The Primal Blueprint (51 page)
Read The Primal Blueprint Online
Authors: Mark Sisson
As we reflect on how far we have drifted from Grok’s simple lifestyle and ponder how we can better honor and reprogram our genes by following the
Primal Blueprint
, it is critical to proceed with a clean slate and a deep conviction that you are doing the right thing. This is not an easy task. Numerous elements of the
Primal Blueprint
flat out oppose mainstream dogma that government espouses or that big Agra and big Pharma promote with billions of advertising and marketing dollars.
“
Today, peak physical and intellectual performance and self-discipline are no longer requirements for survival. Man has become self-indulgent and has reverted to behaviors that provide short-term gratification
.”
One must also wonder how society has strayed so egregiously far from healthy living that Grok has devolved to the carb-overdosed, pill-popping, overfed, overweight, overstressed Ken Korg. How can Conventional Wisdom that you have believed for years and decades, read in respected publications, or been handed down from trusted elders be wrong and even dangerous? The truth is, human nature is to blame. Just like Grok, we have programmed into our genes a desire to manipulate and rule our environment for our benefit—to pursue a more advanced, more comfortable life. Our indomitable human spirit has accomplished many great things but has also created tremendous fallout from our constant quest for “progress.”
Man has conquered the world. As a species, he is the fat cat. He is on top of the heap. Yet now, peak physical and intellectual performance and self-discipline are no
longer requirements for survival. Man has become self-indulgent and has reverted to behaviors that provide short-term gratification. Like the miners who stripped and poisoned the land and water during the gold rush, we have done similar to our bodies in the name of making life easier, more convenient, and more productive. In Eric Schlosser’s
Fast Food Nation
, he reveals how the fast-food phenomenon exploded in popularity because fast food made life easier: No more cooking or lengthy waits for expensive meals! Now everyone can live the good life by dining out on delicious food! Unfortunately, the fare served up was disastrous not only to the human body but to the human spirit—destroying a centerpiece of family fabric that was the shared home-cooked meal.
When there is interest and demand to make life easier, profit seekers often swarm in and exploit this element of the human spirit. Nowhere is this more evident than in my own field of health. While I am all in favor of capitalism and making a profit, it seems that where health is concerned, we have allowed forces to run amok to the extent that today we must question the approach, motives, and trustworthiness of some of the traditional pillars of health and expert medical knowledge.
We must admit that doctors, despite their extensive knowledge, training, and loyalty to the Hippocratic Oath, are focused on treatment rather than prevention. As with drugs, it’s wonderful to have extensively trained and prepared doctors standing ready when we need them. The sad reality is that most of their business comes from dealing with symptoms—not causes—of easily preventable conditions (as evidenced by the remarkable comment from a solo family practice doc I know, who lamented that his “business was down” due to America’s 2008 economic recession!). The fact that doctors receive little or no training in nutrition is nothing short of abysmal.
Our government’s laws, subsidies, and diet education efforts (flawed USDA food pyramid, anyone?) are seemingly driven more by lobbyists for the beef, grain, and dairy industries than by unbiased scientific evaluation and concern for human health. In the media, the historical checks and balances provided by the impartial investigative journalist have been pushed aside by giant ratings-driven corporations. Salacious stories that elicit fear, anger, or other strong emotions are what sell, regardless of their legitimacy. Even our educational community experiences free market influences that potentially bias the objectivity and even the premise of many studies.
The Korg Komeback
Let me reiterate my distaste for a perfectionist mentality toward diet, physical appearance, lifestyle change, and even school, career, and competitive athletics. Respecting the broad definition of health and the legacy of the simple lifestyle that our ancestors lived, we need to reject the measuring and judging forces of society and pursue fun and peace of mind in conjunction with health and fitness goals.
