RULES OF FLETCHERISM
Never Eat until Hungry--Mouth-Treatment of Solid and Liquid Food--When
to Stop Eating--Instructions to the Medical Department of the U. S.
Army
To make my ideas a little clearer, I will elaborate them a little more.
Remember that the rules are exceedingly simple. That, to my mind, is
the worst obstruction to the general adoption of my system: it is so
simple that many find it difficult to comprehend. But take these rules
and you have the idea.
FIRST RULE
Don't take any food until you are "good and hungry."
Some people will reply: "I am always hungry." Others will aver that
they "never know what it is to be hungry." We may assume that both
replies are incorrect, because hunger must be intermittent, and must
sometimes be present, or life would be intolerable through lack of
satisfaction and something to satisfy.
The question, "What is hunger?" is a natural and legitimate one, for
the reason that there are true appetites and false cravings. True
hunger for food is indicated by "watering of the mouth"--not that
watering of the mouth, or profuse flow of saliva, through artificial
excitement by some pungent stimulant, such as sweets, or acids or
spiced things; but that which is excited on thought of some of the
simplest of foods, such as bread and butter, or dry bread alone.
"All-goneness" in the region of the stomach, "faintness," or any of
the discomforts that are felt below the guillotine line, are not signs
of true hunger, but symptoms of indigestion, or some other form of
disease. True hunger is never a discomfort unless a growing desire
may be classed as a discomfort. Accumulating appetite (true hunger) is
like the multiplication of uncut and uncashed coupons on a railway bond
or on a Government bond. The feeling of possession is a joy of itself;
and the ability to collect the proceeds when needed and at leisure
is comfortable rather than uncomfortable. Under circumstances of
intelligent nutrition, if we pass one meal-time we wait patiently for
the next, with the knowledge that we are accumulating appetite coupons.
SECOND RULE
Have you yet learned what true hunger is?
Don't go on unless you have done so. Take a little more time; skip a
meal or two, and give Nature a chance to show you what real appetite
(true watering of the mouth) is. Having learned to recognise healthy
hunger and appetite, and to know what it is to have both of them
begging you for satisfaction, proceed with the second rule.
From the food available at the time take that first which appeals most
strongly to the appetite. It may be a sip of soup, or a bite of bread
and butter, or a nibble of cheese, or, perhaps a lump of sugar. It may
be a piece of meat, though I doubt that a true appetite will call for
such at the beginning of a meal. Never mind what it may be, give it a
trial. If it be something that should be masticated in order to give
the saliva a chance to mix with it and chemically transform it, chew it
"for all that it is worth."
"For all that it is worth" means for the extraction and enjoyment of
all the good taste there is in it.
If the food selected by the appetite happens to be soup, or milk, or
some mushy substance, get all the good taste out of it, doing all
you can to accomplish this; for to get the taste out of food is an
assurance of digesting it, and the pleasure it gives in the process
of Nature's way of getting you to do the right thing in helping her
to nourish yourself properly. Sip, taste, bite, press with the tongue
against the roof of the mouth, the food in the mouth, not because of
any suggestion of mine, but in response to the natural instinct to move
it about and get out of it all the taste there is in it.
THIRD RULE
The moment appetite begins to slack up a bit, the moment saliva does
not flow so freely as at first, the moment there is any degree of
satisfaction of the appetite, stop eating!
You will have a return of appetite; you will have another chance to
eat; appetite is beginning to have "that tired feeling" herself; be
kind to her as she has been kind to you. Give her a rest! Give her
a rest! Give yourself a rest! Rest is the antidote of "that tired
feeling"! Therefore rest the appetite before it gets tired. Stop
eating before you are overloaded.
Now, having learned how to do the right thing in eating so as never
more to have "that tired feeling," don't begin to overdo. Don't bend
backward too far. Don't ever overdo a good thing.
Be temperate; be deliberate. Be thoughtful; be forethoughtful; be
forethoughtful without being fearthoughtful. Don't overdo chewing, for
then you take away much of the pleasure; smother the psychic enjoyment
of eating, and raise the very mischief again.
Just be natural, and know that being natural is being deliberate in
enjoying the thing you are doing, for that is Nature's way.
* * * * *
To the above simple rules I will append a few recommendations which
occurred to me and which I wrote while in a respiration calorimeter,
an experience which I will relate in a subsequent chapter. This list
of recommendations has since been included in the Instructions to the
Medical Department of the United States Army, under the heading:
_Method of attaining Economic Assimilation of Nutriment and Immunity
from Disease, Muscular Soreness and Fatigue_.
(1) Feed only when a distinct appetite has been earned.
(2) Masticate all solid food until it is completely liquefied and
excites in an irresistible manner the swallowing reflex or swallowing
impulse.
