I am so excited that the concept of holistic healing is becoming very popular. Most people seem to know what that means--that more than the physical body has to be treated for healing to occur. We are multi-faceted beings, with minds, bodies, and spirits that all need to be in alignment for vibrant health to be experienced.
In my practice, I address physical and mental ailments with Pranic Healing and, in addition, place importance on healthy food and lifestyle choices in order to prevent illness and maintain health. (I will complete my nutrition consultant program by the summer and add this officially, including nutrition protocols to heal particular ailments.)
The first step is healing from present ailments, and the second is to prevent any more from occurring. However, there are several parts to each of these steps.
The first part of holistic healing is to heal past psychological trauma. This may involve blockages, specific traumatic events, chronic negative thinking, negative attachments, and unhealthy patterns. By releasing past negativity, a person is immediately freed to move forward, live in the present, and be fully empowered. Pranic Healing is a brilliant modality which heals even severe trauma in a fraction of the time it would take with conventional talk therapy. Forgiveness is absolutely key in this process, as lack of forgiveness can manifest as severe health ailments, and complete forgiveness is a requirement for total healing and moving forward. One must be completely ready and willing to Let Go.
Next is to heal any mental ailment (ex: depression), chronic pain, sickness, or other physical ailment. This can be done with Pranic Healing and nutrition therapy. Emotional issues could potentially surface again at this point, as disease is often a manifestation of our mental state. All processed foods must be eliminated and only whole foods, preferably organic, should be consumed. This means the body is getting real nourishment, allowing it to carry out its natural and powerful healing processes which are so often hindered by our food choices. Balanced nutrition is also key to emotional and mental health.
Fasting might have a place as cleaning the body and purging obstructions is very influential in allowing flow and also proper assimilation of nutrition. Again, emotional issues can come up during fasting as emotional experiences are stored in the body. This new freedom and emotional clarity can even be scary at times, but is necessary for health, a sense of well-being, and true personal power.
Other targeted therapies might be useful or required such as massage, chiropractic, or others.
The third part is to permanently alter lifestyle habits over a transition period. This allows a person to stay healthy and prevent future mental or physical illness. The point is to become as independent as possible in staying healthy and healing oneself. Health is our natural state and should not require frequent and regular intervention from healers.
At-home, from scratch, whole food preparation for 90% or more of meals is necessary. Purchasing pre-prepared meals, whether from grocery stores or restaurants means consuming substances which are not actually food and shouldn't be put into our bodies in the first place. Or, it means consuming excessive amounts of salt, oil, and other things which should be consumed in a moderate balance. Only by making your own food will you have control over your health.
A WIDE variety of plant foods should be eaten and raw dairy is preferable over pasteurized for much easier digestion. Meat must be hormone and antibiotic-free, free range, and beef should be grass-fed. Sugar should be practically eliminated, as sweets can be made at home easily without it. Pranic Healing is fabulous for food addiction healing, whether due to the physically addictive nature of sugar and caffeine or from the emotional addiction aspect of eating. An exercise and meditation routine has to be established as well, even if it only starts with just once a week for each. These might be dramatic changes for many people, and they won't happen overnight, but the goal is total health freedom, and these are, therefore, all essential.
Coping techniques for stress may be required for some, as well as overall stress reduction in general. Certain lifestyle changes could be required, perhaps as small as turning off the TV or as large as changing jobs. Life balance in all areas is required for peace, health, and sanity. Are you doing what you love? Do you at least have time for your hobbies, or time to yourself? Relationship assessment is also important, including family, friends, co-workers, and romantic relationships: toxic relationships do to our energy what toxic food does to our bodies. Energetic hygiene using Pranic Healing techniques is always taught: saltwater baths, cord-cutting, and keeping the home environment clean.
These elements combined will truly treat the whole person and make them health-independent, as every person has the natural right to be. Our culture has somehow gotten so far off track that such a system is even required, when all this should be natural. It is the right of everyone to feel vibrant, alive, peaceful, and fully healthy all the time.
