The Carnivore Life

Having been an addict for nicotine, caffeine and alcohol at various points in my life and having cut those off with no real struggle several years ago, I still have one quasi-addiction: carbohydrates.

When I went off alcohol for good, I was using several bottles of wine a week to get to a mental state where it felt as if there was a break from suffering. Alcohol and drugs are attempts to reach a mental state really only found in meditation.

Food is the real drug of choice, the thing I've truly experienced as an addiction and the worst part: I was blissfully unaware of its importance to me. Whereas the other habits of dependency impose some heavy chains, food – at least in America – is the thing one can abuse all day long and no one says anything about it. Sure, a few fatphobes like myself complain about the eyesores that dot the supermarkets and public venues, making the ogling of young, pert and fertile women moot as there are few of them left. Spotting an attractive woman now in America is as rare as a comet, but I don't live somewhere like LA or Miami. I'm sure there are certain venues left in the U.S. where hot bodies can be found.

Cigarettes have killed two close family members, damaged another pretty badly and will soon take out a sibling. For those not killed or maimed, the filthy things have left many members poorer and sicker. My brother Bret started smoking as did all my siblings when he was like 13 or 14, stealing them from my parents. My family was pretty dysfunctional with dear dad as a serious devotee of the alcoholic arts. Dear mom was left to fend for herself, the victim of yet another alcoholic, the first being her dear old dad. Bret has been a life-long smoker with no interest in quitting. When I think of my family, a paraphrase from Oliver Wendell Holmes comes to mind: "Three generations of alcoholics is enough!"

Many years ago, Bret was diagnosed with arterial disease, sufficiently advanced in fact that a doctor had to place stents in his aorta to keep it from exploding. Or something. It was one of those things where he could've died at any moment. Through a series of woo-woo events which I will leave unstated here, he got help and was saved by an Indian doctor – probably one of the greatest in the world for that specialty – who just happened to be close by. There is so much woo-woo in fact that I may post the story someday as evidence for how karma works. Yahwists would be inclined to call it grace – materialists, coincidence.

Bret recently dropped off the radar and I got no answers whenever I called. Usually he picks up or calls right back since we don't talk a lot. Come to find out, he was in the hospital again to get more stents added to arteries throughout his body. His cholesterol level had been through the roof years ago but was brought to heel through statins, which are known to cause dementia as a side effect, depending on whom you ask. We're dealing with science here of course, so there are multiple opinions to be found among its habitues. Still, the plaque in his arteries was significant enough to warrant an invasive surgery lasting several hours and costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. His recuperation has been painful.

At no point has he ever told his doctors and specialists that he smokes. And drinks. Many years ago when I was trying to talk him into sobriety, I mentioned that his GP could prescribe a pill to help him leave cigarettes behind. "He doesn't know I smoke. None of my doctors do."

I was dumbfounded for a second and then, reflecting on his personality and history of addiction, was like, "Well of course!"

Turns out that cigarette smoking is very inflammatory, being particularly damaging to the endothelial lining of vessels and arteries. To counteract the inflammation and constriction of the blood system caused by toxic chemical pesticides and nicotine, cholesterol – mother nature's healer – steps in and tries to patch up the irritation. This of course leads to the terrible build up and, in Bret's case, to the series of surgeries, trips to the doctors, hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills, etc. Addiction is a powerful thing and everyone is forced to bear the burden through higher insurance premiums for health coverage.

Bret had narrated himself into a story about a family history of arterial disease, that his was a genetic curse which could never be broken, etc. High cholesterol is not unusual in smokers and is in fact, pretty much a given, so our ancestors can't be blamed too much. Another older brother, Paul, lives in a nursing home with a very similar condition and is probably not long for legs. Meaning, his legs will have to be removed since they no longer are able to circulate blood and oxygen to cells. He's not been able to walk for sometime, hence his life in a nursing home at a relatively young age. Paul was a life-long alcohol, nicotine and caffeine user and in the last 10-15 years, discovered American food and its ultra-refined carbohydrates. So he combined all of these and was basically wasted physically by 50.

Bret smokes still, of that I've no doubt. My mom was a lifelong smoker and even as her body was wracked by the agony of an especially potent rheumatoid arthritis, she clutched her cigarillos. Her fingers and toes were so badly mangled by the arthritis that it left her in agony for many, many years. Imagine your body turning against you, invisibly twisting every joint from within such that your hands become useless and your toes stick up at angles that are unnerving to see. At no point would she countenance giving up the cigarettes. I read up a little on RA and saw articles stating that smoking was one of the worst things you could do if diagnosed. An already inflammatory auto-immune condition is made worse by pouring gasoline on the fire.

