The Global Conversation

Tag: GMO

  • Making yourself sick…with breads?

    “You cannot be ill without at some level causing yourself to be, and you can be well again in a moment by simply deciding to be.” This is a great quote from Conversations With God,  Book 1.

    There are so many ways that we cause ourselves to be ill, but it seems that our diet is one of the worst. What we eat can give us conditions over time such as obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer. You know that many of the foods you eat are not healthy, but what about some that you might not know as much about?

    A huge problem in our diet is the type of grains that we are now eating. If we eat processed foods and commercially baked breads, we are most likely not eating whole grains. We are just eating the starchy part of the grain. Eating whole foods means eating whole grains. The whole grain has valuable vitamins and minerals that we need. It’s a huge problem that most grains are genetically engineered (GMO) unless they are certified organic. Your body may not recognize GMO foods and may not digest them properly – therefore making you sick, allergic, or fat!

    Grains have three parts: the bran, germ, and endosperm. When wheat is made into flour, the outer brown part – the bran and germ are removed leaving the largest part – the endosperm. All of the vitamins and minerals were contained in the bran and germ. The bran and germ are then fed to cows. We eat the endosperm which is totally made of starch. The same process is followed when polishing rice. Healthy brown rice ends up being the starchy white rice that we see everywhere. There is no fiber left to slow down absorption so the result is similar to a sugar overload.

    Replace your grains with organic whole grains. If you buy bread, make sure the label says “100% Whole Grain” on the front and in the ingredients. Better yet, get a breadmaker and bake your own whole grain bread on the weekend. It only takes a few minutes to make! Just dump all of the ingredients into the breadmaker and hit the button.You can also eat less bread and more plain grains. Eat brown and wild rice instead of white rice. Try quinoa. Quinoa is a seed that cooks quickly – you can use it anywhere you would normally use rice. The great thing about quinoa is that it is a complete protein.

    Experiment with new organic whole grains such as rolled or steel-cut oats, wheat berries, amaranth, or barley. One cup of dry grain will be enough for 2 – 4 people. Make sure you soak the grains for a few hours (20 minutes for quinoa) before cooking to soften. This makes them more digestible and eliminates phytic acid. If you have problems with digestion, soak them for up to 8 hours.

    Limiting your grain intake to organic whole grain and experimenting with new grains is a huge step in deciding to be well!

    (Beth Anderson is a certified Holistic Health Coach and founder of the Holistic Health Hotspotin Evansville, Indiana. She is also the author of “The Holistic Diet: Achieve Your Ideal Weight, Be Happy and Healthy for Life.” Beth received her training from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition.She is a speaker and also presents workshops on health and nutrition topics. Beth offers in-person and phone consultations – contact her through Facebook or email for more information. You can find Beth on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/HolisticHealthHotspot or email her at beth@holistichealthhotspot.com)

  • What about vitamins?

    In my last article I talked about God’s perfect medicine for us – greens and leafy vegetables! We are surrounded by what we need – beautiful multi-colored fruits and vegetables – all put here to share and enjoy. We can maintain our health and heal ourselves by consuming plenty of natural, healing foods. In order to be proactive and keep ourselves healthy, would God take vitamins?

    Today’s farming methods result in produce that has less vitamins and minerals than intended – sometimes 30-40% less. So how can we get enough of nature’s medicine and make sure that we don’t ingest chemicals at the same time? It would be great if we could all have access to 100% organic produce all the time, but most of us can’t. Do you think we were meant to take inorganic, fake vitamins and supplements?

    A typical person needs about 12 servings of fresh fruits and vegetables every day in order to get the amount of nutrients needed by the body to function normally and protect against disease. The fruits and vegetables need to be chosen from a variety of colors from deep green to purple, red, yellow, and orange. Even if we eat a healthy diet, we are still eating produce that has much lower nutrient content, and we cannot possibly get what we need as far as vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients.

