Section 1, chapter 10, paragraph 3:

"A few years later, food additives, preservatives, caffeine, and sugar were permanently banished from my diet. I reasoned that subtle natural effects might be washed out by the impact that these substances had on consciousness. I was right - the difference was dramatic."

The word "dramatic" caught my attention. Can you let us know what your diet is? Personally, I've tried to drop out High fructose corn syrup, processed flower, and other sugars. However having a sweet tooth it's hard to resist for long. BUT! if what your saying, that it will have a dramatic difference, then that will be a great motivator to permanently change my diet.

Have you any experience with fasting? I've done it for religious reasons, and body cleansing. There's a notable difference in my perception, and thought patterns. Currently testing it to see how it may help with meditating. Even if this does help it's only for a short time without a better long term dietary habit change. So I'm looking forward to any comments as always.

Shin

Shin,

I am very glad that you posted this question. I have been thinking of posting a similar question lately. I wondered if the additives were still "banished" from Tom's diet or if a certain level of proficiency had been reached that the exclusions were no longer necessary. One can't argue with the health benefits of permanently ridding one's diet of these things though.
However, I am right there with you. My sweet tooth and food addictions make it hard to adhere to such a spartan routine for long. Old habits die hard I guess.
I also agree that the "dramatic" difference would be a good motivator.

Ramon

Shin & Raymon,
Very good question, though you will probably eventually regret having asked it.

How dramatic? Dramatic as the difference between looking through a window that is filthy or one that is clean.

All those substances I suggested you avoid are psychotropic -- i.e., they affect the central nervous system by altering (clouding) the perceptions of consciousness. They produce an effect in consciousness that is analogous to looking through a dirty window with lots of bubbles (distortions) in the glass. Another problem: You don't recognize the glass is dirty because you have never looked through a clean one — dirty is accepted as the “normal“ condition.

All these substances can reduce a clear awareness of the state of one's consciousness to muddled mush — an affect much like in the old days when one would take too many antihistamines and mentally feel like a zombie. All are a problem but sugar is the worst because of its ubiquity and because (like caffeine, alcohol, and nicotine) it is addictive. Any form of sugar, including honey, fructose, molasses, etc is a problem. “Fruit juice sweetened“ is mostly unacceptable, though natural fruit juice is generally OK if in limited amounts and if it is not concentrated through evaporation. The only reliable exception I have found is barley malt in reasonably small quantities. The problem is how fast the glucose enters the blood — the system balance is upset and goes through wild swings. Glucose is a critical part of your physical and mental system — unstable glucose creates an unstable system. Evidently barley malt is slow to digest.
How much sugar is OK? None. Zero. A micro pinch is too much. I generally loose significant clarity of consciousness just walking through a bakery and breathing the air. Now, you can eat whole fruit, even sweet ones like raisin, apple, pineapple, and banana in reasonable (small) quantities because whole fruit is slower to digest and thus doesn't ring your system. It will take you 3 to 6 months to get over your sugar addiction if you are careful to READ EVERY ingredient before ingestion and make no assumptions or excuses. Sugar substitutes and things sweetened some other way (other than just adding WHOLE fruit) are also generally unacceptable.

Over the last thirty five years I have become somewhat more tolerant of (resistant to) some of these substances (mainly, I get over some of their effects more quickly now), but nothing has changed in my diet — I avoid all these substances scrupulously because I value and depend on the clarity of my mind/consciousness. The impact they have on that clarity is as obvious as being slapped in the face. Sugar, particularly in sugar laden Western cultures, probably does more to inhibit and disrupt good meditation states and the ability to function and operate in the larger consciousness system than any other single thing besides large amounts of fear/ego. However, because addictions are difficult to beat within a culture that is saturated with the addiction, that fact is generally hardly worth mentioning more that once.

