Is Hollywood ReWilding?
Greetings Friends & Welcome to 2012!
This past autumn was a really exciting time for my team and I, with so many of our projects coming to fruition and our message of ReWilding, Spring Water, and Indigenous Nutrition spreading around our community and beyond, faster than we ever imagined.
I want to extend a big thanks to the Longevity Now Conference for all they have done to make this happen. Check out this 12 minute video clip (click on the image below) of the talk I delivered in Costa Mesa last October titled, “Developing Sovereign Health: The Path of Rewilding Ourselves”. If you would like to see the rest of the talk, as well as those presented by the rest of the Longevity Now speakers, it is available here.
"Rewild Yourself: Tips & Tricks for Strengthening Your Epigenetic Health"
I also want to share this quick video clip of my good friend Shailene Woodley’s appearance on the Late Night With Jimmy Fallon Show (check out that clip right here)! She was so kind as to mention my name and the work I have been doing the last several years! Shailene has become a tremendous ally, helping to share the message of ReWilding, Spring Water, and Indigenous Nutrition with the world. Recently, she also appeared on the Ellen Degeneres Show carrying a mason jar of spring water which she promptly shared with Ellen!
Here is a recent interview with her in Black Book Magazine titled “Eating Clay and Super Humans”! She talks about foraging, spring water and her daily clay consumption!
If you don’t know Shailene’s work, check out her latest film, The Descendants, where she co-stars alongside George Clooney. Shailene, from all of us, Thank You for all that you are doing!
Lastly I want to share the link to the newly rebuilt SurThrival website! It’s a great place to stock up on great winter immune system supplements, such as Medicinal Mushroom Extracts and Colostrum. I am so proud of SurThrival as a project, as a company, and as a team! Thanks to all of you who have supported us! We are constantly working to serve you better!
Thats all for now!
Keep on ReWilding Yourself!
~Daniel
Sovereign Dental Health, a 6 Part Strategy
Hello Friends,
Welcome (or welcome back) and thanks again for stopping by. My last few videos have been focused on sharing some Sovereign Self-Healthcare strategies that I have been developing and employing for some time now. It has been really exciting to share these with you all, and for me it feels like a timely message, given the considerable distrust and dissatisfaction so many of us have been feeling for mainstream “medicine” in recent years.
Many of us have taken our diets and nutrition into our own hands, though when it comes to personal health care, few of us have really stepped out and away from the entrenched medical system’s doctor/dentist treatment, and the role we play in it as “patient” (from the Latin meaning “suffering”).
This current video is a 6 part dental health and maintenance strategy that has replaced the role of dentistry in my life. It has been many years since I have seen a dentist (I was 12 the last time I can remember having an appointment with one), and as it is with so many aspects of living, I have found it far more rewarding to take care of myself, rather than turning my health over to others. Especially those “quacks” – originally a term reserved for dentists who employed mercury amalgam fillings – with less than shiny-white histories (e.g. fluoride, mercury, etc).
The world of “modern medicine”, to include modern dentistry, seems far less interested in our health than it does in furthering its quasi-scientific agendas, human experiemention, and profit driven procedures. For this reason I will continue to promote Sovereign Self-health Care Strategies here at DanielVitalis.com.
ReWild Yourself! This doesn’t refer to behaving wildly, or giving up your standards of personal conduct, rather it means “Shed your Domesticator“!
This video is for all of you who celebrate being grown-ups, and are unafraid to raise yourselves up and out of the near ubiquitous neoteny that is now standard in the epi-genome in our “modernized” population.
This video comes on the heels of the last video we released, which details how to make the toothpaste that is used in this dental care strategy. Please keep in mind that this toothpaste, in addition to providing the mild abrasive qualities we have become accustomed to in our commercially available toothpaste preparations, is designed to pull toxic cations out of the body, and to be an aid in our overall radio-protection strategy (protection from radioactive isotopes).
For those of you who are interested in going deeper, I would highly recommend an e-book by my good friend Nadine Artemis called “Successful Self-Dentistry, how to avoid the dentist without ignoring your teeth”. This e-book is very comprehensive, and empowers us to take our dental health into our own hands for a lifetime.
