Depression is a vicious and insidious disease that destroys our lives from the inside out. But I’ve finally figured out a way to kill it dead, deader, and deader than that.
In The Future of the Mind, Michio Kaku reports that researchers have found a genetic link between schizophrenia, bipolar disorder (aka manic depression), serious depression, ADHD, and autism. And in his l974 book, Why Your Child Is Hyperactive, Dr. Ben F. Feingold proves decisively that ADHD (aka hyperactivity) is caused by an adverse reaction in the brain to chemical additives in food and drugs.
Therefore–therefore–serious depression is also caused by an adverse reaction in the brain to chemical additives. So if you want to cure your depression, the first thing you need to do is eliminate all chemical from your diet.
(As a personal note, when I was going through a rough time with my physical health, my physician prescribed some very potent medicine and it kept me up at night and made me crazy. It was only when I found a clean alternative at Whole Foods that I was able to start sleeping again and regain my sanity.)
But while eliminating chemicals from your diet may sound simple, it can be quite complicated, since chemicals can pop up almost anywhere. Here’s an example– Stouffer’s meatloaf frozen dinner. The top of the box has a yummy picture of the meatloaf and mashed potatoes. There’s also a rectangle with “No Preservatives” in bold type and a pretty green leaf. A good start, right?
But only a start, because when I looked at the list of ingredients (in much smaller type) on the side of the box, I found twenty(!) additives, ranging from sodium phosphates to hydrolyzed soy protein (aka MSG) to carrageenan (which can cause ulcerations, lacerations, and cancer in the digestive system–http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-80857/Additive-everyday-products-cause-cancer.html).
If you look closely at the list of ingredients on most packaged food, you will find chemical additives and usually colors as well. And you also need to be extremely careful with buying animal products. Most fresh chicken is injected with sodium phosphate. Frozen turkeys that are self-basting will cook up filled with additives. Much, if not most, red meat is sprayed with preservatives before leaving the production plant.
And then we need to think about what the animals ate when they were alive, because feed can be adulterated with a frightening array of additives. The same goes for the cows that produce milk and the chickens that produce eggs.
At least when you shop, you control what you buy. But when you go to a restaurant, all you can control is what you order. And since most restaurants buy the same adulterated food that’s in grocery stores, your meals will be laced with chemicals. You can’t even trust a salad bar, because the vegetables could have been sprayed with a preservative to keep them fresh, and the prepared salads could have the same additives that most prepared deli food has.
As for fast food joints, there ought to be a skull and crossbones on their front doors.
We simply can’t take safety for granted, whether in food or drinks or medications or vitamins. So I have three basic rules to help me:
1. I buy organic whenever I can.
2. I stay away from restaurants unless they’re organic.
3. I buy any medications and vitamins I may need at Whole Foods, which has clean alternatives.
Removing the chemicals from your diet–and your brain–is only half the process, though. The other half involves removing the toxic thinking from your mind.
I’m not talking about occasional sadness or fear or anger–negatives emotions are part of being human. The problem comes when we allow ourselves to fixate on them and get stuck in a negative loop of misery and rage. Instead, we need to teach ourselves to let go of our negative emotions and move into healthy, productive thinking.
This is going to take some work, because I’m talking about retraining our minds. The most important part, though, is to be good to ourselves and never beat ourselves up. We’re all going to screw up–it’s part of being human. And one part of screwing up is getting stuck in a negative loop now and then. What matters is what we do to break that loop and move forward.
The best advice I’ve ever found comes from Norman Vincent Peal in The Power of Positive Thinking. The DVD of The Secret is also useful, as long as you don’t allow yourself to get sucked into its dogmatic message of “It’s our way or the highway.” And there’s also a short, powerful book called It Works which you can find on Amazon.
Finally, there’s meditation, where you sit quietly in a chair, close your eyes, and clear your mind by focusing on your breathing. The easiest way is to say (in your mind) “In” when you breathe in and “Out” when you breathe out. (I also find this a very effective way to fall asleep.)
Modern medicine has a powerful PR machine that works overtime to convince us that we always have problems, and if we can just find the right doctors and/or procedures/and or pills, we’ll be fixed. Of course we’re occasionally going to need some help, and I’ve worked with some very fine doctors who helped me heal. But the medical/theraputic/pharmaceutical industrial complex is growing larger and more lucrative every year, so we need to protect ourselves against its very convincing sales pitches.
Depression is caused by an adverse reaction in the brain to chemical additives in food and drugs. If you clean up your diet, you’ll clean up your brain, and then you’ll be able to focus on teaching yourself to think productively.
Period.
Sources:
Feingold, Dr. Ben F. Why Your Child Is Hyperactive. New York: Random House, 1974, 1975.
Kaku, Michio. The Future of the Mind. New York: Doubleday, 2014.
Recommendations:
Byrne, Rhonda. The Secret. (Australia?): TS Productions, LLC, 2006.
Peale, Norman Vincent. The Power of Positive Thinking. New York: Fireside Books, 1952, 1956, 1980.
RHJ. It Works. Camarillo, CA: De Vorss & Company, 1926, 1953.
