Good Food | Going Outside to Heal Inside

Turmeric – Nature’s anti Inflammatory

Nature Sense is not just about being out in nature it’s also about an ancestral rediscovery of it’s gold ..

How better than to take a close up look at Mother Nature’s actual gold – Turmeric – along with it’s radiant component – Curcumin

You may have first come across turmeric as the orangey yellowy spice adding a zing to your curry. It would be doing it an injustice to believe that it begins and ends there. These days Turmeric is everywhere from posh lattes to luxury chocolate and staining your tongue if it’s been sprinkled into a health shot, salad or smoothies.

It’s been around forever – they say the gold that was brought by the three wise men was actually turmeric, which would make sense as frankincense and myrrh were also both revered medicines in times past. So what’s at the root of this root? Why so popular in times present?

It’s been touted as a miracle remedy for everything from inflammation to cancer due to its ability to help boost your cells’ resistance to damage and infection. The most studied part of turmeric is curcumin which is not to say the rest of this spice is not important, it’s just that it accounts for most of it, so has received a lot of attention. And with reason.

First however is a concept called bioavailability. This means how easily your body can make use of something. Curcumin is not so much bioavailable on it’s own and is only fat soluble – but if you pair it with a friend that is – pepper – it is in a class of it’s own! The rest of the turmeric is more bioavailable and is water soluble .. so your best way of availing of this ancient healer is take – both. For instance, I take curcumin in the morning with a smoothie (with Omega or MCT oil ) but during the day I break open a couple of turmeric capsules into what I’m cooking. If I’m feeling achey – as curcumin is great for inflammation – I’ll have one with anything rich in oils at the same time – increasing that bioavailability.

You can’t have too much of this stuff as it’s like some vitamins – it doesn’t hang around for a long time in your system. Basically, the more the merrier. After all it’s been around with proven healthy outcomes in Ayurvedic medicine for over 4,000 years. Now that’s a long time in the bigger system of things!

The internet is full of information on both Curcumin and Turmeric, so no point in duplicating it. The point of this article is to get you looking into ancient practices that have worked, to empower yourself and come back with questions ( if you can’t find answers that work for you). Most of all it’s to open your eyes and mind into living well, knowing that living in harmony with nature and trusting in it’s bounty – gets us closer to our optimal living template and further helping us down regulate the stress and inflammation of modern living.

So I’ll sign off with a few things that Turmeric (and curcumin with pepper) is good for. Essentially it is known for its anti-inflammatory, anti-tumor and antioxidant effects and a strong standby for skin conditions, digestive issues, period pains as well as many other aches and pains including arthritis. More recently it’s been found that contribute to protecting your brain as you age and has shown promise in the treatment of Parkinson’s disease.

Here are some of the areas in which both turmeric and curcumin have shown clear benefits, backed by science: Osteoarthritis: Obesity: Heart disease: Diabetes: Liver: Cancer: Antifungal: Antibacterial:

Using your favourite search engine – search Turmeric and your issue and presto you’ll have started on your journey. Also look at the many amazing recipes that uses Turmeric including Golden Milk an age old yogic and Ayurvedic application.

UPDATE: I’ve been asked quite a number of times in both private consults and our Nature Sense course “what my favourite Curcumin supplement is?” – it’s from the nordic company AAVALabs and if you use BMCC at check out you’ll get a discount.

Stone age men didn’t take Supplements

The wisdom of our ancestors certainly is an important measure to optimising our biology but there’s nothing wrong with taking a closer look at how they lived to see what was going on and if it could work for us. To harness their natural wisdom, to supplement a stronger shield against today’s tough living.

However the assumption that previous generations didn’t take supplements is actually not true. Ancient supplements include root, stem, and leaf teas targeted for specific symptoms, medicinal powders ground by mortar and pestles, and highly concentrated oil extracts. Just because these dietary extras don’t look like the capsules and oversized tubs of protein powders, doesn’t mean that they weren’t popping a bit extra of what made them feel good!

Further our ancestors didn’t have the antibacterial living that we experience. They consumed dirt, which we now know contains a wide range of beneficial minerals and probiotics along with good bacteria and viruses. So we’ve to make that up and top it up! Compounding our depletion are the methods that we use to cook, and consume food in the industrial world. These are also pretty different from those of our ancestors which has also contributed to the deficiency in our overall nutrient availability and absorption.

Take our food, generally these days we eat only animal muscle and discard the collagen-rich connective tissues. Previous generations – as recent as our grandparents – simmered animal carcasses for hours, for bone broth, liberating collagen, gelatine, and fat-soluble vitamins from connective tissues. In a way, the soups our ancestors consumed are equivalent to the joint supplements that proudly line the wellness and sports shelves of our health food shops.

To learn more about ancestral nutrition maybe ask your parents what foods their parents or grandparents prepared. Reflect a while about how indigenous tribes can carry water on their head for miles – where some of us in our twenties are too busy balancing the latest charcoal latte complete with a plastic lid – to consider where these notions or needs – came from.

So yes our Stone Age relatives did supplement and Yes we can learn from them! In this modern world the key is to eat simple, eat variety and dump the junk. And supplement? Why not! Perhaps in addition reflect on your curcumin or charcoal latties and ask ‘would my ancient biology like this’ and if so what’s the nutritious story behind it? Because there is one. It makes Nature Sense!

