Yogi Cameron achieved fame as a runway model and music video muse, but left the world of high fashion in 1998 to pursue a different path. Today, Cameron utilizes yoga in combination with meditation, herbal remedies and diet guidance to set his clients on a road to mental, physical, and spiritual health. We talked with the guru about the diet ethics laid out in his new book, “The One Plan.”
When I was younger, I ate a lot of sweets. I grabbed whatever cakes, cookies, and candies I could find, and in any given week ate my weight in chocolate. Once I began to learn about the Yogic path and began to follow a more natural way of life, these habits of course came to an end: slowly, and with great effort.
Ayurveda Yoga Diet
The ancient sages of India developed a natural way of life and wellbeing known as Ayurveda—a medical system that addresses each person’s individual constitution when resolving diseases and creating a balanced lifestyle. Ayurveda teaches us that to have a healthy body we must have healthy digestion, and it utilizes herbal remedies as well as various therapeutic treatments to supplement a balanced eating regimen. We must live in accordance with what our body needs—not what we think it wants. When we do, we attain our ideal body weight. Our skin shines with vibrancy unmatched by anything attained by covering it up with makeup. We are healthy.
Digestion plays such an important part of an Ayurvedic way of life because if we eat too much, or if we eat too many processed foods, our body must commit extra resources to expelling those substances from our system. When the skin can no longer expel all of the toxins that are now in the system, we break out as a result.
My Diet Regimen
My eating regimen reflects the idea that we must protect and strengthen our digestion in order to remain healthy and balanced:
I eat a couple of times a day. I eat small meals so that I’m only half-full by the time I’m done. I eat simple, natural foods including vegetables, rice, fruit, and maybe some milk or a couple of slices of cheese. I don’t mix incompatible foods, such as dairy with fruit and hot foods with cold foods. I never eat meat, for meat’s low water content makes it difficult to digest and burdens the body. I also never eat for the last four or five hours before I go to bed, for it takes that long for food to leave the stomach. If we leave food in our stomach when we go to sleep, the reduced functionality of our dormant body makes it ill equipped to process what remains and leads to greater toxic build-up.
Ayurveda for the Individual
Perhaps the most significant aspect of the way I eat is that I consume the type of food that is right for me, but may not be the most beneficial for someone
else. I benefit from eating heavier food when I am moving around alot while filming my TV show or conducting promotional work for, “The One Plan.” However, for someone who leads a more sedentary life, heavier food would be detrimental to his or her balance. No matter what someone else may benefit from, we must always consider our individual situation and constitution when structuring a diet around an Ayurvedic way of life.
As I state in The One Plan, “Consuming processed, unnatural, genetically modified, and nonorganic foods compromises your digestion and wreaks havoc on your immune system.” When your immune system is compromised, so is everything else.
There may be days in which you, like I did, feel like eating your weight in chocolate. But this is a habit best left behind.
Slowly, and with great effort.
