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What is
macrobiotics? |
Macrobiotics is founded on the
principle of oriental medicine. It teaches the laws of nature
and how to live harmoniously within them. It is not just a diet,
but a holistic approach to living that takes into account all
aspects of life. It stresses the importance of a balanced diet
because diet is the foundation for a healthy, hence happy, and
harmonious life. It calls for living a balanced life based on
the two complementary, but opposite, natural forces of
contraction and expansion. These forces are often referred to by
their well-known and convenient oriental names of yin and yang.
Sometimes they are called male and female or positive and
negative, and you can call them what you like so long as you
understand them. It is mentioned in some of the ancient
literature: The truth is one. The sages speak of it by many
names.
The philosophy of yin-yang in
macrobiotics shows in simple terms how the universe works. Many
phenomena that are ambiguous become crystal clear.
Examples
Yin is the force of expansion and yang is the force of contraction. These
two complementary forces rule everything in this world. Think of
a beating heart. Heart beats are actually nothing more that an
oscillation between the two forces of contraction (yang) and
expansion (yin). So are our breathing lungs (inhaling is
expansion=yin and exhaling is contraction=yang). Even when we
walk, our movement is due to the synchronized contraction and
expansion of our varied muscles. |
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Why do some
foods propagate an infection and others stop it? |
In macrobiotics is it explained
that Sodium and calcium are yang while potassium and magnesium
are yin. Yang elements, being contractive, prevent and constrain
bacteria from multiplying, while yin elements, being expansive,
promote and enhance bacterial multiplication.
Therefore, yang foods, kill
bacteria and stop an infection while yin foods increase the
infection. This is a simple scientific example of macrobiotics.
My experience with my own diet and with thousands of patients
who have visited my macrobiotics consultation office (and via
the internet) over the last few years from 32 different
countries has shown me time and time again that yang foods are
the best antibiotics in the world. They are better that any
antibiotic chemicals man has ever invented. They also have
several advantages over chemical antibiotics:
● Bacteria can not develop
resistance to these foods like they do to chemical antibiotics
● They have no side effects
● They are always effective unlike some chemical
antibiotics that fail o eliminate an infection even after
repeated doses.
Many patients with diseases that
were difficult to cure like tuberculosis, gangrene, Chlamydia
and countless forms of infections have been cured using the
proper selection of foods.
The macrobiotic movement has become increasingly popular during the past
decade due to the many shortfalls in traditional western
medicine and due also to various astonishing recoveries of
terminally ill patients who used a carefully designed diet. |
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Modern medicine and
macrobiotics
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2500 years ago, the Greek
Hippocrates, the father of modern western medicine, admonished
his students in one of his precise aphorisms Thy food shall be
thy remedy. Modern medicine and macrobiotics do agree. Food is
your best medicine. No matter what the illness and no matter
what you call this approach.
Listen to what the world renowned
Dr. Henry G. Bieler, M.D. has to say about this:
I began to suspect the close
relationship between health and proper eating habits when, early
in my career as an overworked young doctor, my own health broke
down. I have always been a man of great curiosity and as I
investigated deeply the chemistry of food along new lines, I
came to the conclusion that I, personally must give up the use
of drugs and henceforth rely solely on food as medicine. It was
not long until, after repeated verified results, I discarded
drugs in treating my patients. My colleagues, at the time,
thought I had lost my mind. But time has only strengthened my
belief.
Note that Dr. Bieler never
mentioned the word macrobiotics but his method is the same
nonetheless.
As a person's understanding of the
macrobiotics principles deepens, it will eventually become clear
that all diseases are the result of a long term disturbance of
these two forces at work in the human body. Let us take for
example two GI tract disturbances, constipation and diarrhea.
Constipation is the result of consuming too much yang foods
(contractive=yang) like red meat. Therefore, constipation is a
yang illness and can be cured by yin foods like cauliflower and
celery. Diarrhea is the result of consuming too much yin foods
(expansive=yin) like sugars and fruit. Therefore, diarrhea is a
yin illness and can be cured by yang foods like buckwheat, leeks
and carrots.
If we start thinking in these
terms, everything becomes crystal clear and the road to health
will no longer be a mystery. And there will be NO incurable
diseases. If you know which foods to select for patients with
these illnesses, there will be no need for chemical medicine.
Food really is your best medicine.
The standard macrobiotic diet
developed over the years is general and not for everyone. Your
own health condition, especially if it is a serious condition,
might require you to do more research into what foods are
currently right for you, which means digging deep into the
macrobiotic concepts of yin and yang and balance. It would also
mean experimenting for a long time with foods to see how each
affects your body.
Macrobiotics philosophy originated in the orient and the main teachers
who carried macrobiotics from the far-east to the west and other
places were Japanese. So it was natural for them to teach people
eating balanced Japanese macrobiotic foods. However, we must not
forget that in a broad sense macrobiotics calls for
understanding the world around us and applying its principles of
balance in our daily lives including our eating habits. One of
the fundamentals of macrobiotics is that one should eat locally
grown food. This means that applying macrobiotics principles in
south-Africa, one has to select south-African balanced foods,
and applying macrobiotic principles in south-America, one has to
eat balanced south-American foods, and so on. |
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Where is the
calcium in macrobiotics foods? |
One of the questions I get asked
the most by patients seeking macrobiotic solutions to their ills
is: "No Dairy products! Where is the calcium in my diet?"
A common misconception is that the
macrobiotic diet does not provide enough calcium because it does
not include milk and dairy foods.
This diet is actually very rich in
calcium as it includes: sesame seeds, seaweeds, leafy greens and
root vegetables and green tea which are all rich sources of
calcium. The body can assimilate calcium in these foods more
readily than milk calcium. Plus, these foods do not create
problems normally associated with milk and dairy foods such as
bloating, mucous and ovarian cysts among women and respiratory
problems like asthma and allergies.
How can you treat somebody over
the internet without seeing them personally?
This is another question that I get asked often. It is easy. As explained
above macrobiotic treatment depends primarily on symptoms and
cleansing rather than high-tech diagnosis. If a person suffers
from constipation or high blood pressure or typhoid, there will
no need to do any expensive tests. The proper foods will cure
these illnesses not matter what the cause. |
