For the past week, I've been a vegetarian. It's been good. It was really hard one day when some chicken chowder soup with bacon was offered to me, but I had the cheese bread instead. For lunch on Friday, I went to a Thai restaurant and had tofu in my dish instead of meat. While I think I prefer meat to tofu, the tofu was good. The only reason I prefer meat is because it's what I'm used to, but the tofu was prepared in a way that tasted good and had good texture.
While I don't plan on being a vegetarian, it made me realize that I probably eat too much meat. As a Mormon, we have been given a "Word of Wisdom" on our diet, and it says that meat is "to be used sparingly." I don't think that most Mormons follow this very well. There are other things that we are very strict to follow such as no coffee, no tea, no alcohol, and no tobacco, but for some reason, we're okay with having meat at the majority of our meals.
At work today, we were discussing how a pilot from Australia found it interesting when he moved to the US that he was not allowed to drink at all during lunch. Where he is from, one drink is acceptable. They are expected to be adults and not drink more than is unsafe. We discussed this idea and that the problem with this is, where do you draw the line? I responded to this point with "That's why I don't drink at all." And it's true---does one cup of beer, one cup of coffee, or even drinking tea a couple times a week hurt you? Probably not. Some things may even help you, like drinking wine occasionally. It's when it's impairing you mentally whether through the affects of alcohol or an addiction to caffeine that's the problem. Still, where do you draw the line? It's just safer not to drink at all.
So, what am I going to about meat? While I don't think abstaining from it entirely would be good for me, I am going to cut back. I'll try not to cook with it much and try to choose items on the menu with less or no meat. And maybe I'll be more meat conscious like my mother by buying grass-fed beef.
