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Diet with Grace
23 Plays16 days ago
Wrapping up this series on diet we go over some lingering questions, get lost in nuts and spices, and review helpful attitudes on making dietary changes.
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Transcript
Introduction to the Banting Diet
00:00:10
Speaker
Real quick, there's a ah diet that i like because it's not an actual diet, but i don't know, this is just how it's called. It's called the Banting Diet, named after this dude Banting. And he's basically like for two weeks, think it's just two weeks, he's like two weeks, he's just like, dude, real low carb, right? Everything glycemic, that's really low. I think he even says no beans.
00:00:31
Speaker
Like he's, even though it's low enough glycemic index that most other people would be like, it's fine. He's like, don't even do the beans. got sure And he's like, do that for two weeks and then do whatever you want.
00:00:44
Speaker
He's like, this isn't a diet to like stay with forever. This is just like a reset for your system. Love it. And from there, you're going to have a much better ah like navigational system through this world.
Long-term Benefits of Low-carb Eating
00:00:55
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, if it catches, i think that works 100%. i would I would do two tweaks, I guess. I don't know if I would lose people doing this, though. I would do it for a month.
00:01:06
Speaker
So kind of like how Whole30 does it for 30 days, right? I think. Yeah. I've never done Whole30, but i think I assume that's what the 30 is talking about.
00:01:14
Speaker
So I would do it for a month. And part of the reason is because when I started doing this, like... I used to say eight years ago, but I've probably been saying that for two years. So I'm going to go ahead and say I've been doing 10 years now, somewhere between eight and 10 years I've been eating this way. I trimmed the carbs way down, fiber not included, of course, fiber is always positive. So starches and sugars way down.
00:01:37
Speaker
Fats, I didn't skyrocket, but I probably increased just a little bit. And then protein, I kept normal and big increase on the veggies, right? And I started doing that. And within the first month, I actually would say the first six weeks is when I really felt enormous changes in my body.
00:01:53
Speaker
um And it went from everywhere from like my energy felt like it was shifting.
Inflammation Reduction and Metabolic Comfort
00:02:00
Speaker
Inflammation drastically felt like it was shifting. The way you like, you know, a lot of people don't realize they're they're running what they feel like is their metabolism and their metabolic heat output.
00:02:12
Speaker
They're running on inflammation. And so when you take that away, you're like, oh, now some people, when you take that away, they get a little chilly and you're like, that's not bad. That just means you're where you're at.
00:02:22
Speaker
I have always just ran too warm. I've always ran hot and I just, you know, I knew it and I didn't like it and I didn't know what it was before I did Chinese medicine. And it really just helps you not run too warm, which is just really comfortable. And then some people are like, oh, well now I feel actually kind of chilly. And you're like, oh, well that's what it feels like when you're not running on inflammation.
00:02:42
Speaker
right Oh, if you need to tonify young, do that. If you don't, then just, you you know, be at this better kind of balance point. So that's a really good one. And I, and, you know, for the benefits of exercise too, I felt like like I've exercised most of my life, but the way it changes your body, it so much accelerates when you're not fighting against it.
00:03:04
Speaker
So yeah, that's great. And you're like, you get stronger, faster if you want that. And your body, you know, it's funny because some people say like, well, what is health? And there's a whole lot of things that we could talk about.
Defining Health through Body Responses
00:03:15
Speaker
But one of the best ways I think, it's not the only way, but I think it's a very helpful way is when your body responds the way you think it should, that's a pretty good indicator of health.
00:03:24
Speaker
I mean, how many people have, how many patients have we had come in be like, you know, my knees just don't work like they should, or my pee doesn't work like it did, or... Right. Maybe it's just me getting old and everything stopping working.
00:03:35
Speaker
Yeah, right. And you're like, but that dude's fine. Like 70 year old buddy, they're crushing his V-Style pull-ups, right? And you're like, oh man, like what's the, what is, you know, what is health in a way? It's kind of like where your body responds the way you want it to. It heals like it's supposed to, right? some people are like, I just don't heal anymore.
00:03:55
Speaker
Yeah, because your body is fighting all this, you know, all this stuff, all this damage and injury you're putting it through all the time. So that's a really fundamental component of um decreasing all of that inflammation and the stuff that
Extending the Diet Reset
00:04:08
Speaker
you're fighting against.
00:04:09
Speaker
And then trying to fuel it. So I would say that that diet totally makes sense. But if yeah if you could push it to a month, great. If you could push it to six weeks, I may, might start losing people, but that would be really great. And at six weeks, I don't think most people would want to go back after two weeks. I'd be scared that some people would just want the croissant so bad that they just start eating it.
