MEAT

for your mind

What you eat has a massive impact on how you think, act, feel and behave. Which is why it’s essential to eat ancestrally aligned food — mostly meat, some fruit and roots, little to no seed oils and processed carbs — so your MIND’s innate wisdom can be unlocked.

MEAT is the foundation of Inner Shamanism — nutrition is first doorway to healing your body so your mind can appear. This is why, as you’ll notice, this section of the framework is extensive.

But, MEAT (nutrition) is not a panacea; eating the “perfect” diet and getting everything right when it comes to nutrition is not going to solve all your problems. You are not one-dimensional. You are so much more than your diet — hence the emphasis on integration: eat meat for your mind, move for your body and be mindful for your soul. It’s integration (not isolation) that will Awaken Your Inner Shaman.

Too often people undertake various contingencies to heal themselves, thinking that their micro-dosing schedule is a little off or that they only need to get in an extra hour of exercise a week or they don’t have the right bedroom temperature or they just need another 6-week retreat in the Tibetan mountains in order to heal (otherwise known as spiritual bypassing) and then, only then — after the next thing being the thing — will that be the spark that magically lights the eternal flame of health and happiness as they ride their translucent steeds into mists of Babalon. Not quite. 

Often, what is needed to heal — and a simple first step — is eating ancestrally aligned food; a way of eating that focuses on animal-based foods that nourish the bodymind from the inside out.

As Inner Shamans, we know that the mind and body are not separate — they are inexplicitly connected, so what we feel on the inside is not disconnected from the outside, and vice versa. Your bodymind is one. What you consume — not limited to only your diet — has an impact on your bodymind.

Eat mostly meat and thrive. It’s simple. It does not need to be more complicated than this. It’s also up to you as to how extreme you want to go on the scale of eating meat compared to carbs/plants. But the basic premise of MEAT as inner shamans is ensuring most — if not all — our meals come from quality animal-based sources. Making sure that meat is the priority ensures that you are getting adequate protein that minimises an insulin-spiking response from your food. 

When you eat cereal laden with processed sugar in the mornings you are setting yourself up for a whirlwind of insulin-spiking responses throughout the day. That 3 pm crash you get daily is not a coincidence. Chances are you’re not eating enough protein/fat to minimise the spike of blood sugar from your food. What goes up must come down.

Animals have developed various mechanisms for avoiding getting eaten or hunted over the years like long legs to run away, teeth and horns to fight as well as insanely clever camouflaging techniques to hide from predators; plants, on the other hand, don’t have the sentient luxury of limbs and brains to escape the onslaught of deadly counterparts — instead, they use chemical warfare.

Plants have built up defence mechanisms over millions of years to prevent me, you, and the neighbourhood cat Ivan from eating the living shit out of them. These defence mechanisms interfere with your hormones and gut. Otherwise, if they didn't, they would not be able to reproduce. This interference comes in the form of stomach issues like IBS, brain fog, anxiety and various other low-level chronic symptoms that are brushed off as “untreatable” or “just part of old age” by modern pharma.

EAT MEAT FOR YOUR MIND

CONSUME ANCESTRALLY ALIGNED FOOD

It’s hard to come by a better graphic than the one above sourced from https://heartandsoil.co/ — if you focus on eating these foods daily you will heal and thrive.

  • Beef is baseline. When in doubt, stick to beef. In most cases, I’ve found beef to be the food group that will not let you down. The options for beef are near endless. You’ll find yourself gravitating towards a specific cut of beef like sirloin or ribeye; or you may find yourself just loving ground beef over anything. Ground beef for most people is the staple. You can save money by sticking to ground beef and make things interesting by changing the way you cook the beef itself; I sometimes opt for simple panfrying in butter and it’s own fat or sometimes make my own beef smash burgers.

  • Pork and Chicken is a great fat and protein source. If possible, stick to regenerative sources. Unlike cows who have multiple stomachs to digest and ferment the food they’re eating, Pigs and chicken have a single stomach. This means that what they eat gets directly stored into their fat. In most cases this would be fine — however, the modern world of consumerism and cheap alternatives, most farmers feed their chicken and pork soy-based food to fatten them up quickly. Soy is highly inflammatory and destructive to our hormones. So when you eat ample amounts of factory-farmed pork and chicken you are essentially eating tons of excess soy and cheap grains from the fat of the animal itself. But, having said that, do the best you can with what you have. So if you can only afford the cheap meat options, go for it. It will still be better than a microwave office meal or chips fried in vegetable oil.es here

  • Eggs are always great. I’ve eaten at least 4-6 eggs in the morning for the past 8 years of adopting a meat-based diet. Some might experience discomfort with eggs. If this happens, I challenge you to make sure the are fresh or try buying from a different supplier. Again, chickens are highly sensitive to what they eat and this affects their egg quality. So choosing quality eggs if you’re eating their daily matters. But, just do the best you can. Cheap eggs are still better than frosted cornflakes and a Red Bull.

