The Art of Vibrant Living Show with Daniel Aaron - Will Tuttle: Video automatically transcribed by Sonix

The Art of Vibrant Living Show with Daniel Aaron - Will Tuttle: this mp4 video file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Daniel Aaron:
Hello, everybody. I am Daniela Daniel Aaron, your host for The Art of Vibrant Living. And I am very happy that we have Dr. Will Tuttle with us today. Early, thanks to Longevity drops our sponsor. And let's just jump right into it. It's such a blessing to have you here today. Dr. Tuttle is a really accomplished, broad spectrum. I'd say artist, really? Artist of life. And how I first came into contact contact with Will is I read his book many years ago, The World Peace Diet, and for a long time, my own teachings around yoga and what I do with my trainings and in my own lifestyle is about how can I live more peace in the world. And when I when I came across that book and it became a great part of the curriculum for our training, I just so appreciated and the message of that and then was lucky enough to be, I think it was on Maui a couple of years ago and Will and I met in person there and Will is going to be coming and part of our teacher training in May bringing us some information and education. And in addition to being the author of that book, which was, I think over ten years ago now Will has got two other books we'll hear about today. He's an accomplished musician, musician, a former monk, and a really fascinating heartful guy. Will, thank you so much for being on the show today.

Will Tuttle:
Yeah, thank you, dear Daniel. And thank you, everyone, for listening in and watching. And I'm really delighted to be with you and I really appreciate the work you're doing. It's fantastic.

Daniel Aaron:
It's it's a real blessing for us to be here, especially with with David. This is David Wolfe's channel and he's a good friend. And the people that are here are people who are for sure interested in the relationship between food and health. And, you know, and I know for you Will, that's a big part of it. And you talk about the different levels of health, But before we jump into really helping people make the link and make it more conscious and and I definitely want to get into how people can look at and understand their their food choices and the effect that has on them and on the world. Um, you know, for, for you and I, this kind of conversation, veganism and the way, the way our food impacts the greater whole is a normal conversation. I know that for myself and for you, though, it wasn't always that way. And I grew up in the standard American diet world and eating meat three times a day and never thought anything about it. And. And you did it in a way, too. Would you be up for telling people how you how you got to be where you are now with this?

Will Tuttle:
Sure. Yeah. Thanks, Daniel. You know, I'm very similar to you. I was born and raised back in the 1950s in New England and Concord, Massachusetts, eating the typical meals with lots of meat, dairy and eggs and fish and so forth. And I did not question it because there was no little chink in the in the wall anywhere for any vegetarian or vegan light to shine in back then. And so, in fact, I remember when I was about seven, I asked my mother, so the food we're eating, is that what everybody eats in the world? And she said, Yeah, this is pretty much what everybody eats. And then she came back a few minutes later and she said, Well, actually that's not true. There are vegetarians. I never heard that word. And I was at that age when I loved learning new words, especially if there were big words. And I said, What's the vegetarian? And she said, Well, I wouldn't worry about it. You're never going to meet one. And she said, I'm a lot older than you are and I've never met one. And then she said, I don't know where they get their protein. So I had this image of these poor people who were vegetarians that were probably dragging themselves along the ground, barely able to walk because they didn't, you know, they were suffering from such severe protein deficiency. And I was so glad I wasn't a vegetarian and that we could eat meat and be strong and healthy and get plenty of protein and get plenty of calcium from the milk and so forth. And so that was my life growing up. And I went away to a summer camp when I was in my early teens, maybe 13, 14 years old, and participated actually in killing chickens and cows on this dairy operation that was learning, sort of learning where your food comes from. And I have to say, I didn't like doing it, but I was sure that what I was doing was the right thing. Because like you at that point, I had gone through about 13 years. Well, yeah, 13 years of the most intense indoctrination a person can go through. And I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that God gave us these animals to eat.

Will Tuttle:
They don't have a soul. They taste good. And if you don't eat. You're definitely going to die within 24 hours of a protein deficiency. So that was basically it for me. And so I remember, you know, you know, we shot this poor cow in the head right in the barn, you know, in this cute little Vermont dairy where nothing bad ever happens. Little organic, small, you know, small operation. The dairyman himself, you know, shot the cow and we helped cut the cow up. He said, if you can't use it for meat, you have to use it for milk. You have to use it for meat. And so so that was the thing. And what I'm so glad really in my story is that when I went away to college back in the early 70 seconds, I began to realize that there were people who were vegetarians, but I never actually met one like my mother said. But right after that, I left home with my brother and we decided to go on a spiritual pilgrimage. I started reading books about Eastern meditation and yoga, and I was starting to practice yoga. I was trying to practice meditation. It was kind of the new thing back in the 70 seconds, and I remember we thought we were going to go to California, we're going to go to San Francisco and find cosmic consciousness. You know, back in the day when you could have those kind of ideas and just do it. And so we left home. We walked down the our parents driveway. I remember we had some fresh baked cookies from my mother and we left home and we're going to go and find enlightenment. And we got as far as Buffalo after a few weeks and or maybe a month of walking. And then we decided to just head south and we actually walked all the way down through upstate New York, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky, into Tennessee, eventually to a Zen center in Alabama. But in Tennessee, we lived for a little while in a community that was called the Farm and the Farm back in 1975, when I got there was about 900 people, and they were mainly from California.