We are now getting ready for Ancestral Ignition, a workshop that myself and some good friends are hosting here at my home in Maine, September 16th – 18th, 2011. The main focus of this retreat is to share the ancient and ancestral skill of aboriginal friction fire with all of those who attend. We really believe that stewardship of this ancient fire-craft is valuable for many reasons, not the least of which is the carrying on of what is one of our most ancient and fundamental human technologies.
Our ability to generate and maintain fire is a powerful thing indeed, so it is our intention to pass on not just the skill, but the ethics of stewardship as well.
We also feel privileged to share the basics of fire-craft with our friends and clients because so many of us were never taught how to properly or efficiently build or maintain a fire. I certainly wasn’t, growing up in the 1980’s American Dream. In fact, learning to properly construct and burn a fire has meant far more to me than just having another survival skill. It has connected me with one of the essential practices that makes us human.
This workshop will be fully catered with organic, local food, prepared by Chef Frank Giglio, who is one of my best friends and a truly culinary mentor of mine.
Check out the video below to hear more about Ancestral Ignition, and to see acclaimed botanist, author, and my foraging and aboriginal skills guide and all around friend, Arthur Haines, make a fire with a primitive tool known as the bow drill.
If you are interested in joining us, or learning more about Ancestral Ignition please contact us at info@danielvitalis.com.
As always, we would love to hear from you, so please let us know what you think of this recent post, video upload, and what you would like to see in the future by commenting below.
Your readership is truly appreciated,
~Daniel
Coconut Water in Maine??? The First Wild Food of the Season!
Ok, so of course Maine hasn’t got any coconuts, but we do have something that tastes just as good – maybe better – and is just as nutritious.
Its the sap of the Maple tree.
There are not many wild foods that taste particularly sweet here in New England, but Maple Syrup is certainly the exception. Whats more, the flowing sap of the maple tree is the first wild food to emerge after a long and cold snow covered New England winter.
This video is a quick peek into my spring cleansing strategy which is most welcomed after a lengthy season of living indoors. The fresh Maple sap is so refreshing, so hydrating, and tastes so good that it is almost shocking that more people aren’t taking advantage of this delicious, abundant, and free late winter/early spring drink! In the second half of the video I’ve included a recipe that I have been making with fresh maple water, chaga, and a bit of cream. I wish there was some way to convey flavor through the internet! Is there an app for that yet?
To compliment and expand on my video, I have also included a video with botanist Arthur Haines detailing how he taps his maples, and prepares his maple syrup. With childlike enthusiasm, we have been texting back and forth each day to see how much sap the others trees have produced!
The experience of procuring food directly from wild nature is truly, for me at least, one of the great joys of living! As each season goes by and my skills in this area increase, not only have I developed a strong sense of food security, my direct relationship to the Earth as an abundant and loving provider continues to increases. To say that I am grateful would hardly do justice to this exuberant emotion.
For those of you who are interested in developing more wild food identification, harvesting, and processing skills, please consider joining Arthur and I for our Ancestral Plants workshop here in Maine, May 6th – 8th, 2011. Be sure to contact us soon, as the class size is very limited. We have chosen the intimate class size to ensure that each of you gets the close personal attention you need, and to ensure that we don’t trample our wild foraging grounds. The class has been filling up rather quickly these last few weeks, and we are getting very excited for the spring foraging to begin!
I have a few more days of maple sap harvesting before heading of to Los Angeles for the Longevity Now Conference, April 1st -3rd. I have just finished preparing my presentation, called “Habitat, Your Guide to Intentional Lifestyle Design” which will focus on specific strategies for more than just vigorous health, but epi-genetic wealth. In other words, we can use our environment and lifestyle to activate our genetic potential for a more robust experience of life on Earth! The newly emerging scientific field of “epigenetics” is rapidly confirming the obvious fact, our habitat and lifestyle choices, from what we eat and breath to what we wear and think not only impacts our health but actually influences our gene expression! Many of you are already planning on being there, and those who would like to join can get your tickets here. If you can’t make it to the event, but would like to watch the video stream, here is the link where you can sign up to watch at home.
I am so enthusiastic about this upcoming foraging and touring season. I have events planned around the US, Canada, and even in Peru. Keep checking my current events for more details, and I hope to meet you somewhere out there soon!
Keep ReWilding,
~Daniel
David Wolfe, Matt Monarch, and Daniel Vitalis Make a Smoothie Spoof!
Whats the World’s Best Kept Health Secret???