  • I don’t personally eat much fresh fish. I feel this is very much environment-dependent. If you live in an area of the world that has access to quality fish then by all means go for it. However, given the sad state of our oceans filled with heavy metals and microplastics, quality fish has become not only a rarity but also a deep-pocket experience that will require a monthly loan from the bank to work become feasible.

  • Dairy can be a superfood — or your downfall. Most dairy these days contain fillers and sugars that won’t do your inner shamanic journey any good. Try sticking to raw dairy if possible. Otherwise, just make sure the milk and yoghurt ad cheese you’re eating doesn’t have weird additives in.

  • This is where is gets a little nuanced and a little bespoke. Read further for more. My favourite easy-to-digest carb sources include:

    * Fruit like berries, avocados and banana

    * Well-cooked white rice

    * Sweet Potato

    * Dark Chocolate

    Processed carbs should be a no in most cases. I do like to indulge in the occasional chocolate croissant on a Saturday after CrossFit, but this definitely isn’t my staple diet.

  • Avoid processed sodas and drinks at all costs. Our bodi’s wisdom simply cannot handle the detrimental effects of that amount of sugar and caffeine going into our system so quickly.

    Stick to:

    *water (add lemon if you want flavour)

    *sparkling/soda water

    *coffee/tea (I usually don’t like to have coffee on an empty stomach so I’ll usually make Bulletproof Coffee in the mornings)

MEAT = SATIETY= MUSCLE GAIN = FAT-LOSS

It may sound simple, but eating meat (protein) will keep you satiated, which will increase the odds of you not grabbing a snack at the grocery store checkout isle, which will equal greater mental clarity and stability, which will give you the motivation to honour your sacred animal flesh and move in whatever form that looks for you, and will increase the chances of sleeping well and losing fat by proxy.

We are overfed and undernourished

The goal of “fat loss” immediately implies restriction. As inner shamans, what we propose is MORE, counterintuitively. MORE PROTEIN from quality animal-based sources. MORE FAT from coconuts, butter and tallow. MORE CALORIES that will nourish your body.

As inner shamans, we need a few parameters when it comes to our diet. Not because we’re stuck-up snobs that are virtue signalling to the world at large: but because we know that the modern world requires us to be resilient — otherwise it will consume us as we consume it. These parameters should guide you on your quest for health and happiness.

#1: Beef is Baseline

This has been my motto for years. What this means is that when you are confused about what to eat or things seem a little crazy and don’t make sense or you have gone off track for whatever reason, you can always return to baseline: beef. You can always think of beef as the starting point on which to build. 

#2: F*ck Seed Oils

Try to avoid seed oils as best as you can. Another name for seed oil is vegetable oil. It is likely that these gut-destroying additives to our food systems are causing worldwide nutritional-based problems.

Prior to the invention of seed oils, we cooked our food over an open flame (the best), or in butter, tallow, ghee and coconut oil (better). Olive oil is ok, as it is cold pressed and minimally processed, but is not ideal for high-heat cooking.

By default, when you remove Seed Oils from your diet, you remove all other processed carbs. Almost every modern processed carb product these days is laden with Seed Oils due to the preservative nature of them (‘them’ used intentionally because they are literally public enemy #1).

Common seed oils to avoid at all costs are:

  • Rice bran 

  • Safflower 

  • Sunflower 

  • Corn 

  • Canola 

  • Cottonseed 

  • Soybean

  • Grapeseed

#3: Save Your Carbs for Evenings

Carbs are so specific and so nuanced in the world of nutrition. To give you background, I began my fitness journey being a carb-avoider. I became obsessed with low-carb. To the point where it became an impediment to my progress. Context is everything. If you are a 50-year-old dad who has diabetes, has a belly, smokes and does little to no exercise, then eating carbs should be the last thing on your list.

‘The basics are the basics,’ as one of my late mentors Charles Poliquin used to say. You have to deserve your carbs. If you cannot visibly see a row of abs you probably don’t deserve hundreds of grams of carbs each day.

When you save your carbs for the evening you are keeping yourself in a fat-burning state throughout the day. It also has a strong limitation factor built in which I love; by the time you get around to having your berries and yoghurt or white rice in the evening, you’ll be so full from all the quality animal-based protein you’ve consumed you won’t even have the strength to gulp down on too many carbs.

#4: Beware of Liquid Calories 

One way to really mess with your body wisdom is to drink soda and milkshakes. I’m a sucker for milkshakes. I used to drink at least 2 Woolworths chocolate milkshakes a day. I also used to be 30 kilograms (~ 90lbs) overweight. Sodas and milkshakes are literally engineered to be addictive. So don’t give them the time of day and think you’ll just have one — you won’t. Stick to simple drinks and add some flavour if you have to like lemon juice.