Showing posts with label Nutrition. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nutrition. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
Toxic Bodies, Toxic Minds
A suddenly major interest among health-conscious people is detoxification. The fact that we are toxifying our bodies in the first place is a subject worth serious consideration and is usually skipped over in the conversation about detoxing. Why should detoxification be necessary at all? Why do we have to "clean up after ourselves"? What are we putting into our bodies in the first place?
What is a toxin? In general, the word toxin refers to something chemical, not considered food or nourishment, and which does not belong in our bodies. Toxins can be chemicals in the air, water, beauty products, and food which we ingest or which are absorbed through the skin. Toxins are, in part, stored in the tissues and lymph fluid.
Toxins are not stored intentionally--why doesn't the body just get rid of them? The body does get rid of plenty of junk we ingest, however, not everything can be eliminated easily. The way that toxins end up stuck in the tissues and lymph is due to a simple process of diffusion. Immediately after eating cooked food, the blood becomes thick. This is the reason one cannot eat 8 hours before surgery: the blood is too thick for surgeons to safely operate. Due to this thickness, toxins diffuse into the lymph which is thin and light in comparison. When fasting or eating raw food, the blood becomes thin and toxins naturally diffuse out of the lymph fluid and into the bloodstream. Then they are eliminated.
More complicated than that, however, is toxic residue. Toxic residue is basically a layer of junk lining the intestinal tract. This junk inhibits proper absorption of nutrients, which is the purpose of the intestines. This reduces the nutrition we can get from our food, even when we are eating what we should in the first place. Where does this come from? Cooked food, especially animal products, which are difficult to digest and do not "burn" cleanly. Toxic residue keeps us out of touch with our bodies. Many people believe food cravings are messages from the body, and sometimes they are, but often we are just craving what we are addicted to. This layer of junk is a barrier between the real messages of our body and our awareness, and our bodies cannot communicate through it. Until you have detoxified, you will not hear very well your body's real messages.
This junk stuck in the intestinal wall can actually ferment by being stuck in the gut for too long, hence becoming toxic. This buildup does also leak continuously into the bloodstream and cause problems, however, as illustrated by Gabriel Cousens, MD in his book Conscious Eating:
"Many people think that the phrase 'toxins in the body' is just some jargon of food faddists. Research over the last 100 years shows that these bowel toxins actually exist. Not only do they exist, but they also have a tremendous negative impact on mental and physical well-being. Toxins usually come from a process called 'intestinal toxemia,' an overgrowth of putrefactive intestinal bacteria in the small and large intestines. These toxins are then released into the blood stream and from there affect both our mental and physical functioning. Intestinal toxemia is predominately caused by a high-protein and low complex carbohydrate diet. Intestinal toxemia not only has been associated with severe mental symptoms such as psychosis, but with a variety of mental imbalances.
As early as 1917, Drs. Satterlee and Eldridge presented 518 cases at an American Medical Association conference that had mental symptoms which were cured by removing the intestinal toxemia. The reported symptoms of intestinal toxemia which are familiar to many people: mental sluggishness, dullness, and stupidity; loss of concentration and/or memory; mental incoordination, irritability, lack of confidence, and excessive and useless worry; exaggerated introspection, hypochondrias, and phobias; depression and melancholy; obsessions and delusions; and hallucinations, suicidal tendencies, delirium, and stupor. Senility symptoms are also common with intestinal toxemia."
Gee, does anyone here know any Americans that seem excessively anxious, stupid, or sluggish??
I'm going to make the bold statement that toxemia is rampant in this country. I do believe that our food HAS made us dumb and complacent, quite easily managed and manageable by the so-called powers that be.
The long-term solution is to eat more raw food and less cooked food, especially less animal products. Eat lots of raw leafy greens and fruit which contain fiber. For a more sudden and possibly slightly painful detox process, you can do a fast which will rather quickly and dramatically release toxins into the bloodstream and then out of the system. This might put you through some unpleasant symptoms as all this garbage comes out from its hiding place. It can be mild to severe, from a headache or a little crankiness to getting a cold or major aches and pains in the body. However, I have heard of wonderful benefits to doing this such as lasting weight loss, disappearance of minor health problems, especially digestive problems, among other things.