00:04:30
Speaker
And they would just deal with the inflammation, even though it may make some feel shitty or whatever. But at six weeks, you start realizing like, I don't want to go back. Even if it's yummy or something like we'll find other ways to make yummy things.
00:04:43
Speaker
I think I said this in the previous one, i eat chocolate cake for breakfast sometimes. My cake is made of almond flour. Great. Eat almonds. It's made of ah coconut flour. That's pure fiber.
00:04:56
Speaker
There's literally no sugar in it. It's made of monk fruit powder, which is an extract from one of our herbs called lohang guo. So heck yeah, maybe I'm even clearing a touch of lung inflammation if anything else came through there. It's got some eggs or flax eggs of either one. You can do the vegan or the non-vegan one. we use alternate We alternate both. So it's got some protein and some good seed amino
Healthy Dessert Options
00:05:16
Speaker
acids in there, depending on which one you pick.
00:05:18
Speaker
It's just like so healthy and it's got maybe dark chocolate in it. Right. So if you, if we do the dark chocolate version, then we use like, we you like to use the, um, the 86% Ghirardelli one.
00:05:30
Speaker
there So just for sugar and inflammation, do 86% or more. Cause if you look at the whole hundred gram bar of that, is 10 or 11 carbs max. I think it's 10 in sugars. The fiber, of course, is negative. So it's even less total carbs than that. But that means, you know, I aim for basically 40 grams of carbs, sugars and starches. There's about 10 carbs. At least I aim for less than 40 a day is my goal.
00:05:59
Speaker
So nice because that gets all burned up pretty immediately and it's not ah like actually making your system switch over to carb or out of the the ketosis. Correct. Yeah, correct.
00:06:11
Speaker
And you'll find the longer you do this because I've done it for eight or 10 years now, you switch back into ketosis so much faster. Um, I remember it used to like, yeah, it used to take me like two or three hours. You could just feel the sluggishness, everything, the slow switch.
00:06:25
Speaker
Now I, I don't even know. I don't even notice the switch anymore. If I ever, if I ever get out of it. Nice.
Impact of Alcohol on Health
00:06:32
Speaker
um So it it just, it just, the yeah, the benefits just keep compounding, but um it's not that you can't eat delicious things, but you just realize they're not worth it.
00:06:41
Speaker
It's the same argument. I think that the best argument against alcohol is there's a, did we talk about the Huberman podcast? Yeah, we did. Andrew Huberman. There's some mixed vibes out there because maybe he's got some stuff that, I don't know, some cancelable stuff. Who cares? He is a scientist of reasonable quality and he's got a good episode on alcohol. So,
00:07:07
Speaker
i know I don't care to get into the nitty gritty about everything else, but I do recommend people listen to his alcohol episode. And it's like a three hour episode, but it tells them a lot about what modern science and good current research is saying about what alcohol is doing. And one of the biggest takeaways is it wrecks your HPA axis, which is your hypothalamus pituitary adrenal axis.
00:07:26
Speaker
And the second big takeaway is that moderate drinking is like one drink every two, four weeks. not one every two days. And so when people start shifting what their idea of moderate drinking is, they really, i think, gain gain a lot of benefits from it. And one of my favorite things is if you know all the damage that the alcohol is doing,
00:07:47
Speaker
You as the individual just get to make the educated decision of, is it worth it? Because maybe it is. Maybe you love that drink and maybe that's the one vice that you think is top notch for you.
00:07:58
Speaker
Well, heck yeah. It's not my vice. I give up alcohol don't even think twice. Right. Right. Ask me like how often do you drink yesterday. Cause it was in clinic yesterday. And i was like, Well, it's been like a a year and a half since I had a sip of Kate's drink.
00:08:12
Speaker
um I had a sip of Paloma when we were in Mexico. i It was the first time I'd ever been to Mexico. It was good. I had a sip. was a year and a half ago. And i was like, great.
00:08:23
Speaker
Done for another year and a half. Doesn't matter to me. And I don't mean to poo-poo on, you know, that's some people's big challenge is giving up alcohol. I know that that can be challenging for some people. What I mean is it's not my vice. And so I
Post-reset Carb Cravings
00:08:35
Speaker
don't care. And what I really don't care about is how good is alcohol compared to what I know the damage it's doing to my body. And the same thing when you start switching over the carbs is when you feel the damage, you just don't think it's worth it anymore.