    Cheap inorganic vitamins are being manufactured quickly and are made available everywhere for mass consumption. However, studies are showing that there is no benefit to taking multi-vitamins and that many are not even digested in the intestines because of the fillers and materials used to manufacture them. Since there is no way we can eat what we need or get the nutrients from what we buy, YES we do need to supplement, but it needs to be done the right way. Everyone needs a whole-food, plant-based concentrated supplement made strictly from fruits and vegetables that are non-GMO and processed at low-heat so the original nutrients are preserved. Look for gluten-free, dairy-free ones. If you have questions about one you find, just ask me! There are also great plant-based shakes and powders that you can use. Make sure your vitamins and minerals don’t have fillers, chemicals, or coloring in them. Otherwise you are defeating your purpose. Be careful and research what you buy. There are several quality affordable products you can find easily. Skip the synthetic pills and go for the most unprocessed, least chemically fortified version you can find.

    My recommendation is to stick with whole foods in nature’s package and eat as many fruits and vegetables daily as you can, as many colors as you can. Then supplement on top of that with whole-food, plant-based, pure, organic, non-GMO products. If you have any questions feel free to contact me!

    (Beth Anderson is a certified Holistic Health Coach and founder of the Holistic Health Hotspotin Evansville, Indiana. She is also the author of “The Holistic Diet: Achieve Your Ideal Weight, Be Happy and Healthy for Life.” Beth received her training from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. She is a speaker and also presents workshops on health and nutrition topics. Beth offers in-person and phone consultations – contact her through Facebook or email for more information. You can find Beth on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/HolisticHealthHotspot or email her at beth@holistichealthhotspot.com)

  • Choose to be healthy NOW

    Are you surprised when you have low energy or when you are tired and listless? Are you aware that you could easily be more productive, stress-free, and healthier starting today, right now? All you have to do is choose to be healthy instead of continuing to choose the opposite. Everytime you eat or drink something, it is totally your own choice, and you probably know how it will make you feel.

    Today, let’s look at some ways you can choose good health today, right NOW.

    Choose plant-based. Choose plants over animals. You don’t have to be 100% vegan or vegetarian unless you have health issues. Choose plants 90% of time if you need to. If you choose animal products, know where they came from and how the animals were treated. Stick to animal products such as yogurt, honey, and eggs instead of flesh if you can. Do a little research and find out how corporate animal farmers actually treat their animals. You will be appalled. The senseless torture and inhumane practices used to butcher animals is not what your God, my God, or anyone else’s God intended. Choose not to be ignorant about how your animal products came about.

    Choose whole. Choose whole foods. Instead of purchasing processed foods in boxes and bags, or pre-prepared foods, prepare your own meals using whole foods! Stop ordering food for delivery and stop going to restaurants so much! Increase what you know about the food you are eating by preparing it yourself. There are super-simple, quick recipes you will love and can make. Find them. Make up your own recipes from foods that you like. Of course you may have to experiment, but once you have it figured out, you are set for life!

    Choose local. Support your local farmers. Choose products that have been grown locally. Even if you can’t find or afford organic produce, choose local produce. This will boost your local economy and at the same time reduce the income going to big business, GMO-filled, super-agricultural companies. We were meant to eat what is grown right around us! Try every locally grown fruit and vegetable you can find! Join a Consumer Supported Agricultural (CSA) group and find out what you have been missing. REAL FOOD has super taste and so many more nutrients, vitamins, and minerals than everything else. Experience it for yourself and you will make new choices!

    Choose what you know is the right thing to do. You already know what is the right thing to do. Stop making poor choices for lazy or unconsciously self-sabotaging reasons. DECIDE TODAY THAT YOU WILL MAKE GOOD FOOD CHOICES AND DO IT WITHOUT EXCEPTION. If you don’t, you are choosing disease, every time you make a poor choice.

    In Conversations with God, Book 1, we learned that people are making themselves sick, and “Most people do so quite unconsciously. (They don’t even know what they’re doing.) So when they get sick, they don’t know what hit them. It feels as though something has befallen them, rather than that they did something to themselves.

     This occurs because most people move through life—not simply health issues and consequences – unconsciously.”

    Choose to be conscious. Choose to be healthy today!

     (Beth Anderson is a certified Holistic Health Coach and founder of the Holistic Health Hotspot in Evansville, Indiana. She is also the author of “The Holistic Diet: Achieve Your Ideal Weight, Be Happy and Healthy for Life.” Beth received her training from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Beth offers holistic health coaching to individuals and groups via internet, phone, or face-to-face visit. Contact Beth for a consultation. You can find Beth on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/HolisticHealthHotspot or email her at beth@holistichealthhotspot.com)

  • To GMO or Not to GMO?