Will Tuttle:
So we kind of we felt like we kind of met everybody in the middle there. And but they were all vegetarians. They said, We're vegetarian. So this is my first real exposure to a community of vegetarians. There was 900 vegetarians. They were actually what we would call today vegans in the sense that they didn't eat meat or dairy or eggs, But no one heard of the word vegan in 1975. So they said, we're vegetarians. And lo and behold, nobody was dragging themselves through the dirt, you know, suffering of a protein deficiency. In fact, they struck me as being wonderful, energetic, creative, idealistic, very happy people, well adjusted from my point of view. And so that was basically it. From that point on, I never have eaten meat in my life since 1975. I asked them, Why are you guys vegetarian? And they told me that there were two main reasons. One was the fact that most of the food that we grow, instead of feeding it to the people who are hungry, like 80%, is fed to imprisoned cows, pigs and chickens and other animals, fishes and so forth. And and so people are starving. And so they and what they said was we want to create a world of peace. And it's well understood that food shortages are the main driving force behind conflict and war in the world. So we want to help create a more peaceful world. So we're eating lower on the food chain so there's enough for everyone to eat, you know, that basic idea. So that I thought that was brilliant, actually. And then also, I remember the guy said, you know what, the animals go through that people are eating. And I said, you know, don't tell me I don't want to hear all the terrible things. But he told me just a few of the things, the basic routine mutilations and castrations and impregnations and this whole and the hyper confinement, the basic misery that we force all these animals into. And then the thought of eating all that misery too, and causing it. And but the beautiful thing for me was that I had this living example. I think it's kind of rare.

Will Tuttle:
You know, I was there. I was with 900 other people. They were all vegans and they were all thriving. They had probably 200 children. They were all vegan from birth. They were doing great. So that was it. I never ate meat again. And and actually, the other thing that was interesting, a couple of years maybe, I'd say five years later in 1980, I made the connection with dairy and eggs. So I became a vegan in the sense I gave that up and it's kind of a process, you know, I gave up leather and fur, wool, silk, you know, all that stuff. I just try to kind of slowly get those things out of my life because I didn't like the idea of causing suffering to animals. I've always felt that the earth is so beautiful with such a celebration of life here and the idea of imprisoning animals and abusing them just never sat well with me. And once I realized it's not necessary and I had that example of another community that that made it so much more easy for me to do it. Actually, it was that I realized basically the one of the main teachings for me is that the only reason anyone eats animal foods is because of the communities we're raised in. So if we can have an example of an alternative community that's based more on health, sustainability, freedom, liberation and equality and. Justice, then we can make a change. And that was what happened to me. And then the other thing just briefly is that a few years later, in 1984, I shaved my head and I became a Zen monk. I was in Korea. I was already living in meditation centers in California at that point. I did get out there eventually and for about ten years. But when I went to Korea, I found myself in a Zen monastery called Songgwangsa, which in at that time, 1984 was totally vegan. I mean, it still is. We were just there actually recently. So there was no meat, no dairy, no eggs, wool, silk leather. You wouldn't even kill mosquitoes. You know, it was this idea we were meditating virtually. That was all we did from 3:00 in the morning till 9:00 at night every day.

Will Tuttle:
We were just we were sitting. It was this intensive retreat. But I realized that I was in a community that had been practicing again, what we would call today veganism for about 750 years since the I think the 1100s or something. This is what they had done for hundreds and hundreds of years. So that was a big piece for me to really understand that this thing we call veganism is not really veganism. You know, it's an ancient practice that goes back thousands, hundreds of years, probably thousands of years. And it's just I think, really what it is. It's our natural wisdom, our natural intuition, our natural empathy and kindness just functioning naturally. When we see beings, we see beings, we don't see objects, we don't see commodities. And I think we're trained. We have our natural wisdom repressed, being raised in our society. And when that's in a sense a possibility, I think for us to deepen our connection spiritually with our own inner wisdom, then we can begin to question the official narrative in our society, and then we can begin to actually, I think, be a force for healing in the world. So when I came back actually from Songgwangsa, it was then that I went on to get my PhD at Berkeley and do a bunch of other stuff, including writing the World Peace Diet and it became really my mission to help show people that there's a much bigger picture to the whole food thing. You know, it's there's many levels of health. And to try to share this message as best I can and working with my my wonderful spouse, Madeline, in order to do that. So we travel a lot, but it's great to be able to work with people like you and the people who are watching and listening, because I think really this is the most important thing we can focus on today is how to question a narrative that's harming us on every level and the fact that we have an alternative that's absolutely practicable. So we're not just criticizing a system that's obsolete and destructive. We have an alternative that's delicious and that's available. So that's my my brief story. Yeah.

Daniel Aaron:
Yeah, that's great. And it's know it's fun to hear your trajectory of how you came into the new awareness and seeing the living examples of it and and seeing the impact. And you know, and I know you talk about the, the, the disconnection. That's one of the ramifications of the meat diet. And, you know, and I know for me as a as a kid, it was it was I had no awareness of animals being the thing that was on my dinner plate. And and I you know, I loved animals. And I'm curious what you can tell us about the reception. And I'm sure that a lot of our audience here, maybe all of our most of our audience are people that are already tuned in to the impact of of of what they're eating in terms of their own health and also the greater planet. You know, my experience when I when I made the connection and it was when I was 17 years old, my first year of college, you know, just suddenly a light went on and I realized like, whoa, that. And it was for me, it was a funny thing. It was I walked into Fuddruckers, this, you know, chain restaurant, and there was a big paper mache cow hanging from the ceiling. And and I looked at it and it was plastic, not paper maché. And I looked at it and the way they had it, one side, it was black and white, you know, shaped like a cow. And the other side, it was a cross section and it was showing the different cuts of meat. And and this was advertising for them. And when I when I looked at it, I just stood there like open mouthed, looking up at like, whoa, that's the animal that I love. And that's the thing that we eat. And that was the moment for me. I didn't eat any more meat. And I swung the other way and I got into PETA and I got into my college organization and for vegetarianism and I started protesting and, you know, making paper mache cows. And I stopped just short of throwing, you know, blood onto people and that kind of thing. And what I found is that I started losing friends.

