Finding the Best Diet for Your Body

By William McLaughlin, AlterNet. Posted April 9, 2008.

There's been a lot of debate lately -- much of it quite heated -- about what sort of diet is best. Vegetarians tell us their diet is the one. Vegans believe their diet is better still. Omnivores insist that meat and other animal products are essential for optimal health. Still others believe that we should eat mostly raw foods. The level of passion in these discussions is reminiscent of the arguments in the Middle Ages over the One True Religion.

Over the years, I've met many devotees of each philosophy -- some of them healthy and some not so healthy. And since many of these beliefs directly contradict one another, it's difficult to know who's right.

But I think I have the answer. They're all correct ... for them. If you're a vegetarian, your food tastes good and you're vigorous and healthy, you should be a vegetarian. Same goes for an omnivore. If you like animal products and you feel good, then that's the right diet for you.

Before I go any further, I should point out that I'm not a doctor, don't have medical training, and I don't work in the health field. So this is more of a philosophical treatise than a medical one. Believe this if my line of reasoning makes sense to you, but not because I'm some sort of expert whose pronouncements can be taken on faith.

Biochemical Individuality

Each of our bodies is a collection of hundreds of systems -- digestive, circulatory, respiratory, etc. All of these operate in dynamic balance with the other systems. So when there's a change in one system, the others must adjust to keep things in balance.

When you eat, for example, you activate the digestive system. The circulatory system adjusts to this change by diverting more blood to the stomach and intestines. Other systems within the body also adjust to the decreased blood flow and thus the dynamic balance is maintained. Every time something changes in one system, the others adjust themselves to the new circumstances.

Because of this incredibly complex balancing act, it is meaningless to characterize one diet as optimal for all humans. Since each of our bodies must balance its systems in its own way -- based on its unique genetics and environment -- what works for one person might be disastrous for another. Scientists call this "biochemical individuality."

Every couple of years, physicians and researchers tell us something new about our diets. Once we were told to eschew butter in favor of margarine. Now we're told the opposite. Once we were told that we should eat lots of red meat. Now we're advised to reduce or eliminate it from our diets.

So who are we to believe? The doctors? The vegetarians? The omnivores?

Well, we all have a much more reliable source of nutritional advice than all of these put together: our own bodies. Perhaps it's the puritanical belief that our natural impulses are base and wicked, but most of us have been conditioned to ignore our bodies' messages, especially when they contradict the prevailing wisdom. When we crave something or it tastes extra good, it is -- I believe -- our body's way of telling us what we need.

Caveats

Of course, it isn't quite that simple. I'm not advocating just eating anything you want. There are a few rules that are important to follow, since modern processed foods are designed to trick our bodies. They make us think we're getting something we need when we aren't. And our body can't tell us what it wants if it doesn't know what it's getting.

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