00:08:50
Speaker
Right. I think that's the thing too, is that if you're stuck in a um cycle of drinking or a cycle of of eating carbs and having the carbs make you feel good, it's really hard to to get that perspective of like, what is it actually doing? What's the damage? And so i think that's what he's trying to illuminate with the two weeks, right?
Feeling Younger with Reduced Inflammation
00:09:11
Speaker
Of like carb-free is that here's what your body starts to look like without it.
00:09:16
Speaker
And I mean, I did it and I was like, oh, this is just like, I think I told you, I was like, I feel like I'm in my twenties, like with the energy level yeah change because I was just like, oh, i'm I'm not fighting myself. Right. All the time. Yeah. And what I have energy wise can just be used to to do things instead of to internally fight my inflammation or create inflammation and fight and clean and yeah, just waste all that energy there. yeah.
00:09:44
Speaker
um Yeah, I think it's a good start. But if you if you can continue on with the low carb for eight years, definitely definitely worth it. Although I will say ah i i i still like a croissant, man. i don't know what know to tell you.
00:10:02
Speaker
well it's it's So when it comes to alcohol, I just don't give a hoot. So I haven't drank it. And it's not that I won't drink non-alcoholic things, by the way. I probably drink a non-alcoholic beer every day. but it's, you know, it's also a low carb non-alcoholic drink. I'm going to have two.
00:10:19
Speaker
Like, should I go for two low non-alcoholic beverages? Oh my God. This is funny too. Cause it's like weed is legal in Colorado. I'm pretty sure mushrooms are decriminalized and Steven's over here, like feeling kooky about his two non-alcoholic peers. um andy Yeah, it's real.
00:10:38
Speaker
It's real. Um, But yeah, so you know so some people can, and and you brought up a really good point, and like I'll cheat on the carbs when I travel. oh yeah. Because ah you know you just can't find food, and like the amount of energy I would have to spend to, yeah i could I guess I could try and cook all my own meals, but then I also am traveling for the experience of trying to go places and not always staying at home then and cooking there.
00:11:04
Speaker
So yeah we just went to Santa Fe month and a half ago maybe, Yeah, about a month and a half, month, month ago. um And crushed some tortillas, man. I crushed some corn tortillas.
00:11:16
Speaker
So there was no ketoing there. when you when you eat corn, you have skyrocketed out of ketogenic phase ah very quickly. And wheat.
00:11:26
Speaker
So for all you corn lovers out there, it's super delicious. I get it. But unless you're about to go running, there's not really a reason you want to skyrocket. But it was super delicious. It really was. and It was like homemade stuff and like just phenomenal. So we're only there for two or three days.
00:11:42
Speaker
Yeah, two and a half days or something. And I probably had carbs at like two or maybe three or four of the meals. So, know. That's like half, right? That's over half of the meals. Half the meals. Yeah.
00:11:55
Speaker
It was fine, you know. Yeah. um And so that's the thing too. Like this is a ah really key point is how long does it take to build up how much inflammation people have in their body right now?
00:12:07
Speaker
Oh yeah. Well, I mean, you've been building it up for probably, i don't know, for me, it was like 30 something years. Exactly. Right. Right. So it doesn't build back in two days. No. And so, and
Diet Flexibility During Travel
00:12:18
Speaker
you're, you just still find you're so much more resilient to things.
00:12:21
Speaker
And it's fine. And you can just kind of work around it and then just eat more vegetables. Oh, this is also a nice double cardinal rule too is, so like if I am going to break the rules and I am going to have that croissant or some corn tortillas or something, how do I mitigate some of the damage that I'm doing there?
00:12:37
Speaker
And the answer is- Pair it with alcohol. No, sorry. It's a nice blender. I get my bread and my alcohol jar blended together? What's that? What is that? It's that ah Russian drink that's made of fermented bread.
00:12:52
Speaker
oh yeah was just going to say, oh yeah, that's going to be carby.
00:13:00
Speaker
Oh, there's a little chunk of unfermended bread in here. I'll just eat that one. so Sorry. So you eat the croissant and how do you mitigate the damage? Fat and fiber. Those are the two tricks, fat fiber. So um the reason why all berries are totally fine to eat, even though I don't eat most fruit.
00:13:18
Speaker
all berries are totally fine. And, you know, we even make, I'll make my own jam and stuff, which is super easy. I don't know why people don't do that. it takes like no effort, but, um but yeah, jam or berries, as long as it's pure fruit,
00:13:31
Speaker
no like added apples and stuff like that. But if it's pure berries, the reason why berries are fine is because they have so much more fiber than they do sugar that they cancel themselves out. And the second thing is fat. And so like if you are going eat a corn tortilla, it's actually better to eat it with guacamole because you're counterbalancing the carb.