    I live in the Midwest amongst huge corporate farms full of beautiful fields of grains and beans. Well, at least they LOOK beautiful at times. I’m not so sure I am willing to eat the stuff. From what I understand a huge majority of what is grown around me is genetically modified GMO produce.

    Many people (even here!) here have no idea what is happening or that anything potentially dangerous is being grown in their own backyard. For hundreds and maybe thousands of years, people have been genetically engineering foods. We have trees that grow both lemons and limes. We have new fruits and vegetables made by crossing two plants together such as loganberries and limequats. We have selectively promoted different strains and species based on their color, taste, and growth patterns.

    But the kind of GMO manipulation that is going on now just isn’t safe. At least it hasn’t been proven safe. Studies around the world are linking it to cancer and many other health issues. There are too many correlations between these GMOs and food allergies in children (and adults). Doesn’t it seem strange that dozens of countries overseas have banned our GMO produce based on their own scientific health studies? Is it a coincidence that since GMOs have been heavily marketed there are huge spikes in children’s food allergies, along with the severity of the allergies? Doesn’t it seem strange that SOMEONE is profiting off of these GMO seeds and it isn’t the farmers, but instead big businesses?

    There are two types of GMO that I am most concerned about.

    The first type is GMO seeds that are herbicide resistant. Supersized companies have engineered grains that don’t die when they are doused with toxic herbicide. This means that the farmers can spray as much herbicide all around the crops to kill off every weed and stray plant, but the produce won’t die! This is one sure way to guarantee that you will be ingesting much more pesticide than you would have before. Does this sound safe to you?

    The second type is GMO seeds that have pesticide DNA built into them. There is a toxin that causes pests stomach’s to explode when they ingest it. This is the pesticide that has been genetically “built-in” to your GMO grain. They have found this pesticide in the stomach of pregnant women. If it kills bugs by making their stomachs explode, what does it do to humans?

    If you haven’t heard yet, there are dozens of countries around the world that have banned the import our GMO grains. They have banned it because they have done scientific studies linking GMO to cancer and other diseases. You would be surprised to find out that the same GMO grain is in hundreds and thousands of your grocery products, but how would you know? They certainly don’t tell you on any label. The vast majority of grains that are grown in the USA by big agricultural farms now are GMO, which means the vast majority of ALL grains grown in the USA are GMO. Try to find out if your crackers, chips, cereals, even tofu have GMO grain/soy in them!

    I recommend buying products that are clearly labeled “No GMOs” or “Organic”, as organic products cannot contain or come from animals who are fed GMO. Let’s get healthier by protecting ourselves against what hasn’t been proven safe!

    (Beth Anderson is a certified Holistic Health Coach and founder of the Holistic Health Hotspot in Evansville, Indiana. She is also the author of “The Holistic Diet: Achieve Your Ideal Weight, Be Happy and Healthy for Life.” Beth received her training from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Beth is helping people improve their lives through nutrition and lifestyle education, health coaching, and by helping others to learn to make informed choices. Beth continues to spread understanding of the connection between body, mind, and spirit and encourages all to discern the truth about food, consumer products, environment, and life choices. You can find Beth on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/HolisticHealthHotspot or email her at beth@holistichealthhotspot.com)

  • What is robbing your energy?

    Everyone seems to be tired, stressed out, fatigued, lethargic, or burned out today. We work too much, become caregivers for parents or children, and spend way too much time worrying about others instead of ourselves.It’s time to focus on YOU and making yourself feel better. Let’s start by looking at what is stealing your energy and vitality from your system!

    There are four kinds of stress that will deplete your energy store – chemical, emotional, mental, and physical. Here are some examples of each type of stress and what you can do about it.

    Chemical stress can come from your food, air, water, and environment. You ingest hundreds of chemicals daily simply from the food you eat. The more processed foods you eat, the more chemicals you ingest. By processed foods I mean foods that have been changed or transformed from their original state in nature, packaged, and sold to you through a grocery store, restaurant, or shop.

    You are eating food coloring, artificial and “natural” flavoring, artificial sweeteners, and preservatives in every bite of your pre-prepared foods. You eat pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers in your conventional and GMO foods. You drink in the water pollutants in every soda or glass of unfiltered water. You are surrounded by air pollution in your workplace, airport, and even outdoors depending on where you live.

