So, the gut is a little dark and mysterious. Hard for us to see, and harder to understand.
But with the aid of modern science, what we now know is that inside the human gut is actually an entire ecosystem that we call “the microbiome” – two kg of bacteria, or microbes, that are living and thriving down there in a complex cooperative web.
Like it or not, your gut is home to thousands of bacterial species, most of which have never been described in science. This ecosystem is a proper living community: the microorganisms live side by side, competing for nutrients, overthrowing one another or even benefitting from each other.
Scientists at Oxford University have found in that inside the microbiome, there are actually prey and predator species battling with each other all the time.1
It’s a jungle in there.
In fact, that’s the easiest way to understand it. Imagine that inside your gut is like an Amazon rain forest full of life, filled with lizards, leaves, frogs, flowers, fish, jaguar and deer, all competing, eating, breeding, fighting and going about their day to day business.
Except in this case – their day-to-day business is you! Their job is to break down your food, making building blocks for skin cells, muscle cells, organ and bone cells, etc. They also protect you from pathogens and maintain a healthy immune system.
You are the planet – and they are the busy, productive little inhabitants. Without them, you couldn’t survive for even one second.