Tom

Knew my diet was a problem, but this is a kick in the pants. I don't see what you eat, because I went shopping some time ago to find food stuffs without processed sugars, and found so few of them. Love Mt Dew, but it has high fructose corn syrup (which causes your appetite to increase), so switched to fruit juices without additives like apple, grape, and other mixed juices. Thought that it being natural it would help, but seems that it's still to much. Switched over to fruit a little more often instead of candy, and snack stuff. A lot of ham, and other things are curred with sugar. Sitting here thinking of almost everything I like has some sugar in it.

What about whole grains for breads, and cereals? There's also other starches like potatoes, and rice. Then there is good old fat, what about that? Much of the meat on the market is full of steroids, and antibiotics. Fruits and vegetables laced with pesticides. "Fat free" often means high carbohydrates from processed sugars, and starches. Problematic to say the least.

You mentioned that your a "tea-totaler", but doesn't tea have some of the highest caffeine concentrations of any drink?

Been wanting to do this for a long time, now have the motivation. If your willing, could you give us a couple of meal examples you eat. Just to give us a better idea. Guess it's time to become a nutritionist, any references you could give us would be great.

Thank you,

Shin

Hey Shinoki. google The Paleo Diet. I've been working on this myself, and have changed the way I eat. Long way to go yet. The artificial additives in diet soda are bad, but I drink maybe one a day, and when I get up to work nights my two cups of good coffee are required. Dangit! Oh well. The change in diet made a huge difference in how I feel within two days, and now "normal" food is hard on me. Diet, like all else, remains a work in progress. Why is self discipline so hard to achieve long term? Can't blame it all on society.

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always, John

You're right. I do regret asking the question. I think I will pretend that I never heard that...What, what were we talking about? Oh yeah. Consiousness exploration, that's right! Now about reducing entropy...
That was a joke of course but what you just said Tom is a lot to digest. Consciousness exploration is very important to me and if it is this dramatic it would be worth the commitment. I too would like an example of what foods you eat on a daily basis and what a typical meal consists of. I imagine you have to prepare a lot of your own foods. Do you shop at natural food stores?
I also am going to check out the Paleo diet you recommended Stroker. Thanks for the tip.
Ramon

Listen guys, it is not as hard as it sounds.

BTW, "teetotaler" doesn't mean that you drink tea, it means that you don't drink alcohol.

1) Read the ingredients of everything you want to eat. If it contains any sugar or words ending in 'ose or if it contains chemicals that don't sound like food (preservatives, artificial colors and flavors, etc), then put it back on the shelf and don't eat it. 10% of the food in a grocery store will meet this condition -- you just have to find it. Fresh fruit and veggies are OK, just be sure to peal, scrub and/or rinse them. Meat is OK, organic meat is much better. Poultry and fish better that the others -- make meat a very small portion of your diet. In restaurants, order simple plain foods, avoid most sauces or dressings. Patronize good restaurants that start with basic fresh ingredients as opposed to those that use processed, pre-prepared, mass-produced, or canned ingredients.

Eat zero sugar, sugar substitutes, and chemicals, but if you drink one beer a month or are served roast beef at a friend’s house, or have a glass of good wine on New Year’s Eve -- enjoy it. Don't be a fanatic or become obsessive over detail. AFTER YOUR SYSTEM IS CLEAN, you can dissipate most toxic substances inadvertently or unavoidably eaten in about 4 to 10 hours. Look for the plain and unsweetened version of foods -- like plain yogurt and unsweetened soymilk.

Yes, in answer to your earlier question, fasting can be a good idea if you are healthy and not too skinny to begin with. Once a year, fast 7 to 10 days in-taking nothing but plain water. If your diet is good, after five or six years you can fast less often. Clean out, purge, your GI system on day one and return to food after day seven with a little plain acidophilus yogurt and a small banana. Use your head, if trouble starts, end the fast.

Good Luck,

Tom C

Paleo Diet: " The Neanderthal diet" Stroker are you picking on me cause I drag my knuckles? :) Never new that grains, beans, rice, and potatoes are toxic (uncooked). Read where it's similar to the Atkins diet, which I tried, but much more flexible. Think I'll use it as a base system, wile avoiding all sugars. Nice find thank you.