    Read your food labels when you buy food products. If the ingredients list is long, has confusing words or unpronounceable words, or has recognizable chemicals in it, don’t buy it. Make it yourself. Cooking isn’t that hard and doesn’t take that much time. If you can’t cook it, get it from a place where you know who made it and what went in it. For today, just make a better choice. Try to drink filtered or purified water when you can, and get outside in a clean natural environment whenever you can.

    Emotional stress can come from toxic relationships, caring for children, or lack of boundaries. There have been many studies done that show that the better your relationships are, the healthier you are and vice versa. If you are stuck in an unhealthy relationship, either figure out how to improve it or leave it behind. You can do this by setting healthy boundaries for yourself even if it is your own children you are dealing with. Learn to say no, and teach people how to treat you by letting them know what is not acceptable, enforcing your boundaries and following through.

    Mental stress can come from your work environment, school or education pressures, and especially self-inflicted standards and expectations. If you take your work home with you, work at all hours, check your emails or are on call while you are “off,” or can’t stop studying, then you probably need to look at your standards and expectations. Set a time when you are truly off work. For example, after 7:00 p.m. stop checking your email, stop studying, and stop beating yourself up in general for not being perfect. If you don’t start taking care of yourself, no one else is going to do it for you.

    Finally, physical stress can result from your immediate environment – loud or constant noise and lack of sleep are some great examples. Try to get some quiet time daily and make sure your sleep schedule is regular and enough. Most people need 7-8 hours of sleep a night. If you sleep less on a regular basis, you might need to make some changes in your schedule. Too much partying or alcohol can also put your body in a state of physical stress.

    The biggest and most common source of physical stress on your body is a lack of nutrients. There are no nutrients in packaged cereals (except what they fortify it with after removing the natural nutrients!), fast food, processed foods, sugar, alcohol, white flours and rice, and much more of what we eat on a regular basis. Try to start eating whole foods – foods with one ingredient. Cook more of your own food with whole ingredients. You will at least know for sure what is in your food!

    Take a look at what kinds of chemical, mental, emotional, and physical stress you are putting your body through and start making changes here and there to improve your life. You will end up with more energy!

    (Beth Anderson is a certified Holistic Health Coach and founder of the Holistic Health Hotspot in Evansville, Indiana. She is also the author of The Holistic Diet: Achieve Your Ideal Weight, Be Happy and Healthy for Life.Beth received her training from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Beth is helping people improve their lives through nutrition and lifestyle education, health coaching, and by helping others to learn to make informed choices. Beth continues to spread understanding of the connection between body, mind, and spirit and encourages all to discern the truth about food, consumer products, environment, and life choices.)

     

  • A Right to Know…or not

    Prop 37, The Right to Know GMO labeling initiative, looks to have been narrowly defeated last week in California. It was a contentious fight with over 45 million dollars of advertising and support from major food makers who outspent their grassroots and organic counterparts in an effort to avoid labeling their products.

    GMO – Genetically modified organisms, are food crops, animals and other food products that have had their genes changed to create breeds and strains of plants and animals that do not naturally occur. Scientists have been for years now introducing genetic material into organisms to alter, create and effect changes in living plants and animals. Also called recombinant DNA technology, this practice changes the core genetic make-up of organisms. This genetic manipulation gives scientists the ability to create any trait they wish, or suppress natural traits they don’t want. Why? One argument is the world’s population growth demands scientific intervention due to a perceived inability of nature to provide the yields necessary to keep pace. My opinion is much simpler…there’s money to be made in them thar seeds.

    Little is known about the long-term effects of eating GMO foods; I ask, why fix what isn’t broken?  Nature has provided us the perfect packages to create and sustain health, and we do know the long terms outcome of that, so why mess with perfection? While some countries, including the US, have adopted GMO foods, many others have banned the production and selling of GMO, or at least have created guidelines that require GMO foods be labeled, which is what Prop 37 had proposed to do.

    Among the largest bankrollers of the NO on 37 campaign were huge multinational food and beverage companies whose subsidiaries make billions of dollars, ironically, selling some of the most well-known “natural” food brands. Could corporate greed rather than pubic good be the reason why there was such a huge effort to stop the labeling of GMO food? Don’t get me started.

