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I've been reading into diet books for the last 15 years or so and have accumulated quite a bit of knowledge and experience in that area which I would be pleased to share with anyone still starting out in the jungle of dietary theories and literature. You may have spent years working on a career and hardly have had the time or inclination to spend reading up on the myriad books on diet and health, who can blame you. Me, I just couldn't accept the utter hopelessness of the options offered me and set out on a quest for something better. It's taken me years to compile this information, working against preconceived notions, brainwashing and bullshit in my own mind. I reasoned "there has to be a better, healthier, happier life than this" and I looked into every serious attempt at solving the riddles surrounding eating and a happy digestion and constitution. Now you may profit from the results of my quest.

Almost everything I've read I have put to the test myself. I've tried many diets, among which Atkins', Fit for Life, Macrobiotics, the Bloodtype Diet, the color diet and a few others along the way.

Books I've studied include:
The Rotation Diet by Martin Katahn
The T-factor Diet by Martin Katahn
Fit for Life by Harvey and Marilyn Diamond
How to be your own Nutritionist by Stuart M. Berger
Zenmacrobiotics by George Ohsawa (Sakurasawa Nyoshii)
Dr. Atkins (New) Diet Revolution by Robert Atkins
The Eat Right 4 Your Type Diet by Dr. Peter D'Adamo
The 5 day Miracle Diet by Adele Puhn
Eat yourself Slim by Michel Montignac
The Love-Powered Diet
Star Signs by Linda Goodman
The Eating Gorilla comes in Peace by Ruchira Avatar Adi Da Samraj (Bubba Free John)

I do not necessarily support the (entire) contents of the above-mentioned books, but have taken what they have to say and put it to the test of common sense and practice and feasibility.

No diet is necessarily right. They all have their pros and cons, depending on what you want out of them, your life, your eating habits, or (temporary) diet. I myself use many diet theories simultaneously throughout the day and/or at one meal, depending on the effect I seek to acchieve. Or I chuck them all overboard and stuff myself with whatever pleases me. This is rare nowadays though, because there are many things one can do that hardly make eating more pleasureable but result in castastrophy, so why live ignorance when you know better? I'll eat ice-cream, detrimental by any standards, but lessen it's effects by applying certain simple rules, thereby actually increasing my enjoyment of this particular poison. Even making it possible to eat more of it! Dietary rules are not there to stiffle us but to free us. This has been the outset of my investigation from the start and I gladly share the results with any willing to hear or read.

Please don't be put off by the overwhelming amount of theory here. It took me years to put it all together and I don't expect you be able to or even want to put all of it or even half of it into practice at once. I will try and offer you your best options from which you can then pick what will suit you best in your life now. I have put together a list of priorities to look to when starting from scratch, so to speak. What's best to start out with. What makes the most impact with the least amount of effort and sacrifice. Or, if you like, you can chose something which demands more from you but results in a quicker or deeper impact on your health or physique.
YOU choose. I am here simply to make your options clear as best I can.

I apologise for spelling errors and such as I am not a true native-speaker, though I spent 9 years in the States.
I also apologise for any chaotic layout that should confound you @ this webpage. It is under construction. Always, but especially for the time being.

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these so-called "experts", who calls them experts? What credentials do they carry? What have they proven? Now Atkins, that's a man who has proven through results what works and is healthy. Let's face it, much in the science field merely caters to the whims of economic multi-billion dollar powerhouses trying to get the consumer to buy more of this or that. I never listen to "experts", I listen to arguments and make my own decisions. The article I view as just so much whining by uninformed people out on area's they know nothing about. Do you have any idea how many hours a doctor is issued to study about diet when he or she is at university? I don't even know that it is mandatory, it's certainly not a lot. I read in a book documenting these things that a physiotherapist takes more hours. Hell, they usually don't show much knowledge and competence DOCTORING let alone taking over where dieticians might be expected to having an opinion. Ever heard of a doctor curing a patient? It's usually covering symptoms and creating side-effects and then saying it's all unavoidable. They are not in the curing business, let alone the avoiding problems business which is what dieticians should be doing. Listen to your experience. They whine about bad-breath when the mistakes THEY make usually cause major disasters and these they ignore. They would do well to show more humility. These so-called experts have made horendous calls in the past, they will (and still do today) in the future. Give them as much credit as your next-door neighbour or less. Chances are your neighbour is better informed. If you think this is exaggerated read Fit for Life II, it's full of references to scientific papers and such which support the above opinions. Why do you think I started looking into dieting in the first place?

If the AMA were right, why would cancer, AIDS and heartdiseases be so prevelant in the world?

Follow your feelings and experience at any rate, not "specialists'" meanderings. Follow love, not fear.

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I read the Flex and Muscle and Fitness religiously for two years and one thing stuck out like a sore thumb: no one agrees on anything and for every idea there are at least a couple of contradicting ideas just as convincing.

