Why I became a Vegeterian

The topic of living a vegetarian life style is more relevant than ever. What a summer we had with fires around the whole globe! We all know that most of the fires in the Amazons are set on purpose to open up for more grass land to raise cattle which then is sold for meat consumption. Mentioning this I would love to share with you my journey of how I became vegetarian.

I was in my early 20s when I moved to the South of Turkey. After breastfeeding my first child I was wondering what to feed him from now on. To inform myself I read literature written by nutritionists and doctors of antroposophic lineage. They explained healthy nutrition was natural, non-processed and possibly vegetarian. I understood that if I wanted to bring up my child in this way I needed to start with myself first. There was some struggle in me how strict I should be in this pursuit…until one day. I was walking to the neighbors to fetch some milk when I suddenly perceived a horrible smell. All of a sudden I found myself standing in front of a dead sheep. Most likely it was killed by stray, wild dogs coming down from the mountains. I suddenly was confronted with a reality that I hadn’t experienced yet in this way. The decay and decomposing of what we call flesh. It dawned onto me: ‘What on earth are we eating? What is the difference between this sheep here lying and deteriorating with a heavy smell and meat being kept refrigerated in order to be eaten a few days later?’

As I was taking care of my family and I hadn’t made many friends yet in my new environment, there was plenty of time to read. My interest grew in mystic and spiritual teaching and I began to research in order to find out what spiritual teachers from different times and regions had to say about killing and eating animals. To my surprise I found a lot. What I obtained from the texts I read, is as follows: If we wish for a better world and wish for more empathy and love, we have to love and respect the entire creation and our fellow creatures, the animals as well. I also learned that there is a karmic law. That our thoughts, words and deeds are acting as seeds for reactions and like this we create and design our future. I learned that we as human beings have a purpose here and that we need to make use of this life to develop and grow as humans.

You can see there are many reasons for being vegetarian – from an ecological perspective, for a healthy and natural life-style, as well as for ethical and spiritual reasons.