Orac and antioxidants

Antioxidants provide protection against the ageing process. They attack active free radicals. The antioxidant values in food are expressed in ORAC. Fresh vegetables, pulses and fruits are high in ORAC. Herbs and a few essential oils top the list. The lower the level of processing, the higher the ORAC value of the food. It is generally assumed that our bodies need an intake of 3,000 to 5,000 ORAC units per day for protection against free radicals.

Bovis and vitality

Fresh-from-the-field lettuce and wilted lettuce have very different life energies. How can we measure that life energy? Frenchman André Bovis has developed a frequency scale to measure the vitality of things. Healthy people have a value of 6,500 to 8,000 on the Bovis scale. At a lower Bovis value, a person becomes susceptible to diseases and his/her energy level is subdued. The renowned Dutchman Robert H. Steelooper says: ‘Food products with a Bovis value of less than 7,000 take energy from the body and induce disease. Food products above 7,500 provide energy and can be considered good for health. Above 9,000, the food products even have a cleansing and therapeutic effect.’

Glycemic index

The degree by which carbohydrates (sugars) in food increase our body’s sugar levels is expressed as a GI-value. Food with a low GI (less than 50) keeps our sugars at an appropriate level. Food with a high GI (more than 70) causes too much fluctuation of the sugar level (rise and fall). Dates, white baguettes and parsnip have high GI levels. Although they provide instant energy (a good thing for athletes), people who don’t get much exercise will soon feel a dip afterwards.

Yin&Yang balance

Yin and Yang are each other’s opposites, but they are also complementary and dependent upon one another. According to Indonesian and Chinese medicine, for a person to be balanced, both powers should be more or less equally represented. Women are more yin than yang, men are more Yang than Yin. People who are off-balance have too much yin or too much yang. When yin dominates, yang requires additional attention and vice-versa. In his Polarity therapy, Marc Elsen puts it as follows: ‘Being unhealthy can be perceived as a set of scales that is off balance. The Yin polarity on the one side must weigh as much as the Yang polarity on the other side of the balance.’

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