But I have found effective ideas in the diet corners elsewhere, ideas I know just work. And they very often go against every belief commonly accepted. For accepted theories you can go spread in the gym and have people say "wow, I didn't know that, thanks", don't come to me. The things that really work are more complicated and at the same time more simple than anything you can spell out in a couple of sentences to someone that's not really listening.


sit-ups
Let me make this one little point. I realize it will be contrary to common beliefs, but it is based on common sense and common beliefs will get you knowledge like "drink milk for your bones" while scientific studies learn that drinking milk CAUSES osteoporosis. So, so much for "common knowledge", even by so-called specialists or professionals.
What I'd like to say is NEVER DO SIT-UPS OR LEG-RAISES in great numbers. It is an inefficient, uncomfortable (that should be reason enough), and illogical way to tone the abs. When you work on your biceps, do you not stretch your arm completely to work the entire muscle and to stop from shortening the muscle? Of course you do. Otherwise you'd end up with an arm that's constantly bent after a while. You should work the abs STANDING UPRIGHT or lying down flat. You want them to be trained the way you're going to be most of the day, which is straight, not bent over.
You use the abs simply when walking or running, but if you want to work them do squats or bench-presses. Do this for a while and you will see that they are worked more, harder and get harder, with less effort and more results, than with any amount of situps. Therapists who advise sit-ups should have their licenses and their "I have a brain"-cards revoked.
Sorry, but the fact that situps are so commonplace is kind of unsetteling. Do them at your peril.
Try powerlifting instead.

protein intake
It is very easy to eat too much protein, too little is almost impossible. Macrobiotics teaches us that the optimal ratio carbs to proteins should be 6:1. If you consume more proteins in relation to carbs than this you're body will merely be fighting to get the balance back and you'll be craving sweets and such. So maybe not just what proteins or carbs, but also how many.

Considering quality of proteins I really must refer you to the bloodtype diet, which is not necessarily for losing weight and could possibly assist you for optimal results. Each bloodtype has it's own specific set of foods, in each foodgroup, and using proteins specific to your bloodtype will at least make your digestive system work optimally and leave your body with the energy to grow, I'm assuming. Besides this you'll not be building fat and what muscles you grow will show. In my experience this is as satisfying as more.

You obviously need high quality proteins, but much more than this I can't say. Raw eggs seem to work swifty and well. I'd add a few nuts (according to your bloodtype) once in a while, but you must realize you need not consume proteins every single day. The body uses a protein POOL, and when it has used up it's stock of some amino you will be craving it. So maybe, in order to know which amino/protein you need to add on at that time you need to be sensitive to what you're body is telling you. Eat what you crave, not what you think you need. You could be wrong in your thinking, the established ideas on proteins have been wrong in the past, but FEELINGS/cravings have always been the same and have always been right. Of course other good sources of proteins are (fat) fishes, but particularly (I'm very serious, especially in the way of minerals/vitamins) WHOLE grains. Consider that you are causing your body to sour up due to the consumption of animal proteins and you should really consider millet which is an alkaline grain, the only one besides buckwheat, which you should only eat if you're an A bloodtype. If you consume diary you should be looking to goat's milk as this is possible to digest for human beings. And then preferably RAW goat's milk. Research shows a VAST difference between what LIFE the body can take out of raw vs. pasteurized milk. I can tell you about test results that make your skin crawl of what happens to subjects only eating pasteurized cowmilk. So watch the (quality of your) dairy.

Those are things that come to mind right now. I'm talking QUALITY here, as most people only talk quantity. With the above you can also improve your health vastly, let that stimulate you as well. Big and toned is noce, but gleaming with health is as attractive as a person can get. (And Darwin confirms this!)

applying the Rotation Diet rule
If you eat 500 calories for 3 weeks, your body will simply adjust to that amount and suddenly you may be GAINING weight with the same amount you were loosing it rapidly before. So where do we stand in regards to carb/calorie counting? It's all about metabolism. First, like in the above example, you must take care to keep your metabolism up and not adjusting to any lessened intake of energy, whether you're counting carbs or calories or fat or proteins or whatever.

The thing about working out is it equals dieting in a way because demanding energy from yourself is like denying yourself that same amount of energy. Your body notices "hey, there's less energy around" and whether that's due to less food or more exercise doesn't mean that much to the body at that time. It will go into starvation mode, it will cause the metabolism to go slower to keep in step with the activity to energy-input ratio.
This means that after 3 weeks of exercising your body will adjust your metabolism, same as after 3 weeks of dieting.

Combining diet and exercise is just too complex, in this sense, to say anything sensible. Only that you could be nullifying the effects of stopping dieting by keeping up (added) exercise. I'd say stick to one or the other or do one, then add the other on top later.
Just remember, as far as (manipulating your) metabolism (= losing weight) is concerned... EXERCISING = DIETING

Cycling your training according to the Rotation Diet theory works a bit like this:
Exercising takes more energy, demands more energy, therefore would SEEM to be more efficient. However, if things were so cut-and-dried why are there overweight people around today?! The important thing is to use it to help up your metabolism (to lose weight). If you, say, run for 4 weeks (longer than 3 weeks is the point I'm making), your metabolism will have adjusted to less food (= demanding energy = offering your body less).
THEN your body will NEED less food. THEN when you stop running YOU'LL ACTUALLY GAIN WEIGHT!

