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Famous for her books on health and diet, when prolific
writer Leslie Kenton recommends a nutritional supplement,
thousands go out and buy it. Jan Goodey tests her powers.
 Leslie
Kenton is to mind body spirit what Sven Goran Eriksson
is to football: the leading light, whose name is spoken
in hushed tones of pure reverence. She has her detractors
of course, who doesn't, but there's no getting away from
the fact that American-born Kenton is the guru of gurus:
an author of over 30 best-selling books on health and
spiritual well-being, a TV presenter, and one time consultant
to the European Parliament. In the words of that bible
of 'good taste', Cosmopolitan: "Influential? When
Leslie examined the nutritional benefits of the mineral
selenium, there was a market run that month on selenium
supplements. She's the source that everyone reads and
quotes, a one-woman Wall Street of wellbeing."
Enough
of the eulogies. So she cuts the mustard, is the mustard
worth cutting? Kenton started out early, very early in
fact. Just into her teens, and her long-awaited sister
was born with her intestines in a sac outside the body,
requiring major surgery at five hours old. Kenton was
determined that she was not going to die. By the time
the baby was ready to leave hospital she had read up on
nutrition and changed not only her own, but the entire
family's diet. This is the way she operates - see a problem,
find the solution and ring the changes.
Kenton's
own childhood was blighted by illness, further fuelling
sorties into the world of alternative health. In fact
she spent much of it immersed in Japanese Buddhism, which
laid the ground for her later study of all of the world's
great religions. Then at 18 she had her own very real
epiphany to deal with: a first child. Through the bond
that developed between them, she decided that her life
should be about creating a "physical and psychological
place where people could grow and become what they truly
are". The results are plain to see, this woman certainly
looks the life and soul.
Like
all true proponents of a holistic way of life, Kenton
has long insisted that real health comes from within,
and she goes further: "The only true guru is the
individual human soul." This is reminscent of the
ethos put forward by George Harrison in his song Within
You Without You from Sgt Peppers. And she tips her hat
to the recently departed Beatle: "I think he was
part of a whole wave of energy that swept the world where
people began to question Western materialistic values.
Because The Beatles were so famous their involvement helped
it spread."
Kenton's
own approach is a combination of self-care based on the
long tradition of nature cure, and cutting edge scientific
findings; a synthesis of shamanism and realism for the
modern world. Her background in health, psychology and
philosophy, and a sense that we need to heal the planet,
led her to explore shamanic traditions and techniques.
Kenton went through an in-depth training with the world
authority on shamanism, Dr Michael Harner. It was from
this work that she developed her own Journey to Freedom
workshops which use ancient shamanic traditions. It's
perhaps no coincidence, as shamen are considered to be
the guardians of their tribe's psychic and ecological
health and welfare. Conversely she's also at the forefront
of new advances in science and nutrition and has been
a guest lecturer at the Royal Society of Medicine, a course
developer for the Open University, as well as winning
the PPA Technical Writer of the Year and Gordon Whitehead
Awards.
It's
the no-nonsense manner however, not the scientific wizardry,
which has brought the fame - good old fashioned, no frills,
tell-it-as-it-is journalese. So much acclaim that her
books have been translated into several foreign languages
and sell all over the globe. You've probably skimmed through
some and not realised they were Kenton's; that's how the
majority of us deal with alternative health lit I'd imagine.
Here's some titles that may ring a bell: The New Raw Energy,
10 Day Clean-up Plan, The New Ageless Ageing, 10 Steps
to a New You, Cook Energy, Journey to Freedom: 13 Quantum
Leaps for the Soul and Passage To Power: Natural Menopause
Revolution (a revolutionary title which changed the way
doctors and women now approach the treatment of PMS, osteoporosis
and menopausal problems). And if you haven't touched on
any of these, then you'll have surely come across her
in the press. Kenton's writing has graced the pages of
every national newspaper in the country, except the Daily
and Sunday Sport I hasten to add. The largest journalistic
feather in her cap however, would have to be the 14 years
she spent as health and beauty editor at Harpers &
Queen. As for television work, she has also presented
Raw Energy, a cookery show for Thames and Ageless Ageing
for HTV.
