Food and health
Health is very important in life. The basic requirements for
life are healthy food.
Mahatma Gandhi said, “A human can’t live without oxygen and water. The human body is maintained by healthy food, that’s why food is the soul of life.”
In ancient Tamil culture, the human body was known as
‘Annamayakosham'. Its meaning was the human body is made of food mainly.
For living we have eaten food. But most of the people do not
have the knowledge of how to eat, what to eat. Their concept is eating anything
we got and dying when it comes. Uneducated people do not have the awareness of
healthy food and eating habit.
Well-educated people eat for taste but not for health. This
habit leads to an unhealthy lifestyle. This is like as a proverb said in Tamil
“Kann ketta piragu Sooriya namaskaram” – We can't see sunlight after your eyes
become blind. There is no use. They search for good healthy food after they got
many diseases.
If a human has the knowledge of healthy eating habit, then he or
she lives happily and healthy.
Food
is our best medicine:
Food is not only used for the body growth and for aliveness. But
food protects us from infections and diseases too. If you know the method of
eating food in perfect measurement, we can be able to protect ourselves from
many diseases. If we follow this, we can live without medicines. That’s why our
ancestors told that “Food is the best medicine.”
Our Tamil great
poet and philosopher Thiruvalluvar in his Thirukkural said about the healthy
eating habit.
மருந்தென வேண்டாவாம் யாக்கைக்கு அருந்தியது
அற்றது
போற்றி உணின்.
Thirukkural Chapter name – Medicine
942nd Thirukkural
marundhena vaeNtaavaam yaakkaikku arundhiyadhu
atradhu poatri uNin
Meaning: A man, who eats after his already eaten food
has been digested, needs no medicine.
Health is
wealth – everybody knows this sentence. It gives depth meaning to life.
Good food is helpful to protect our body from many diseases before they attack
us. Sick people will be recovering by eating the correct and healthy food. This
is because, as said above, food is our best medicine.
Utilities of food:
To live
healthily, we should know the importance of food in our life. Food is the major
factor that gives you beauty and a healthy body. A human was born as a child
and then grew to a man. A human’s food starts from his/her mother’s breast
feeding. After that, many varieties of food help humans to grow healthy. Take
food to satisfy our hunger and tasty for our body to grow. This is the basic
construction of the human body by food.
Food gives
energy to activate our body. Our body is like a machine. We all know about the
outer working of outer body parts like our eyes, ears, hands, legs, etc. For
these parts, food only gives energy to work.
Our inner
parts are always working if we sleep. We are alive because of our inner parts
functions. The heart works for our blood flow till our death. Lungs play a
vital role in inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide without failing. Our
intestines help to digest our food regularly. Energy sucked from our digested
food will flow through our body. The intestine and kidneys are helping to
eliminate the waste from our body. The brain controls our body functions. These
functions of our inner organs can be done by food, we eat.
Metabolism
is the chemical process of keeping you alive and helps with the functions of
our organs normally. The process of breathing, digesting and repairing cells in
the body. For this process we need lots of energy from the food we eat. When we
undergo the metabolism process, 2 types of changes will occur. One is the
process of depreciation and wastage of the body, and the other one is the
formation of new tissues and blood cells. Food plays a major role in the repair
of a damaged one and in the growing process of the body.
Food
is energy; it stimulates activity of our body. If we lose energy, we can’t do
anything. The formulas for the medicines are already inside our food. We can
live without medicines if we eat proper food.
The
food habit plays a major role in the formation of his/her characteristics.
Clean and good food is the base of the purity of the heart that is our
thinking. Swami Sivanada quotes describe “If a human did not take food for 10
days; if he/she was alive, but he/she became blind with good eyes, not hearing
with good ears, not thinking with a good brain. Because without food, there is
no function in our body. If a human take food he/she become a healthy person.
Types of food:
Eat proper food instead of eating whatever we
like. We should have enough knowledge about our food we eat. We can classify
our food into 6 categories.
1. Natural food
2. Artificial food
3. Positive food
4. Negative food
Natural food:
These are
the foods that can be available naturally. We do not need to cook or add
anything for taste. Vegetables, fruits, tubers are the best examples of natural
foods. These are called live foods.
Artificial food:
These are the foods that are made by humans
according to their taste. Adding flavours to it for better taste. These are
called inanimate or non-living food.
Positive food:
The
food which is used to take care of health and for growth is known as positive
food. Juicy fruits, fibre-rich fruits, vegetables, and Greens are the best
examples.
These
are the foods that help to eliminate waste from our body and give energy. These
are rich in water content too. These foods are easy to digest too. These foods
are also called primary food.
Negative food:
These
are the food which accumulates waste in our body and increases infections. For
example, milk products, egg, meat, tuber, salt, sugar, processed food.
If
we consume excess of these foods, we get indigestion problems, we can gain
weight and many diseases occur. These are also called secondary food.
The food
habit in the ratio of 80% of positive food and 20% of negative food is called a
balanced diet of food. If we take a balanced diet as much as possible we live
healthy and happily.
Eat healthy
Live happily
Keep smiling.
To be continued..... Next blog Food and health - 2
Keep reading, thank you all.
