“Macrobiotic eating is a beautifully balanced symphony of unprocessed, seasonal foods, prepared in a manner appropriate to your condition and lifestyle, period.” – Christina Pirello
Macrobiotics is simply about living more naturally and in harmony with everything around us. It is the art of understanding the profound effects food and drink have our health and well-being, and using them wisely to create balance within ourselves and our world. When we live in opposition to nature, rather than in harmony with it, we are more likely to develop a variety of physical, emotional, and mental problems. Macrobiotic principles of balance offer us the opportunity to recover our natural health and our freedom to enjoy our life as we choose to live it.
The diet is based on locally-grown foods, such as whole grains, land and root vegetables, beans, with small amounts of seeds and fruits. No food is prohibited, yet sugar, meat, dairy, eggs, and other processed foods are avoided for good health. The macrobiotic way of eating is an energetic approach rather then a nutritional one. Much more then a diet, macrobiotics is a philosophy that everything in the universe is a perfect state of opposites shaped by two main forces, expansion and contraction. For example, day turns to night; autumn follows summer and summer follows spring; inhaling is followed by exhaling, darkness comes after daylight, and so on. This biological rhythm of expansion and contraction, yin and yang, can be seen in all life forms and macrobiotics is a tool for living within this natural order of change and movement.
The essence of macrobiotics stems from the traditional philosophy that food is our best medicine and how we eat today affects who we are and how we think tomorrow. Macrobiotics takes this ancient understanding and weaves it together with the principles of yin and yang, daily movement, hard work, and a more natural lifestyle to produce health, rigor, innate wisdom, and happiness!
2 replies on “What is Macrobiotics?”
Dear Emily,
Thank you for your great feedback on my blog! It is all coming together as it all does. I am glad you have been in touch with the Welters. They are a wonderful group of people doing good things in our bit of the world. Who else? Well, there is a woman who works at the Co-op who has a great blog (https://nourishingcuisine.blogspot.com/2011/05/nourish-and-protect-with-macrobiotic.html) and she cooks macrobiotically and I do believe she is responsible for all those delicious sea veggie dishes you might see at the Co-op deli! Also, Blake Gould is a macrobiotic counselor over in Stowe. He is very knowledgeable and has had a practice for a long time now. He can surely connect you with other macrobiotic folks in and around Central Vermont if you are interested. At one point I had interest in forming a once a month potluck for people to share food and come together. I just never seemed to be able to bring that one together for various reasons! This is a wonderful community we live in and I myself feel blessed to be a part of its richness. Much luck to you and do stay in touch…Tara
Tara, I just found your website. I’m also in Central Vermont and am 5 months into integrating macrobiotics into my life. I’ve connected with the folks who own Rhapsody in Montpelier but am looking for more people who follow a macrobiotic lifestyle. Any ideas or leads? I look forward to reading your blog! Looks great! Emily (Barre, VT).