(3) Attention to the act and appreciation of the taste are necessary,
meantime, to excite the flow of gastric juice into the stomach to meet
the food--as demonstrated by Pawlow.
(4) Strict attention to these two particulars will fulfil the
requirements of Nature relative to the preparation of the food for
digestion and assimilation; and this being faithfully done, the
automatic processes of digestion and assimilation will proceed most
profitably, and will result in discarding very little digestion-ash
(fæces) to encumber the intestines, or to compel excessive draft upon
the body energy for excretion.
(5) The assurance of healthy economy is observed in the small amount
of excreta and its peculiar inoffensive character, showing escape
from putrid bacterial decomposition such as brings indol and skatol
offensively into evidence.
(6) When digestion and assimilation has been normally economic, the
digestion-ash (fæces) may be formed into little balls ranging in size
from a pea to a so-called Queen Olive, according to the food taken, and
should be quite dry, having only the odour of moist clay or of a hot
biscuit. This inoffensive character remains indefinitely until the ash
completely dries, or disintegrates like rotten stone or wood.
(7) The weight of the digestive-ash may range (moist) from 10 grams
to not more than 40-50 grams a day, according to the food; the latter
estimate being based on a vegetarian diet, and may not call for
excretion for several days; smallness indicating best condition. Foods
differ so materially that the amount and character of the excreta
cannot be accurately specified. Some foods and conditions demand two
evacuations daily. Thorough and faithful Fletcherizing settles the
question satisfactorily.
(8) Fruits may hasten peristalsis[G]; but not if they are treated in
the mouth as sapid liquids rather than as solids, and are insalivated,
sipped, tasted, into absorption in the same way wine-tasters test and
take wine, and tea-tasters test tea. The latter spit out the tea after
tasting, as, otherwise, it vitiates their taste, and ruins them for
their discriminating profession.
[G] Forwarding muscular movement which advances food along the whole
extent of the alimentary canal.
(9) Milk, soups, wines, beer, and all sapid liquids or semi-solids
should be treated in this manner for the best assimilation and
digestion as well as for the best gustatory results.
(10) This would seem to entail a great deal of care and bother, and
lead to a waste of time.
(11) Such, however, is not the case. To give attention in the beginning
does require strict attention and persistent care to overcome life-long
habits of nervous haste; but if the attack is earnest, habits of
careful mouth treatment and appetite discrimination soon become fixed,
and cause deliberation in taking food unconsciously to the feeder.
(12) Food of a proteid value of 5-7 grams of nitrogen and 1,500-2,500
calories of fuel value,[H] paying strict attention to the appetite for
selection and carefully treated in the mouth, has been found to be the
quantity best suited to economy and efficiency of both mind and body
in sedentary pursuits and ordinary business activity; and, also, such
habit of economy has given practical immunity from the common diseases
for a period extending over more than fifteen years, whereas the same
subject was formerly subject to periodical illness. Similar economy and
immunity have shown themselves consistently in the cases of many test
subjects covering periods of ten years, and applies equally to both
sexes, all ages, and other idiosyncratic conditions.
[H] The organic materials of human diet are usually classified into
three divisions:--
(1) The Proteids, or Albuminates--the characterising element occurring
being nitrogen. The nitrogenous foods are: flesh (without the fat),
eggs, milk, cheese, legumes (peas, beans, lentils, etc.).
(2) The Fats, or Hydro-carbons. All animal and vegetable fats and oil.
Emulsions of mineral oils have been shown to pass through the system
unchanged, and therefore cannot be regarded as food.
(3) The Carbohydrates (sugars and starches): bread, potatoes, and
grain generally.
Protein is the tissue builder; heat and energy are derived largely
from the non-nitrogenous foods.
A Calorie (large) is the unit of heat required to raise one kilogram
of water to 1° C. The full value of a food is ascertained by means
of the calorimeter, or apparatus used to determine the specific heat
of substances, or the amounts of heat evolved or absorbed in various
physical and chemical changes. Calorimeters take very diverse forms,
varying from quite simple vessels to highly complex apparatus,
according to the particular kind of determination to be carried out in
them.
(13) The time necessary for satisfying complete body needs and appetite
daily, when the habit of attention, appreciation and deliberation have
been installed, is less than half an hour, no matter how divided as to
number of rations. This necessitates industry of mastication, to be
sure, and will not admit of waste of much time between mouthfuls.
(14) Ten or fifteen minutes will completely satisfy a ravenous appetite
if all conditions of ingestion and preparation are favourable.
(15) Both quantitive and qualitive supply of saliva are important
factors; but attention to these fundamental requirements of right
eating soon regulates the supply of all of the digestive juices, and
in connection with the care recommended above, ensures economy of
nutrition and, probably, immunity from disease.