Admittedly, the comprehensive and emphatic nature of the
Primal Blueprint
might seem intimidating, and your efforts to go Primal will possibly require some serious departures from and adjustments to your comfortable modern existence. If you feel overwhelmed or take occasional exception to my strong positions (e.g., “Everything in moderation, including moderation”), keep in mind my 80% Rule as well as the suggestion to take one step at a time.
While the Korgs seem quite far down a disastrous road, they can also easily turn things around, step by step. No, they are not going to be perfect anytime soon, but they will be happier, healthier, and fitter with minimal pain, suffering, negativity, or disruption of the things they love to do in life. If Ken modifies his late-night activities by snacking on walnuts instead of cheesecake and enjoying a focused TiVo-assisted evening of television entertainment that ends at 10:30 p.m. instead of midnight, he’ll fall asleep more easily and wake up refreshed the next morning, without having to rely on Ambien. This means more quality time with the kids, including walking young Cindy to school. If he brings the walnuts and a couple of pieces of fresh fruit to work and chooses lunch wisely at the supermarket deli, he’ll maintain stable energy levels all day long, increase his productivity, and better handle workplace stress. Ken will leave the office at 6 p.m. feeling ready to enjoy and appreciate the leisure and family time options that await.
By reducing the stress of her exercise program and eating delicious, satisfying
Primal Blueprint
meals, Kelly will get her blood sugar and energy levels under control and tap into her stored body fat for a steady, reliable source of energy. With a few sensible and consistently enforced limits on digital entertainment and bedtimes, Kenny can reconnect with the family, focus better in school, and consider the option to eliminate his medication.
Talk about little things making a big difference! There is no better example to illustrate this maxim than the momentum (particularly the unbridled increase in physical energy) created by healthy lifestyle changes begetting further healthy lifestyle changes. If all you do after reading this book is cut way back on grains, you will dramatically improve your health. With more stable energy levels and better immune function, your dietary alteration could trigger an increased interest in exercise. If all you do after reading this book is simply back off your taxing jogs and Step classes in favor of long neighborhood walks and the occasional sprint workout, you’ll have more energy and less cravings for carbs, which will likely lead to improved dietary habits and general health. Forget diet and exercise for a moment; if you took only four letters of the entire book to heart and added more
play
to your busy life, this could still stand as one of the most important, life-changing books you ever read.
Opening our eyes to the direction the bullet train carrying modern society is heading is sobering to say the least. In my opinion, the heaviest realization of all is that
you are on your own
. The imagined safety net of government, modern medicine, or the food or pharmaceutical industries looking after your health is a façade. Oh sure, you’ll be cared for very, very well if something catastrophic happens (that is, if you have good medical insurance), whether it’s a high-risk childbirth, serious injuries from a car accident, or one of the small fraction of cancers that are not lifestyle related. But when it comes to eating healthy, getting in shape, avoiding stupid mistakes—even building a career and a nest egg—the world can lead you astray and separate you from your cash (and other assets, such as health, sanity, etc.) in the blink of an eye, à la Matt Damon’s deft pickpocket character in
Ocean’s Eleven
.
A discernable pattern emerges when I relate the story of Grok to friends and casual acquaintances. After first expressing disbelief that Grok was leaner, stronger, and healthier than modern humans, most are captivated by the story of his uncomplicated life and the 10 surprisingly simple behavioral laws that dictated his (our) evolution. After a few moments of silence to absorb the information, people then commonly call attention to the most unpleasant aspects of Grok’s life, a surreptitious way of asserting their superiority over some vulnerable, primitive caveman.
It seems we are scared of what’s beyond our comfort zone of comfort foods, Conventional Wisdom, “Chronic” workouts, culturally glorified fitness goals that are too extreme, and the rest. I’ve discussed previously the tendency we have to get in our own way, manufacturing self-limiting beliefs and knee-jerk defense mechanism reactions (“Yeah, but didn’t cavemen, like, die when they were like 30 years old—before they could even get heart disease?”) when confronted with our frailties or the prospects of lifestyle change.