Daniel Aaron:
I would walk into the. Dining hall and sit down for a meal and people would leave the table. They're like, Oh, there's that guy again. And he's going to start criticizing what I'm eating. And and I realized like, Well, this is not working. So I just cut it all off and I stopped talking about it at all and didn't say anything to anybody. And then it was years later when I really understood the philosophy of yoga and and ahimsa non-harming or doing as little harm as possible. Then I realized, well, actually, this is this is part of the curriculum, this is part of the training, this is part of this pathway. And it's in a lot of traditions for if you want to awaken or you want to be happy, these are things that you can do. So then I started teaching about it again and it became an important part of of the curriculum that I share with people now. And I know that you are teaching and sharing in in a lot of parts of the world and including in China a lot lately. So what what can you tell us about the reception? And I know, you know, you're a you're a you're a gentle man who is really there to empower people and you're not telling people what they should do or criticizing anything that they're doing. But what's the reception that you're finding for the World Peace diet?

Will Tuttle:
Yeah, well, that's a fascinating story, Daniel. And I know actually, I mean, the first for me, the first probably ten years of being a vegan vegetarian and vegan both, but especially as a vegan, I was quite often I was in people's faces about it in a you know, it's it because I feel even now, I feel that there is an obligation to be a voice for those who don't really have a voice in our society and who are being abused. And I don't want to stand by and just not say something when others are being harmed. The question, of course, is when we're in such a small minority and people don't have to listen to us, they can say, well, you know, I enjoy bacon, so the heck with it. You know, to be effective, you know, how do we actually be effective? And I think that's where yoga, meditation, spiritual practice and an honesty, I think an integrity really begin to work together. And we can see essentially for me, the basic thing is in terms of the receptivity to the message is to broaden the discussion so that instead of this this old fashioned way of doing something which is, you know, I'm right, you're wrong, I'm a vegan, you're not a vegan, I'm more evolved than you because I'm not causing suffering. Therefore, you're obviously less evolved and you're because you are causing suffering or you are causing pollution. And, you know, this whole kind of implicit judgment and criticism and shaming really, of other people. And even if we don't say anything like that, even if I just say, well, I'm a vegan, people already feel like, oh, God, he judged me right now, you know, it can happen. It can be very polarizing because the thing is, people don't freely choose to eat animal based foods. No one freely chooses to to eat these foods. We only do it because from the time we're little infants, we're participating in rituals. And it's very important. I think. So this is what I basically talk about. I talk about the cultural programing or indoctrination and conditioning that we all go through and show that whether we're vegans or vegetarians or omnivores or wherever we are on the spectrum, that we're all in the same boat, basically.

Will Tuttle:
We've all been wounded by being raised in a culture that is based on hurting animals. So I invented a word basically called herder ism, which is the mentality that is endemic or inherent in a culture that's organized around hurting animals. And we don't think of ourselves as living in a hurting culture because we think those cultures were long ago, far away when people were out with animals all the time. But we have just simply industrialized it and we do it on a larger scale than ever. It's massive. I mean, the the number of animals that we're killing every day, just, for example, say in the United States, 75 million is a very conservative estimate. It takes an enormous industrialized killing machine to do that every day, routinely and relentlessly. And it only happens because we have a population of people who have been raised in a culture where they've been taught to demand these foods. You know, if people stop demanding these foods, it would stop completely, you know, instantly. So we're born into a herding culture, an industrialized herding culture. We're forced from the time we're little kids by very well-meaning people, our parents, teachers, neighbors, you know, religious leaders and so forth, government officials and so forth. They're all they're all basically, I think, well-meaning. They want us to eat the foods that are going to be. Healthy for us, but they've also been indoctrinated. And this goes back. As I as I discuss and show and demonstrate actually in the world, peace diet goes back about 10,000 years when people first started owning animals as property for food. The word for that is herding. And the herding cultures have certain characteristics. They tend to be patriarchal because it's about not just humans dominating animals, but really more specifically, it's about men dominating female animals, impregnating them against their will, stealing their babies. And so there's this basic teaching of repressing the sacred feminine dimension of consciousness and of life and of seeing females as just objects to be used. And I think when we're raised in that society, whether we're females or males, we're harmed enormously by that kind of underlying violence that's going on all the time that we're paying for, but we're not just paying for it and causing it.

Will Tuttle:
We're actually eating it, right? It becomes the very cells of the body that we're using. So it's so this herding of animals. I think what the main point that I've discovered and that I share with people and I think it's very effective because it's the truth. You know, I love Gandhi's teaching where he basically said, you don't try to change other people. All you can change is one person yourself. If I can bring myself into alignment with these teachings in a deep way, then by how I speak and and it's not so much what we say, I think it's how we say it. And even more than that, it's who we are when we say it, it's who is the being that's actually speaking. And I think when we're embodying what veganism is, which is, as you said, ahimsa or non harmfulness, another word for that, I think is respect. Another word is kindness, gentleness. I think tenderness, mercy. You know, these words essentially are pointing at a quality of consciousness that is available to us, but that is repressed by being raised in a society where ritualistic early every single day, like you said, probably three times a day. We're eating the flesh and secretions of animals who have been abused physically, psychologically, in every possible way. And we have to understand that every culture does this and every culture transmits its values from generation to generation. That's what cultures do. It's not like we don't have to blame our culture. Cultures do that. They do it through rituals. The main ritual in any society is the meals of that culture. When people sit down and eat food, we're not just eating food. We're eating a whole series of attitudes that go in and it's invisible. And it's it's we don't even know it. It just happens. But these attitudes that go in at a deep level, like I said earlier, the domination and repression of the sacred feminine dimension and the creating a culture that's based on seeing animals, other living beings as objects, imprisoning them. It gave rise also for the very first time actually on planet Earth to a wealthy, elite class that owned capital. The old ancient Latin word capita means head, as in head of sheep and goats, head of stock, you know, livestock.

