The longer I live, the more I become a firm believer that many of us are taking some huge strides in the wrong direction with food.
I love food. I love it so much I toy with the idea of becoming vegan just to play with vegan dishes, to be paleo so I can try some of their more outrageous ideas for desserts, to be anything other than what I am so I can live in a different skin, even just for the time I’m reading their fabulous, sometimes preposterous recipes.
But as I have aged I have come to the stunning realisation that although I love my chia and maca, my inca inchi and camu camu, and as full of some essential fatty acid or trace element or protein or vitamin that they may be, none of this eminently fashionable, specialist stuff is actually going to help us much in the long run unless we have a truly balanced diet.
Balance. Just the word smacks of tipping points and unexpected dives when the status quo is not maintained. Yet when you think of it, balance is something that we all must accomplish. We should admire it. We should passionately pursue it.
Think, for a moment, of balance in this way: A balanced viewpoint. That’s when someone has carefully weighed the pros and cons, They’ve educated themselves on the subject. They’ve thought deeply about it. Now consider a balance beam. Four inches of death-defying horizontal hardness where gymnasts can do amazing feats as long as they comply with the laws of gravity and respect the unforgiving nature of the beam.
It seems to me that balance is what many of us lack. We don’t have a balanced viewpoint with regard to our food.
I’ve read of former paleo eaters who have become vegans. I’ve also read of strict vegans who because of health isssues have later embraced a more paleo lifestyle. To me, that doesn’t mean that they’ve changed sides to be with the winning team—just that they weren’t balanced enough in the first place.
I am absolutely sure that we as a human race can survive just fine if we embrace the more natural aspects of a paleo diet. I’m also sure we could do quite well on mostly vegan fare. But I believe we will thrive, not by denying ourselves any food group but by making better choices within every food group.
And I say this, not as a guru or a teacher or as someone who in any way sets themself above others. I say this with the benefit of imbibing a chocolate bar and a glass of wine most days. I believe that if you include a lot of what does you good, you should be able to also include some of those things that might not be particularly healthy but do make you happy.