This is significant and comes to the public’s attention when, for example, one physician prescribes medication for a person’s ailment and another specialist, without the knowledge of the first physician’s prescription, recommends the patient take another pill for a different (although perhaps related) ailment. The interaction of these two chemicals, known as an iatrogenic reaction, causes difficulties and even considerable fatalities in some cases.5 There is no way for the chemical companies that produce these drugs to account for all the possible biochemical interactions, although software has recently been developed for pharmacists to warn them if a patient is taking multiple medications with possible dangerous interactive effects. Confucius says: The wise one does not completely put his fate in the hands of a computer program.6
The last area of investigation in understanding the fleshy machine is the digestive system, which starts with the three pairs of salivary glands in the mouth and terminates at the rectum, the final aspect of the large intestine.
When one eats carbohydrates, especially starches, there is a substantial amount of saliva required to properly digest that nutrient. What is very common with many people is washing down starches with liquids after a few chews. This is a highly inefficient way to digest starches. Starches require enzymes produced in the parotid glands to start turning the polysaccharide (multi-chained sugar, another name for a starch) into smaller saccharides, tri-, di-, and eventually monosaccharides (single unit sugars, also called simple sugars). The digestive system does this with all nutrients—transforms them from their complex form to their simplest form. Proteins become amino acids, and fats become fatty acids in the same manner. The foremost difference between the three major nutrients is that starches need lots of saliva for efficient digestion, especially if you are a person who already gets an upset stomach easily or excess stomach acidity, heartburn, etc. If this is you, then chew, chew, and chew.
For the average person, drinking small sips of liquid during a meal should not pose a problem; just be aware of not washing down food with liquids. The old-fashioned advice on this subject is still valid, although it should not be thought of as a gospel rule: drink liquids 20–30 minutes prior to a meal and 20 minutes after a meal. A variety of people who have applied this rule have reported very favorable results.
Besides the glands in the mouth breaking down starches, there are glands in the stomach that secrete acids to break down proteins and some fats. You would likely discover that if you ate one nutrient at a time this would facilitate optimal digestion—eating meat without anything else, for example—but this is unrealistic for most people. What is reasonable for most is to be aware of what nutrient is dominant in any given meal. Knowing your metabolic dominance plays a significant part in paying attention to what nutrient you are having the most of. If you are a protein-dominant type, you want to minimize (although not necessarily eliminate) your starches and, equally advisable, not eat sugars at the same time as meats. If you are a carbohydrate-dominant type, you want to maximize the fat-starch combinations and keep the protein portions smaller.
For a healthy person, especially for most under thirty-five, many nutrients in small portions can be combined at a meal without noticeable ill effects. For people who may have health concerns or who are enduring disease, being mindful of food combinations would be a very prudent course to take. (Refer to chapters 7 and 8.)
Your stomach is an expansive receptacle that mixes acids and other complex chemicals with your food. It works to break down organic constituents into a stomach smoothie, called chyme, which your small intestine can receive. You have seen this stomach smoothie before: with yourself, the last time you had the stomach flu, and with your neighbor, weak-stomached Willy, the last time you got on the Tilt-A-Whirl at the carnival with him.
When the food you eat gets chemically reduced into chyme, a signal is sent through the autonomic nervous system to move food along and open the pyloric sphincter at the end of your stomach. This is a smooth muscle “door” that allows approximately 1 to 1.5 teaspoons of food at a time to pass into your small intestine.
In the small intestine most of the assimilation occurs. This is where food becomes energy or building material. If the body does not require energy or building material, it will (a) get rid of it or (b) store it. Since the body is so intelligent, (“Get ready, here comes another plate full!”) it will likely opt for the latter. It assumes that a person is eating six meals a day for a reason: perhaps pregnancy or storing up for a long, hard winter. If a person is overweight because of careless portion control, the body cannot be in blame but just may be, in time, embalmed. Confucius says: “Don’t let the spoon dig your own grave.”
After the crucial functioning of the small intestine, which in some people can reach thirty to thirty-three feet in length (or more), food then passes to the large intestine, also known as the colon. This is where the final water-absorption phase occurs as well as bacterial digestion of any leftover nutrients.
The fleshy machine is a complex one. Since there are so many areas to consider when separating the whole into components, there are three primary areas that one can focus on to jump-start health: the nervous system, the myofascial-skeletal system, and the digestive system. Coordinating the active and restful branches of the nervous system is central to many health traditions around the world. Let us not be so haughty to think that because a system is ancient or uses a different biological or psychosomatic map than our present post-industrial one that it is inferior. Western medicine shares the same holistic roots as the Asian systems through the ancient Greeks. There are millions of people at present enjoying good health by following these ancient traditions and millions who have thrived in the past. In understanding the fleshy machine we benefit from everyone’s outlook, old and new. Let each person decide for himself or herself what the best course to take might be, but let us not limit our choices based on an ill-informed prejudice or bureaucratic myopia.
Although not the only way, one of the best habits for coordinating the nervous system is through regular meditation. This simple (but often challenging) discipline, coupled with stress management and a good quality diet, is paramount to good health. It is also important to have a basic understanding of how your body functions. The more you learn, the more informed you are to make worthwhile choices. The next step, as the Eastern traditions teach, is to get to the root of the mind, the source of the body’s purpose.
Physiology Fundamentals
MANY PEOPLE CAN EXPLAIN HOW A COMPUTER, AUTOMOBILE, OR airplane operates, but when asked about their own body, their most precious vehicle, they often are clueless. How strange that we should invest so much effort in knowing machines and so little in knowing our own bodies. The following paragraphs should establish the basics.
Digestion and assimilation of nutrients is a complex process, and the various organ functions that support these processes also have many aspects to them. The following explanation is pared down for the sake of expediency, yet it is still a good starting point for understanding what is happening both when you eat and while you live.
The Mouth
You have three sets of salivary glands in the mouth that perform two important functions: (1) Secreting saliva that acts as both a lubricant for food and as a trap for bacteria. It is the chewing of food, mixing ample saliva with the nutrients, that helps isolate minor pathogens. This assumes, of course, that your immune system has not been deeply compromised. (2) Secreting a special enzyme called alpha amylase (ptyalin)