I adopted a plant-based diet in the 1980s. I was a distance runner, adapting to diet high in complex carbs to heighten my performance.
A few years later, I began avidly studying yoga. I learned the principle of ahimsa, kindness, and how it extends to not taking an animal’s life. My yogic lifestyle also encouraged me to purify myself by not eating meat. Scientists have documented well the health benefits of eating little or no meat.
At some point I had another thought. Why do we give our pets so much love, and treat food animals so inhumanely? I still eat dairy and wear leather, so I am not perfect in my effort to treat all animals with love and respect. I do my best with awareness and restraint.
If these reasons for eating less meat and dairy do not make sense to you, maybe the facts from an article from Good Medicine magazine will.
A Vegan Diet: Eating for the Environment
From Good Medicine:
- If every person in the United States ate no meat or cheese for one day a week, it would be like taking 7.6 million cars off the road.
- Meat and dairy production are releasing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, which is trapping heat and leading to global warming and climate change. If cattle were a country they would rank third in greenhouse emissions, behind China and the United States.
- Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations–large scale industrial facilities where thousands of cows, pigs or chickens are tightly confined in unsanitary spaces and then slaughtered–emit greenhouse gases. They also pollute lakes, rivers, and reservoirs.
- Beans Not Beef benefits conditions such as cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and obesity.
Is Soy a healthy alternative protein source?
Some people suggest that soy is not a healthy alternative. In fact, however, soy products are associated with reduced risk of breast and prostate cancer in humans. Studies that showed harmful effects of soy were largely done an animals, which, btw, is yet another way we are cruel to animals.
There are many resources for sustaining a plant-based lifestyle. Two I like are LIVEKINDLY and Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. If you search the web for plant-based diet you can see plenty of success stories! Even some professional athletes have adopted a plant-based diet, defying the old concept that athletes need meat.
We at Sewall House treat our pets with respect
The Sewall House July 2021 Newsletter was devoted to the pets of Sewall House. Our guests learn so much from these creatures, these friends, as do we. (And, yes, they eat meat, even though some people feed their pets a plant-based diet!) Some of our yoga retreat guests have been inspired to go home and adopt pets, which is so wonderful knowing that every 8 seconds a pet is euthanized in our country. Likely they have thought more about a plant-based direction in eating too!
Yoga is built on a reverence for nature, for honoring all living things as best we can. In yogic terms, that is living consciously.