00:13:51
Speaker
um And so that's what we do. And it really, it makes a huge difference. You don't get nearly the energy you like drop that you would if you just ate solid carbs by itself. Nice.
00:14:02
Speaker
Butter. on Good trick. Actually, croissants have butter anyway, but then, you know, eat that with something. More butter. More
Mitigating Carb Damage
00:14:08
Speaker
butter. is I mean, it's the trick. It works, you know, and the butter is the energy. Right.
00:14:16
Speaker
good good looking out i like it ah ah the last thing i wanted to ask you about before we uh before we wrap it up yeah is for the chefies out there and for all of us who like experimenting in the kitchen kind of what are the spices doing um and how can we pair it and there's no way we can do all the spices yeah um in this at time but Sometimes ah people want to do smoothies, right?
00:14:43
Speaker
And we're like, oh, but that's a little bit cold for the body. So then you're like, okay, so then add some ginger in there. um Sometimes it'll be a cycle thing and they'll be like, oh, I'm feeling more bloated.
00:14:54
Speaker
And I'll be like, okay, maybe you ah you use the zest of a citrus. Yes. Yeah. Yes. Any other good tips? I mean, the other one I have written down is fennel for a woman's cycle too. Correct. um But that one's pretty weak, yeah.
00:15:14
Speaker
The bulb is a little weak. The seed is pretty strong compared to food. It's a superfood. It's just not ah It's a very gentle herb. um It's called xiao hui xiong in Chinese for an herb. Technically, it's an herb.
00:15:28
Speaker
But it's it's not, it's- Herb strength. It's not herb strength. It's superfood strength, which is great. So yeah I think you bring up a really good point, which is how can we use what's in our own kitchen and use it at least to a superfood strength instead of, because we know we're not getting most herbs in our kitchen, because unless you just happen to grow huang in your kitchen or something, right?
00:15:51
Speaker
So you're absolutely right. So when it comes to the spices, I would actually say, I know there's a big thing called seed cycling, where people try and match the different parts of their menstrual cycle, which is obviously the feminine side of people. um And they match that with different seeds that they do it throughout their cycle.
00:16:06
Speaker
I think there's some, I think it's great as far as how it's educating people about their cycle, literally just wonderful. And however people like to do that, that's great. But what you can do with only seeds is very limited.
00:16:19
Speaker
Now, to that, they added, I think spices are even more potent than a lot of seeds. It's not to say seeds aren't useful. Some seeds are true herbs. Black sesame seeds are an actual herb.
00:16:30
Speaker
Perilla seeds extremely potent. um You know, if you have like chronic constipated folk and they take two spoons of ground up perilla seeds every day, you and You cannot tell me that that does not have a benefit on their digestive motility and everything else. So same thing with black sesame, same thing with full hemp seeds, not hemp hearts, by the way, hemp seeds. Those are kind of a trio for constipation and boy, do they work well, but you got to use a reasonable amount. So I usually aim for two tablespoons of each if you really want to see a notable effect.
00:16:59
Speaker
but So there are some seeds that work, but almost more potent than that, unless they're truly superfood seeds, would be the spices. And the reason is is because we all know spices are pretty potent in their flavor, and they're fairly potent in their function.
00:17:13
Speaker
So fennel seed is a true superfood. In fact, it's a mild herb, which means it's really nice superfood. And it's great at moving your liver. So if you take, if you put phenyl, like, so let's, let's think about this maybe from a woman's cycle, because, you know, it's, they have a little bit more needs than a man does. A man is pretty basic all all month long. So, ah but if for a woman's cycle, if she's approaching ovulation or she's approaching menstruation, it's a real good time to move some qi.
00:17:42
Speaker
And when we say qi, we really mean liver qi. Well, let's go through what moves liver chi. First and foremost, fennel seed, fennel bulb. So you can get either one
Balancing Liver Qi and Digestive Health
00:17:51
Speaker
in the store. They're both nice quality. And then we would say, okay, well, what else can move liver chi. And you're like, well, there's not a ton of other foods that have most like a superfood level strength of moving liver chi that you can commonly find in most grocery stores.
00:18:08
Speaker
But here's a trick that we use in Chinese herbs that works phenomenally well. When you move the digestive chi, it takes the burden off of the liver.
00:18:19
Speaker
So what I like to think of is telling people that you know The things that you just mentioned, the zest of the lemons, the limes, or the tangerine peels, so those are the really the only three citrus that are strong enough to be effective.