The question in my mind is: if we are meant to eat meat and cooked food, why does it leave us with a ton of toxic buildup that causes mental disorders and requires a dramatic fast to get rid of? And then, as popular raw food author, Shazzie, points out: "detox to retox?" because it sounds good to do these fasts or detox diets for anywhere from 3-30 days, but if you're going to go back to your old diet again...? Well, still way better to do a twice yearly fast than none at all.
What is a toxin? In general, the word toxin refers to something chemical, not considered food or nourishment, and which does not belong in our bodies. Toxins can be chemicals in the air, water, beauty products, and food which we ingest or which are absorbed through the skin. Toxins are, in part, stored in the tissues and lymph fluid.
Toxins are not stored intentionally--why doesn't the body just get rid of them? The body does get rid of plenty of junk we ingest, however, not everything can be eliminated easily. The way that toxins end up stuck in the tissues and lymph is due to a simple process of diffusion. Immediately after eating cooked food, the blood becomes thick. This is the reason one cannot eat 8 hours before surgery: the blood is too thick for surgeons to safely operate. Due to this thickness, toxins diffuse into the lymph which is thin and light in comparison. When fasting or eating raw food, the blood becomes thin and toxins naturally diffuse out of the lymph fluid and into the bloodstream. Then they are eliminated.
More complicated than that, however, is toxic residue. Toxic residue is basically a layer of junk lining the intestinal tract. This junk inhibits proper absorption of nutrients, which is the purpose of the intestines. This reduces the nutrition we can get from our food, even when we are eating what we should in the first place. Where does this come from? Cooked food, especially animal products, which are difficult to digest and do not "burn" cleanly. Toxic residue keeps us out of touch with our bodies. Many people believe food cravings are messages from the body, and sometimes they are, but often we are just craving what we are addicted to. This layer of junk is a barrier between the real messages of our body and our awareness, and our bodies cannot communicate through it. Until you have detoxified, you will not hear very well your body's real messages.
This junk stuck in the intestinal wall can actually ferment by being stuck in the gut for too long, hence becoming toxic. This buildup does also leak continuously into the bloodstream and cause problems, however, as illustrated by Gabriel Cousens, MD in his book Conscious Eating:
"Many people think that the phrase 'toxins in the body' is just some jargon of food faddists. Research over the last 100 years shows that these bowel toxins actually exist. Not only do they exist, but they also have a tremendous negative impact on mental and physical well-being. Toxins usually come from a process called 'intestinal toxemia,' an overgrowth of putrefactive intestinal bacteria in the small and large intestines. These toxins are then released into the blood stream and from there affect both our mental and physical functioning. Intestinal toxemia is predominately caused by a high-protein and low complex carbohydrate diet. Intestinal toxemia not only has been associated with severe mental symptoms such as psychosis, but with a variety of mental imbalances.
As early as 1917, Drs. Satterlee and Eldridge presented 518 cases at an American Medical Association conference that had mental symptoms which were cured by removing the intestinal toxemia. The reported symptoms of intestinal toxemia which are familiar to many people: mental sluggishness, dullness, and stupidity; loss of concentration and/or memory; mental incoordination, irritability, lack of confidence, and excessive and useless worry; exaggerated introspection, hypochondrias, and phobias; depression and melancholy; obsessions and delusions; and hallucinations, suicidal tendencies, delirium, and stupor. Senility symptoms are also common with intestinal toxemia."
Gee, does anyone here know any Americans that seem excessively anxious, stupid, or sluggish??
I'm going to make the bold statement that toxemia is rampant in this country. I do believe that our food HAS made us dumb and complacent, quite easily managed and manageable by the so-called powers that be.