That's the way your metabolism works. It's wonderful because it means you won't die when you run a marathon. It's not so wonderful when you don't run 10 miles a day and want to stay slim. UNLESS you keep the metabolism issue in mind and use it to your advantage.

What you do want to do is for instance:
walk (or run if you're up to it) for 60 minutes for 3 days,
then walk (or run) for 40 minutes for 4 days,
then walk (etc.) for 20 minutes for a week;
repeat the first week, so 3 days 60 and 4 days 40 again.
THEN DO NOT WALK OR RUN AT ALL FOR AT LEAST ONE WEEK!!!
This way your metabolism will not adjust to the lessened intake of energy. You will have demanded just enough energy / exertion from your body to depleat it's reserves, but not enough to get it to kick into starvation mode.
Week 5 you can start exercising again, maybe at a higher level, but it is important to rotate your intensity of training or your body will simply adjust and you could end up heavier (in fat tissue) than when you didn't exercise at all.

energy levels and fat
Your glycogen stores are depleted after about an hour and a half of training.When you run on fat, however, you can go up to 4 hours of intense training without hitting that energy bottom. There are those who work out a lot who stick to the protein/high fat diet for staying slim and high on energy. One way to do this is to stick to Atkins', basically, all the time. There are also those that, say, carb up in the weekends and adhere to the Atkins' principles during the week. It is a method applied by some bodybuilders to stay slim all year round and to give them those extra hours of training otherwise lost for having to carb up again in between.
see as well: the freed pancreas

cycling your training
Ed Coan was a middle-weight weightlifter of some time ago, when I was reading Muscle & Fitness and Flex.
But he was no mediocre weightlifter! In powerlifting, where the number 2 in the world lifted a total of 1000 lbs, he lifted about 1200!!! This means, in competitive sports, where the margins are always tiny, this man lifted an awesome 20% more than the runner-up! This cannot be over-emphesised.

The reason he was so far ahead of the rest had nothing to do with dieting and really doesn't fit on this webpage all too well. But it's so impressive I can't just not tell about it while discussing exercise.
Ed Coan would cycle his routines. These were 12 week cycles, with 2 weeks getting started, 8 weeks slowly working up intensity, and 2 weeks of more intense (but never all-out!) training. His basic attitude was "leave your ego at home".

I tried powerlifting this way for 3 months and the results were amazing! My abs were harder than I'd ever felt them. Without one sit-up! And believe you me, I'd done some grueling sit-up training in my (kung-fu) day. Painful, long training. None of the results of those hundreds of sit-ups a day for years (!) could compare with this. So much for no-pain-no-gain.

Unfortunately I can't just think up how to combine Rotation Diet theory with Ed Coan's routines, as combining diet and exercise is just too complex without further serious research.

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.

Atkins and proteins:
Too many proteins is not good. Of course it was never Atkins' goal to keep you on proteins. As your pancreas heals more and more, you should be able to handle carbs better and even sustain occassional assaults by sugar well, if not too frequent. The bad breath issue, by the way, can be dealt with rather effectively by eating enough raw greens and substituting meat with eggs and tofu and raw milk products and by simply not over-eating.

Whatever changes you undertake, take them slow and don't get freaked about your protein intake. It's much less worse than sugar intake and if it's keeping you away from sugar, you win right there. But keep in mind we are not meat-eaters, but biologically fruit-eaters ultimately. Our diet should consist of about 2% meat ideally. Work slowly toward that more natural ideal and that should be fine. It takes about 5 to 7 years to kick the habit of eating meat, it can't be undertaken in less time anyway.

Read books and articles not subidized by the meat or pharmacy industrie and these truths become evident.

Supplements are another part of the great con which is the result of free advertisement and working on peoples' doubts and insecurities. I'm sure they will be outlawed some time in the future. Ever see a 2000 pound elephant eating supplements? It is true, eating sugar rapes your system of nutrients and then you might need to replace them. If you want a lot of nutrients, eat whole grains. Not flour from whole grains, but the grains like rice, oats, millet and spelt.

I'm sorry, I'm not a "believer" in supplements at all. There is no scientific basis for them and I like to check EVERYTHING I've heard about what's healthy or no or sensible or no. And there is nothing intelligent to be found to convince one of the necessity or efficiency of vitamins. If vitamins worked like everyone assumes why don't we eat chalk for our bones? Think on that.

I can tell you of a story about a group of Tarahumara indians. They live off half a cup of corn and half a cup of cornbeer a day. Read it and weep. They have no roads there and these indians in rocky Mexico run about a marathon a DAY and once a week they get together to run a supermarathon of about a 100 km. These people, by all rights and assumptions implied by our vitamin "science" SHOULD BE DEAD! Yet they are totally healthy, showing NO signs of all the diseases typical in our society. When "scientists" dropped by and supplemented their diet with vitamins and stuff THEY SUDDENLY DEVELOPED EVERY ILLNESS KNOWN TO US FROM CARIES TO HEART-DISEASE.
So much for our "know-how".

Truth be told, these people DON'T consume vast amounts of sugar which rape our systems of vitamins and minerals as soon as they enter our bodies. Then we can work hard to get them back out of the chemicals we've consumed. Very inefficient. No wonder we don't run marathons.

