Life and Death and Food

By Annemarie Colbin, Ph.D

Art by Thomas James

My husband died recently at home, peacefully, in his sleep, at the age of 90.  Since then, I’ve been thinking a lot about death and life and how it all works together.  It’s complicated. Or rather, we make it complicated.  It is probably simpler than we think.

We live in a society where we automatically classify everything into “good” and “bad” – so life is “good” and death is “bad.”  We try to avoid, eliminate (if we could), or at least keep away death as long as possible.  Our whole medical system is set up to prevent death (ha! Try that and fail), or if they get their nomenclature right, to prevent “premature” death (would be nice to define that).    But sooner or later, no matter how well we eat or exercise or take care of ourselves – the outcome is assured.

What if nobody/nothing died?  The Earth would fill up with creatures very quickly; we’d run out of room in no time.  It’s a thought worth contemplating.

I think we all would prefer to not die.  On the other hand, I remember my mother at the end of her life – she’d had enough.  She didn’t want to deal with people’s nonsense any more.  She didn’t want to be bothered, had no patience.  So instead of living to 100, as had been her plan, she checked out at 86.  Still not a bad life, and she had no illnesses either.   She just withdrew her energy, and eventually left.

I always felt that I didn’t care when I died, as long as while I was alive I was functional and in good working order – especially my brain/mind.  That is why I spent my life learning how to eat and how to use food as a healing tool – to live well, and not be bothered by disease while being alive.  So far so good, with a few ups and downs, but I’m not complaining.

There is death in food, also.  Eating necessitates killing – digestion demands decay. Those who won’t eat food derived from animals because it entails killing are acutely conscious of this fact, and choose not to be part of such a system.  They get very upset with others who don’t feel the same way.  But the fact is that eating vegetables is no different.  Just go read a book called The Secret Life of Plants (Tompkins and Bird, 1989).  You’ll see that plants are totally alive and conscious, and eating them kills them just as truly.  Even if you kill and eat something else, they’ll register it.  If you hook them up to a lie detector and boil some shrimp, they get all flustered.  Even the New York Times acknowledged their amazing awareness, and the defense systems that plants can muster when threatened (“Sorry, Vegans: Brussels Sprouts Like to Live, Too” By Natalie Angier – December 21, 2009).

So it goes – all living creatures try to stay alive as long as they can.  All living creatures need to eat something to do that.  And so most living creatures end up killing other living creatures, be they plants or insects or animals or algae,  to help with their self-preservation.  (Except plants: plants eat sunlight and the minerals in the soil.)  If you think about it, this a highly ecological and economical system, and it makes perfect sense in the larger view of how life works.  We may not like it, but this is what it is.  And we didn’t invent the system.

How then do we deal with the moral conundrum?  Lots of respectable and serious commentators and writers have come down on the side of “let’s not kill animals, that is murder, and we should be more evolved than that.”  But no matter how laudable, that is a shortsighted position.

I like the Native American approach.  Native Americans are very close to both animals and plants – they would be highly sensitive to the killing issue.  However, they don’t shy away from it – they have to eat like everyone else.  So they ask for permission, apologize, and afterwards express their gratitude.  In other words, they will ask the plant or animal for permission to kill it for food, and once the permission is granted, they apologize and say grace after eating.  They bring the spiritual into the equation.  What I believe we have all lost sight of is that all the world is alive, and our thoughts can be heard, and there is a sacredness in the Universe that our utilitarian approach has trampled upon.  That is what is missing in our life and death approach to food.

Let’s express our gratitude to the plants and animals that allow us to eat them.  Basically they join us in our lives and allow us to do the work we do.  Instead of thinking that we debase ourselves by eating, let’s turn the thought around and envision that that which we eat can be a force for good in the world, as it allows us to be who we are.  Because it’s not what we eat that makes us good or bad people, is how we put our lives to use and how we impact the lives of others.  “Not that which goes into the mouth defiles a man; but that which comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man.” (Matthew 15:11).

Thus, it would be helpful to always say grace (“gracias”, thank you), however briefly, over our food, and to be grateful for waking up every morning and being alive.  Life and death are two sides of the same coin, but death is the default position.  Life is the miracle.

Here is a nice recipe for a fruit dessert.  It will keep you warm in the winter.

Annemarie Colbin, Ph.D., is a health educator and an award-winning writer, consultant and lecturer. She is the founder and CEO of The Natural Gourmet Institute for Health and Culinary Arts in New York City, (www.naturalgourmetschool.com) and also teaches frequently at such organization as Kripalu, the Open Center, and the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Dr. Colbin is the author of Food and Healing (1996), The Whole-Food Guide to Strong Bones: A Holistic Approach (2009), and other books. Her column “Food and Your Health” has been appearing in New York Spirit Magazine since 1988. Dr. Colbin offers private wellness consultations, and is generally recognized as an expert in the uses of food for health. Her website is www.foodandhealing.com.