The long-term solution is to eat more raw food and less cooked food, especially less animal products. Eat lots of raw leafy greens and fruit which contain fiber. For a more sudden and possibly slightly painful detox process, you can do a fast which will rather quickly and dramatically release toxins into the bloodstream and then out of the system. This might put you through some unpleasant symptoms as all this garbage comes out from its hiding place. It can be mild to severe, from a headache or a little crankiness to getting a cold or major aches and pains in the body. However, I have heard of wonderful benefits to doing this such as lasting weight loss, disappearance of minor health problems, especially digestive problems, among other things.
The question in my mind is: if we are meant to eat meat and cooked food, why does it leave us with a ton of toxic buildup that causes mental disorders and requires a dramatic fast to get rid of? And then, as popular raw food author, Shazzie, points out: "detox to retox?" because it sounds good to do these fasts or detox diets for anywhere from 3-30 days, but if you're going to go back to your old diet again...? Well, still way better to do a twice yearly fast than none at all.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
The Middle Road?
One of the most common things I hear when I tell people I'm only eating raw food for a certain duration is that I shouldn't be too extremist and moderation is best.
My question is, what is moderation?
In a raw food book written by two siblings brought up on raw food (Victoria Boutenko's kids), they were visited by a child services worker at the door once. Some school kid's parents thought they were suffering from child abuse because of the strange lunches they brought to school. They asked the kids what they had for lunch today, and, knowing what this child services worker wanted to hear, they said "we ate McDonald's." The person was satisfied and left.
Eating pizza and burgers is considered moderation today, an average middle-of-the-road diet. Wasn't it just 50 years ago that people commonly had 3-martini lunches? Old movies just crack me up because there's barely a scene where the characters aren't drinking straight whiskey, bourbon, or scotch every time they're home. That was moderation.
Then you tell someone you're going to eat an incredible variety of plant foods and not cook them, and they think you've fallen off the deep end. But slicing potatoes and deep-frying them in grease--that makes sense. The only nutritional concept they're familiar with is protein--that's in meat!! But ask them where they're getting the maybe two dozen required vitamins and minerals, and they probably can't identify where to find even one of these nutrients--let alone tell you how THEY are fulfilling these requirements for themselves.
The extremists are the average Americans.
As I read in one of my favorite books, most people take better care of their cars than their bodies. The mechanic has a tizzy if you wait an extra month before getting your oil changed. But the doctor doesn't really mind what you do, there's always a pill!
The middle road isn't the sum average of what everyone in your culture is doing. We are blessed to have some pretty sophisticated techniques now to understand what happens when we do certain things to our bodies. It's time to let science rather than the overwhelming number of unhealthy grocery and restaurant chains guide our idea of "moderation." Culture and popularity so often reign in these decisions such as what we should eat. And Americans pride themselves so much on their freedom, their open-mindedness, and their individuality.
So let those values run free a little!
My question is, what is moderation?
In a raw food book written by two siblings brought up on raw food (Victoria Boutenko's kids), they were visited by a child services worker at the door once. Some school kid's parents thought they were suffering from child abuse because of the strange lunches they brought to school. They asked the kids what they had for lunch today, and, knowing what this child services worker wanted to hear, they said "we ate McDonald's." The person was satisfied and left.
Eating pizza and burgers is considered moderation today, an average middle-of-the-road diet. Wasn't it just 50 years ago that people commonly had 3-martini lunches? Old movies just crack me up because there's barely a scene where the characters aren't drinking straight whiskey, bourbon, or scotch every time they're home. That was moderation.
Then you tell someone you're going to eat an incredible variety of plant foods and not cook them, and they think you've fallen off the deep end. But slicing potatoes and deep-frying them in grease--that makes sense. The only nutritional concept they're familiar with is protein--that's in meat!! But ask them where they're getting the maybe two dozen required vitamins and minerals, and they probably can't identify where to find even one of these nutrients--let alone tell you how THEY are fulfilling these requirements for themselves.
The extremists are the average Americans.