Ponder this: does a 30ton blue whale need vitamins? Taking vitamins is like saying "let's take in Swiss emigrants (or whatever) and all our immigration problems will be solved!" It's a rather convenient simplification.

Supplements and cereals
So my advice is, chuck the cereals altogether if you're serious about health. Chuck as much sugar as you can, chuck dairy (only raw goats milk can be called edible, the rest is murder on our system) but certainly DON'T COMBINE THE 2 IN ONE MEAL like we do when we eat cereal.

Take care, there's a multi-billion dollar industry out there trying to (and succeeding in) brainwash(ing) you, working on your fears of not-enoughness and using self-serving "logic" and general ignorance to barter their "produce".

If you really want to stick to cereals I'd advise you to get over to a healthfood store, get some serious brands that don't need to fortify their food because they didn't take the good stuff out in the first place. Try and get your hands on raw milk, preferably goat and see which grains suit your bloodtype.

Pills
The whole issue of KEEPING weight off revolves around metabolism. Thinking one can enhance metabolism is correct; one can ingest cocaine for instance and up one's metabolism for while it lasts and if you do this often enough you will get a higher metabolic standard and loose weight even when you don't do anymore drugs. Problem is this is very unhealthy. Okay, and now diet pills that promote metabolic changes, what should we think of them?
CAN we possibly change our metabolism through pills at all? For a while. But should we even want to try? Our metabolism is the result of all the choices of our life's activities put together. We are homo sapiens, nature gives what we have as a result of life-style-choices and having certain dietary habits.
One might say "don't try and fool mother-nature!".

Our fat layers are the result of inactivity, stress and bad food choices. We can fight our choices and the resultant natural fat and therefore millions of years of evolution, OR we can work WITH them, changing them (activity, diet, stress) and naturally, healthily coming into a new balance of (less) fat and (more) health.
This involves choices that change your life. Many choose not to do so and substitute changes for pills, fighting mother-nature in the process. Anything that impacts your life so much as to result in a different (higher) metabolism is powerful medicine to be treated with respect and awe. Like one would treat the effects of cocaine.
But even then a definate, longterm change in metabolism is not to be expected. Because mother-nature keeps rearing up her pretty head, she'll be fighting you every step of the way if you try to keep your metabolism at a level at odds with every other aspect of your life.

Work with mother-nature, change habits that result in the production of fat, and you'll acchieve changes that stay with you easily for all the days of your life, enhancing it.

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Pasteurized (cows)milk and nuked foods should be steered clear of. Read books and articles not subidized by the meat or pharmacy industrie and these truths become evident.

There are 2 studies with animals that corroborate this that really speak for themselves. They are mentioned in Fit for Life II. This book refers to the specific scientific articles.

I've made it my focus of attention to find out how to stop cravings from coming up. I will give you a list of things to implement.

You should really look into the bloodtype theory (at www.dadamo.com) to what you should and should not be eating. This alone could solve your problem. The other theories would help as well, just see how much you are able to implement and how much you're willing to read up on. I have culled all the diet bs out there for you, but there is still some theory you need to know, especially if you still want to wing it with more or less regular foods.

If you eat 500 calories for 3 weeks, your body will simply adjust to that amount and suddenly you may be GAINING weight with the same amount you were loosing it rapidly before. So where do we stand in regards to carb/calorie counting?

It's all about metabolism. First, like in the above example, you must take care to keep your metabolism up and not adjusting to any lessened intake of energy, whether you're counting carbs or calories or fat or proteins or whatever.

There are many ways to loose weight and they all work, but for whom do they work, how long do they work and when? This varies greatly. I am the one who should give you your options, YOU be the one to decide which one suits you best, based on your preferences and abilities and case.

What it boils down to as far as I know is this:
- there are diets that manipulate your calorie intake; these I all discard out of hand: calorie-counting is hopelessly out-dated and futile. It is so short-term and so much a hassle, many have come to see already that they are a waste of time.
- there are those that manipulate fat-burning; I will discuss 2 of these,
- there are those that manipulate your bloodsugar level
- there are those that work on the level of toxins in your body(fat),
- there's one that discusses the effects of bloodtype,
- there are those that deal people into another 3 types,
- and there's the one that deals with the harmony or balance of life in general and food in particular.

I USE THEM ALL, SIMULTANEOUSLY to keep my weight where I want it and to improve my health.
But none of them exclusively, all the time. At least not yet. I have to say after years of research and try-outs I am most impressed by the last-mentioned one and am seeing how well I can implement it without distress, to the greatest effect. This has been my goal from the start, to find out what technique works well and easily, when, for whom and in which situation. I will give you an idea of my findings and you decide what to implement to which degree in your life.

Always be aware of this hazard of dieting, the well-known yo-yo effect. What is not commonly known about the yo-yo effect is that when you diet in a starvation kind of way (quickly, and by denying yourself food-intake you do crave) you not only lose fat, but also muscle tissue. The big problem with this is that when you gain back your old weight (part of the yo-yo effect) you DO NOT gain back the muscle. So when the old weight is back, percentage-wise you are fatter still.
When changing your diet in a non-denying fashion, like when eating according to your bloodtype or certain foods at certain times of the day as in Fit for Life, your body will take care of excess fat without having to resort to burning muscle tissue.