00:18:30
Speaker
But with the zest of the lemons, limes, or tangerines, move digestive chi. They're not moving your liver chi. So how come they seem to help for things like ovulation and menstruation?
00:18:41
Speaker
Because they take the burden off your liver, and now your liver only has one job, move the flank. If it doesn't have to move the digestive central canal anymore, it moves the flank, which is the liver gallbladder channels.
00:18:53
Speaker
And that's where the ovaries are at. And that's where a lot of menstrual pain is coming from. And it really does work. It sounds theoretical, but when you take the burden of digestive movement off of the liver's plate, the liver really targets its own channel much stronger.
00:19:08
Speaker
And so you can see this where for, I'm going to drop a little bit of herb knowledge here. I don't know if there's a Muggle episode or not, but just for, we're going to toss in one because there's always some practitioners listening to the muggles too. So for ah a lot of women, we actually take liver chi movers right into their cycle. So we don't stop the day or two before we just take it right in and through because they need to move chi all the way through day two or even day three of their cycle.
00:19:33
Speaker
So we take it right into the cycle and stop after day three usually. But here's an interesting point. We all know Shao Chai Utang is super useful for removing liver chi, great for nausea. And if that's what they're presenting with, it's the correct formula to continue with.
00:19:46
Speaker
But a lot of women just have the lower down menstrual pain. And in that case, it's often more effective that instead of taking six scoops of the Shao Chai Utang granules, which equates to two scoops of Chai Hu in the totality, to actually switch that to eight scoops of Suni San,
00:20:04
Speaker
Because you're still getting the two scoops of chai, but what else are you getting? Two scoops of a phenomenal digestive chi mover called chersher. Chersher, yeah. Exactly.
00:20:15
Speaker
Which is another citrus, by the way. Correct. And check this out. we've I've said this a million times in there the course and everything else. You move the bowels, you move the blood.
00:20:25
Speaker
If you move the blood, you move the bowels. So if you can't move the blood because it's going to push into small vessels or clots, move the bowels to relieve the pressure on the blood.
00:20:38
Speaker
It's a phenomenal function. it really can help a ton. Nice. So, so yeah. Getting back to that food recipe, let's saute some of that fennel bulb with some ground up fennel seed and put some lemon, lime or tangerine zest in there.
00:20:53
Speaker
You've got the perfect food to be doing for ovulation and menstruation times. And any other time, if you're stressed, do that and you feel less stress. And then maybe you'll saute that up.
00:21:04
Speaker
ah Of course, I saute in a little bit of stock. I put any other vegetable. I like to put some celery or whatever vegetables I have in my refrigerator. I just chop them up and toss them in there too. And I make basically a bunch of like kind of a saute vegetable stuff. And then maybe we'll pair that with say some lentil noodles, um some like some lentil pasta, mix it together, half pasta, half vegetable,
00:21:28
Speaker
um And you've got a wonderful source of protein. We talked about how beans have oligosaccharides. And so that's totally fine. You've got a really healthy meal, super fast to cook up. So we just call it pasta with lentil or with fennel bits, but you know, whatever you want to do.
00:21:43
Speaker
With fennel bits. Fennel bits. And then, let's see, I was trying to think of other spices that we use in our kitchen and what they do from our perspective.
The Role of Spices in Traditional Diets
00:21:52
Speaker
So I know clove is in our Materia Medica, yeah? But I don't think I remember, was that to do with the kidneys? But they're not.
00:22:01
Speaker
They say it does something with the kidneys, but then we're like, no. Yeah, it's mostly for stomach heat. Okay. And I like to think of, and you're absolutely right, so nutmeg is basically... um I think that the varietal might be different though, but we do have that.
00:22:18
Speaker
And I'm spacing on the Chinese name, right? Rodoco. That one's called Rodoco in Chinese and cardamom. But again, it's a different variant. It's called Bidoco. Right. um And so we've got nutmeg. We've got cardamom. And like you said, clove, which is, what is that one called?
00:22:37
Speaker
Forgetting that one. um The, what's the spiky one called in English? anise. Is clove? Clove is the little spikes that look like nails, right?
00:22:50
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Maybe just like the the tops of a nail. And that's dingxiang? Yeah. Yes. I think so. So all of these are basically warmers. And what you can basically think of is they're all mostly for stomach warming, sometimes for kidney warming, but mostly for stomach warming.