Food addiction is different. For me, constant snacking became pretty standard at an early age and by 13 or 14, I had a spare tire. My gut bothered me and I lost it briefly in college, when I was depressed, despondent, lost and poor. The tire came back though and has remained a constant for decades. I hate it and don't like to see myself in the mirror. Even when I was a vegan for two years, I still had a gut. A cardio junkie who has used ski machines, ellipticals and now a rowing machine, no matter what I did (as I told myself many times), I just could not lose the visceral fat.

When Covid hit, I decided to lose weight, so I got into keto after listening to a health show. Daily walks, fresh air and the removal of processed foods in favor of fruits, vegetables and lean cuts of meat led to me losing 20 pounds. I started to feel better and stopped my blood pressure medication. I stuck with keto for a while before falling off the wagon. Fresh baked bread, pasta and pies were just too irresistible and before long, I was back in the kitchen nibbling or gorging on food. The nature of flour is to keep you hungry, so if you eat bread, you get an insulin spike and two hours later, are ravenous again.

Eating can be pleasant and like drinking, can lead to a contentment where the more obnoxious voices in the mind's choir are momentarily stilled. People can lose themselves in a kind of food samadhi, where tasting, chewing, grinding, swallowing and drinking can distract from suffering.

Food addiction is the worst of all addictions in my opinion. We have to eat. We do not have to smoke or drink poison. An alcoholic does not have to consume a glass of wine per day in order to survive. A glutton does have to eat at some point and the pleasure of tasting food, its texture and smell have to be at least passable for us to ingest it. Even garbage food, which is pretty much everything in a grocery store, is designed in labs by "food scientists" to be addictive and unfulfilling. You end up constantly hungry if you consume carbohydrates.

I very seldom crave a glass of wine or a cigarette unless I work out. Carbs? Those are thorns in the body/mind, ever present. There is according to one podcast I heard, no dietary recommendations for minimum amount of carbs you need in a diet to have a healthy lifestyle. It's probably the assumption that everyone craves them and they will be ever present in the diet.

Around 2023, I tried carnivore. My body was not looking the way I wanted it to look and my GP had warned me that I was already pre-diabetic. But I love fresh baked bread! And cornbread! And biscuits! And gravy! Flour and wheat are basically just another form of sugar and their use and abuse had brought me to pre-diabetes. You can buy organic, artisanal flour and do your own baking but it doesn't matter: flour is sugar. And for a lucky few, a trigger for tinnitus.

I began the carnivore diet sometime in the summer of 2023. My regimen was a ribeye a day, slathered in butter and as much steak and hamburger as I could stand. I used plain yogurt and kefir to break the monotony and I quickly saw my weight go down to a respectable 185. Carnivore leaves you feeling good, with lots of energy, a clearer mind and more focus. Of course, there are vegan and other diets whose partisans will claim similar results.

In 2024, I went back to carbs. Now, I'm back to carnivore. Like most dieters and people interested in healthy living, I've vacillated between different courses. The search for emotional equilibrium and better quality of life means there are zigs and zags. Nutrition is one of those paths followed by people of an empirical bent. It's no secret that there is an overlap between spiritual seekers and health enthusiasts.

It's unlikely I will ever go back to the carbohydrate rich diet of rice, bread and pasta. My diet now is steak, chicken, seafood, copious amounts of butter and high quality mineral salt. I use plain yogurt, cheese and kefir. Milk, delicious milk, is alas, verboten.

I think my tinnitus is linked to insulin resistance and it's very easy to test. Whenever I eat a carb-loaded meal, within 30 minutes to an hour, the ringing in my left ear will be loud and irritating. Eating a ribeye drowning in butter leads to a slight uptick in white noise, but it's much less noticeable than milk.

Milk unfortunately is one of those foods that causes an insulin spike even though it is not loaded with sugar and carbs. Something about the casein and whey proteins induces the pancreas to release insulin. Cheese loses some of the same proteins in its preparation, so it is still tolerable since the tinnitus flare up is not bad at all, only slightly worse than a plain steak with salt. There are strict carnivore practitioners who abstain from all dairy either as a permanent lifestyle choice or for extended periods.

I am not a pure carnivore since I love coffee and tea (organic, decaf and pricey). When I think about old age, the biggest dread I have is being poor and having to give these up in favor of something really cheap and awful, loaded with chemicals and pesticides. Right now, I can afford good organic loose leaf tea, but there will be a day when I have to say goodbye to it as I will to all things.