Will Tuttle:
So we have this arising of a culture based on the domination of most of the society by a wealthy elite class. The the Kings. I used to teach college courses in these ancient texts like the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Iliad, The Odyssey, you know, these ancient writings, you can just read them. These kings are in power. They're controlling most of the institutions in the society. They're rich and powerful because they own animals. They're eating a lot of meat and that's that has status. You know, this is what we see. This is. And we're in that same culture today. It's come through through the generations. And also, they invented two other institutions that we still have with us. One is war, the ancient Sanskrit word go, which means cow gives rise to this word gavia, which means war. It means the desire for more cows. That's war, the ancient word. So war came from this. And all the violence of war, the horror of war and slavery. Because whoever lost the war in those ancient times, the animals became the property of the victors. But so did the people. So we had this whole transformation, a very slow transformation of a of a more peaceful, I think, more aware society, at least a society where animals were treated with respect to a patriarchal, violent and really in many ways bellicose society or, you know, whole tribes that were like this and and these these people began to dominate and exploit and overthrow others. And this this thing spread, basically. And we see we can see how it spread through from the eastern Mediterranean region into Central Asia, northern Mediterranean to Europe to North and South America. It's spreading really as we speak through the through the, you know, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Burger King, ConAgra, Cargill, Monsanto. This whole web of corporations and financial institutions and governmental agencies that are all part of that same herding culture and the mentality of domination and violence. So for me, just explaining that I don't have I'm not blaming anyone. It's like for whatever reason, 10,000 years ago in what is today Iraq, people thought they had to imprison animals and confine them and then eat them and then eat their dairy products later and so forth.

Will Tuttle:
That's okay. I mean, if they had to do that, whatever. But why? Why are we doing it now? It's obviously completely dysfunctional. It takes enormous quantities of land and water and petroleum causes ridiculous amounts of pollution, climate destabilization, cutting down of rainforest destruction of oceans. We get foods that are absolutely toxic to us. They concentrate toxins. We have heavy metals, PCBs, dioxins, nuclear radiation, all concentrated in these foods, plus the acid, you know, the acidification, the inflammatory quality of animal proteins, the saturated fat, cholesterol, all this stuff. It's like, what in the world are we thinking? We you know, if we if we were actually logical, rational people, we would just we wouldn't have to talk about it. We would we would all be vegan a long time ago. The thing is, we're not really logical and rational. We're much more tribal in the sense we we just want to be like everybody else. We don't want to be different from the people around us. And we and we have a certain image of ourselves and that gets very deeply ingrained into us and we trust our parents. It's such a deep level. So when people hear these ideas, it creates, you know, an opening in them very often. But then there's the cognitive dissonance. And I think that's why it's important for us as activists to be kind and loving to people, because if people are wounded and they are wounded, we're all wounded, it's not going to help them to then criticize them and kick them, you know, while they're down. You know, the whole idea is to be loving and show, gosh, you know, I discovered this is the basic idea. You know, I discovered that the only reason I was eating animal foods all those years was because I was just following orders. And then I realized these orders are not in my best interest. I'm not doing it anymore. And it's fantastic. Now, that basic message, I think, is really the truth. That's satyagraha, what Gandhi said. I'm just speaking my own truth. I'm sharing that truth with kindness and respect. And I have to say, Daniel, we've been able to go to places like the cornfield, you know, small cities and towns in Iowa, in Oklahoma, and share this message in local libraries with people who are definitely not vegetarian or vegan.

Will Tuttle:
And no one argues, I mean, because it's just no one no one argues it's true. I mean, everyone knows that the only reason anyone eats animal foods is because we're following orders. We're products of our communities. We do know it's really not in our best interest health wise, environmentally wise. We understand that. So there's really nothing to argue about. It's just basically sharing these ideas and with a loving way and then planting those seeds. And like the Bhagavad Gita says, don't be attached to the fruit of your actions. You know, basically just plant a seed, let go, and then trust that people at a deeper level will wake up and that their intuition and wisdom is functioning. And I think that's what we're doing. Like what we're doing right now is just, you know, sharing our ideas. But we can't change anybody. People when they come to this change on their own, then they're motivated and then they're activated and they're and they're, I think, much more able to then be effective in their own way at sharing and being part of the solution.

Daniel Aaron:
Yeah, well said. Well, now, now that you said all of that, I wonder, would you say is there any downside to eating meat for us?

Will Tuttle:
Any downside to eating meat?

Daniel Aaron:
I'm just joking. I mean, that was such. Right. You know, and I know that you were just touching really on on very briefly and, you know, to hear the way you speak so eloquently and succinctly about it, it's just there. As you said, there's nothing to debate. There's just so many reasons why it's crazy that we would eat meat and there's so many different angles and perspectives. And, you know, for me, I started I stopped eating meat because because I got the connection that ethically it didn't make sense. I love animals and I love beings and it doesn't make sense to participate in killing them. And then when I discovered, oh, hey, there are health benefits. Oh, and actually it's, you know, beneficial for the environment, Like, Oh great. That's, that's a really good bonus. Um, and there's two areas that I want to jump into with you about this. One is. What are our food choices have to do with our intuitive and psychic abilities? And also and this I think these two are related where it goes in terms of creating peace on the planet. We're at such an interesting time in our planet's history where there is more division and animosity than we've ever had before, which for me and and for what we're doing on the yoga teacher training is great news because it means that yoga is still growing for some reason. There's there's we have an army of people that are trained to address this division and conflict in the world, and those are yoga teachers. So and but before, though, before I before we come to that, I want to just take a moment to thank our sponsor, Longevity Drops. And, you know, Longevity Drops is it's it's such a simple, easy thing that we can do to benefit our health. And you know, I know for me, when I when I became vegetarian, I was a junk food vegetarian in the beginning, I had no idea about nutrition, you know, And I ate Kraft macaroni and cheese every meal. And I thought that that was being a healthy person. And then as I started to learn about nutrition, then I got to discover super nutrition. And that's really what what herbal medicine is all about.