Another hazard of dieting is creating metabolic resistence. When the body has responded to stimuli to alter one's metabolism repeatedly, at some point it will take a very big impact to get the body to change and, for one, start to burn fat. It is, for instance, possible to be so metabolic resistant that one's body will not go into ketosis after 2 weeks of zero intake of carbohydrates as is the most extreme way to start off the Atkins' diet. In such a case it may proove necessary to go on the fat diet for 2 to 3 days to stimulate the body to burning fat. This is quite an uncommon state of being because it takes quite a bit of conditioning to get the body to be so resistant to change, but if even Atkins' does not offer results it may be the case.



The diets are these:
- fat-burning; Atkins' and the T-factor Diet,
- bloodsugar level, The 5-day Miracle Diet,
- the level of toxins in your body(fat), Fit for Life,
- bloodtype, The Eat Right 4 Your Type Diet,
- dividing people into (3) types, the Aryuvedic principle,
- harmony or balance of food, Macrobiotics

Dr. Atkins' New Diet Revolution
Atkins' diet is good for meat-eaters and people who want to loose weight fast. And for those with high-cholesterol/trigliceride count. I also use the zero-carbohydrate trick to start the day off without sugar/carbs without a problem. Best trick: eating fat stimulates the burning thereof. Also:
while eating carbless, the craving for carbs halts,
never experience hunger, gives you a great desire for fresh greens, great for bloodtypes O and B;
Atkins' definately has its pros and cons, but there are many ways to "do" Atkins' and many mistakes to make that might make you think it doesn't work. It is a powerful tool, I assure you.
Before I go on I will have a good say on Atkins':
If you have the commitment and opportunity to seriously stick to such a diet, well, the sky's the limit. But there is much ignorance in the world about dieting and also about the practical aspects of Atkins'. I'll run just a few ideas by you for now. If you want more specifics, ask again. I can't tell you all my experiences and knowledge at once and wouldn't want to burden you with them!

You should not be experiencing cravings!
These are some things you can do wrong with Atkins':
carbohydrate intake should be as close to zero as possible the first 2 weeks. As you should (and probably do) know, the first weeks are crucial. But because of the zero intake of carbohydrates your metabolism doesn't get a kickstart and shouldn't go into the sugar/carbohydrates craving routine.
You could be metabolic resistent, this means sticking to the diet even more stricktly (though you should be as strict as possible at any rate the first 2 weeks). If you crave, you're consuming too many carbohydrates. Check the charts and see where you're going wrong. Or tell me what you are eating and I'll try and point it out.
If you still have no results, you may need to try the fat-diet for a few days to get started. This is also part of Atkins' but is not necessary for most. It's all in the book. Ask again if you think this may be your case.

There are certain supplements which can help ease sugar addiction, but this are not commonly medically accepted (but then neither is/was Atkins'). There are herbal and Macrobiotic aids to this effect. . Best though to stick to zero carbohydrates.

Try and eat as many cucumbers and lettuce and celery as you can stomach. They clean the system which is being bombarded with too many proteins during Atkins'. And the diet will have you craving them anyway. Too many proteins is easy to acchieve, too little is almost impossible. But they polute the system. If you keep up too many (animal) proteins for a couple of days without enough roughage to clean you up on the inside, you could start to smell really bad. If you're an A bloodtype maybe try chicken and a little tofu instead.

You will not have to deprive yourself of sugar forever. But (later on) do a day/meal/snack of sugar and then AT LEAST for another day, be strict. Let your pancreas heal during that time.
see also:
the freed pancreas
Atkins' and proteins
energy levels and fat

the T-factor Diet:
short summary: carbohydrates only get turned into fat for 4%; therefore only fat really gets turned into fat: don't go overboard on fat-consumption.

- bloodsugar level, The 5-day Miracle Diet:
keep your bloodsugar level up and your cravings will be less or even disappear. Therefore it will be feasible to live the discipline you may be looking for. It is a trick in living the sugar-/white flour-free diet.
tricks: drink right after getting up,
eat asap or right after some morning excercise,
eat every 2 hours in the morning,
eat every 3 hours until evening.

- the level of toxins in your body(fat), Fit for Life:
(as much as possible) eat only fruit till noon and any other time than between noon and about 5 PM,
eat plenty of greens with your meals,
don't mix carbs with proteins,
eat between noon and 5 PM only, except for fruit,
start each meal with a salade,
don't mix fresh fruit with meals,
stay away from certain products like pasteurized milk, suppplements, sugar, etc etc (read the book, it's very much worth your while for astonishing facts and common sense),

- bloodtype, The Eat Right 4 Your Type Diet,
according to your bloodtype there are foods/activities you should and should not be doing. There is a very detailed list of what you can eat according to your type. Check out www.dadamo.com,
To find out what your bloodtype is, giving blood is the fastest way.
This theory is very basic knowledge every person should know!