I enjoy organic popcorn and butter, pure monk fruit (no erythritol for me thanks), good olive oil, lemon juice, avocados and kimchi. The latter tastes good but is also good for the stomach and the gut microbiome. True carnivores would eschew these completely but I take a middle way. I try to consume grass fed or at least good quality meats. I no longer shop at the larger chain grocery stores if I can avoid it, favoring instead a health food store. Ironically, carnivores and vegans shop here since both groups are looking for quality goods. Its the lions and gazelles meeting at the farmers market.

The large American supermarket is filled with aisles of food packed with harmful ingredients. The people pushing carts are generally obese, not especially healthy looking. Their carts are loaded up with cakes, pies, sugary drinks; their children are already pre-diabetic and mentally damaged by a short life of eating chemically-laden, scientifically-formulated junk.

Stuff I miss includes nutbutters and ice cream. I still make homemade ice cream, but much less now since I know the milk will worsen my tinnitus. The price of admission is generally not worth it, so I've cut back. Keto ice cream is totally doable with allulose or pure monk fruit. I mix both together with some high quality vanilla powder, lots of heavy cream and eggs from pasture-raised chickens. Blue heirloom eggs are the best, having a deep rich orange yolk and a more buttery taste overall.

Fasting is a weekly practice for me. Most weeks, I do a 24 hour fast of coffee/ghee/MCT oil, or just water/salt/green tea. I try to exercise as well on my fasting day (Friday). In an ideal world, I would do intermittent fasting, but for now, the weekly fast suffices. That's what I'm able to do. Some weeks, I may even extend it to two or three days instead of just 24 hours. Once you transition off the carb-rich diet of fruits, vegetables and junk food, your body evens out and the fast, while noticeable, becomes pleasant. Right now, I'm fasting and craving a jar of peanut butter in the pantry. It's good for the body to suffer this craving though.

I sound fussy about food because I am. There are no apologies here for having lived a life free of doctors, chronic conditions, missed work, crippling pain, potent medications, etc. The fact my body has weathered dependency on drugs like caffeine and nicotine is something I am mindful of and do not take for granted. Health nuts generally have something in their past, where obesity and/or addiction put them in a bad place. When their health is restored through effort, research and desperate acts, they see their new lease on life as a gift and embrace it. Obesity isn't just about being physically unattractive and having a much shorter lifespan; it carries with it a host of mental health issues. Fat people are generally not well emotionally, same as alcoholics. Food can easily become a drug which smooths over dukkha.

Addiction more generally has had one important advantage for me: It taught me that the mind is heedless, in pain and can eventually submerge itself into a rote, mechanical set of processes aimed at ignoring its predicament.

The Buddha spoke plainly, more plainly than any man I've read.

One cannot sit with the Four Noble Truths and see that he was not into metaphysics, mythical stories and tales. To be sure, myth is found in Buddhism, but it is often an accretion of well-meaning, delusional followers. You can chuck the sutta about the Buddha and his physical qualities which make him sound very, very non-human. I consider it to be a kind of fan art that was so entertaining, the monks decided to leave it in the Pali Nikayas.

The Buddha talked about the senses and consciousness, that these are constant inputs which can easily overwhelm us. Think back to his time, where electronic media did not exist and most people who wanted music and entertainment either had to do it themselves or hope for a rare event. If you wanted to be entertained professionally, you might save up all year to travel to a nearby large town to see a traveling troupe of performers. One simply couldn't click a button and find a bright stream of movies, music and video games like we do now. Life was probably calmer sensually speaking.

Today of course, the ability to drown oneself in heedlessness is everywhere, starting with our devices.

So is the preoccupation with diet important for the spiritual life? Is this blog post a case of a First World problem?

No. Recall that the Buddha and other spiritual leaders understood that food was very important when viewed from different angles. He wrestled with diet, undertaking austere ascetic practices which saw him eating a single grain of rice per day before finding the middle way – one meal per day. He lived to be 80 years old and remarked that his middle way led to fewer ailments, probably because he was not overworking his body via digestion, likely hitting autophagy from time to time. (From what I understand, autophagy only kicks off around the 48-to-72 hour range of fasting, but AI indicates it can happen sooner, around the 12 hour mark.)

Remarkably, 2500 years later in our time, the practice of intermittent fasting looks a lot like the one proposed by the Buddha in spirit although not in law. One popular intermittent fasting method sets out a 6 hour grazing period per day followed by an 18 hour fast. Others prefer the variant where they just eat one midday meal, as is the tradition preserved in Theravada. In any event, the users claim better health, more energy and more focus.