At the end of the day, the most critical element in your fight against disease—yeah, even against the dreadful Covid—may be bound up in a little word called “balance.” Like Kenny Rogers sang, “You got to know when to hold them and know when to fold them.” It’s not as much about having a strong immune system as it is about having a smart one. There is an army in your body that can give your immune system that intelligence. It is a community of microbes called the microbiome.
Balance Your Immunity
Each species of microbes in this largely intestinal army has a specialized function in keeping you healthy. For instance, some of these microbian warriors help you metabolize nutrients, but others are critically involved in balancing the immune response against pathogens, ensuring that it is effective yet not injurious to the body. At least three new Covid studies—here, here, and here—add weight to the accumulating evidence of the important role that the microbiome plays in the homeostasis of overall health. Of course, this is not new knowledge. The great healers of the last century, such as Dr. John Christopher and Dr. Bernard Jensen, taught at length that the condition of the gut is the primary indicator of overall health.
We know all too well that the trademark death mantra of Covid is an out-of-control immune response. This means that if you want one of the most powerful defenses against Covid, Covid vaccine complications (such as Antibody Dependent Enhancement), or any other disease, then look no further than balancing and diversifying your microbiome.
It’s A Sick World
One of the reasons we are having such a tough time with acute disease right now, including Covid, is that we live in a high-stress, sick country, indeed, a sick world. About half of all American adults have one or more preventable, diet-related chronic diseases, including cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and obesity. Patients with these chronic illnesses have unbalanced hyperactive immune systems that can’t tell friend from foe because of their sickly gut microbiomes (which have often been poisoned by drugs and antibiotics). Did you get that? Half of all American adults have an impaired or missing microbiome army that can no longer effectively defend them. Without a balanced, vitally functioning microbiome the body simply cannot tell the life-threatening microbes from the beneficial ones. Consequently, an unmodulated immune system seriously injures or kills its host because it literally doesn’t “know when to hold or when to fold,” whether it’s the flu, heart disease, or Covid.
How To Restore Balance
Unless you are very old or very sick, it doesn’t take long to turn things around. Tending a healthy microbiome occupies a prominent place in doing that, along with diet, exercise, stress reduction, and good sleep. Here are six things you can do to send you on your way toward a healthier microbiome:
- Reduce toxicity by limiting drugs and antibiotics as much as possible, eliminating toxic personal and household products, eating organic, and minimizing emotional venom.
- Get outdoors and breathe different brands of microbial richness in as many different backcountries as possible.
- Play in the dirt. Weed the garden. When a plant is pulled out of the soil the microbes that are touched and inhaled dramatically improve the microbiome.
- Play with an animal. Each animal hosts a different combination of microbes. When we engage an animal it shares its unique colony with us.
- Eat microbe-nourishing wild ferments. And don’t forget that the gut loves fibrous foods like garlic, leeks, onions, apples, oats, and legumes. This will bring diversity and equilibrium to your body’s microbial community.
- Increase diet diversity. Occasionally eat foods that you don’t usually eat. Go to an ethnic grocery store every once in a while and buy a strange vegatable or fruit that you don’t usually eat. The molecular structures in these foods are different enough that they increase the diversity in the microbiome.
- Fast regularly. Periods of fasting enhance the function and expression of certain groups of microbes in the microbiome.
- Take cannabinoids. There is good evidence that cannabinoids, such as CBD and THC, improve the health of the microbiome by stimulating the balancing function of the endocannabinoid system.
Replace Fear with Intelligent Microbian Warriors
There is no need to huddle in fear before Covid or any other disease. Don’t let the media scare you with its manipulative focus, statistical shenanigans, and horror. Step away from fear and, instead, take these simple actions to improve your microbiome and build the best defense there is against disease. It will not only give you a strong natural immunity but will bring a life-saving balance to that immunity. It will give you a cheerful new lease on life and a fountain of hope in the midst of a sick and fearful world.