HEAVEN’S HEALING — GOOD HEALTH IS A HABIT, NOT AN EVENT
Material by ELLEN WHITE
Book compiled and edited by DAHLIA DOSS
(Extracted from pages 26—31)
Two Meals Better than Three
“And the ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning,
and bread and flesh in the evening” - 1 Kings 17:6
The practice of eating but two meals a day is generally found to be a benefit to health. Those who are changing from three meals a day to two, will at first be troubled more or less with faintness, especially about the time they have been in the habit of eating their third meal. But if they persevere for a short time, this faintness will disappear.
Yet under some circumstances, some persons may require a third meal. If taken, this should be very light, and of food most easily digested.
Five to Six Hours Between Meals
The next meal should never be eaten until the stomach has had time to recover from the labor of digesting the preceding meal. At least five or six hours should intervene between the meals; and most persons who give the plan a trial, will find that two meals a day are better than three.
No Eating Before Sleeping
We are not nocturnal animals; when we sleep our entire metabolism slows down. The reclining
position causes the weight of the internal organs to press against the very large nerve trunks on each side of the spinal column and shuts off the mechanism that keeps the digestive system working.
When you lie down at night, the stomach should have finished all its work of digestion so that it can join the rest of the body in enjoying its needed rest. But if you eat before you sleep, the digestive
organs have to work through the night. The sleep is often disturbed with unpleasant dreams, and in the
morning you awake un-refreshed.
Many indulge in the pernicious habit of eating just before retiring. They may have taken their meals, yet because they feel a sense of faintness, they think they need supper. By indulging in this wrong practice, it becomes a habit, and they feel as though they could not sleep without food. In many cases this faintness comes because the digestive organs have been severely taxed through the day in disposing of the quantities of food forced upon them. These organs need a period of entire rest from labor, to recover their exhausted energies.
When it is a habit to eat before sleeping, the digestive organs lose their natural vigor, and the person finds himself a miserable dyspeptic. And not only does the transgression of nature’s laws affect the transgressing one unfavorably, but others suffer more or less with him. Let anyone take a course that irritates him in any way, and see how quickly he manifests impatience!
If you feel that you must eat at night, take a drink of cold water instead, and in the morning you will feel much better for not having eaten.
Eat at Regular Times
“To everything there is a season, and a time
to every purpose under the heaven.” – Ecclesiates 3:1
Having your meals at the same time everyday regulates and controls the internal signals of satiety, appetite and hunger. You injure your health greatly by overeating and by eating at improper times. This diminishes the blood to the brain. The mind becomes confused, and you have not the proper control of yourself – “Feed me with food convenient for me: lest I be full, and deny Thee” (Proverbs 30:8b,9a).
In one research, test subjects were given regular meals for 2 weeks and then irregular meals for 2 weeks. Below are some of the advantages found when people ate at regular mealtimes versus
irregular mealtimes:
If we would form habits of regularity and order, we would improve in health, in mental attitude, in memory, and in disposition. It is our duty to observe strict rules in all our habits of life. This is for our own good, both physically and morally.
No Snacking Between Meals
“Blessed art thou, O land when thy king is the son of nobles, and thy princes
eat in due season, for strength, and not for drunkenness!” – Ecclesiates 10:17.
A king who cannot control his food intake will not be able to rule his kingdom in peace and quiet. Snacking between meals destroys the healthful tone of the digestive organs, to the detriment of health and cheerfulness.
Three meals a day and nothing between meals – not even an apple – should be the utmost limit of indulgence. Those who go further violate nature’s laws and will suffer the penalty.
More Variety in Diet but Less Variety in Each Meal
“When thou sittest to eat with a ruler, consider diligently what is before thee.
And put a knife to thy throat, if thou be a man given to appetite.
Be not desirous of his dainties: for they are deceitful meat.” – Proverb 23:1-3
There should not be many kinds of food at any one meal, but all meals should not be composed of the same kinds of food without variation. Food should be prepared with simplicity, yet with a nicety which will invite the appetite. The simpler our diet, the better our digestion, assimilation and health.
Ideally 80% of diet should consist of alkaline food. Eating too many acid-forming foods brings disease, while alkaline foods overcome disease and help prevents it. Most fruits and vegetables are alkaline. Most grains, beans, nuts and seeds are quite acidic unless sprouted. All animal protein including seafood, meat and dairy, is very acidic. Cancer and several other diseases only thrive in an acidic environment.
A diet rich in raw food is health restoring because enzymes and many of the nutrients in the food are destroyed by cooking.
To preserve health and increase strength, avoid a large amount of cooking that has filled the world with chronic invalids. The food which God gave Adam in his sinless state is the best for man’s use as he seeks to regain that sinless state. Food should be so simple that its preparation will not absorb much time. The large amount of cooking done is not at all necessary. Neither should there be any poverty-stricken diet either in quality or quantity.
