To properly enjoy the full benefits of your macrobiotic lifestyle, be sure to note the necessity of symmetry and steadiness in your diet. One can easily become out of balance with oneself by taking in foods that are dynamically off balance with your yin and yang stability. Luckily, there are a few simple ways to regain regularity through your nutrition, and many of them taste delicious!
Find Your Balance
“Foods should be consumed in their most natural state and processed foods are not recommended. Other excluded foods are fatty meats, most dairy, sugars, coffee, caffeinated tea, stimulating beverages, alcohol, chocolate, refined flour, very hot spices, chemicals and preservatives, poultry, potatoes, and zucchini… Excluded foods are considered to be extreme, over stimulating, or too concentrated and therefore not capable of achieving balance.”
Macrobiotics engages the Eastern mindset of utilizing foods to obtain and maintain a finely tuned balance of yin and yang with dietary pairings of sweet, salty, sharp, sour and bitter individualities of taste. Generally, it is instituted that yang-foods are salty, hot and aggressive, whereas yin-foods are sweet, cold and passive. Barred foods are those that possess toxins, falling heavily on either far-side of the pairing gamut, endangering one’s Zen-food balance. So, it’s not that a macrobiotic diet is strict, per se. It simply relies on the basics of quality, quantity, regularity and equilibrium.
Health Benefits Experts Cannot Deny
The scientific health facts concerning a macrobiotic lifestyle are profound, as Zelman notes:
“A well-managed macrobiotic diet can be nutritionally sound. The ADA approves of carefully planned and monitored vegetarian diets for all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, breastfeeding, childhood, and adolescence. The macrobiotic diet is low in fat and high in fiber. Because of all the soy products, it is also rich in phytoestrogens, which may reduce the risk of estrogen-related cancers, such as breast cancer. There is no scientific evidence that a macrobiotic diet will reduce breast cancer, however eating a diet low in fat, high in fiber, and rich in plant foods containing phytochemicals may offer disease protection.”
Macrobiotics calls for a lifelong commitment to gradually accruing health benefits, and one of the many gifts in maintaining this dietary rubric, along with spiritual calm, increased awareness and heightened bodily function, involves fortification from common, yet serious ailments. But a beginner’s journey, just like their diet, should be well and evenly paced.
“The macrobiotic diet focuses on foods typically lacking in most American diets. Eating more natural foods, whole grains, vegetables, and beans could be beneficial to most people. Adopting it, however, may prove to be much more difficult because it often requires major lifestyle changes. If you’re interested in trying a macrobiotic diet, start slowly. First, incorporate just a few concepts, such as eating less unprocessed foods. Then add more whole grains and so on.”
Taste of Health Holistic Holiday at Sea is more than a great vegan travel experience, it’s an opportunity to travel and stay healthy while pampering AND educating yourself with current events and trends in the vegan world. On our holistic cruise you will have the opportunity to eat divine meals, make new friends engage with some of the most celebrated personalities of the Vegan Industry. 2013 will mark the 10 year Anniversary of the Holistic Holiday @ Sea and there will be lots of socials, great classes, amazing Caribbean ports and even a few surprises. Learning a new way of living has never been so much fun, so easy and so tasty!
Sources –
http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/macrobiotic-diet
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