Nuchi Gusui
'Food is Medicine' (Okinawan Proverb)
Okinawan eating habits play a significant role in this "successful aging" phenomenon. One of these habits is linked to an ancient Taoist prescription from the 2,500-year-old "Yellow" Emperor's Classic of Internal Medicine advocating limiting dietary intake. In this case, it means limitation of calories. Limiting caloric intake is thought to limit production of DNA-damaging oxygen-free radicals, which are generated mainly by metabolizing (oxidizing) food for energy. The more food we eat, the more free radicals we make. Caloric limitation results in near-universal increases in life expectancy for all species studied -- from fruit flies to monkeys -- including preliminary evidence in non-human primates from research in progress at the U.S. National Institute on Aging.
The Okinawans may be the best example of a human population that has learned to minimize free radical production while at the same time maximizing intake of free-radical-fighting foods. The Okinawan habit of "hara hachi bu," which means eat only until you are 80 percent full, plays a role as well as their habit of eating a low calorie, antioxidant-rich, plant-based diet. Stopping at 80 percent capacity gives the stomach's stretch receptors time to catch up since the stomach takes about 20 minutes to tell the body how full it really is. Not recognizing this fact encourages overeating and worked well in famine-survival periods for early humans, but not so well in over-fed modern humans. Eating mainly unprocessed plant foods also provides more fiber, allowing you to feel fuller while actually having eaten fewer calories. Ounce per ounce, plant foods also dwarf animal foods in terms of antioxidant content. |
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