    The Organic Consumers Association, who is calling on consumers to boycott the companies and brands whose money may have swayed California voters into voting No on Prop 37 said, “If we raise enough hell, maybe the parent companies of these popular brands will come to their senses and stop doing the bidding for Monsanto and the biotech industry.”  The OCA is calling on consumers to boycott the companies and brands listed below by exposing how much each spent to defeat GMO labeling in California.

    PepsiCo (Donated $2.5M): Naked Juice, Tostito’s Organic, Tropicana Organic

    Kraft (Donated $2M): Boca Burgers and Back to Nature

    Safeway (Member of Grocery Manufacturers Association, which donated $2M):“O” Organics

    Coca-Cola (Donated $1.7M): Honest Tea, Odwalla

    General Mills (Donated $1.2M):  Muir Glen, Cascadian Farm, Larabar

    Con-Agra (Donated $1.2M): Orville Redenbacher’s Organic, Hunt’s Organic, Lightlife, Alexia

    Kellogg’s (Donated $791k): Kashi, Bear Naked, Morningstar Farms, Gardenburger

    Smucker’s (Donated $555k ): R.W. Knudsen, Santa Cruz Organic

    Unilever (Donated $467k): Ben & Jerry’s

    Dean Foods (Donated $254k): Horizon, Silk, White Wave

    Most thought that Prop 37 would have easily passed in the granola state, and like me, many were shocked when it didn’t. However, to this day, questions about whether Prop 37 actually lost still linger. Was there vote tampering? According to investigative reporter Jon Rappoport, there may have been. “Media outlets made an early call on election night claiming that Prop 37 had gone down to defeat, while there were well over 3 million uncounted votes at the time of reporting.”  Rappoport goes on to question whether or not there was criminal vote tampering and asks the question, should the election have been called so early with such a close margin and so many uncounted votes?  Seems like this one may yet be challenged.

    Either way, California’s Prop 37 has spawned a national debate and consumer awareness since the “right to know” movement seems more determined than ever to fight for labeling of food that has been genetically modified. Already under way are efforts in Washington State, Vermont and Connecticut, along with a 30-state coalition that is formulating a plan to collaborate on GMO-labeling laws and initiatives. This issue is far from settled, and the same may still be true for California’s Prop 37. Stay tuned.

    America is one of the only major industrial countries that allows and promotes the production and sale of GMO foods. In Europe, Norway, Austria, Germany, the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, Greece, France, Luxembourg, and Portugal have put in place GMO restrictions. France made an important step in the no-GMO movement by specifically defining exactly what “GMO-free” means when it comes to food labeling. Ireland has banned all growing and cultivating of GMO foods, and the European Union — a governing coalition of European countries — has considered a Europe-wide banning of GMO foods. So have many other countries.

    No matter what side of the GMO food debate you fall on, it seems prudent to me that the public should have a right to know what is in their food supply, no matter where it’s grown or what company produces it. It’s not like labeling ingredients isn’t already required. As a holistic health professional, my further concern is, what are the real long-term effects of eating GMO? Are you willing to be a lab rat? You may be right now and not know it!

    Is it telling that in Monsanto’s own corporate cafeteria only organic food is offered and served? If they are so proud of their products, why are they unwilling to eat or label them? I will stick with what nature produces, and the only way to ensure that is to buy and eat organic. Or better yet, grow your own. Gardening is cheaper than therapy and you get to eat your efforts!

    So it’s clear what my opinion is…what say you? Do you have the right to know if you are choosing GMO… or not?

    (J.R. Westen, D.D. is a Holistic Health & Spiritual Counselor who has worked and presented side-by-side with Neale Donald Walsch for over a decade. He is passionate about helping individuals move beyond their emotional and spiritual challenges, transforming breakdowns into breakthroughs. His coaching provides practical wisdom and guidance that can be immediately incorporated to shift one’s experience of life. As is true for most impactful teachers, J.R.’s own struggles and triumphs inspired him to find powerful ways of helping others. Sober since June 1, 1986, J.R.’s passion for helping individuals move through intense life challenges drove him to also specialize in Addiction and Grief Recovery. J.R. currently shares his gift of counseling & coaching with individuals from around the world through the Wellness Center, Simply Vibrant, located on Long Island N.Y.  In addition, he works with Escondido Sobering Services and serves on the Board of Directors for the Conversations with God Foundation. He can be contacted at JR@theglobalconversation.com, or to book an appointment, write support@simplyvibrant.com.)