- dividing people into types, the Aryuvedic principle,
of which I know far too little. It seems to concentrate on the effect of food on your biggest organ, your skin, dividing people into 3 types and spelling out which type should be eating what. A thousands of years old theory practiced throughout India,

- harmony or balance of food, Macrobiotics
main tricks:
eat mostly (whole) grains,
carb:protein ratio should be 6:1,
drink when thirsty, not too much (most in the morning),
don't take too much fruit, especially in cold climates/seasons,
eat every meal in a certain order,
eat the meals in relation to each other in a certain order,
chew carbohydrates really well (they mainly get processed in the mouth), eat and drink as little as feels right (feasible with the nutritious whole grains which are the staple of this diet).
This diet has proven to be affective against cancer but is widely misunderstood. If you read about it, read the fantastically inspirational Zenmacrobiotics by George Ohsawa himself and avoid books by so-called followers of his system, unless their name is Kushi. George Ohsawa helped proove scientifically (according to western standards) in 1964 (!) by way of Eastern scientific deductioning (macrobiotics) that there is COLD FUSION going on in our bodies!
Details on the workings of macrobiotics:


Besides all this there's the Rotation Diet rule:
Do not ever diet for more than 3 weeks straight. Dieting longer than 3 weeks causes your metabolism to adjust and start working on less food. After 3 weeks take a break and return COMPLETELY to the way you were eating before for at least a week (or at least to a comparable amount of energy-intake).
During the 3 weeks also rotate the intensity of dieting:
3 days very intense, say 600 calories.
4 days say 900
7 days 1200
3 days 600
4 days 900
THEN TAKE A BREAK!
This will keep your spirits and your metabolism up;


I always keep the teachings of Bubba Free John in mind who goes into the spirituality of eating and practical aspects in his (1977) book The Eating Gorilla Comes in Peace. Main themes:
eat sprouts, and wheatsproutsjuice
as much live food as possible (as with Fit for Life),
raw goats' milk products instead of cows',
with the right attitude;


Then there's always the color diet, which works extremely well, but is a great hassle to do, even if you only do it once. The macrobiotic diet acchieves the same result over time. Read about the color diet in Linda Goodman's Star Signs or ask me.


and to sum it all up in one verse: Gen:1;29

fasting
Fasting done well should leave you with more energy!
There are things to be done wrong with fasting but there is also so much to be gained. Let's define what we're talking about: fasting can be not eating or it can mean not eating nor drinking. We call "breakfast" so because we have broken the fast of the night, presumembly not having eaten or had anything to drink during the night. A fast can be as long, therefore, as you like, be it the night, the morning, one meal, or 40 days. Part of the hype of modern dieticians is drinking half a gallon a day. Therefore many may assume that fasting should mean drinking to "clean the system and wash out the dirt". This is just one way of approaching fasting! A "true" fast of not drinking nor eating can have results no "water fast" can acchieve. We might do well to consider how natural fasts are in the animal kingdom, including true fasts (for lack of a better description). There are very many species that do not live very near by a water source, yet they can thrive.

Fasting is really as natural as eating itself. You'll notice that eating without fasting is impossible in the sense that one can simply not just keep on eating. In fact it could be the one most effective good eating habit you pick up to stick to 3 meals a day. Eating all day, including meals during the night, can very effectively disrupt one's digestion, whilst simply fasting for 12 hours or so solves all problems caused by over-eating. Our intestines simply need the time to do their job! Especially when our diet is problemetical to the natural talents our digestive tract possesses. Giving your intestines a break once in a while (once a week or so) by denying them food and/or water, can be very condusive to your health and sense of well-being. This can also, or initially until cleansing has become less immediate, be done by drinking only (one) fruit or vegetable juice(s) for a day or so. Watered-down juices would help in keeping hunger at bay. Consider how many apples go into just one glass of juice and worry not about getting enough nutrients!

Not drinking as well as not eating can make the fast a lot easier. At least drinking sparingly can help. Try starting out the day without drinking at all or just very little and notice how hunger pangs don't kick in. Notice how the urge to eat will become overpowering after drinking a large glass of water.
A longer fast of a day or longer without water can also be done as long as the atmosphere is not too dry or activity not too intense. But it must be said that such might be better left to those used to fasting and/or a "clean" diet, for unevitably with a fast poisons will be released into the system and a still very polluted system will have to deal with great quantities of dirt which your body may not be able to deal with without the help of the consumption of some water.

When fasting while drinking it is even more important than otherwise to drink when thirsty. As mentioned before, macrobiotics teaches that drinking overmuch will result in saturated kidneys which will then become sluggish. It should be clear that, according to Natural Health science as described in Fit for Life (II), the body cleanses itself particularly between 4AM and noon and in this period has a greater need for fluids than at other times of the day. You will notice a greater natural inclination to drink fluids in the morning. I suggest you accept nature and drink more in the morning than at other times of the day, depending of course on one's activities. It can be a healthy habit to have a couple of large glasses of water ready to drink (soon) after getting up and later in the morning.

