On the flip side of that coin there is a factor of equal -- if not greater -- importance that is sometimes completely overlooked and nearly always underestimated. This little discussed area of health maintenance concerns the elimination of waste and toxins from our body.

While it is practically impossible to overestimate the importance of putting good things into our body, it is more likely that we will underestimate the importance of getting the bad things out of our body.

It was Henry Wheeler Shaw who said, "A good reliable set of bowels is worth more to a man than any quantity of brains."

All cells must take in nutrients to maintain their metabolism and their life. As an end result of this metabolism, every one of our approximately 100 trillion cells also must produce waste material. To maintain optimal health, we must eliminate this waste efficiently.

Every cell and every organ in our body eliminates waste and is effected by waste elimination from the body as a whole. It is up to our colon to eliminate the bulk of the most toxic and putrid waste in our body.

When we obtain energy from the food we eat, we create a waste product (feces) that should be eliminated within 24 hours or less. But with a meat-based, high-fat, low-fiber diet, the average American has a transit time of 72 to 96 hours, meaning this waste begins a toxic build-up that creates numerous problems for the colon and every other part of the body.

If it is not quickly eliminated, fecal matter in the colon turns into a toxic and putrid waste that is absorbed into the rest of our system. Over the course of time, this effects the functioning of every cell and organ in our body. It poisons the blood, lymphatic system, nervous system and brain, while clogging up the heart, vascular system, lungs and sinuses.

A proper diet is one that provides necessary nourishment for the body, and facilitates proper waste removal and cleansing... from the cellular level to the colon. But the typical American diet featuring an abundance of meat, dairy, fried and over-cooked foods, sugar, starches, salt and artificial chemicals is hard to digest, very little of it can be assimilated as nutrition into our cells, it is high in toxic waste, fat and cholesterol, and slow to move though the colon because it is low in fiber.

We know the body of a dead animal in hot weather creates quite a stench after a couple days. This stench gives us a good idea of what meat does inside the 98.6-degree temperature of the body.

The comparison of a human colon with the colon of a true carnivore, such as a dog, provides strong evidence that humans were not designed to eat meat. The colon of a dog is smooth and straight, like a stove pipe, and takes a short, direct route. In contrast, the human colon turns back and forth along a convoluted pathway with many puckers, pouches, twists and turns. The dog's colon is designed to allow a short transit time for even hard-to-digest meat, cholesterol and fat, without much need for fiber to move things along.

In Diet for a New America, John Robbins, points out, "Dogs, cats and the other natural carnivores do not get colon cancer from high-fat, low-fiber, flesh-based diets. But we do... The toxins from putrefying flesh are not the problem for them that they are for us because everything passes through them so much more quickly." He notes that colon cancer is a killer that affects more than 20 percent of American families, and his book provides an incredible number of statistics and medical studies proving that the more meat, the more fat, the more cholesterol and the less fiber we eat, the more likely we are to die of colon cancer.

Fiber acts as an intestinal broom to sweep things along in the colon while fat clogs up the intestines. It is vital to remember that all animal products -- meat, dairy and eggs -- have zero fiber, while most are high in fat.

In addition to constipation and increased risk of colon cancer, a meat-based, high-fat, low-fiber diet can cause a host of other colon-related problems, including diverticulosis, hemorrhoids, irritable bowel syndrome, spastic colon and appendicitis. These are all problems that can be caused by slow-moving, hard, dry feces, and can be cured by something as simple as a predominately raw foods, vegetarian diet, which is high in fiber, low in fat, and produces soft, moist feces that are easily eliminated.

Our colons were designed to act as a smoothly-flowing sewer system to rid our body of waste products shortly after the waste has been separated from usable nutrients. But instead, most colons have become stagnant cesspools, collecting layers and pockets of toxic and putrid feces and mucus that poisons the blood stream and every cell and organ in the body.

It has been estimated that the average American colon carries five pounds of putrid, partially-digested meat, and another five to ten pounds of toxic fecal matter that has been packed with mucus for years to form a hard lining in deformed folds of the colon.

The colon (also known as the large intestine) is about five feet long, and is the final stop-over for the bulk of the waste from food after it has passed through the stomach and small intestine. The colon begins at the ileo cecal valve (which separates the small and large intestines), and ends at the rectum. The colon is lined with nerves, blood vessels and muscles. These muscles create wave-like motions known as peristaltic waves that propel waste through the colon and out the rectum.

In Colon Health: the Key to a Vibrant Life, Dr. Norman Walker notes that in addition to forming these peristaltic waves, the first half of the colon performs two other vital functions. First, blood vessels lining the colon extract from the waste any available nutrients the small intestine did not pick up. Dr. Walker writes: "Obviously, if the feces in the colon have putrefied and fermented, any nutritional elements present in it would pass into the blood steam as polluted products. What would otherwise be nutritional becomes, in fact, the generation of toxemia... a condition in which the blood contains poisonous products which are produced by the growth of pathogenic, or disease-producing, bacteria."

