“Nothing can be more important or necessary to know than the science of nutrition; so let your medicine be your food, and your food be your medicine.” Hippocrates
People, by and large, wish to abstain from un-nourishing and unwholesome foods, but the majority of us are largely unaware of what really constitutes ‘Nutritious Food’.
Nutritional balance can take many forms. Mainstream nutrition divides food into proteins, carbohydrates, fats, fibre, vitamins, minerals and water. While this is accurate scientifically it doesn’t help us understand the kind of balance each individual needs.
In Tibb nutrition we not only use the extensive research in the field of complementary medicine but we look to nature for guidance with the four elements of hot and cold, moist and dry. We can balance our foods according to their taste, temperament, temperature and texture. Some of us may have already observed that ice cream after a meal can give us indigestion, or simply cooked fish is easier to digest than battered fish and fruit is easily digested if eaten alone. Our western diet tends towards imbalance with an abundance of processed foods, sugar, caffeine, alcohol, red meat, dairy produce on offer and a lack of balancing elements such as fibre, bitter vegetables, fermented foods and plain water.
As we go through life our bodies respond to lifestyle changes; for example, as we age we become less flexible and energetic. These changes are gradual, like the changing seasons – spring is warm and wet but as it becomes dryer it leads into summer; early autumn is cold and dry but as it gets wetter it makes way for winter. Our diet therefore needs to adapt around the changes of life in order to help us. The diet of someone in a hot and dry country will be different to that of a person in a cold and wet one, a child needs different foods to older people. Nature offers us appropriate foods for our climate and season.
“Food is our most intimate contact with our external environment.”
Elizabeth Lipski, Digestive Wellness
In British culture today there has been a search for new and exotic foods, as a result of our rich cultural heritage but also the availability of such foods being transported across the globe. Unfortunately the harvesting of premature crops and their excessive storage leads to depleted nutrients in our food. Our loss of nutrients start in the soil where modern agricultural practices are causing a decline in soil nutrients. Much of our soil is deficient in trace elements such as zinc due to the continual heavy use of synthetic fertilisers and over-cropping to keep up with our over-eating.
In our efforts to fight climate change we have been encouraged to buy locally grown, organic produce which can only be seasonal, so this practice not only helps us care for the natural world but it connects us to it as we learn to feed our bodies with the appropriate foods for our wellbeing.
“Most illnesses, even those which lead the sufferer to the specialist, arise solely from long-continued errors of diet and regime.”
Ibn-Sina, Prince of Physicians
Reference source: M. Salim Khan M.D. (M.A.) M.H. D.O. M.I.R.C.H. F.G.N.I. mohsinhealth.com