The Wholey Regenerative Vegetarian Diet includes drinking watered-down juices between meals as part of keeping to 3 meals a day. One can take, for instance, apple juice (fresh), filter it and then add an equal part water. Drinking such will nurish and sustain the body to some extent whilst not causing an appetite which plain fruit juice would certainly do. This is a good trick for fasting in the morning and keeping hunger at bay until later in the day.

distilled water
There is no substitute for distilled water. Bottled water can pick up dangerous metals and other elements right in the factory processing the water that came from a clean source in the earth. Tests confirm this and that these elements are detrimental to your health. For more information read Fit for Life II or The Cure to all Diseases by Hulda Clark. For a small price machines can be had that distill your own water at home. Filters can certainly not garantee that the water from them is free of pollution and they can only boast to about 99% purification. When 1 gram of certain metals can be lethal this is hardly an impressive percentage, though certainly much better than water from public sources containing pollutants often put their on purpose for economic purposes! Again, Fit for Life II has many interesting points to make to this effect, and references to hard evidence as well as common sense. You'll be shocked to see the harsh residues build up on your distilling machine after every single cycle. Those useless elements staining the stainless steel of your distiller would otherwise have had to be taken care of by your body!

the natural diet of homo sapiens
Bones found of our earliest ancestors and examined on their eating habits by the markings on their teeth reveal that they were not hunters and meat-eaters but fructarians, their diets consisting for about 95% of fruit and nuts and only for about 2% of (obviously raw) carrion. This is man's evolutionary, biological adaptation. Any and all dietary developments of the past 10,000 years or so are due to migrations to colder climates and such, resulting in hunting and agriculture, can only be seen as inconsequential variations. The evolution that took place in the course of millions of years determines that man is by his very nature a fruit-eater or fructarian.

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I employ each one of these rules at times. But it has taken me years to gather them together and sort them out. I do not expect you to be able to or even want to do them all. Pick which you think will help you most for the moment and when you feel it no longer takes discipline to maintain it try out something on top of that.

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And for those out-on-a-limb characters who'll go for anything that works, the color diet as described by Linda Goodman works wonders! Major discipline for 9 weeks but you'll never be the same again.

So let's make a division of priorities here between diets for general health/ long-term weightloss results, and
more short-term quick result kind of theories, and the priorities within these divisions we might make:

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Atkins' gives the pancreas a chance to heal, a vacation if you will, by denying it carbohydrates to deal with for a time. Macrobiotics will offer it only healthy carbs and also has a very beneficial effect.

Your pancreas is the key to your sugar levers, therefore to your metabolism and therefore to your health. Lowering your sugar levels may give some solice, but for those with a sick pancreas it may take more than that for a time.

It should be clear that sugar is the ultimate culprit when dealing with health issues. A doctor who worked at the beginning of the 20th century noted that he treated his first patient with a heart-attack some time in the 1920's. This was then at last and for the first time the result of the use of sugar as a common-day commodity which was becoming more and more prevalent at that time. Note that the extensive use of fats in the diet had never caused such distress. Only the combination of fats with sugar result in the, by now, commonplace ailments suffered by billions. A general of another age once remarked that he had noticed that the Turks were no longer the fierce and terrible warriors they once were since they had taken up the habit of consuming sugar.

The freed pancreas
Alcohol, caffeine and sugar effect the pancres severely. As long as one of these 3 items is part of your diet you may experience that it stays weakened and less than optimally functioning. I was once off sugar and alcohol, then I stopped drinking coffee too; after 3 days I suddenly needed 2 to 3 hours less sleep at night and woke up fit as a fiddle! Caffeine, contrary to common belief, is a known sleep inducer. Homeopathic medicine uses it in minute measures for this purpose.
Some people have been known to suddenly need drastically less sleep due to sticking to the Atkins' diet, which precludes the use of sugars. I know one person who sticks to Atkins' for the simple fact she then only needs 3 to 4 hours of sleep a night and is generally more energetic.

The psychology of consuming sugar
For most people there is an unconscious reasoning that sugar gets things done. This works because people know they get agitated when having consumed sugar and equate that state with the state wherein they get things done. Of course this state is one of less efficient use of the brain which is in havoc for the irratic sugar supply. Stress is the result, but more can be acchieved with calm and a constant high but stable supply of energy.

Sugar levels graphics
Grafically portrayed, the energy highs and lows of someone on sugar look like this:
;
for someone whose on a diet of starches and complex carbs it looks more like this:
;
for someone on a diet of fresh fruit it goes like this:
.
Of course if you usually eat sugars and suddenly eat an apple your energy levels aren't going to stabelize immediately. But people with such consistent energy levels do not usually experience hunger because their energy levels take so long to reach their lows. Imagine what efficiency and level-headedness this brings.

Of course if you really think you need to get pissed off to accomplish something, realize that THIS is then the main cause for your inability to get off eating sugars, and not some physical inability.

also see protein intake

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Macrobiotics

Macrobiotics is exactly what the word implies: it's about the processes of life in general, viewed from the widest possible human scope. Feng Shui, the oriental art of placement is also part of macrobiotics, as is acupuncture and many other disciplines that teach balance in life. What is usually referred to as "macrobiotics" is this balance in life as it partains to eating. This emphasis on eating, by taking such a common denominator as macrobiotics and meaning mainly diet, is logical as it is such an essential part of life and everyday living. But as one grows in understanding of this diet aspect of balance in life, other aspects such as climate, time (of day/month), age become clearer, not only as they relate to diet.