Tea-totaler: my mistake, got the impression of all those people pushing green tea as being so healthy for you. :)

Thanks Tom, going to see what I can find tomorrow morning. Know this is going to be one of the best things I can do for myself.

My body has been cleansing itself for a while, I don't know if you guys can relate with "listening to your body" something that has been happening to me for years now.
Things like drinking any sodas,juices,beef,processed foods,cans,drugs (I consider medicine part of this equation,although I have always tried to stay away from them, but I won't even take a pill for a headache now) are becoming foods from the past.
I cook very healthy but I do sin at work since I work for the restaurant business right now (transition job) and it is a lot easier to grab something from there; I usually regret it at the end but this is what we do as humans I guess.

About a month ago I decided to quit drinking as well, although I never really drink that much (maybe 4-6 beers a month because of social gatherings) hoping that maybe this way I could meditate better and purified my body to get to the goals I want to get, something in the back of my mind has been telling me this for a while now...

What has me a little concern is the sugar intake (this one is going to be a hard one) and the starches and breads I also do love....I have to admit a do like chocolate a LOT! specially females I think are more leaning towards chocolate, so having to take it off my diet is going to be hard :(
But I do want to experience this journeys of the mind so I am getting ready to try a new diet and see if I can concentrate better when meditating because for some reason I have lost connection lately and I am not sure if maybe it is a diet issue, even my dreams are hard to remember and not all that informational.

Tom and the rest, if i may ask, what is a normal day diet for you?

One more question, after you have control of your OBEs and do this on demand, can you go back to cheating with not so healthy foods (not drastically) but maybe a treat here and there? or a drink here and there? maybe to celebrate the latest achievement :)

The Paleo Diet. I love Neanderthals and think it was one of the coolest times to exist. This diet resonates...Thank you Stroker, as always. I had been wondering about this too. The next best diet to check out would be the glycemic index diet as it is all about controlling blood sugar speed of entry into and levels of glucose in ones system. The diet plan Nutrasystem goes by it and maybe SouthBeach now, there is free info on the web though.

Love
Bette

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All That Is
what is?
Consciousness.

bette: I love Neanderthals and think it was one of the coolest times to exist.

Peter : I know Bette it was... But all I can remember now was that really bad body odor my tribe had and the teeth....oh the teeth.... ;-)

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"Those who know do not talk.
Those who talk do not know." - Tao Te Ching

MySgMyLuv (Nelly),

A normal day's diet? Good question. The hardest part will be trying to figure out what a normal day is like -- there is very little about my day that is regular or predictable or generally repeated -- other than the fact that I spend much time each day sitting in front of a computer.

This morning I consumed 3 soft boiled organic eggs, a slice of toast (Ezekiek sprouted grain-sesame -- no chemicals, flour, sugar, or preservatives) and some Canoleo cranola oil margarine. For lunch I had five large grapes and a glass of unsweetened soymilk. For dinner I will eat perhaps 2 or 3 Wasa (oats) crackers and drink some more soymilk and maybe a few more grapes. A hand full of dry roasted almonds may work its way in there somewhere along with some plain yogurt. The past week I was traveling and ate mostly at restaurants. Many mornings I skip breakfast and lunch and have one meal at about mid afternoon - then perhaps a homemade ice cream cone (no sweetener in ice cream or cone - e.g., fruit and soymilk based) with Pamela in the early evening. Some days I don't eat anything at all. Some days I go to a restaurant for two meals in the same day. Pamela and I tend to be spontaneous and plan very little. I am not a vegetarian but I eat very little meat (mostly fish, seafood, and chicken). My body is efficient and metabolism slows some with age so I don't need to eat very much ( I am 6 ft tall and 180 lbs - on my way back to 175).

Yes, you can have a beer every once in a while but before long you won't want to ingest sugar (of any sort - natural or unnatural with very few exceptions) or caffeine, or both (chocolate), or preservatives, or other such junk that you may think you will miss, because of the way they make you feel and what they do to your awareness. After you live with a clean diet, inadvertent ingestion of sugars or preservatives can usually be worked off in about 4 hours - but it is a somewhat unpleasant and unproductive 4 hours.