00:23:09
Speaker
And the easiest way to do this is if you would put it in a pumpkin latte, a pumpkin spice latte, the fall spices, um they're all warmers. So stomach heat,
00:23:20
Speaker
They generate stomach heat and they generate kidney heat, which maybe sounds like a bad idea. But if it's the middle of winter, maybe it sounds like a good idea. So mulled wine and stuff, the reason it's in there is for heating things up, right? Generating heat.
00:23:33
Speaker
But if you're stomach fire, be very careful. On the kid, deficient fire rising, be very careful. Cinnamon, of course, is in there too. Cinnamon is very much targeted at the kidneys.
00:23:44
Speaker
um But there's two things about cinnamon, which is, um because I know that, I think it's Russians tend to take a scoop of cinnamon every day, Russian men, because they think it's good for like their vitality and virility.
00:23:57
Speaker
o That's a lot. A lot of them have damp heat. You know, some of them come to the clinic and I'm like, well, we can counteract that or you could just stop generating more damp heat. There's a lot of other ways to improve your virality, right?
00:24:09
Speaker
Yeah. Well, in the amount too that we would use for generating qi and blood using the cinnamon is is not a lot if I'm remembering correctly. For those of you who don't know what Asher is referring to, because it's a pretty actual awesome and not super well-known function, is that Rogue Weight does actually um help your body generate both chi and blood simultaneously, which just sounds like a great idea, but it has to be used in a very small amount. You're exactly right. So three grams or less is the rule, but I keep it to maybe one.
00:24:40
Speaker
So it's very small. Yeah. Yeah, totally. And then with generating the the stomach heat, it could be useful for people who who don't have that stomach heat. They need help digesting. Correct. And then is that why they're saying it's going to benefit the kidney? Because the stomach being like the the beginning of your digestive tract and how you have to process stuff so it can eventually hit the kidneys. Yeah, you bring up a really good point. And I think there's a lot of crossover and just ambiguity between those two.
00:25:09
Speaker
um You can even see this from an herbal perspective where we have a formula called Sishun Wan, like the four shun pill. um And it's used for a kidney, what they call kidney yang deficient diarrhea or cox crow diarrhea, or what they should call is fifth gung diarrhea. laityruberty Point is early morning diarrhea with undigested food.
00:25:31
Speaker
And yes, we target kidney yang for this, but look how much, and how important Rodoko is in that formula. And so if you want see faster effects with that formula, and I, my formulas, one of my formulas teachers was saying this, and I totally agree with him is if you increase the amount of Rodoko to be close or equal to the amount of bugujur in that formula, you see way faster effects way faster. Um,
00:25:55
Speaker
like way more notable effects way faster is what i mean. And so the key here is that when people say it's kidney yang deficient diarrhea, they you can't separate that from your spleen yang.
00:26:06
Speaker
So what tonifies the spleen yang is very close to what can tonify a kidney yang and vice versa in that way. And that doesn't mean we're using kidney yang tonics the same way we are stomach yang tonics.
00:26:19
Speaker
But if you look at foods, it tonifies spleen, heart, and kidneys simultaneously. If you look at rotoco, does there have any, it's yes, it's absolutely spleen young.
00:26:30
Speaker
Does it have an effect on the kidneys? Probably. um Because basically I think like what you're saying is the front of the, the top of the tract is the spleen young and the bottom of the tract is the kidney young. So one does tend to affect the other.
00:26:42
Speaker
Nice. But like some of them are very clear one one way. Like, so cinnamon is much more on the kidney side, though it will stoke stomach fire a little bit. Yeah, yeah, totally.
00:26:53
Speaker
I tried that with too much quager. It's hard to try his stuff. Oopsie daisy. Let me go have myself a salad. Oh, which is which is the other one. So then if you um you got too much stomach heat, you know, I eat the the prototypical cold stuff that we usually tell you not to eat, like the raw veggies. That's exactly right. Yeah.
00:27:17
Speaker
And so a lot you'll see a lot of times like – Traditional Chinese medicine doctors will be like, oh, don't eat any cold raw vegetables. No, right? So that is not actually true. um The problem is, is they're probably dealing with a lot of weak yang deficient patients, right? So if you have plenty of yang in your tummy or even excess yang, like Chris Singh, maybe tending towards heat and fire,
00:27:41
Speaker
of juices and salads and raw foods is exactly what you do need. Um, or herbs. So pick your poison there. Right. But, um, yeah, so that, or, or your medicine, exactly. have medicine.
00:27:56
Speaker
Um, but like, so for instance, if someone has like really serious, um, stomach fire, acne, super common, stomach fire is one of the most common causes of acne. Um, and they do celery juice on an empty stomach, they will notice a difference.