Daniel Aaron:
And, you know, part of what I love about this is just a little bottle. And the way I do it and it's so easy is you just a dropper full of this in the morning and the evening and it's just power packed essence and tonic herbs like chaga and Romanian cordyceps and hoshu wu and blended in in coconut glycerin and really high quality way it's eating vegetarian is fantastic because it will take away a lot of the toxicity that comes to us in other ways. And then when we have the ability to supplement with such beneficial things as tonic herbs, it's just a bonus, a blessing for us. Um, and well, and before I turn over, back to you, Will, to respond to what I'm saying, if you would, I want to let people know about what we're doing on the teacher training in May at Omega Institute. And, and I think part of what I want to say about this is, you know, I hear people say a lot of times like, I'm not I can't really do yoga because I'm I'm stiff or I haven't really done that before, which is kind of like saying, you know, I'm too out of shape to go to the gym. Well, and the idea is, hey, this is the place we go in order to create this. And and I'm really excited for myself, having been in Bali for the last 13 years and back in the US to be partnering with Omega Institute and have so many amazing teachers like yourself. Part of what we're doing to take people who, you know, maybe are already teaching yoga or maybe just a little bit interested in yoga and have 26 immersive days to really get into the essence of what yoga is from, from all perspectives, from the physical practice, of course, but also the the education and the philosophy and and maybe most importantly, the community. And you've addressed this already in beautiful ways here that we tend to do what we see around us. We tend to be what we see around us. So the blessing of coming together for for a month with like minded people who are devoted to not just being peaceful, not just being healthy, but being lights in the world and, you know, and just like you said, what Gandhi said, what we can do is change ourselves.

Daniel Aaron:
We can be that change. And the more of us that are doing that, the bigger the impact in the greater world. And I really think that that's why, you know, that's why we've got such a crazy time on the planet right now. And that's why the the political world has shifted into such craziness. And ridiculousness is to to wake us up, to say, you know what, It's time for those of us who believe in peace, those of us who believe in yoga, and there's so many people that are practicing yoga to actually step up and really be leaders for a change in the world right now. And yeah, you know, I personally have this faith and a lot of people would say it's crazy given the the evidence that we have in the world right now. I have a faith that we actually can have a world where there is not war, where there is peace everywhere. And I have a faith that that we can all wake up to the to the idea that animals are beings worthy of love and respect, just like. Her brothers and sisters and parents and children. And, you know, and I know that these are very interrelated possibilities. So all that said, you know, what can you say about this connection between intuition and and food and peace and and the possibility for a whole new way of being.

Will Tuttle:
In the Yeah. Thank you. Thanks, Daniel. And yeah, I think there's so many things you said that I agree. I agree with everything you're saying. And I think the fact that you're going to be able to do an immersive intensive at Omega is terrific. There's something in all the world religions and wisdom traditions. It's called the I would say, right you there's the the eightfold path of the Buddha that has Right. Right. Livelihood and right speech, right thought and right meditation and so forth. But one of them that I think is sort of underlies all of those is right association that whoever we associate with, we become like them. And I think it's important really for us to choose our friends and colleagues and partners and so forth very carefully and to take advantage of opportunities to get together with like minded people who share ideals that we want to grow and deepen in ourselves. And I think that kind of opportunity is is incredibly important and powerful. And I think that's really in a sense, what we're doing right now is is creating a community at this moment, you know, for sort of a virtual community where we're sharing about ideas. And I think these are the kinds of communities that can transform the dysfunctionality of the community that we're born into. And I'm really glad that you you brought up the idea of intuition and also world peace. Of course, I wrote the World Peace Diet. I've written another book that just came out called Your Inner Islands The Keys to Intuitive Living and and this is something that I just can't estimate more strongly, which is that we all have an inner wisdom that is is present all the time. And in many ways I think it's been covered over by being raised in a society that's based on herding animals. It's based also on reducing people in many ways to commodities, to all of us, to to fit into a machine that's running here, an economic machine or a cultural machine. And so one of the things I talk about is, is the fact that there are five dimensions of health that we are, I think, very advised to become aware of When we think of being healthy.

Will Tuttle:
Most of us think of our physical health, our biological health or having a healthy body, and that's one for other ones. And the underlying idea is that animal agriculture or herding animals and eating the foods of these animals is devastating and and eroding and harmful to all five levels of health. We really need. I think it's important for us to be very clear about this, that animal based foods do not help us on any one any of these five dimensions of health. So what are these five dimensions of health besides the physical health? There's three of them really, that are the outer world. So there's our physical health, our physical body. There's also our environmental health, the health of our earth. And then there's also a cultural health or the health of our society. Those are the three outer dimensions of health. And I think we all know that they're all interrelated and all very important. It's really virtually impossible for us to be radiantly healthy physically if the environment is all messed up, right? If the water is polluted and the soil is eroded and the food is contaminated and the air air is, you know, and the climate and and the oceans are being destroyed and so forth. All of this erodes the health of ecosystems that we depend on for our physical health. So we have to really understand clearly that animal agriculture is by far the number one most devastating activity that human beings engage in in terms of environmental destruction. I could talk for a long time about it, and I've already mentioned a few things, but I recommend see the movie Cowspiracy if you have a chance or just do some research. But basically all the levels of environmental devastation, mainly because animal agriculture is so wasteful, it takes enormous quantities. A very conservative estimate is 10 to 110 times the amount of land to feed one person eating a standard American diet as feeding one person excuse me, as feeding ten people a plant based diet, especially if it's organic. So we can really feed. We can. This is such a good news. I mean, the basic idea in all this is good news, really good news.