Being able to laugh at yourself! Let me explain…
This week has been full of just that kind of laughter! For the last couple of weeks myself and several good friends and great acquaintances have been working together diligently to get the word out about the 16 DVD set that was filmed last September at the Longevity Now Conference in Costa Mesa, CA. There has been a friendly rivalry going on, and a few of us decided to take it as far as we had to in order to bring the most attention to these DVD’s. It sort of turned into an informal contest, and I was determined to win…
It all started last week with my team and I brainstorming about how we could get peoples attention. I needed to do something out of the ordinary, something bold and hilarious. This is what I came up with, and if you haven’t seen it yet, I would love to hear your opinion.
My girlfriend Ali, my operations manager and brother Kaleb, and my Best Friend and Business Partner LeighLon and I then spent several hours posting this video to everyone we could think of in our social networks. It was a huge hit, and got a few thousand views in its first 24 hours! People were loving it, but the competition was swarming and before we knew what to do, several other videos popped up. It was our friends and colleagues trying to out-do us (special thanks to Jason Wrobel and Ron Obadia) with videos of their own!
We went back to the drawing board.
I needed something fresh, something bold, something that would send ripples coursing throughout the health-minded community… I had an idea, but would this be going to far? Was what I was about to do; was I crossing the boundary? Did I even dare?
No… I couldn’t, I didn’t. I was going to back down. I was defeated.
Then, suddenly I was flooded by a deluge of emails. It was my friends from the Longevity Now Conference. They wanted to know if I, Daniel Vitalis, was the kind of person to retreat into shadow, to fall sullenly into obscurity, or would I rise like the proverbial Phoenix from the ashes of video doldrums to deliver the masterpiece that the world had been waiting for?
Text messages from my close friends David Wolfe and Chef Frank Giglio started rolling in. They told me that I had until midnight to get something onto youtube, if I was to regain my honor. It was 9 p.m., and time was running out. I had just a mere three hours to make some magic.
The few hours that followed are little more than a blur, and if it wasn’t for the record kept in the footage I am about to share with you, I would’t have believed that it even happened. None the less, it will now be immortalized forever.
What follows is a spoof of myself, David Wolfe, and Matt Monarch all hanging out in my kitchen making the “Longevity Now Conference 16 DVD Set Superfood Tonic Elixir Smoothie”…
I play all of the parts, and keep in mind that this was made on an extreme time budget. Each character had to be filmed separately and I had to shave between each filming session. I can hardly believe this is real….
So, what’s the message here? Is there a message?
Please allow me to summerize. For years now the three of have worked seperately and together in the same general arena and field. Each of the three of us represent extrememly driven and productive individuals. Each of us has spent countless hours employing personal development strategies to fulfill the blueprints for who we truly are and what we want to share with the world. Though each of us is very different, there is a common theme that we all agree on, and that is wanting to see a healthier, more peaceful, and more beautiful world for everyone.
As public speakers and figures, there is a tremendous amount of pressure placed on us from all directions, as this is the nature of the work that we do. It can be so easy to find and focus on the differences in what each of us is teaching and if we are not careful, to allow ourselves to be divided by it. It is easy to lose sight of the obvious; that we are all friends and working together toward a common goal. The differences between us are beautiful and healthy, and ultimately what make this whole ride so much fun.
I think of it like this, imagine that David Wolfe, Matt Monarch, and I all walked into a restraunt together (ok, what restraunt would that be? I guess this is hypothetical). Each of us orders something different from the menu, something that is suited our own unique taste, preference, whim, and health goals. The fact that we ordered different dishes does not mean we are in nutritional opposition to one another. It does not mean we are contending with one another, and certainly doesn’t affect our friendship or support of eachother. None of us would be wrong for what we ordered, it is just a menu after all. We can each enjoy our meal together over laughter and appreciation for each others company.
A second message I have embedded into this video is the following: Don’t take life or yourself too seriously. Ever.
All three of us are so focused on creating the life that we desire, each of us so good at what we do, that we have all become characters as archetypical as those found in the pages of a comic book. This deserves to be laughed at sometimes… Its funny.
David the globetrotting shamanic mad scientist, Matt the California beach boy turned South American land owner, Me the elven borreal forest primitive locavore. This is the stuff comedy is born of! Each of us is simply bringing forward the health strategy that has fueled our unique missions and passions, and each of us does this in our own unique style. Our work is the distillation of years of study and practice, and we could be celebrating the diversity that this has created.