00:28:11
Speaker
That becomes pretty potent. That is like ah almost herb strength. It's superfood for sure because you're just hitting the stomach with some serious stuff. Now, I would recommend in general to put some ginger with it, not actually to protect the stomach, to protect the spleen.
00:28:29
Speaker
So you want to get stomach heat without damaging the spleen. Totally. Nice. So this is going to be, you know, for all of us, we just start where we are.
Starting a Health Journey
00:28:41
Speaker
We have our whole history of what we were brought up eating and then we're trying to be healthy and we have maybe some ideas from other Western docs or from some fad diet and friends.
00:28:52
Speaker
Any advice for us? You know, we want to eat healthier because we know if we take care of this part, you know, our health will start trending in the right direction and fixing itself on its own.
00:29:05
Speaker
And we'll get better benefits from any of the other things that we do, be it exercise or herbs or acupuncture or whatever we're doing, stress management. And so just it being a long road and there's a lot here to digest. Do you have any advice for us?
00:29:22
Speaker
Yeah. I would say follow some of these big cardinal rules. And, ah you know, we we talked a little bit about like, how do you rehab a liver? How do you rehab? I guess we didn't really talk about rehabbing a spleen as much, but we can talk about that too. We could, we could do that more.
00:29:38
Speaker
That's the pumpkin squashes. I think we did. Yeah. that we did Yeah. yeah that's Yeah. We're good. Pumpkin squashes. Actually, healthy fats are really useful. um Nice. As long as you can digest them.
00:29:52
Speaker
So you can see how the spleen and the the liver really go back and forth. You can't have a healthy spleen without healthy liver. You can't have a healthy liver without healthy spleen. And so you basically just kind of inch both of those up one at a time until you get to a good function of both.
00:30:06
Speaker
um You can't fully rehab a liver without some raw vegetables. You can't eat the raw vegetables unless you have spleen on. So like, you know, eat some real strong ginger dressing on a little handful of raw arugula. There you go. You had your raw vegetables for the day. Eat the rest cooked.
00:30:24
Speaker
until, you know, and you can eat them cooked regularly, right? It doesn't mean you have to eat a bunch of raw vegetables at any point. You just want to tailor that to how much heat versus yang versus whatever you have. Technically heat and yang aren't the same thing.
00:30:38
Speaker
Heat would be pathogenic, yang would be positive thing. So the difference there is spleen yang versus stomach heat. Right, right. Fire. Hey, Hootie. So I guess one of the biggest takeaways, like, yeah, let's do it. Let's do a quick summary. So in case someone didn't have a chance listen to lose now all these episodes, however many hours we've been talking about this, let's talk about some big things. First of all, low inflammation, right?
00:31:02
Speaker
this way to get out of your own way and not cause inflammation in your body. Just ask yourself, do you want less inflammation in your body? Because I do. ah It's a lot lot of diseases, not every disease, but a lot of diseases are inflammatory based. So that's a big one. And so eat less sugar, eat less starches.
00:31:22
Speaker
And if you are going to eat those buffer with fats and fiber. So that's number one. And then number two is higher nutrient density. And what does that mean? I like to call the – how is Mixon? Is it Tina Turner or Jackson? Who did the What Have You Done For Me Lately? The For Me Lately? Yeah, I know. Is it – it's not Janet Jackson? Is it Janet? I think it's Janet Jackson. I can never remember if it's Tina Turner or Janet Jackson. I'm going to Janet Jackson too.
00:31:48
Speaker
Yeah. Have You Done For Me Lately? Yeah. Yeah. So that's what I call it is the what have you done for me lately diet. Because if you can't tell me why you're eating the thing you're eating eating besides yummy. ah Yummy. Happiness, Stephen. happiness that You cannot put a price on my happiness after eating a croissant.
00:32:09
Speaker
Or ice cream. Oh my God. It's real. It's super real. there Yeah, there are technically some keto ice creams and stuff out there. Check the ingredients to see if they fit their vibes. But yeah yeah And then shortbread, dude, that chocolate cake that I do, it's ah it's a variation of a keto shortbread. I'll put that recipe. The hell yeah. Let's do that. Super easy. And just like, so like you can eat the yummies, but like if I'm eating my chocolate cake in the morning, I can tell you how much, like why I'm eating it for a protein reason and why I'm eating it for a fat reason.
00:32:38
Speaker
And why I'm eating it, why did I put walnuts crushed macadamias in that or something? Not just because I was born in the year of the pig, and apparently pigs love macadamia nuts. They go nuts over them. Nuts over nuts.
