“Healing is not just a matter of time, but also opportunity.” – Hippocrates

Most of us have grown up in a world where processed foods and fast foods are the norm. Soda and sugary cereals for breakfast, donuts and coffee with cream and sugar at break time, candy bars and bagels in the afternoon and a fast-food meal on the way home. Without a second thought, we eat the way we were raised and programmed by our culture.

The industrialized food system has coded our subconscious with automatic responses and habits that drive daily food choices. Until one day when you wake up, press pause and begin asking the right questions:

Why am I eating this right now, and where did it come from?
What does my body actually need to be disease resistant and fully alive?
Is the sacrifice of my health and vitality worth the short-term pleasure and perceived convenience of processed and fast food?
What is the comprehensive cost of lost quality of life due to disease, now and in the future?
Is there a better way to eat that can prevent and reverse common diseases and restore my health?

The global pandemic of chronic, lifestyle disease is not caused by some unknown threat that will take science decades to discover and billions of dollars to develop a novel treatment. It is caused by the industrialized lifestyle and diet. Today, diet-related diseases like type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease impact more than two billion people worldwide. According to numerous large studies, an unhealthy diet is the number one cause of death and disability globally.

It has been said that the truth can set you free, and a validated scientific truth is that the food you choose to eat every day is one of the most powerful forces for comprehensive healing. The right choices can prevent, suspend – and even reverse – most common lifestyle-related diseases like heart disease and type 2 diabetes; they can dramatically improve your immune system, protect you from infections, improve your mood and memory and enhance your quality of life.

Truthfully, the “cure” is one of the most exciting, energizing lifestyles. It includes full plates and stomachs, abundant food choices, normal body weight, more energy, less pain, more mental clarity, reversal of many of the most common diseases and hope for a brighter future. It is backed by thousands of research studies, and millions of people around the world have stories of life transformation and disease reversal. It is not patented, nor does it require expensive prepared meals or special supplements. The solution is a full plate of delicious, whole plant-based foods and a lifestyle promoting health.

Your body’s natural state is health. According to research, more than 90% of diseases are caused by outside influences like diet, stress, disrupted sleep, inactivity and toxins that injure cells and deplete body resources. Every bite of unhealthy food, stressful, inactive days and sleepless nights, results in the accumulation of incremental cellular injury, similar to credit card debt that accumulates one swipe at a time. Initially, you may experience early warning signs (like the check engine light on your car) such as fatigue, pain, exhaustion, indigestion, inflammation or constipation that typically precede a measurable, clinical diagnosis. If someone tries to silence the warning signals with medications to reduce symptoms, caffeine to overcome fatigue and food, alcohol or substances to treat stress, they are likely on their way to a major breakdown.

Your body diligently works to keep you going. It does so every day by making small withdrawals from precious reserve accounts until one day they are depleted, and your body faces a crisis of disease. Eventually, cellular injury reaches a critical tipping point, much like a credit card that is maxed out. This is the point when disease symptoms manifest: the chest pain of heart disease, elevated blood sugars of type 2 diabetes or the joint pain of rheumatoid arthritis.

The good news is that if an unhealthy lifestyle causes the system failure, in most cases, an intensive lifestyle intervention can turn back the clock and jump start the healing process.

Hippocrates said, “Healing is not just a matter of time, but also opportunity.” A whole food, plant-based lifestyle provides the opportunity to help your body reverse the harmful effects of the western lifestyle. It adds years to your life and life to your years.

Diseases are diagnosed based on a constellation of medical data and findings. As the body heals, these characteristic findings can also resolve. Essentially, the disease condition goes into remission with no further symptoms or measurable evidence. Essentially, the epigenetic susceptibility was silenced through healthy lifestyle choices. But, if someone returns to their old lifestyle, the disease condition may return.

Health care systems have limitations and can’t accomplish what you can when you decide to change what’s on your plate, sleep and move more, and stress less. Your health future truly is in your hands.

At The Plantrician Project, our mission is to educate, equip and empower our physicians, health care practitioners and other health influencers with knowledge about the indisputable benefits of whole food, plant-based nutrition to help their patients reverse disease and restore lost vitality.

Now in our 11th year, we invite you to join us in Palm Desert this September for our International Plant-Based Nutrition Healthcare Conference (PBNHC) open to the general public, students and all health care practitioners and professionals alike. Learn from world-renowned faculty and experts such as Dean Ornish, MD and Michael Greger, MD, as well as the recipient of our 2023 Plantrician Luminary Award, John McDougall, MD.

At PBNHC, you’ll not only find answers about a whole food, plant-based lifestyle for disease reversal and prevention, but also a supportive, welcoming and enthusiastic community of individuals who are eager to take control of their own health and future.

Choose wisely, live abundantly.

Dr. Stoll is co-founder of The Plantrician Project, The International Plant Based Nutrition Healthcare Conference, the International Journal of Disease Reversal and Prevention and the Regenerative Health Institute. He is an international leader in lifestyle medicine, member of the 1994 Olympic Team and member of the Whole Foods Scientific and Medical Advisory Board. For more information, visit www.plantricianproject.org.

Source: 1) Includes excerpts from The Power Of A Plant-Based Plate by Scott Stoll, MD