The other function performed by the first half of the colon is gathering from glands lining its walls the intestinal flora necessary to lubricate the colon. But in a typical American unhealthy colon, Dr. Walker notes that hard, densely-packed layers of fecal encrustation interferes with all three vital functions of the colon -- the formation of peristaltic waves that move waste matter through the colon, absorption of nutrients into the blood stream and the infusion of intestinal flora for lubrication of the colon.

In an effort to minimize toxins absorbed into the blood stream from the colon, mucus is created to encapsulate the waste of certain foods, such as meat, dairy, white flour and other processed foods. This mucus build-up is a natural defense mechanism, and could be efficiently eliminated through the colon if it occurred only rarely. But people who eat mucus-producing foods every day create a toxic build-up of layers and pockets of mucus and decayed fecal matter, remnants of which can stay in the colon for 20 to 30 years or longer.

Dr. Walker's book also explains another way in which the colon has a direct effect on the health of every part of the body. Similar to a foot reflexology chart that shows how certain points on the feet are correlated to specific parts of the body, Colon Health: the Key to a Vibrant Life contains a colon chart showing locations on the colon that are correlated to specific organs and glands. "Every time waste matter accumulates in the colon, which results in fermentation and putrefaction, a disturbance takes place both in the afflicted area of the colon and in its corresponding part of the anatomy," Dr. Walker writes.

Examples he provides of short-term afflictions resulting from the absorption of mucus and toxic waste from the colon into the rest of the body include pimples, sore throats, colds, hay fever, sinus, eye and ear problems. Afflictions of a more long-term nature caused by a constant influx of toxemia into the body from the colon include degeneration or cancer in vital organs. In addition to physical ailments, he writes: "It is almost impossible to maintain a clear mind and proper mental and spiritual equilibrium when we allow the colon to go unattended for too long a time."

Dr. Walker refers to constipation as "the number one affliction underlying nearly every ailment; it can be imputed to be the initial, primary cause of nearly every disturbance of the human system. The most prevalent ailment afflicting civilized people is constipation." He writes "to be constipated means the packed accumulation of feces in the bowel makes its evacuation difficult." He adds, "constipation can also exist when movements of the bowel may seem to be normal, in spite of an accumulation of feces somewhere along the line of the colon."

Over a period of time, constipation interferes with the functioning of every cell, organ and gland, causes the blood stream and lymph system to become overloaded with toxins, sends poisons throughout the entire body, and clogs much of the system with disease-causing mucus. This pathogenic mucus, which results from eating and drinking the wrong foods, "is the ideal media for propagating germs, microbes, and bacteria," Dr. Walker writes.

If our colon and the rest of our body is free from excessive pathogenic mucus and other putrefactive waste matter, harmful germs, bacteria and parasites will not flourish and cause problems, because there will be insufficient food these scavengers need to survive.

The book, Cleansing the Body and the Colon for a Happier and Healthier You, by Teresa Schumacher and Toni Schumacher Lund, states a clogged-up colon and its parasitic infection is often the undiagnosed root of many physical problems. But, Schumacher writes, the medical profession "does not even agree with the notion of filthy and impacted colons contributing to much American ill health. This may be because there are no patented drugs for quick relief of impacted colons. The only way to cleanse intestines is with natural ingredients, and via a persistent personal hygiene program."

She estimated there are "about 300 different types of parasites thriving in America today," and that more than 80 percent of people in the world are infested. Schumacher quotes parasite expert June Wiles, Ph.D., as saying, "Parasites are vermin that steal your food, drink your blood and leave their excrement in your body to be reabsorbed back into the bloodstream as nourishment."

Schumacher's book lists several types of parasites and a variety of ways in which they are caught. As for parasites in food, Schumacher notes the parasite incubation period is 36 hours. She says once we have eaten a meal we should be able to eliminate the waste from that food within 16 to 24 hours. But, she notes, "it is startling to learn that the average elimination time in America today is 96 hours."

If waste is not eliminated within 24 hours, it begins a toxic buildup that provides a breeding ground for parasitic infection. She writes that a clogged intestine with putrid fecal matter and plenty of sugar provides the ideal environment for parasites to thrive.

So, it is easy to see how a vegetarian, high-fiber, low-fat diet can affect the health of our colon, and how the health of our colon affects our whole body. Adding fiber to our diet and eliminating animal products and processed foods will greatly assist the movement of waste through the colon, and this will have a major impact on the health of the entire body. Some benefit may be obtained by adding fiber to a diet that continues to include fiber-deficient animal products, but this benefit will not be as great as can be found by making a complete dietary change.

At Hallelujah Acres, we recommend a vegetarian diet of at least 75 percent raw fruits and vegetables. In addition to providing an excellent source of easy-to-assimilate protein, vitamins, minerals, and live enzymes, this high-fiber, low-fat diet will create an improved waste-elimination process, from the cellular level to the colon. Dr. Walker's book recommends the regular use of colonic irrigations to keep the colon clean, but we feel a better approach is to first attempt to cleanse the colon through diet. Dietary changes are a less intrusive approach than colonic irrigations, and we are finding that people are receiving excellent results.