There are times when we all come together for work and play, and when we do, all of these apparent differences are set aside. We are friends first and foremost, and we know the value of love and laughter.
You the reader may have encountered some of the harassing internet trolling that each of us has had to endure. There are those online who do take this far too seriously and are constantly leveling accusations, and cruel and harsh words against us. They take our work and contort it in an attempt to make a mockery of us. What is funny to me, is the way that these people seem to do this as a near full time job! They are so obsessed, and take it all so seriously that they have committed their lives to displaying hatred and spewing vitriol, claiming that their way, their method, their diet, is the only viable truth. This video is a message to those people. It says “You can never make fun of us better than we can of ourselves!”, and that living without humor in your life is more than ugly, it is unhealthy and violates one of realities prime directives. Honestly, I feel sorry for people like that, people who are too closed down in their hearts to display the lightness of being that initiates human bonding. It seems like a cold way to live, and very, very lonely.
Though people may at time level criticisms against us, I ask that you imagine this. Imagine the fearlessness it takes to put yourself out there to the world. Imagine what it takes to make videos, write books, travel the world getting in front of hundreds and thousands of people to share a message of hope and healing in a world so full of suffering and destruction. It takes a lot, and it is not always easy.
To those who have supported us all these years, THANK YOU.
Oh, and one other thing, a message to the haters… I am making a joke about the sales of this DVD for this reason alone. I don’t understand why there are people who are critical of me or anyone in my field for being a business person. How would I be able to do what I do if I otherwise had a full time career doing something else? Also, I feel the need to point out the obvious here: People buy products from myself or my colleagues because we carry extremely good products, products that help people. People choose to purchase these products because they add value to their lives and health, and because they feel good about putting their money back into the economic networks that support what they believe in.
We exist as businesses because we carry things that people want. That should be obvious, though there are those that detract from this. Perhaps it is because they make their money in ways they are not so proud of.
The businesses that each of us run are beautiful, thriving, life promoting operations and each of them is working to support the vision that each of us share for the world. My company, SurThrival, is my contribution to peoples health and healing and is my way of operating economically in a world that demands this of me. I am proud of the work that I do there, and of the people that this business supports. David Wolfe and his Longevity Warehouse exists to support peoples health and developement, and is critical to keeping the message alive and available. I am proud to work with him. Matt Monarch has ceaslessly brought more and more products to us at his Raw Food World, and runs one of the tightest ships I have ever seen. I am proud to work with him.
In closing, I want to say this. The Longevity Now Conference DVD’s are amazing. I feel very good about sharing these with you because I know how much quality information they contain, and how diverse that information is. Each speaker is very different from the others, and holds a piece of information that could be the piece that you are looking for. These DVD’s are not for the dogmatic; they are for the open minded and adaptable! One of those DVD’s is dedicated to the talks that I gave at the conference, and is the information that is most on my heart and mind now. I truly hope that you get the chance to watch these, as this is why I do what I do. I believe in their value.
If you would like to get yourself a set, click here now!
Also, I will be at the Longevity Now Conference in April (1st-3rd), and will be making tickets for the upcoming conference available soon… So… Stay tuned, I might just be forced to top this last video!
~Daniel
Sauerkraut Fermentation At Home
For those of us who are developing or returning to our ancestral health through traditional and indigenous nutritional practices, few food preparation skills are as valuable to possess as lacto-fermentation.
Imagine for a moment living without a fossil fuel driven infrastructure to deliver us our “fresh” veggies in January and an electrically powered refrigerator to store them in, and its importance and relevance becomes clear. Storing vegetables for the winter is a critical skill, and lacto-fermentation has some advantages that are hard to beat.
For instance, Lacto-Fermentaion actually increases the amount of nutrition that was present in the vegetable alone (by converting sugars into protein rich bacterial bodies, B vitamins, and omega 3 fatty acids), increase the bio-availability of the existing nutrition (by breaking down cell walls by predigesting the vegetables cellulose, and removing anti-nutrients) and all the while preserving the inherent nutrition better than freezing, canning, or drying!