When
she has the time, Kenton lectures throughout the world,
which is very much her own stage when you bear in mind
she has homes in London, Wales and New Zealand. How do
London and New Zealand compare? "London is more exciting
and invigorating. I love the humour when I am home in
London, and the edge to life there. New Zealand is an
inner place for me. I live overlooking the sea within
the crater of an extinct volcano. In New Zealand I find
myself entranced by beauty and wanting to submerge myself
in it. In both places I eat the same food and do the same
kind of exercise and meditation." Processes which
she then passes on with her almost patented natural methods
of enhancing health and good looks. The grand PR machine
is currently focusing on the new best-seller-to-be The
X-factor Diet. Forget 'stop the ageing process', 'fat-free
diets' or other gimmicks which are trotted out with the
regularity of a whirring treadmill, Kenton's new ideas
turn received wisdom on its head. According to her the
low fat, high carbohydrate diet we are still urged to
eat, may literally be killing us - these are the foods
that can make us fat in the first place. Apparently a
newly discovered metabolic disorder called Syndrome X
or insulin resistance, is largely to blame for rising
levels of obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes and heart
disease. Banish Syndrome X and you will not only look
and feel better, you'll also become lean, prevent degenerative
diseases and yes, you guessed it, slow the ageing process.
Currently we stress our systems with so much high-density
carbohydrate that the high levels of glucose triggered
by such foods flood our cells with insulin, the hormone
that helps the body turn carbohydrate into energy. Our
bodies become unresponsive to the hormone so our pancreas
secretes more and more of it in an attempt to get energy
into the cells. Unable to turn this excess glucose into
energy, the body lays it down as fat. Make sense? Good!
The
way out of this foodie nightmare is, as is so often the
case in these instances, quite simple: choose natural,
fresh, organic, unprocessed foods, eat raw vegetables
and fruits if you can, to get the benefits of the sunlight
quota they carry, eliminate both refined and high glycaemic
carbohydrates, and finally walk briskly for 15-30 minutes
each day to counter insulin resistance, enhance energy,
and maintain good emotional balance. Kenton emphasises
this idea of balance a lot in her work and it is inherent
in her mind body spirit/scientific approach, "It
simply works better than anything else because it is based
on a clearer and more accurate vision of reality that
encompases the holographic universe established by leading
edge science. I am a pragmatist. If it works best then
use it." What about the low fat, get fit quick (while
I get rich) authors and therapists operating alongside
her? "You do find a few incompetents operating in
any field from shoemaking to law. Charlatans: people who
pretend to have skills and knowledge that they do not
possess. I think there are some of them - many of the
incompetents are probably charlatans too."
Has
she always worked in this field? "I have only had
one job in my life for I have always been self-employed.
However I did work for three days in the collating and
duplicating department of Capitol Records in Hollywood
when I was 17 and still at university. I loved stuffing
envelopes and stapling stuff. But I would finish all the
work by 11am. They did not have more work for me, yet
they refused to let me read the novel I was reading at
the time, so I quit." There's that no-nonsense bit
again.
Not
that this frank exchange is the whole of the story; Kenton
is also a writer of fiction. "It is far more challenging
and demands everything of you," she says of this.
"Writing my first novel Ludwig... A Spiritual Thriller
was the most challenging thing I have ever done and the
most satisfying. The night it was finished I felt elated
as I had never felt before, for, through four years of
hard work and anguish over whether I could ever get it
done, I had succeded in doing something that required
all of my abilities, energy, passion and commitment. I
loved it. I am writing my second novel now." Selkie,
which is about a woman's rediscovery of the power of instinct,
is set in west Wales and will be published later this
year.
Further
projects include film-making and photography. Kenton is
fascinated by telling visual stories and is now shooting
and writing her own screenplays. Is there nothing this
59-year-old, mother-of-four can't do? What with the EU
having had the benefit of her wise words, dare we suggest
she gives counsel to some of those in the upper echelons
of power currently involved in futile sabre-rattling on
the international stage. Who knows, it may be just what
they need.
Leslie
Kenton is at Borders bookshop, Churchill Square on Jan
22 at 7pm.
copyright New Insight 2001
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