Will Tuttle:
We can really drastically and dramatically heal our world in. Environmentally as we move toward a plant based way of eating. The amount of land that we'll need to have destroyed. We're cutting down rainforests right now at an acre per second in the Amazon. We can't even wrap our minds around what it is to cut down an acre per second of of ancient forest and destroy habitat and cause the mass extinction of between 1 and 200 is the estimate of species. Every single day is going extinct because of cutting down and destroying habitat to grow soybeans, to feed, to imprison cows, pigs, chickens and imprisoned fishes eat an enormous amount of soybeans. So this soy production to feed animals, to fatten up animals, to get dairy products and meat and eggs is driven by people taking out their wallets and voting for eating meat, eating these foods. That's the voting booth. And so it's very important, I think, for us to realize that environmentally our oceans are being destroyed, our rainforests are being destroyed, our climate and soil and aquifers are being sucked dry. We see evidence of this. We live in an RV for 17 years traveling around all over North America, and now we travel worldwide. And it's clear we just got back from Africa not too long ago. I mean, the the absolute slaughter of elephants and zebras and giraffes and all these other these animals lions is because Kentucky Fried Chicken and Burger King and so forth are moving to Africa and they need to grow a lot more soybeans and corn to feed these imprisoned animals. And now these free living wild animals, these iconic animals are now pests. They're now get rid of them. You know, that's the basic mentality we have in the United States and in the West in general. We have governmental institutions and agencies that kill millions of coyotes and bobcats every year. So it's a war. Animal agriculture is a war against wildlife. A war against environmental health. Moving to a plant based diet is by far the best thing anyone can do for environmental health, but also for cultural health, because we have to understand again that a healthy society is a society of justice, of equality, of caring and kindness, and animal agriculture is the exact opposite of these things.

Will Tuttle:
We're feeding enormous quantities of grain and petroleum and water to a relatively wealthy elite, those who live in industrialized nations where it's relatively easy for us with our high powered economies to vote up the price of grain on the world market, to feed to our imprisoned cows, pigs and chickens and go to the store and buy meat, dairy products and eggs. When we do that, we are we are making it impossible for people in less industrialized nations to afford that grain. And they're starving. And that hunger is not only a massive injustice, but it is well understood to be the driving force behind conflict and war which caused even more problems and the environmental devastation. It's the poorer countries of the world that get most of the environmental devastation caused by those of us in the in the wealthier countries. So really moving to a plant based diet is a is an act of justice, not just to the animals and to wildlife and ecosystems and future generations, but also to hungry people and to reduce the war machine. We're going to have a war machine if we're going to have animal agriculture. As I said, the first word for war was was the desire for cows. You know, animal agriculture and war go together. And they always have. But this is a terrible, devastating institution in terms of happiness for human beings and refugees and all of the problems of war. It goes on and on. I mean, it just it just keeps building from this. So moving to a plant based diet is the foundation of bringing more health to our society. And also, just remember that there's a whole army of workers who have to kill animals and impregnate them on rape racks and steal their babies and electroshock them. And we pay for them. And we're paying basically people to do work that brings out the worst in them. And these workers have the highest rates of work related injuries, but also among the highest rates of suicide and drug addiction and alcoholism. So again, to understand that animal agriculture essentially is a web of trauma to ecosystems and to and to other people and to our society. And so when we eat that stuff, it's also traumatic to our body because it's constituted.

Will Tuttle:
It's constituted of of of so-called nutrients that are really hard for our body to deal with. That's a whole other conversation we get into. But basically that's our physical health. So what I've discovered like I've been a vegan now for 38 years and I haven't been to a doctor essentially in 38 years. And I think in general, people who eat a healthy, organic, Whole Foods plant based diet, not only does the food become enormously delicious and and much more environmentally sustainable and creating a foundation for health in our in our environmentally, but also culturally and physically. But then the other two. Mentions of health besides physical, environmental and cultural, are the internal dimensions of health, and those are psychological or emotional health and finally, spiritual or ethical health. And I think this is where intuition comes in. The basic idea, just briefly, is that if I'm eating animal based foods, I'm not just eating foods that are toxic physically in all these ways I've been talking about I'm eating attitudes that are also quite toxic. The underlying attitudes in animal agriculture are, like you said earlier, disconnectedness. I'm not going to make the connection. I'm taught not to make the connection between what I'm eating and what it took to get it onto my plate. And so the ability to make connections is the definition of intelligence. Essentially cultural intelligence as well as individual intelligence. And so being forced to sit down and eat animal based foods really were being unfortunately dumbed down in our natural capacities of empathy and intelligence and awareness and wisdom are repressed. We're forced to see beings as objects. We're forced to just not look deeply, feel deeply care, deeply listen deeply. And that shallowness makes it very easy for large institutions to exploit people. And we're much more likely to just believe the official stories because animal agriculture is the official narrative. The basic subtext of every meal is just trust the authorities. Don't trust your own intuition, don't trust your own feelings, don't look, don't really look at what you're doing. Just go along like the emperor has no clothes. Just pretend that what you're eating is just chicken, right? Or it's just a hamburger.

