-intuitive. Why would you want to make the people who buy your products sick?
Primarily, companies do things based upon their bottom line:
The cheaper the ingredients, the higher the profit.
The longer their fragrance stays in the air, the more people will buy it
Having people on prescriptions for life is more profitable than curing them.
And so on.
Do these companies create products that harm people on purpose? Are they solely culpable for their actions?
What about a government that allows questionable ingredients to be used? Saying, perhaps, that they are GRAS (generally regarded as safe). Or allowing the fragrance industry (Big Fragrance) to hide behind their "trade secret" claim so they don't have to reveal what's in their products?
Or government agencies that get money, and lots of it, from Big Pharma or other industries. How can you think they would be unbiased when 40% or more of their funding comes from industry?
How It’s Going
When I started writing here in March, I started off by saying that each one of us is in charge of their own health. Not doctors, not anyone else. The reason? As I said earlier, the system is rigged against us.
I believe the best defense is to be educated. To be aware of what is in the foods at the grocery store, for starters. But to also know that traditional foods have both health-building and healing capabilities. Knowing how to eat and what to eat is the best defense against a rigged system.
And that is why I do what I do. That is why I take what may seem like the harder path. The road less traveled, if you will. It's the healthier road. It's the cheaper road, in the long road. Cheaper when you factor in the cost in both money and lost time that result from illness.
What’s Next?
All of that to say that I’m going to be focusing in the next few months on healing foods: foods, spices and herbs with health-building and healing capabilities. I know you’ve heard that chicken soup is healing. It’s not just an old wives’ tale either. But not the “mm-mm good” brand in the grocery story. The healing properties in chicken soup start with the bone broth that was the base of soups for centuries. Until Big Food figured out a way that they could make soup for less.
I’ll be sharing how every day foods and culinary herbs and spices, that may be in your kitchen already, can also help you get healthy and stay healthy.
Perhaps I will start with the Allium family which includes onions, garlic, shallots, leeks, etc. Including a recipe!
Talk soon!