Lacto-fermentation, the kind of vegetable fermentation that produces foods like sauerkraut (as well as kimchee and brined pickles), preserves our food in lactic acid, and was one of the dominant preservation techniques used by our ancestors before sugar and preservatives became the norm. The primary fermentative organism present in these kinds of preserves is lactobacillus acidophilus (who’s name means “acid loving milk bacteria”) one of our bodies primary microbial symbionts.
Not only does lactobacillus acidophilus allow us to preserve and even increase the amount of nutrition in our vegetables, but it also aids in digestion and increases our immunity too! Lactobacillus takes up residence in our small intestine, creating a kind of probiotic bio-shield in the gut, where it aggressively out-competes other dys-biotic organisms that can cause us to fall ill.
Ok, so forgive me here, but I am going to interject a few definitions and a quick mathmatical formula. Trust me, it will help.
Prebiotic + Probiotic = Synbiotic. Easy right? Here is what it means.
The thing we intend to ferment is known as a “prebiotic” (I am using this term loosely, don’t tell the scientists), this is the food source (sugars) for the organisms that will be converting the food into a fermented-food (in our case cabbage). We add to that the “probiotic” organism (these are healthy, symbiotic micro-organisms) that will be performing the fermentation (here it will be lactobacillus). Ok, a little caveat, we might not actually add the probiotic, but rather let it colonize itself, in what is called a “wild fermentation”, as is the case here with sauerkraut. Organisms native to the area where you are fermenting, or – as is the case with cabbage – are indigenous to the food itself. Through the alchemy of the fermentative process something new will be created, and that new thing is known as the “synbiotic”. I want to emphasize, the synbiotic is a new food, not the sum of the original parts, this is why sauerkraut is not “cabbage”, and wine is not “grape juice”.
Synbiotics like sauerkraut have long been used by those before us to fortify their immune systems, assist in digestion (their acidity helps to lower the pH of the stomach increasing the effectiveness of our hydrochloric acid), and to maintain healthy levels of the probiotic organisms that colonize our digestive lumen. While many people use probiotic supplements in an attempt to achieve these ends, most often lacto-fermented foods perform these tasks better, can be made at home from whole, fresh, local foods, are inexpensive, and add a considerable amount of quality nutrition in the form of highly absorbable predigested, living food. Oh, and they taste great too!
For me, lacto-ferments like sauerkraut are one of my primary ways of preserving and consuming local vegetables through out the long Maine winters. Aside from the occasional Whole Foods splurge, I don’t suspect I will be eating very many fresh green vegetables until the wild spring shoots emerge after the thaw. Aside from the vegetables that keep in my cellar (onions, squashes, garlic) and the vegetables I have frozen (wild fiddle heads, japanese knotweed) lacto-ferments are my main source of “living” vegetation.
If you have never made a fermentation like this at home, take heart! It is easy to do, and requires very little work or know how. Simply follow the steps in the video below, and in a couple of weeks you will have your first batch ready to eat!
For those who would like a deeper look into the biological processes that take place in the fermentation of cabbage into sauerkraut, check out this link!
I love to hear from you, so please leave me comment below to let me know what you think of this post, the website, and what you would like to see next!
~Daniel
Vegans vs Carnivores!
Are we Hunters? Are we Gatherers?
Or….. are we Hunter Gatherers?
Allow me begin this article with a show of Gratitude to everyone who commented on the blog “Hunter Safety”. It was wonderful to see how much intelligent (and at times even heated) debate was generated, not to mention the space it made for a conversation that was long overdue…. This most is certainly a place for open dialogue, so as long as we remain fairly civil, you are welcome to discuss your feelings and opinions in the comments below…
That said…
It seems to me that as a collective we have so much more in common than not, and since our visions, values, and goals are so closely aligned, we might be all the wiser to unite and synthesize our views, rather than creating infighting within what is quickly becoming a bi-partisan health movement!
I don’t know about you, but I am very motivated by the ideal of balance, and feel that when we polarize we become cut off from an entire range of innovation, possibility and opportunity. One such polarization that is emerging in our community now is that between the “Vegan” community and the “Primal” community. For those who are not familiar, please allow me to elaborate.
The Vegan ethos is one of total abstinence from the foods and products derived from animal origin, this includes more than just meat, but also dairy, eggs, honey, leather, wool, silk, beeswax, and more. This total abstinence in my experience (I lived this way for many years) is an ideal which one strives for, though in reality is difficult to achieve. Still, one can get relatively close to it, and it is intimately entwined with a world-view that sees the eating of Wild or Domesticated animals as both unhealthy and unethical.