#5: Chew Your Food Properly

This may seem obvious, but to many, it’s not. Your digestion begins the most your put food in your mouth to chew. So ensuring you’re in a stress-free state and chewing your food for at leat 30 counts has a huge impact on how your food is digested. Bonus points for chewing your food properly with the people you love — sharing food with your people provides a sense of bonding, love and connection. Food is sacred, and we’ve forgotten that.

 

FAQs

  • MEAT. When you start your day with a huge heaping of carbs (and I’m not a dogmatic carnivore saying all carbs are bad, as you’ll see further down the road) you are essentially sending your hormones — mainly your insulin — on a massive rollercoaster throughout the day. The simple and often forgotten way around this is, that you can have your precious carbs: just save them for dessert — save them for the evening. This will keep you in a fat-burning state throughout the day. It’s crucial that you begin your day with a high-fat-protein-based meal. This often looks like eggs, bacon, avocado, butter, butter with coffee (yes, heard that right), and greek yoghurt.

  • Simple. McDonald’s. Maybe this wasn’t the answer you were looking for because we’ve been led to believe that McDonald’s is bad for us — and generally it is: but, it’s not necessarily the McDonald’s itself, it is what your order. The same two people can eat at McDonald’s for the rest of their life and look entirely different. The only difference is the one person ordered the regular old garbage and the other person chose to order and eat only the essentials: MEAT. All you have to do is simply go up to the counter and ask for a double-quarter pounder (or whatever your favourite meal is) without the bun. 99% of the time they will know what you are saying, maybe give you a weird look at first, and then place the meal into the usual container with just the burger patties. Also, part of this journey is enjoyment. So if you choose to enjoy your travels and let loose a little, that is fine. Don’t deny yourself the simple pleasures of existence every now and again.

  • Most people tend to lose weight — specifically fat — when adopting a meat-based diet. But It’s common to gain weight initially when switching to high-nutrient-density foods. This can throw people off. Stick with it. As your hormones get adapted and your body nourished, over time you’ll lose weight. On that note: try to avoid the scale at all costs — the scale is like seed oils of the emotional mind. It can throw you off. Go for looks instead. This sounds vain, but looks — and how you feel — are a far better measurement of progress than the weight on a scale.

  • No. There is little evidence to suggest that grass-fed / finished beef is superior in nutrition to grain-fed. Obviously, I believe the highest order - the place we should all be striving for — is eating only regenerative meat from ethical farms. But the reality is that it’s just too expensive for most. Therefore, my motto is ANY BEEF IS GOOD BEEF. Whether it’s a McDonald’s burger patty, A-Grade ground beef or the best tomahawk streak sourced from Montana — it doesn’t matter: what matters more is your health and happiness. Chances are eating a low-quality beef product like a McDonald’s burger patty or beef biltong or cheap ground beef is far better than an Oreo or a bagel or Monster Energy or worse: an Oreo-coated bagel washed down with Monster Energy.

  • Chances are your inner shaman led you here for a reason. We have to admit to ourselves that we are all bio individuals with widely different body types and ways of progressing foods, stimulus, stress, emotions, toxins, etc. Therefore, choosing what to and what not to eat is up to your inner wisdom. People like Judy Cho has great resources on healing through fully carnivorous ways of eating. Some may find immense benefit in removing all plant material for a period of time to give their gut a chance to recover. Others may find they need fruit or vegetables to make sure they feel good. Regardless, we know that meat = protein/fat = satiety = muscle gain = fat-loss. And that there is little room for seed oils and processed food.

  • Personally, I think fasting is overrated (and even destructive at times). When you’re listening to your inner wisdom it will know when it’s full and when it should and shouldn’t eat. I’ve used fasting as a way to “catch up” after a weekend of binge eating and drinking too many times for it to be beneficial. You might find that fasting and intermittent fasting just happen from time to time by just being human and living with others. You might find your plane is delayed and nothing is open but your resilience as an inner shaman takes over and you go for a few hours without eating as a natural side effect of being part of society.

  • Of course. You can’t not do anything really, but if you listen to the wisdom of your own body after you’ve indulged on alcohol, you’ll very quickly discover that it ruins your sleep, libido and motivation rapidly. If you are going to drink, ensure you stick to pure spirits like vodka, whiskey and tequila. I enjoy any of the spirits mentioned with sparkling water, ice and lemon added

This section of the guide is extensive. But MEAT is the foundation of living well. We have to have these good measures in place otherwise we’ll face the perils of dis-ease. Next, we move on to MOVEMENT.

MOVEMENT