“The complex interplay of animate and inanimate systems on the surface of the earth — soil, air, water, plants and animals — has come to be appreciated only recently as a delicate but fundamental factor in the welfare of the planet. We have just begun to realize that our unthinking interaction with these systems — air, soil and water — multiplied by families and groups and cities and crowds, can burden them and shift from a state of equilibrium, the thrust of which can recoil, damage us, our food supply and our health in turn.”
Dr. med. Rudolf Ballantine
Each day I try to engage in some healing and medical study to enhance my clinical practice. Today I decided to go back and reread Dr. med. Rudolf Ballantine’s internationally acclaimed classic, Diet and Nutrition: A Holistic Approach, first published in 1978 by the Himalayan Institute of Yoga Science and Philosophy of the U.S.A.
As the social and environmental crisis deepens, it should be clear to all and sundry that we in the “developed world” cannot continue to consume gluttonously. In fact, we have proceeded along a spiritually, socially and environmentally destructive trajectory for decades. And this in spite of the substantial warnings issued by honest, insightful scientific and medical researchers year after year. Of course, many of these warnings were suppressed by multinational corporations, politically-motivated government regulators, academic institutions hungry for funding, the commercial mass media seeking maximum advertising revenue, etc.
In our contemporary world, it would also be just as counterproductive for people in “developing countries” to fail to benefit from the experience of the wealthy countries over decades. May they resist the temptation to uncritically adopt policies promoting wasteful consumption of the investment of raw materials and human labor involved in producing goods and services, if and when they can afford to do so.
It behooves us, as individuals and as societies, to embrace ideas and learn lifestyles that run counter to decades of global food and pharmaceutical industry propaganda, whose primary objective has been to induce people to buy their products and services, while often promising illusory benefits and downplaying their unhealthy effects.
What spiritual, mental and physical impulses do you think have driven us to ignore reality, engage in fantastic, wishful thinking, and avoid taking responsibility for our dietary and lifestyle habits?
Self-empowerment and healthy social reform begin with increasing our spiritual wisdom and reliable scientific knowledge. As a next step, we need to exercise our wills to successfully implement what we have learned into our daily living.
Are we finally ready to ask ourselves, what can we each do to discern and implement necessary change in our individual, family, community, national and international lives?
We are already suffering the dramatic consequences of inaction. It will only get worse if we do not radically change course.
And each of us can have a role to play in this. We all have a personal stake in the outcome.
To your spiritual, psychological and physical health and well-being!
Joseph Michael Contrada, Heilpraktiker
Heilpraxis Contrada | Naturheilpraxis Contrada
P.S. If you decide to read Diet and Nutrition: A Holistic Approach, you might want to continue on to Dr. Ballentine’s subsequent book, Transition to Vegetarianism: An Evolutionary Step.