The Primal diet focuses largely on the diet of “Primitive” peoples, and not so much those living today as those who inhabited the Earth during the last IceAge. Its focus is primarily on red meats, organs, animal derived saturated fats, as well as fishes, birds and their eggs. There is a focus on the anthropological history of Homo as a genus, and what the fossil record indicates was, at least at that time, one of our dominant food sources.
Not only do these two dietary camps represent a polarization, both occupying extreme ends of a scale of possible food choices, but both see their approach as the “orthomolecular” or correct diet for our species from an anatomical and zoological perspective. And while both sides possess their token charts and statistics, books, cult of personality figures, and amazing health testimonials, I cannot help but feel that there is a piece here that is missing.
Human beings (genus “Homo” species “sapien sapiens”) are – rather inarguably – Omnivores.
Omni, from the Latin “Omnis” meaning “All, Every, Everything”, and Vore from the Latin “Vorare” meaning “To Devour”. In other words, we eat everything. This is fairly indisputable. The only place where this is being disputed is within the extremes of dietary culture, where one might contend that while we are omnivores by habit, we are otherwise by design.
Still…
From sworn herbivory to total carnivory, human beings really do eat everything! Just have a look at this guy, Michael Lotito, who was famous for eating bicycles, televisions, and even a small airplane (that “meal” took 2 years!)…
Oh yeah, before anyone comments…. I am not suggesting this!
Personally, I have come to view the Omnivory of Humans (outside of bicycles of course) as something rather beautiful and it seems to be our ability to include “everything” into our diets that has allowed us to so consciously craft our destiny as a species.
It occurred to me recently how very dependent our species is on both plants and animals for our nutritional needs. Take vitamins as an example. We know that metabolically we require the vitamin B12, or cobalamin, without which the deficiency known as “pernicious anemia” develops. This molecule is particularly deficient amongst the plants of this world, and so we require animal foods for this essential nutrient (essential as is meant in nutritional terms, meaning we can not produce it from our own metabolism). One of the glaring issues with Veganism as a dietary practice is that it is notoriously deficient in this vitamin, making it then, a vitamin deficient diet. And while this may seem odd to those who are not and have never been vegans, it is something that, rather astonishingly is often the most overlooked, side stepped, and brushed aside flaw in the field “strict vegetarianism”. It is of course not the only nutrient that we find lacking in Vegan diets, but is a great example thereof.
Similarly, when we come to a molecule like Vitamin C, or L-ascorbic acid, again we are talking here about an “essential” nutrient, one that we can not manufacture (well, except in laboratory synthesis). Its deficiency causes the rather unfortunate symptoms of “scurvy” precisely because we lack the ability to “bio-synthesize” it. This is somewhat unique in nature, as most animals and plants are quite capable of making their own. Vitamin C, while found to some degree in animal tissue (liver and adrenals concentrate the most), but when compared against plant foods (in particular berries) meats and organs come up wanting. It is unlikely that we have developed a dependence on this Vitamin’s presence in our food from the consumption of animal foods, but rather from its liberal and even extreme concentration in the foods that we have developed eating… in other words, plants.
We truly are Omni. We are the everything species…
Even more so than animals like the Bear that, while omnivorous, lack Fire, the Elemental tool that renders the inedible edible. Sorry Rawfooders! Check out Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human
While a look into the distant past – which of course is merely speculation – may yield some interesting insight into the diet of the proto-form of our species, I think both perspectives lack a critical component. We are Homo sapien sapien. The domestic human. Homo sapien (one sapien) was what is considered the “archaic” human form, the predecssor of the “modern” variation. We are a novel organism and….
We are neither chimpanzees as the vegan world would often contend, nor are we Neanderthals as the primal diet proponents seem to suggest.
We are a unique species, specifically adapted as omnivores, and with modifications to our anatomy that attest to this. In fact, it seems to me that our anatomy demonstrates that we have adapted to Fire in the same way an organism like a fish might adapt to the Water, or a bird has adapted to the Air. Our lack of hair being just one example. Another is the fact that we have the smallest mouths and stomachs (compared to our body size) of any of the great apes seems to indicate a selection towards those who ate the softest and most condensed food sources.