Will Tuttle:
We're not eating cows or pigs. We're eating. You know that. That's such a lie. And and it really reduces our intelligence. And so that basic understanding that the attitudes of disconnectedness, of commodification, of life, of might makes right of the domination of the feminine. The spirituality in many ways is about cultivating the sacred feminine dimension of life. I refer to this in the World Peace diet as Sophia. Sophia is the ancient Greek goddess of wisdom, and I think there's a reason for that wisdom. In all the traditions, whatever they are. I've noticed I used to teach college courses in comparative religion, and it's typically wisdom is typically a feminine goddess because it represents the inner capacity of us, whatever gender we are to be receptive receptivity is the feminine, you know, like in China, in Chinese, there's the yin and the yang. Yin is is receptivity. Yang is action. And the basic idea is we can never be effective in our action if we can't be really truly receptive in Yin, you know. So but animal agriculture is about just repressing this receptivity and just and just always be doing something all the time. So we have a whole society where in general we're just we're not peaceful. We're not comfortable with turning our attention within and listening with being receptive, with looking deeply and and trying to be aware of the consequences of our actions. This is all the sacred feminine and also the sacred feminine is about caring and kindness. Like when a mother gives birth to a little baby. This feminine love, this unconditional love kicks in and it's the foundation of everything. If we're not going to be healthy physically, psychologically, or in any way, if our mother ignores us or after we're born, right and doesn't care about us, we're going to die physically and psychologically. We'll be very damaged. So this is the foundation of everything of a healthy people, healthy society. Healthy world is the loving, caring, giving nature of the feminine dimension. But what does animal agriculture? It's the opposite of that. Babies are always stolen from their mothers. When a mother, cow or pig gives birth to a little baby, they want to love and protect and nurture and nurse that little baby.

Will Tuttle:
But in every case, whether it's an organic backyard operation or it's a big factory farm operation, it's not your baby. That's my baby. I own you. I own your baby. I'm going to steal your baby. I'm going to kill your baby. I'm going to impregnate you again. I'm going to steal your baby again. I mean, it's this massive violence, sexual abuse, and also the breaking down of the most precious sacred bond of the mother and the child. We do that millions of times a day. It's the foundation of our entire society. We have to understand we've been wounded by this. We've been born into it. We've been taught even not only to vote for it and make it happen, but to eat it. You know, as little kids, we're eating this stuff. So our basic spirituality and ethics have been shut down. We're raised in a society of competition. And so what veganism is really is not veganism. It's simply it's ahimsa. It's coming back. It's an intuition. It's peace, liberation, freedom, but it's basically coming back to our true nature. And I agree with you, Daniel. I think that there is a time coming soon when. We as caterpillars are going to become butterflies. I mean, we're going to we're going to we're going to we're in this outward eating, kind of destroying, gobbling up the world, consuming everything mentality. And it's becoming obvious we cannot do this much longer with nuclear weapons, with machines that can cut down rainforests an acre per second and overfish the oceans. It's time for us to turn within and reconnect with our purpose here and emerge as different beings. And I think some of us feel that calling and and just everything we can do to live this and understand this will give our life meaning. And we are really the ones, I think, that are essentially paving, I hate to use the word paving, but pioneering the way to a world where peace and freedom and justice and sustainability are actually possible. And they are possible. This earth is beautiful. It's abundant. There's nothing stopping us from a positive, beautiful future for ourselves and our children.

Will Tuttle:
Except for one thing, really, which is this this this mentality of violence in our food and eating. This is our most intimate connection with nature. And our world is food. We have got to get to the food we've got and our and our way of eating and relating. And so I think if we as we question that and bring that into harmony with our own inner wisdom, we create a whole other world. And imagining a vegan society actually is imagining a completely different world. And it's a beautiful thing to imagine because I think as we move in that as we transition in that direction, we'll see enormous healing forces unleashed. And we're already starting to see that. I think the more we have community gardens and farmers markets and more energy self-sufficiency and more connection with the Earth and more spiritual consciousness, more yoga and so forth, we're creating that that world right now. And I think this is the most important thing to focus on is this understanding this and living it.

Daniel Aaron:
Absolutely. Yeah. Well, you said it really well. Well, you know, and part of where I get excitement these days is this may be a reach. And I don't know if anyone's thought about or talked about it. And you mentioned earlier when we were talking about, you know, do we do we say anything to people about their food choices and we don't want to blame or push them away. But like like The Lorax said, you know, I am the Lorax and I speak for the trees. And animals don't have voices that most humans are hearing. And right now, one of the exciting things happening culturally is this MeToo movement, right? Where so many, so many women's voices that have been restrained or suppressed, repressed in the past are coming forward and saying, saying, hold on, now, it's time for the truth to come out. And and I'm hoping and seeing that, well, hey, this is, you know, species ism is just as real as sexism or racism and or homophobia. And, you know, soon we're coming to a MeToo in the voice of animals saying, hold on, you know, me, too. I want to have babies. I want to be happy. I want to live. Thank you.

Will Tuttle:
Yeah, that's a powerful, very important point. Yeah.

Daniel Aaron:
Yeah. And hey, we're going to I think we're going to wind down in a couple of minutes. I want to also let people know two things. One is if you have questions or comments, please toss them into the comments. Say hello and I'll be going through all of the comments. And also, if anyone wants to learn more about this kind of stuff and really make some powerful changes in your life and for whatever reason, you're not able or wanting to join us at Omega Institute for the full four week teacher training. I just created something brand new that I'm really excited about, which is a online learning institute, a spiritual mentorship membership where people can join on a monthly basis. And we've got a an online community, a virtual community, which is just to me, so amazing that we have the technology allows us to connect in ways that that we never could have before. And, you know, I've been working with people one on one. And in these in-person trainings, which is a big investment in time and money, and now I have the chance to work with people, you know, where we do live, group coaching calls, and I can put my information and learnings and lessons online. And there's just one more day to get the early bird discount for that if anyone wants to. And last thing I'll say about it for now, anyone on this show who wants to join in, I will also give you a bonus 1 to 1 coaching session to kick start it for you. And and well, you know, as I see the time, there's so much that we could talk about here, so much that's just this conversation is so important. And I know that the crowd that we have here, the people watching this show, are already quite aware of and warm to this conversation. So I guess my last question or two questions, here are one, is there anything that I've missed asking you about or anything that you want to share about this conversation or what's coming up for you? And two, for the people that are already hip to this conversation that are maybe choosing to live a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle and aware of the consequences of their food, what else can can they be doing that will further our common cause here?

