The multitude of opinions are always present in these discussions. But there are some things that are so widely seen, about what foods humans thrive on. I would question whether someone eating unsoaked grains and beans, high-carb and high-starch diets, and little or no animal foods, are adapting well to that diet. I've never seen anyone eating vegetarian or other unprecedented diets for many years in vibrant health. I myself was vegetarian for 27 years and largely socialized with vegetarians eating best-case vegetarian diets. I saw no one who was sustaining good health over long periods of time. I think we've lost our frame of reference for what good health can be.

I've listened to clinicians who have seen hundreds of patients over 20-year time frames. I've looked at Weston Price's observations, along with these modern-day clinicians and put pieces together. The people I've seen who are overcoming serious disease not only to put symptoms in remission but to recover to a greater wellness-- and people I've seen who are managing huge modern day stresses with grace and ease and enduring energy, are ones who are eating diets that fall into category of traditional diets. Not all same diet, but certainly common denominators are there. Those traditional diets are based largely on organic animal foods raised on pasture, with a high percentage of raw foods. Fats are highest macronutrient content, then protein, and only lastly carbs. Those are ratios that are seen across all diverse diets of native people who lived vibrantly long lives. Our constitutions are weaker and we're dealing with so many unprecendented pressures in these times. But we're still human.

Now, of course we have added challenge of how to get there from where we are. Especially with compromised digestive systems as we all have to some degree, we need to find our own way of evolving toward an optimal diet, which can mean bringing a lot of creative tricks into picture. When I talk about what's "right" for people, I don't mean to do another version of round-peg/square-hole scenario that has worn us thin. Many of us are coming from some rather unpleasant experiences with conventional diagnoses that have misjudged and misunderstood us. We feel that much of modern medicine and dietary conventions don't seek to understand our individual needs but wants to fit us into their little boxes that more conveniently fit their boxy protocols. So we're seeking different forms of support from different systems that are capable of understanding paradoxes and contradictions of who we are.

I've immersed myself in many systems that made my feel more understood, that met me where I am instead of my being required to meet them. But in all detailed differentiation, I came to sense that some of broader patterns were being overlooked. For me it was a distinctly new step in my evolution of healing, to move slightly to side of, if not away from, highly individualized approach.

In my effort to be understood personally, I was missing what was relevant universally, what makes me part of human family. Seeking to be so exquisitely understood in my uniqueness, I had separated myself in a way that was keeping me from understanding what was same about me and every other human on planet.

The roots of that need to separate can be long and deep. We've all had someone, a person or institution in our past that told us what to think, what to feel, how to behave, slapping generic rules on us that neglected and dishonored our various needs as individuals. I know that for me, rebellious and defiant urge still motivates a lot of what I do. But I also don't want to be looking so closely at myself that I miss larger view of what I have in common with all others.

"What works for me" can be a slippery slope. If someone is truly happy with their health over long run, that's what I call "working". But we each get to assess for ourselves what we can live with, what kinds of compromises we feel comfortable making; these are all very personal and sometimes delicate decisions that can easily be insensitively bulldozed over when dietary or other health dogmas are being spouted. In describing and trying to define more clearly what an optimal human diet is, I don't mean to discount those personal considerations. I just want to bring a different perspective to discussion.

It's been said that health is nature unimpeded. There's something there to be obeyed not in a rigid way but something in our original, primal nature that supercedes individual choice. As we reattune ourselves to a more natural way of living, I trust that our choices will become more aligned with natural order of things, so that there's less conflict between them. Then our lives will consist less of imposed rules about what we're "supposed" to be eating, and more of trustworthy instinct guiding us to our best choices.