Recently, I read with amusement a blogger’s critique of the
Primal Blueprint
eating style, something to the effect of “This is an elitist diet—too expensive [eschewing inexpensive grains and switching from conventional animals and plants to the natural, organic variety] and impractical for the average person to follow. Furthermore, there are not enough wild animal products or organic produce to sustain our society at its current population.” My gut reaction was, “You’re damn straight it’s an elitist diet!” Expensive? Depends on your perspective. Eating
Primal Blueprint
style for the rest of your life is much cheaper than long-term prescription drug regimens or extensive doctor visits or hospital stays for cardiac bypass surgery or cancer treatments.
My evolutionary theme pops into mind here. Our increasingly comfortable modern life disguises the fact that the concept of survival of the fittest still permeates our being. Competition is everywhere in the world, with human nature programmed for “
Citius, Altius, Fortius
”—the Olympic Games motto (in Latin) meaning “faster, higher, stronger.” Make no mistake, we are in a competition to achieve good health and prosperity with a massive number of entrants worldwide. Economically, you need only glance through Fareed Zakaria’s
The Post American World
, to see the writing on the wall for the world’s leading superpower. America is heading steadily down the pop charts while larger, hungrier, more strategically-minded societies, such as China and India, will soon catch and surpass our economy. (Poor investment in education and technology in favor of billions spent on military are some key reasons for our impending downfall, according to Zakaria.) Now imagine if all the money recently spent on bank bailouts had been channeled into diet, fitness, and health education!
Over the past century of rapid technological progress, we’ve figured out how to manufacture and package food and mass-produce animals, producing huge profits without regard to the health, humane, or green consequences. Stepping back for a moment to grab a wide-angle view of the wide angles in the buffet line at a Vegas casino, it’s evident how ridiculously out of control this situation has become. No offense, but America looks like one giant yard of fattened cattle ready for slaughter, complete with a significant percentage of “downers” (a term for sick cattle that can’t stand up; they are dragged with forklifts to slaughter).
The global macroeconomic example offers an interesting parallel with your own health. The emerging countries parallel those like you and I who challenge Conventional Wisdom and the consumerism “pack mentality” to seek the truth about healthy living. The military waste and economic bailout parallels the Western medicine approach to treat disease instead of pursue wellness—or, in this analogy, peace and economic stability. The annual harvest of wild salmon in Alaska is indeed limited, and it can run 20 bucks or even more per pound. In contrast, there is an abundant supply of farmed salmon that I’ve seen at big-box stores for as low as three-something per pound. Ditto for the heavily sprayed, genetically modified fields of corn and soybeans that will feed the masses for years to come versus the relatively few organic baskets of vegetables your local grower schleps out of his pickup at the weekly farmers’ market. There will also be plenty of prescription drugs and hospital beds available (although you might deplete your life savings, but I digress…) to help you overcome the health problems that ensue from a lifetime of consuming processed foods.
In comparison, being “elitist” doesn’t seem bad at all. Theoretically, if everyone wanted wild salmon and organic strawberries, we would indeed run out in the short term (however, demand would also stimulate increased production, thereby changing
the world one person at a time through the power of our wallets). Right now, the race is on and you are welcome to participate. So suck it up and pop for the organic meat, eggs and leafy greens, especially if you are pregnant or have a two-year-old in his most crucial brain-development stage. Come to think of it, make that especially if you are
not
pregnant; are age 20, 30, 40, or 80; and have an interest in enjoying a long, healthy, happy life.
While you can clearly discern my passion throughout the book for the Primal way of life, I don’t wish to be judgmental and assert that there is a right or wrong way of life for you. We live in an age of abundant freedom and choices for how to spend our time, raise our families, and fill our plates with food. While I have dedicated my career to promoting health and being a motivational force in people’s lives, I want to temper my enthusiastic message with the understanding that I’m simply presenting you a specific blueprint of choices (hopefully very compelling!) and explaining the benefits of choosing them or the possible ramifications of disregarding them.