When I stopped eating meat I was called vegetarian. That was about 20 years ago. Today I would be called a vegan by most people. A vegan does not buy any leather products, nor use or eat anything that requires killing or hurting animals. I use all my old leather products until they are no more useful, but wouldn’t buy any new ones, as I know what I know today. For me as for most people the change is a process, a process of learning, thinking and committing to what feels right. It’s a step by step process. I’ve met very few that changed from one day to the other and it is normally when they get a life-changing piece of news, like a diagnose.
It feels right to not support the industry that has animals as resources for their goods. I don’t buy anything that requires killing (not directly anyway, or as I know of). Nor do I buy dairy or eggs. But if I have a coffee at a bar and they don’t have soy milk I wouldn’t get upset. I accept that I’m a minority and would take a ‘cortado’ which is a coffee with a little bit of milk, like an Italian macchiato. I surely wouldn’t try to convert the bartender to veganism!
If I haven’t planned my food intake or something came up that I couldn’t foresee, and I don’t have any healthy plant-based food around, I wouldn’t starve. I’d probably go for the omelet, or dairy such as yogurt but probably not the cheese as it’s made with rennet that requires killing a calf (which many don’t know). So, what am I? I’m not eating a 100% anything. Do I need to be labeled? I choose not to be a 100% anything. If I do it would make me a fundamentalist and I find that more unhealthy than anything else I can think of.If anything I would see myself and my partners at Olive Retreat as ‘sustainabilitarian‘. My advice to you is to learn and feel what is good for you.
Fruitarians only eat fruit. The most common today is to be a vegetarian, that only eat plant-based food with eggs (ovo-vegetarian) and dairy (lacto-vegetarian) or both (ovo-lacto-vegetarian). A pescatarian is a vegetarian that also eats fish. Plantarian is a new word that popped up a few years ago and labels the ones that only eat plant-based food, and that is probably me most of the time…if I need to be labeled! Veggie-tarian is OK too! At least I don’t get confused with being a planetarian 🙂
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Published by O• L I V E
Naturopaths who deeply believe Natural Immunity is still the best, and therefore we work in defense of it.
Since 20+ years we have successfully been consultants in the natural health sector to support individuals and we are in particular working with entrepreneurs and professionals. Our mission is to defend natural health, the only one that really works so far. We mainly but not entirely use Eastern philosophy such as Ayurveda, TCM, Yoga, Thai chi, Falun Gong, and only honest modern science.
Everyone can heal naturally, it's what bodies and (free) minds want. Our O• Method is based on physics, chemistry and biology with emphasis on the first one as the rest often follow naturally. We divide our work in three parts: Body-Mind-Soul. To allow them all to detox and let go we work with energy (Prana, Xi, Vitality, Spirit, Pneuma or whatever you call the life force, it's the same force mentioned in ancient texts) to heal on all levels, i.e. from chronic disease, toxicity, depression and traumas using our own method, reaching 96% success rate which is unheard of by others in our sector. Would you know of anyone with that result, let us know.
Considering that we invented and dumped >120.000 (petro)chemically derived substances since 1945, of which many are very toxic, getting healthy will most likely include a good old body detox sooner or later.
My love for Ayurveda started in 1993 with Deepak Chopra and after a few turns in life I quit my job as a Nordic Brand Manager and BI strategist at the largest Nordic telecom operator and re-schooled in natural medicine. Besides Dr. Chopra I have studied Dr. Lad, Dr. Siva (Pune, India) and other prominent teachers in their field, but the real difference comes with a practiced. I added nutrition, Orthomolecular Medicine with Dr. Nielsen (USA/Spain) and herbalism.
Today we teach those whom want to continue our work and we love to dig down in etymology and the original (mainly Avestan, Pali and Sanskrit) scripts to understand the words fully and I fall in love with the concepts over and over again for every sutra. This love affair that created a few books (Amazon), presentations, essayes and many events and consultations, is still giving us Yang-Yin balance and inspiration. I guess with that we are recognizing the value of Dao De Ching 💚🌿💜
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For others that eat meat, what happens to the leather (skin) that is no longer acceptable to some to use? Would it be better used than discarded as waste?
Hi Practical Man, thanks for your comment.
I would say like I say about eating meat. If it feels good to you to wear another animals skin go for it. If it feels good to support one of the most toxic industries, do it. If it feels good to give those companies your money, do it. I also say, don’t fool yourself just because you are ‘normal’. Know the implication of what you do.
The society has no moral implications yet in abusing our earth and animals, it’s up to you and everyone right now. But being ‘normal’ isn’t necessarily right and healthy, as history has shown so many times. As there are no taxes for being so much more polluting and it’s not forbidden to create a holocaust for animals, it’s just up to you.
And for the waste…that’s a problem we’ll happily deal with when a few billion people more stop buying it. For now the world’s most violent animal eats more meat (with subsidiaries in many countries) than ever and it has made leather so cheap that alternatives are too expensive. Low quality leather is wasted more than ever.
Take care