00:32:50
Speaker
um So that's the second thing is if you're eating low inflammation and you can tell me like why. I don't want you to be a nutritionist. It's not that I don't want you to be. I don't expect you to be a nutritionist. But just have some idea of why I would be eating this thing.
00:33:04
Speaker
then you know you should be eating it. It's something to seek out and and that's nutrient density, right? Like looking for that protein, you're looking for that healthy fat, you're looking for the something, something. that would be the big takeaway, I think.
00:33:18
Speaker
Totally. the little thing I'll add on is that I feel like a lot of us, we get our ah in our own way when we try to make these kind of big changes, be it from expectations for for how we're going to be or what we're going to feel like. um But, you know, I see people like, oh, well, now is just not a good time for for me. I got too much going on to to start now. I'll i'll start later.
00:33:42
Speaker
And then you start later and then maybe there's there's something that's not working for you then. And then you're just like, oh, I'll just well kick it down the road again.
Small Diet Changes for Big Health Benefits
00:33:49
Speaker
and it's kind of like, just start now with whatever you can do. Yes.
00:33:53
Speaker
Like, give yourself some grace. You're a human being. ah you there there is no There's no black perfect thing that you're going for. ah You're just trying to incrementally be better than than you were previously.
00:34:05
Speaker
And to do that, it just takes a little a little bit of effort in trying. And in some cases, it's you know I do agree, sometimes it's almost insurmountable. Some people live in food deserts, they don't have time to have a cook, you're working multiple jobs, you just got to eat out. like There are for sure things that are outside your control. But...
00:34:25
Speaker
um at the same time, then that's the grace part where it's like, okay, so then not now, but you still do what you can. Heck yeah. I love that. That's so important. I think we should change the name of the diet to be like, i don't know Lindo Grace or something. Cause you said it exactly right, man.
00:34:41
Speaker
People need to remember that like, If they always postpone it until everything is perfect for them to try this out, they're going to end up in a point of disease that's too big for them to handle.
00:34:54
Speaker
And that's when everything comes crashing down. They're like, oh, I'm just going to push this back. And then they end up pushing it years back. And now their blood pressure and their blood sugar and their cholesterol, everything is and out of control.
00:35:07
Speaker
Well, does that sound like a great time to pick something up? or or should you have done it like when you had an exam paper to write or something silly, you know? Right, right, right. I mean, at that point, not only are you gonna need to take our nasty-ass herbs, but you also have to change your diet. And you probably went to the ER because something big went down, and you're like, oh my God, for hours, and they didn't help you, you were there for overnight, and then they sent you a home because they didn't believe that you were in pain, and then you went back again, and yeah. Looks like you've heard this every day, Asher. Dude, it is wild. i don't understand medical health system that we think is so great. But yes' that is another episode. Yeah, that's true. We're just going to call it ripens.
00:35:55
Speaker
But you're so right. And so I think you hit on like the head exactly what I always try and tell people. And I literally say this every time people ask me for this. um Obviously, i give a shortened version of this nutritional advice and stuff.
Reiterating Gradual Dietary Improvements
00:36:07
Speaker
But it's 10% change is 10% better. It really is. Inflammation is quantitative, not qualitative. Meaning if you can decrease the quantity of your inflammatory foods by 10%,
00:36:23
Speaker
You literally just increased your, decreased your inflammation by 10%. So you can decrease in an incremental way and still see the same benefits, you know? And if you decrease 10%, feel 10% less inflamed, you'll feel better. And guess what you'll do if you have 10% more energy, you feel more resourced to take it 10% further.
00:36:42
Speaker
And that's the thing that people are looking for is like, I think when people are keep postponing it, that's what they're really saying is I don't have the energy to do that. Well, you're not going to get the energy by eating a crappy diet continuously, right? Right, right, right. that 10% change and then see how you feel. If you feel better, make 10% more. And once you can get to 50%, you're like, oh my God, this is just another, this is so much better.
00:37:07
Speaker
Right. And then at that point, it's almost it's easier to do the healthier thing yeah that's working for you than it is to switch it up and and do the unhealthy thing. And you know that wherever that 50% is, that can be closer or farther away for people. yeah Obviously, if it only takes you a month or two to get there, you're in pretty good shape and...
00:37:26
Speaker
easy and if it's going to take you six months to a year to get there just through doing with diet then you know it's a long haul but you got to still celebrate your incremental wins along the way 100 100 and you'll feel it and that's the celebration is feeling better yeah sweet nice all right guys eat healthy we'll talk about how to healthy later