Drink Between Meals
Stop drinking about thirty minutes before a meal and wait about one hour after a meal. Food should not be washed down. The more liquid there is taken into the stomach with the meals, the more difficult it is for the food to digest for the liquid must first be absorbed. The less we drink with our meals the better. The dryness of our food furnishes the necessary stimulus to the secretion of saliva and of gastric and intestinal juices. An abundance of liquid in the digestive tract interferes with the action of the secreting glands. It dilutes the secretions and thereby weakens their digestive qualities.
To improve digestion by thickening the lining of the stomach, it is recommended to drink 1-2 glasses of filtered water half hour before each meal.
Avoid salty foods; keep spicy food out of the stomach. Free use of salt imposes a great burden on the kidneys, increases risk of cancer, hardens the arteries and impedes circulation. Have fruit meals, and the irritation that calls for so much drink will cease to exist. If anything is needed to quench thirst, pure water is all that nature requires. Never take alcohol, tea, coffee, or sodas. Even bottled fruit juices are not the best.
Not Too Hot; Not Too Cold
Food should not be eaten very hot or very cold. Cold paralyzes the stomach. If food is cold, vitality must be drawn from the system to warm the food before digestion can take place. The colder the water, the greater the injury caused to the stomach. Cold liquids taken with meals will arrest digestion until the system has imparted sufficient warmth to the stomach to enable it to take up its work again.
Heat debilitates the stomach and creates acidity. Hot drinks are not required except as a medicine. The
stomach is greatly injured by a large quantity of hot food and hot drink. Thus the throat and
digestive organs, and through them the other organs of the body, are enfeebled. Heat relaxes and paralyzes. Hot food and drinks weaken the digestive tract muscles. The practice of eating food as hot as it can be
swallowed, and especially of taking hot drinks with or after meals is an active cause of constipation.
Enjoy Your Food
Because it is wrong to eat merely to gratify a perverted taste, it does not follow that you can be
indifferent in regard to your food. It is a matter of the highest importance. There is a class who seem to think that whatever is eaten is lost, that anything tossed into the stomach to fill it, will do as well as food prepared with intelligence and care. But it is important that you relish what you eat. If you eat mechanically, you fail to receive proper nourishment.
For food to be properly digested, each enzyme and digestive juice must be secreted in the right amount, at the right time. If you are not hungry, have no appetite, or if the food does not taste good, the digestive juices will not flow properly, and the food will be poorly digested.
Food prepared and served with love is more nutritious, because it is not what you eat but what you assimilate that counts. Assimilation is enhanced if we enjoy the meal.
Ask for Blessings, Then Eat with a Grateful Heart
At mealtime you are to cast off care and anxious thought; and not feel hurried, but eat slowly with cheerfulness and hearts filled with gratitude to the Universe/God/Mother Nature/Buddha or the one you believe in and ask for blessings.
Neurophysiologists have found that people who eat with grateful heart experience more efficient and complete digestion than those who are distracted when they eat. Being thankful for the food increases Z before the meal and then eating while watching TV, reading a magazine, or having an intense discussion with a companion. It means being grateful for your food one mouthful at a time.
The most desirable foods in the world may rot in the stomach of one who is mentally perturbed. The
body-mind relationship cannot be separated. These depressing emotions are a great injury health wise, for by hindering the process of digestion they interfere with nutrition.
Your thoughts and feelings about what you eat are just as important as the food itself. If you are
constantly worrying that the food you are eating will hurt you, then it most surely will, even if it is simple and healthful.
Every food requires a different digestive enzyme combination and mixing too many at one time causes a disturbance in the stomach and renders the digestion less efficient.
Most people hold the misconception that a wide variety of foods is necessary for good health. When describing the excellent health and youthful appearance of the Native Americans, Benjamin Rush wrote in 1776, “… the old proverb may well be verified: Natura paucis contenta – nature is satisfied with little …” All mixed and complicated foods are injurious to the health of human beings. Dumb animals would never eat such a mixture as is often placed in the human stomach.
It is the variety and mixture of meat, vegetables, fruit, wine, tea, coffee, sweet cakes, and rich pies that ruin the stomach, and place human beings in a position where they become invalids.
The serving of a great variety of dishes absorbs time, money, and taxing labor without accomplishing any good. It may be fashionable to have a dozen courses at a meal, but the custom is ruinous to health. It is a fashion that sensible men and women should condemn, by both precept and example.
Do not have too great a variety at a meal; three or four dishes are a plenty. If your work is sedentary, take exercise every day, and at each meal eat only two or three kinds of simple food, taking no more of these than will satisfy the demands of hunger.
Proper Food Combining
Because from the principle we discard the use of all animal products and processed foods that destroy health, the idea should never be entertained that it is of but little consequence what we eat.
The preparation of food in the best manner possible is a science. Knowledge in regard to proper food
combinations is of great worth, and is to be received as wisdom from God. There is a way of combining and preparing food that will make it both wholesome and nourishing. Those cooking should understand how to do this. The matter should be treated from a Bible standpoint. There is such a thing as robbing the body nutrition. It is important that the food should be prepared with care, that the appetite, when not perverted, can relish it.
Fruit is especially recommended as a health giving agency, but it should not be eaten after a full meal of other foods. Fruit digests quickly and when eaten after a full meal it causes fermentation in the stomach.