Yes. Listen to your body and your consciousness. Here is a simple experiment that works best if your diet has been relative clean. 0) Before a meal (at least 5 hours since the last food intake other than plain water), 1) attain a light to medium meditation state where you become very aware of the state of your consciousness (how does that meditation state/awareness feel and operate?). 2) Shake your head very vigorously back and forth (front to back ("yes" motion) and rotate side to side ("no" motion)) and observe how your head feels when you are shaking it. 3) Reestablish awareness of your consciousness/meditation state (observe your nimbleness, clarity and control), 4) then eat or drink something, 5) about 30 seconds to a minute or so later check your awareness of your consciousness state (re-observe your meditation state consciousness clarity - note any differences). If you still have the same clarity in your altered state, then repeat 2 through 5 with a different food type - otherwise you are done testing for 5 hours unless you want to experiment with how long it takes before the clarity returns -- go back to step zero the next meal.

Tom C

Great, thank you for the response and I can see what you are saying about not wanting to consume sugars after I stop taking them, just yesterday after 6 months that I haven't had any coffee I took a sip of my mom's cappuccino and end up with a really bad belly ache :(

As far as chocolate though, I have always heard that dark chocolate is good for you because of all the antioxidants, it would be so nice if I could finally some day access the so called Akashi records to really crack the truth about foods and what is really healthy for you and what is morally wrong as oppose to healthy for your body.

I told you, I have a thousand and one questions...can't wait for my book to get here before I start drilling you guys with it, or even better before I can get to those answers myself, my way of reading my body has been effective so far but it is taking a long time.

I use a modified Paleo diet. Breakfast consist of meat. Any kind such as eggs, sugar free bacon, chicken, beef, pork, fish, liver, etc. Lunch consist of fruit such as apples, pears, watermelon, grapes, bananas, etc. Dinner/Supper consist of vegetables. They can be cooked, preferably steamed, or raw. Often I'll make a salad with ranch dressing, which is not so good, or a plate of steamed broccoli only. If I'm to tired, or just plain lazy, I'll have a bowl of bran flakes in the evening. Snacks consist of mostly nuts, sometimes grapes, cherries, and generally only drink water, tho I'll sneak organic whole milk a little to often.

The main idea is proteins will carry me through the day, wile fruits will give that boost of energy with natural sugars. Vegetables will replenish vital nutrients that were depleted during the day, along with fiber to help flush the system. Started this not long after my last post, and it has made a noticeable difference. My mind is much more clearer, feel better, tend to have more energy, and have lost about 25-40 pounds. Not so strict as to avoid any sugar or other foods. Like you, if I'm out and it's a little to convenient I'll eat at a restaurant (can't pass up General Tso's Chicken, and a MtDew... nectar of the gods). It was a successful, least in my mind, change of dietary habits.

A friend came to visit for a few days, and so I full out broke it. Ate some candy, and must of had a 12 pack of MtDew over those few day. It was worse then a hangover. Took a week to get over it.

Next faze is more towards detoxing. Will be looking for ways to reduce toxin intake wile eliminating the build up I already have. Also to establish a better nutrient intake, don't much like the idea of taking supplements wile a viable food source can do it. Also want to test Stevia, as it doesn't have the effects of sugar... "supposedly".

[quote="MySgMyLuv"]One more question, after you have control of your OBEs and do this on demand, can you go back to cheating with not so healthy foods (not drastically) but maybe a treat here and there? or a drink here and there? maybe to celebrate the latest achievement :)[/quote]

Wish I could consciously make water taste like MtDew :)

Tom you eat like a bird! :) Your right I don't think I could eat like you. Food is one of those few pleasures I have in life. I'll have to develop magical skills in the kitchen to get anywhere near that. All in good time.

Shin

BTW after you've read MBT your dreams will be amazing, least that's what happens for many of us.


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