Macrobiotics is viewing life from the point of infinite variables and accepting one's inability to break down these variables and embracing their influence as a whole, making obversations and deductions from there. The Western approach is typically to work from the bottom on up, to more complex situations; macrobiotics takes complex life circumstances and works on down, deducting What Is So from how things just naturally turn out. It is the exact opposite approach. But as George Ohsawa demonstrated in his scientific research related to cold fusion, it is obviously hardly a less intelligent or less scientific or less effective approach to research.

One of the things to keep in mind with macrobiotics and the consumption of whole grains, is which of them are acidic in nature and which alkaline or neutral. Adi Da Samraj teaches in his The Eating Gorilla Come in Peace that of all grains only buckwheat and millet are alkaline. And only rice is neutral.
As most "bad" foods are highly acidic and acidicy is usually something we all cope with, it can be very beneficial to choose millet or buckwheat as the choice for a meal or for the staple grain of one's diet.
I have to remark right here that buckwheat is not suitable to all bloodtypes and that therefore millet can be prefered, though truth to tell, the fact that buckwheat cooks in about 10 minutes makes it very appealing if it does suit your bloodtype. Millet takes 20 to 25 minutes. Use plenty of water for boiling with both.
Rice is neutral in it's acidicy/alkalinity and is a good second. Best to not eat too many rice meals and surely not more than one a day. You'll notice that it goes down better at some point in the day than at other times. When in doubt: millet. Millet and buckwheat are both very yang grains, which can be essential in helping regain balance for all those with a history of eating far too yin.

to be continued...

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Rats
"Pasteurized milk is frequently touted as essential for good teeth. A study with rats whose tooth decay process is biologically idential to human teeth indicates otherwise. The rats were separated into 3 groups. The first group received a standard rat chow mad by Purina. They averaged less than one cavity for their entire lifetime. The second group was fed a very heavy refined sugar diet. They averaged five and a half cavities per rat. The third group was fed pasteurized milk, and they had nine and a half cavities each, almost twice that of the sugar-fed group! (359) In the Lancet during teh 1930's, it was reported that children's teeth are less likely to decay on a diet incorporating raw milk rather than pasteurized. (168) In the same journal, it was reported that chilblain, a very prevalent malady that causes terrible itching and rashed in children, was practically eliminated when their milk was not pasteurized.

Dogs fed pasteurized milk developed mange and other disorders. Litters fed on raw milk thrived. (336) But here is the one that tops them all: Calves fed on pasteurized milk died before maturity in nine out of ten cases. (245, 344)"

Cats
"One of the most impressive and impactful studies of cooked food versus live food was conducted by Dr. Francis M. Pottenger and published in the American Journal of Orthodontics and Oral Surgery. Dr. Pottenger carried out a meticulous, thorough ten-year experiment using 900 cats placed on controlled diets. Only two items of food were used and were given either in their raw state or cooked state. The results were so overwhelmingly conclusive and convincing that there can be no doubt whatsoever of living food's superiority over cooked. The cats fed only the living, raw food produced healthy kittens year after year. There was no disease, no ill health, no premature death. Death came only as the natrual consequence of aold age. However, cats fed the same food, cooked, developed every one of humanity's modern ailments: heart disease, cancer, kidney and thyroid disease, pneumonia, paralysis, loss of teeth, arthritis, difficulty in labor, diminished sexual interest, diarrhea, irritability so intense that the cats were dangerous to handle, liver impairment, and osteoporosis (resulting in bones and teeth becoming thin and brittle). The excrement from these cats was so toxic that weeds refused to grow in the soil fertilized with it, whereas weeds proliferated in the stools from the cats fed living food. Here is the clincher: The first generation of kittens born to the second group of cats were sick and abnormal. The second generation were often born diseased or dead. By the third generation, the mothers were sterile.
... Even when the meat was left raw and only the milk was heated, the same symptoms of degeneration occurred! ... Dr. Pottenger conducted similar tests on white mice, and the results coincided with those of the test runs on the cats.
... Dr. Pottenger conducted another test with three infants. One was breast-fed. One was fed raw milk. The third was fed pasteurized milk. The first 2 infants were healthy and developed normally. The 3rd was sickly, amll, and developed asthma at the age of 8 monts. (336)"

336: The Hygienic System, Vol. I, II, & III. San Antonio, Texas: Dr. Shelton's Health School, 1934
245: McBean, Eleanor. The Poisoned Needle. Mokelhumne Hill, California: Health Research, 1974
344: Shillam, K. W., et al. "The Effect of Heat Treatment on the Nutritive Value of Milk for the Young Calf: The Effect of Ultra-High Temperature Treatment and of Pasteurization." British Medical Journal, Vol. 14, Nov. 10, 1960, p. 403.
168: Hart, P.M., and M. D'Arcy. "The Prevention of Pulmonary Tuberculosis Among Adults in England." Lancet, May 8, 1937, p. 1093.
359: Southern California Dental Association Journal, Vol. 31, No. 9, Sept. 1963.

These are just a few of the many interesting quotes from Fit for Life II. In my opinion it is a must-read and should be part of every household/family and/or school(ing).