What is holistic nutrition?

“The road to better health will not be found through drugs, doctors and hospitals. Instead it will be discovered through better nutrition and changes in lifestyles.” – William Crook, M.D.

As a Certified Holistic Nutritionist, I sometimes get asked what holistic nutrition means. If holistic can be defined as being characterized by comprehension of the parts of something as intimately interconnected and explicable only by reference to the whole, then holistic nutrition is the process of providing or obtaining the nourishment necessary for health and growth of the whole person - body, mind and spirit. Simply put, it takes into consideration not just food and liquid nourishment but also lifestyle factors such as exercise and stress management, as well as environmental, emotional and psychological factors.

As we begin to recognize that we are what we eat, we also begin to realize that food does not nourish the physical body alone. Mind, consciousness and body are interconnected. As spiritual beings, we can accept the significance of the spiritual dimension as it relates to overall health. Spirituality is not synonymous with the religious. There is no single, widely agreed-upon definition of spirituality but for the purposes of a discussion about health and well-being, I would simply define it as one’s belief system, one’s values and how one approaches life. Spirit can also be thought of as a form of energy. Illness often corresponds to a pattern of emotional and psychological stresses, beliefs, and attitudes that have influenced corresponding areas of the human body.

There is also a field of study that looks into optimum nutrition for the mind, which seeks to fight against mental disease. How we think and feel is directly related to what we take into our bodies. Just as food affects our bodies, so it affects our brains. Eating the right food has been proven to boost IQ, improve mood and emotional stability, sharpen memory, and keep the mind young. At the other end of the scale, the harmful things we take in to our bodies - artificial food including oxidants, alcohol, sugar, and stimulants, and certain chemicals – negatively impact mental health. Nutrition for the mind can help with beating addictions and overcoming eating disorders.

Holistic nutrition respects the fact that the only person in charge of us, as individuals, is us and that no one knows more about what’s good for us than we do. This is the foundation of holistic nutrition counselling. The upshot is that there is no one diet that is right for everyone all of the time. And there are no miracle ingredients that will cure all ills. Because we are unique, we must use our own judgement about what is right for our own well-being. This is where the nutritionist comes in. While seminars help to educate a mass audience about general guidelines for healthy living, a nutrition counsellor will help you achieve your specific personal health goals based on your input and feedback.

Holistic nutritionist is based on nutritional symptomatology, the study of symptoms as they relate to nutrition. Nutritional symptomatology is the preferred method of testing because as practitioners in the holistic field, we recognize that it is the client who ultimately holds the key to his/her own well-being. This testing or information-gathering process involves asking the client to rate various symptoms, if they exist, and the nutritional counsellor will tally the scores to come up with a number for a given system of the body. This number, meaningless on its own, gives a basis for comparison of one system to another.

The ratings are then used in combination with the client’s expressed concerns about their own state of health to determine a course of action to bring the systems most out of balance, back into balance. Examples of some health concerns might be frequent headaches, joint pain, weight loss, indigestion, malaise, fatigue, and so on.

In addition to nutritional assessments there are questions about lifestyle, environment, habits and state of mind and spiritual inclination, all of which affect overall well-being. And of course, the client is asked to keep a daily log of food and drink consumed throughout the day and how they feel before and after eating. These responses can provide valuable information about blood sugar regulation, digestion, elimination and allergies. 

Other questions that the client is asked include medical and family history, exercise, hobbies, vacations and spiritual discipline, which reveal a person's priorities and important grounding factors that are part of their life. 

Clearly the client's active participation  is crucial for accurate assessment, as is the practitioner's knowledge, understanding and empathy. It is, in fact, the role of the nutritionist to teach the client and guide them on a path to achieving balance and ultimately, to rebuild optimum health.