A brief survey of those humans we call the “Indigenous” of the world, especially those who were Hunter/Gatherers reveals a diet that, while varying in the ratio of animal to plant food, still always contains both in ample degrees. These people are always cooks, in that they are never found on “Raw Food Diets”. They eat a mix of raw and cooked foods, as well as balancing animal foods against plant foods. I know of no culture that is based solely on plant food, nor one built exclusively on animal foods.
It seems like a strange and impossible argument to reconcile when the Vegan community continuously references chimpanzees and other apes, which we are a distinct species
from as an indicator for what we should be eating. And regardless, Chimps are far from vegetarians, eating insects, small primates, honey, eggs, and even bush pigs and antelope! And while they are largely fruit eaters, most primatologist agree that meat is amongst their most prized dietary inclusions. We cannot just simply blow this off, nor use Chimpanzee diets to validate the safety or soundness of a human Vegan diet.
At the same time, neither are we Neanderthals. Isotopic testing of Neanderthal bones seems to indicate that their was little to no plant protein present in their diets. In other words, they were predominantly meat eaters and hunters. Homo sapiens sapiens sapien surveyed anywhere around the world today is, without question, Omnivorous.
I propose a synthesis of these two world views, and actually, everything in between. What I have learned from 16 years of direct immersion into the field of nutrition is this… Whole food plant based diets promote cleansing in the body, and are very catabolic. They are great for reducing weight, for clearing toxins from the system, and resting the organs… temporarily.
Vegan diets are cleansing!
Animal based whole food diets are very building and anabolic, and promote the growth of the body’s tissues. Increasing the quantity of high quality animal protein and fat in the diet is critical for rebuilding the body after long cleanses. They are also amongst the only foods that many people can tolerate when they have developed significant fungal infections or food allergies.
Primal Diets are Building!
When the goal is neither building nor cleansing, then a diet that is balanced between both high quality plant and animal food is ideal for homeo-dynamis, the dynamic balance that is usually (mis-correctly) called homeo-stasis.
Here in this chart is an example of the spectrum of nutrition that I was talking about…
Where we eat on this scale is entirely up to us, and of course always in flux. Rather than dogmatically polarizing ourselves to one extreme or the other, would it not be wiser to move along this scale based on our personal goals and the affects we are aiming to achieve?
If you have spent years on a vegetarian diet and have experienced a “failure to thrive”, it is animal foods that offer the chance to rebuild your body. In particular it is wild animals or free ranging grass-fed domesticates that contain the nutrients required to refurbish a depleted body.
Conversely, if you have been on a Standard American Diet for some time, and are feeling the burden of the toxic load this so easily creates, a vegetarian and even raw food approach may be just the answer to cleanse your body of the environmental and industrial toxins that pollute our inner ecology.
More importantly, can we simply eat without judgment for one another? The heated discussions between the opposing factions of our community is almost embarrassing. We all agree, it seems, on this; Our food choices matter. They matter for our health and the health of the planet. They matter for our children, and for the future of our species. They are at the root of so many of the challenging issues that face us today.
We all agree that we prefer organically grown and wild foods over those cultivated with pesticides and herbicides. We all prefer foods with wild or heirloom genetics over those that have been poorly bred or genetically modified. We all are doing what we can to create a world where the Soil, Air, and Water is clean and pure, and the rays of the Sun can freely penetrate down to the Earth (hint).
We have such a wonderful technology and medicine in the nutritional wisdom we have gleaned. We know how to both cleanse and rebuild someone. Whether you come from a Vegan diet, a Rawfood diet, a Wholefood diet, the Weston Price diet, the Paleo diet, or the Primal diet, or any other makes little difference. We are all committed to using our dietary choices to heal ourselves and everyone around us that is willing. We share far more with one another in this regard than we do with the other 99% of the Earths current human population. Perhaps a bit of Conscious Omnivory could go a very long way.
Besides we all have a piece of this mosaic we are creating… We each bring a little more perspective based on our knowledge and experience.
and…
After all… its only food.
~Daniel
PS. For all of the frutarians who kept saying that if humans were animal eaters they would be able to run down an antelope… well, check it out! We can! Ok…. so in this video its not an antelope, but rather a Greater Kudu, and the Kalahari Bushmen do just that! Amazing, humbling, inspiring, and…. well rather Sacred too. Its called Persistence Hunting! Notice at the end that they eat plants with this meal! Enjoy!
