Mirror or Selfie your microbiome

Back in the day I remember hearing “take a look at yourself in the mirror”.  Today one could probably just say, “take a look at yourself in your selfie”.  Whatever your choice (mirror or selfie), why don’t you take a look at yourself?  What do you see?  Hello – your microbiome!

We are looking at a huge walking micro organism ecosystem.  The same goes for the dog next door or the cow in our pasture.  How you look and feel has a great deal to do with the state of your “microbiome”.

Our goal should be to keep the good “bugs” we carry around happy.  With a healthy supply of good microbes surrounding us, it is hard for bad bugs to make us sick.  The foods we consume will have a huge impact on the bugs living inside of our stomachs.  With most of our immune system linked directly to our gut, our mental and physical health is directly linked to the company we encourage to live within us.

A recent webinar put on by the folks at the Society for Risk Analysis pointed out that our unique microbiome will decide how our body reacts to:

• drugs
• food additives
• minerals (such as heavy metals)

That is why there are so many “side effects” listed in drug commercials, our microbiomes react differently.  The Food and Drug Administrations prior testing on drugs and food additives for “safety” have not accounted for the biology living within us.

So what’s safe to eat?

Refer back to our “Traditional Food” post.  Keep it simple and eat foods that our Grandparents would actually recognize as food.  When you learn more you will probably want to encourage those good bugs in your microbiome.

Eating locally raised foods is a great place to start, including grassfed beef.  Eating right can be an important part of your overall life/health plan.  For a holistic approach to life consider the 7 spokes in Zig Ziglars Wheel of Life:

• Mental
• Spiritual
• Physical
• Family
• Financial
• Personal
• Career

Here’s to a happy healthy YOU (microbiome).