Judy:

Thanks for your interest. It's useful for me to write this stuff, so I
appreciate the prompt!

This is more a life philosophy than any hard and fast diet rules. It's all to
do with personal respect. You are made in god's image, your body is a temple,
so you need to treat yourself accordingly. It's to do with "at-oneness" with
nature. It's useful to read Joseph Campbell on myth, and other writings on
native america, such as Chief Seattle's letters.

Native paleo (that's paleo with a small p) peoples knew this very well.
That's why studying these peoples is so beneficial. As someone remarked, they
had what we have lost. Prior to the arrival of Christianity in northwestern
Europe with the Roman Legions, we were all pagan. Pagan simply means the
people of the countryside, as opposed to city dwellers. And all their
"religions" were nature religions, just like native paleo america. Judaism
created the idea of monotheism to unite the tribe as a people, to distinguish
themselves from the Caananites, who worshiped the nature gods (Ashteroth, the
goddess, was worshipped in groves of trees).

Nature religions treat every living thing as equal. The two worst things
Judeo-Christianity has given us are  "thou shalt have dominion over every
living thing..."   and   "they were naked and they were ashamed...." The
first has given us carte blanche to rape and pillage the planet, and the
second has made us ashamed of our own bodies.  Native peoples had neither of
these philosophies. They observed that to the whiteman, nature was a
wilderness to be tamed, but to them it was their home. Modern people are
freighted of nature, of the outdoors.

So what's this got to with your question? Well, It's the idea of respect for
yourself, for your body, and for the world you live in. This is a native
philosophy, and it is the original paleolithic philosophy that humans would
have had from day1.

Food has to be treated as something sacred. You are making a holy offering to
the temple. This means that you don't over indulge, that you only eat best
quality, and you learn to recognize what that is. You listen to what your
body is telling you. You have to raise the sensitivity level. We get so
dulled in modern society by too much external stimulation that we cannot feel
anything.

All I can say is eat small amounts at a time (my meals would be other
people's snacks), and treat it with respect. Try fasting - this will heighten
your sensitivity to food greatly. It will also give you more energy.

Too much sugar is our biggest problem, because it dulls the sensitivity. The
reason americans do not drink tea  is because they cannot taste it. Tea,
particularly green tea, drunk from small elegant porcelain cups in the
Chinese manner, is highly beneficial. And this is paleo, because the indians
made teas from wild herbs, and Paleo (with a capital P) would have done the
same.

To actually eat native american foods is going to require some organization.
To gather wild acorns and berries, and roots and wild animals and insects
means actually going out and doing this. I am working on it!

Hope this is helpful, or at least thought provoking.

Charles



Charles