What is Health Optimisation in the 2020’s?

A Historical Look at Health : What can we learn from Paleo Times?

People are always surprised to hear that we as a species are not at our peak! We have this sense that we’re advancing, that we improve with every year. But is this really the case?

From digs to studies it’s been shown that paleolithic humans were taller, more keenly in touch with their senses and showed no sign of disease such as we have today. Their main threat outside of childbirth was from other animals – and each other! But certainly not their own biology as is the case today. Death then was from outside – now death is from inside – predominately the exponentially rising chronic illnesses of heart disease, diabetes, cancer, brain disorders, inflammations all generating from within. Even the current much reported ‘pandemic’ – the overwhelming majority of deaths are occurring due to a reduced internal immunity and secondarily illness.

So is this a key to our health? Our species, classified as Homo Sapiens (meaning wise humans) are the most recent in a line of hominids who’s history stretches back into what’s referred to as the Paleolithic or the prehistoric period which dates around 2.5 million years to about 10,000 years ago.

Post primate evolution we were preceded and at times shared the planet with a number of now-extinct hominin relatives, including Homo Erectus, Neanderthals and Denisovans. Many of whom – as species lived for hundreds of thousands of years – very much longer than we sapiens have yet to achieve. We are the last surviving human species.

Putting this into context – it may feel like we’ve been around creating huge volumes of historical achievement forever, but everything we know has just covered 10,000 years! As if pre-history means no-history, implying there’s nothing for us to learn. Is this right?

It was around 10,000 years ago that our species changed from being hunter gatherers. At that time we lived with the light and slept to the dying embers of fire.

Our diet was obtained by fishing, hunting birds and wild animals as well as collecting berries, fruit and nuts. We were surrounded by a world of plenty living for the most part, in harmony with our surrounds, with Nature. We were at the peak of our Nature Sense.

This most harmonious of times for our species also marks a point in history when we biologically started to disconnect – to devolve. It was when we started to get sick: Our teeth rotting, our skeleton shrinking and chronic disease showing up in our skeletal remains, never seen in previous finds. Despite the great PR that farming receives in our evolution, this marks a decline in not just our biology, but also life for many other animals. We started to domesticate (not just them but also women where their role became dependant and owned as much as the animals!) This sedentary shift ironically brought with it a much harsher life, with less variety in food and more vulnerable to weather as well as a much challenging life of planting, harvesting and building. Bringing us to now where we value any invention that stops us moving and increases our sitting! We are en rout – unless we become aware of our hubris – to be the shortest living of the hominoid species. So much for the ‘wise’ human!

Of course there is no denying the incredible advances in surgery and some medical discoveries but only time will tell if the big pharmacological advances are as beneficial as we believe. After all the medical establishment is the third biggest killer in America with the rest of the west not far behind. We hail antibiotics as remarkable – without question, in many applications they are – but they may ultimately be useless as we are increasingly suffering auto immune diseases. Much of this rising tide of illness is due to our lack of understanding of the importance of viruses and bacteria and the stark fact that we are actually made up of over 50 percent virus and bacteria. To kill them, kills us, kills our innate immunity.

Our overuse and reliance on many of our man made chemicals, the whole way up the food chain from farming to ‘health’ and with it an increasing philosophy of a one shot cure for everything is leading to a Homo Helpless. This idea that the GP’s bible of medicine is somehow more advanced than finding a cause, than living optimally – ignoring our innate natural health – is making this generation the first to die younger and sicker than their parents at any time in history! And now stepping into 2021 we’re set to be even sicker from our increased inside living and screen addictions.

We do not need to be reminded with the world health crisis how elements such as virus and bacteria are so much stronger than we are. Perhaps trying to eliminate the building blocks of all life will seem in time, as backward as we perceive humans who knew nothing of taming fire.

So to close, what’s the solution as obviously our earth is no longer the earth of 10,000 years ago? Awarness and acknowledging there is a challenge is the first step. That we have become misaligned with what our biology needs to thrive a real need to be recognised. Allowing ourselves to consider ‘How do we live well when our lifestyle is predominately sedentary, that our life having jumped from being 90%outdoors to now more than 90% indoors!’ The first is to admit we have a challenge.

But Human’s have survived – and we do rise and thrive in challenge. Let’s acknowledge and then Act.

Realising that we are part of nature, that being apart does not serve us. That learning to live in harmony not just with nature, but our tech. Health optimisation recognises that we need to be in sync; encouraging earthing, healthy living, eating with the seasons, dumping the junk. It’s also about recognising that our good food has depleted nutrients so sometimes supplimentation is needed. That filtering water to eliminate fluroide and chlorine to nurture our guts is important. That many medicines are not the best solution and a recognition that so called alternative medicines are a good first call in many cases. That the simple things are actually the easy way to start. Walking in a park, Forest Bathing, talking with friends, learning to cook so that you can buy organic and make it last. Paleo or Primal eating. Growing veg, not using pesticides in your garden, turning your phone off at night, reading books, chucking hours of social, upping your vitamin intake, stop wearing SPF all the time, bringing in mindfulness, turning off mainstream news, learning how to breath deeply… there is so much that this is just the start of even more information that you can find here.

Choose just one, heal yourself – It’s just Nature Sense.

Nature Sense is about connecting with a reality that makes you feel alive.