Will Tuttle:
Yeah, thanks. Thanks, Daniel. And that sounds like a great thing you're doing with your membership group. And I agree. This is. It's so wonderful we can get together beyond all national borders and so forth and create these communities. Yeah The only thing that maybe I didn't have a chance to touch on, I mean, there's many things really, but one of the things we just finished quite a few different lecture tours, one in here in North America, a two month lecture tour to the southern part of the north of the United States, and then before that, China, India, Europe and then before that, some other, you know, worldwide tours over the last year or two. And just to really emphasize to everyone that vegan this movement we're talking about veganism, say, or vegetarianism as a spiritual and social movement as well as for our own health, is an international movement that's booming in many countries. Seeing vegan restaurants in Dubai and Cape Town in in all over all over Asia. I mean, China, it's just it's huge. India. It's growing very quickly also. And there's a lot I can talk about that. But essentially to realize that this is probably the I think, anyway, the defining movement of our time, because it's bringing, as you said, the MeToo idea, you know, to the most inclusive is inclusive as we can be to include all beings, not not only those of us who are women, but those of us who are cows, pigs and chickens. You know that we also have interests and that our interests are as important to us as as humans are. Interests are important to them. You know, we we're completely able to experience psychological and physical, physical suffering and and the amount of abuse that we're we human beings are inflicting on on other animals is so enormous. And it boomerangs back. And so I just want to, you know, really thank you for creating the space for this kind of conversation. If people are interested in knowing more about the world peace diet approach to living, we have a website world peace diet.com and in will Tuttle my name.com music and art. I'm a musician an artist we try to essentially bring this message through beauty, through harmony and also through I guess what you could call spiritual approaches like guided meditations, reading to understand the interconnectedness of all life and understand that, like the ancient spiritual teachings always said that whatever we sow.

Will Tuttle:
We will reap ourselves. So it's wonderful to be kind and loving to animals just for for that that's really the main reason. But also realize that if we're not if we abuse animals and make them sick, we're going to be abused and we're going to be sick. If we let them be free, we'll be free. If we imprison them, we'll be imprisoned. If we enslave them, we'll be enslaved. If we you know, whatever we do, it comes back to us in this life or the next. Right? So just really understand the bigger picture that what we are, each one of us is an expression of eternal consciousness, and that from that point of view, we can look with eyes of, of respect to all other expressions of eternal consciousness and realize that we're all in this together and that our happiness is interconnected. We've been born into a culture where in many ways our consciousness has been colonized by a force that is really not in our best interest. But we do have the power to question that, to question the values and actions and attitudes that we have internalized, and to transform those and to transform our behavior. And that when we do that, we become an example that can help others. So I think the whole thing is not so much to try to change other people, but really to change ourselves and then let our changed self just be creatively engaged in sharing. However we feel intuitively is the right way to share this message. And I think there's no one right way to do it. Each one of us has our own unique piece to the puzzle, so we're happy to work with anyone and we have a training. Also the facilitator training, which you can find out about at our website. And we're happy to work with people and coordinate lectures. We travel anywhere really all over the all over the United States and worldwide and, and give lectures and workshops and things too. And there's just a fantastic network of people that are unified by this movement. And I think it's great to be part of something that is based on radical inclusion like you're talking about and based on an ancient wisdom traditions that also are in alignment with the most modern scientific understanding of everything.

Will Tuttle:
So it's there is really it's A11 fundamental teaching that has to do with a deeper understanding of who we are that we can each explore on our own and share with others.

Daniel Aaron:
Nicely said. Yeah, it's beautiful that we've we're making such great progress. And I'm really glad to hear what you're saying about other nations and cultures really embracing this movement and and super encouraging. And so Will, thank you for being such a beautiful, non-judgmental voice, you know, an inclusive voice with such experience and education and really leading the way for this and being the voice for the animals. And you wanted to say something else?

Will Tuttle:
No, I. I appreciate what you're saying, Daniel. And I want to just thank everyone who's watching and listening, because I think if you're here and you're part of this message and you can then turn your attention out into the world and speak up in whatever way is, I think not so much to like like we've been saying to blame other people or criticize them, but just to share the good news that I realized the only reason I've been eating animal foods is because I was just following orders. It's not in our best interests. I'm not doing it anymore. And it's fantastic just to understand what that means and to to free ourselves from the cultural narrative that's based on domination and exploitation and oppression and create a new narrative based on inclusion and kindness. And that's the real health is the spiritual health from that all the other kinds of health actually flow.

Daniel Aaron:
Absolutely. And one of the subtitles for this show is how to break free from the Matrix and Master One's own life. And and one of the most basic things is that choice of, well, what am I going to eat? And actually what do I want to eat rather than just what the model was that I was sold as a kid without thinking about it. So yeah, Nicely said. And thank you again to Longevity Drops our sponsor. Y'all. I hope you come over and join me for the membership mentorship, Your Vibrant Life now it's called and our Community is Growing. A family of vibrant living. It's super exciting. And. And that's it for now. Next week, I'm very excited. For next Wednesday, we're going to have Jenny Blake, author of Pivot. The Only Move That Matters is your next one, which is also about how to live your life in a way that's meaningful to you in terms of career and income and your mission on the planet. She's an amazing speaker and we're lucky to have her next week. And until then, I am so grateful for you all for being here. This has been the art of vibrant living. Show Your host, Daniel Aaron Will, thanks again. Thanks, everybody, for tuning in. See you next time.

Will Tuttle:
All right. Great.

Daniel Aaron:
Bye.

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