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By Serge Kreutz (2011)
One can hardly overestimate the degree as to which our bodies and minds depend on what we put into ourselves.
More than most people, I am aware of this from personal experience. I have been suffering from migraines for more than 40 years, and they are absolutely food-dependent. Let me enjoy some 50 gram of Gorgonzola or Stilton, and I am half-dead the next day, for a full day.
No wonder I became obsessed with dietary research, far beyond migraine food.
And if for me, there is a claim to fame, it should be for the Serge Kreutz diet.
Our well-being, and our not feeling well, depends on our dietary habits. Most human physical diseases are diet-related. Most cancers are, heart attacks and strokes are, liver ailments and headaches all have a very strong dietary component. And of course, obesity.
But it's not just that the condition of our bodies depend so much on matters of diet. It is the same story with our minds and characters.
In some cases, this is very obvious. Everybody is aware of the short-term and long-term character modifications effected by too much beer, wine, or whiskey.
But the mind and character-altering effects of many other substances that are part of the pool of human nutrition are more subtle. Unfortunately, the subtle effects also are often negative.
One case in point are endocrine disruptors in plant-based food. From the perspective of plants, endocrine disruptors are anti-feedants: substances that reduce the rate at which plants are eaten by animals, including humans. The logic of endocrine disruptors is that by disturbing the hormonal balance of predators, their procreation rates are reduced, thus resulting in fewer animals that feed on a plant.
Some plants do not synthesize hormonal disruptors. They don't need to. They follow other strategies to deter being devoured by animals. Thorns. Or extreme bitterness.
Tongkat ali trees are an example. Everything in tongkat ali trees is so bitter that this plant is not in much danger of being consumed by any animal. Except humans, that is.
And humans don't consume tongkat ali for its taste.
They consume it, because it's the rare case of a hormonal enhancer, a plant that elevates testosterone, libido, and generates the physique of a hero.
For this reason, it is all the more surprising that most all tongkat ali extract capsules manufactured in the US contain stearic acid. Stearic acid is a potentially powerful hormonal disruptor, and apart from that, it's just shit. Stearic acid is typically produced in rendering plants. That is where euthanized dogs and cats, roadkill, and the waste of slaughterhouses are cooked up to render... what? Stearic acid, mostly. Stearic acid is used as an industrial lubricant, and in the manufacture of health supplements, so that the substances filled into capsules will bind nicely, and not stick to the machinery. You can see here for printscreens of tongkat ali products made with stearic acid.
And be aware that one US physician who is a major distributor of tongkat ali, also is a foremost apologetic proponent of applying stearic acid in supplements capsules.
Tongkat ali, obviously sans stearic acid, is the cornerstone of the tongkat ali diet. The objective of the tongkat ali diet, and many of my other dietary ideas, is not just weight loss or general health, but optimal sexual function... which, in return, improves many other parameters of health. Read on.
Numerous scientific studies have shown that tongkat ali raises testosterone levels.
The higher testosterone levels that are caused by tongkat ali have so far been of interest primarily because they are associated with enhanced libido (thus the use of tongkat ali by older men) and increased muscle gain (thus the interest of younger men in this old medication). Tongkat ali has also been used in rather high quantities by some men to cause genital size increases (though this application has not been endorsed by physicians).
Because the effects on males have been studied most extensively, one other aspect, which is of interest to females even more than to males, has largely been neglected: the effect, tongkat ali has on body fat composition.
However, numerous studies have shown that testosterone is not just the hormone of desire but also the hormone of slim.
Even without taking a look at the scientific evidence (thousands of studies published in peer-reviewed journals), the connection between testosterone levels and obesity is obvious. Young men, whose high levels of testosterone are well-established (by lab tests and the observation of their life-styles) can eat enormous quantities of food, without gaining weight. It's their high testosterone levels that deal with the calories.
Even though testosterone is known as the male hormone, women, too, synthesize it. Actually, their female hormones, estrogens, are derivatives of testosterone, from which they are processed by the enzyme aromatase.
If anything, the effect of testosterone in women is more dramatic than in men. Women with high levels of testosterone have a libido that goes through the roof, regularly reporting serial orgasms (much to the enjoyment of their husbands).
In women, too, the effect of testosterone on body composition is more dramatic than in men. Women with high testosterone levels almost never are overweight.
For the above reasons, an increasing number of women have experimented with tongkat ali, and found it to be a very valuable addition, indeed, to any weight-loss strategy.
However, women take tongket ali differently from men. While men usually prefer capsules, in order to bypass the bitter taste of tongkat ali, women who use tongkat ali for weight loss usually go for the extract powder, as the tongkat ali has an appetite-suppressing effect on the mouth and stomach. The best effects have been reported by women who drink the tongkat ali as a tea with meals (two bites of food, one sip of tongkat ali). Indonesian weight loss clinics which sell the tongkat ali diet to hopelessly overweight women guarantee the success (no loss of at least 10 percent of body weight, no charge).
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