As I read in one of my favorite books, most people take better care of their cars than their bodies. The mechanic has a tizzy if you wait an extra month before getting your oil changed. But the doctor doesn't really mind what you do, there's always a pill!
The middle road isn't the sum average of what everyone in your culture is doing. We are blessed to have some pretty sophisticated techniques now to understand what happens when we do certain things to our bodies. It's time to let science rather than the overwhelming number of unhealthy grocery and restaurant chains guide our idea of "moderation." Culture and popularity so often reign in these decisions such as what we should eat. And Americans pride themselves so much on their freedom, their open-mindedness, and their individuality.
So let those values run free a little!
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Protein
I was all excited to write my little schpeal about protein, and in looking up a few facts I found a web page that is so far superior to anything I could have written, I am just going to be totally unoriginal and paste a few things, make a few comments, and then put the link to the page at the end. Sorry, but it's more important to portray the best info than to come up with something original in this case!
To start: no dietary concept has been more hyped up than the one of protein.
This has an extremely simple reason, and it is that certain powerful people stand to gain a lot of money from their businesses if we think their product is nutritionally superior a.k.a. the meat and dairy associations. Otherwise, why wouldn't the average person know how much selenium, potassium, and vitamin D they need? Yet everyone knows about protein and calcium. This is sly corporate marketing and nothing else.
Did you know the beef and dairy associations supply free "educational" materials to children in schools? They get to color in pictures of happy cows on the farm to learn about nutrition: protein and calcium! What else is there?!?
I started doing some research to see which plant foods are complete protein because a few were mentioned in my raw food book, and I was surprised because of course I learned that no plant food contains all essential amino acids. Well, if I'm not the dumbest vegetarian that ever lived.
Here's some plant foods that contain all essential amino acids:
brown rice, tomatoes, potatoes, green peppers, corn, lettuce, celery, cucumbers, oats, carrots, broccoli, pinto beans....and more. Maca contains all essential and unessential amino acids, along with some other superfoods.
The most everyday, common foods any American eats...
We have been duped.
The plant food with the lowest percentage of protein is the potato at 10% protein. Even the poor Irish farmers from the old days who had to sometimes survive on potatoes and water didn't have a protein deficiency.
Again, from this website:
"It's really meat that's incomplete:
When you think about it, it's kind of silly to single out protein, just one of the many nutrients, just so we can declare plant proteins to be incomplete (although they're not). Why aren't we declaring meat to be an incomplete vitamin? Because it is, you know. For example, beef is completely devoid of Vitamin C, an essential nutrient without which you'd die. And beef doesn't just have a lower level of this essential nutrient, it has zero. So why didn't the authorities ever caution us that we need to combine beef with chicken to get a complete vitamin?
But actually, no combination of meat will make a complete vitamin, since every single kind of meat has zero Vitamin C. And it's deficient in other vitamins as well. So while plants aren't actually deficient in protein, meat is definitely deficient in vitamins. But I'm sure you never heard about vitamin deficiency in animal foods. All you've heard about is the supposed deficiency of protein in plants.
And speaking about biases, the whole protein-combining idea supposes that vegetarians are eating just one food, which is allegedly incomplete. Okay, how many people do you know who eat one food? And since nobody eats just one food, the whole idea of protein combining would be unnecessary anyway, even if it were true. So here again, what would be the point of harping on protein combining when it doesn't matter?"
The World Health Organization recommends the diet be 5% protein. Mother's breast milk is 2% protein (although this website says 5%--I have always read 2%). There is no known death on record from lack of protein. The only way NOT to get your required protein is to not get a significant number of calories per day.
from http://michaelbluejay.com/veg/protein.html :
"We never talk about protein anymore, because it's absolutely not an issue, even among children," says Marion Nestle, Ph.D., chair of the Department of Nutrition, Food and Hotel Management at New York University. "If anything, we talk about the dangers of high-protein diets. Getting enough is simply a matter of getting enough calories."4.3
"'There was no basis for [protein combining] that I could see.... I began calling around and talking to people and asking them what the justification was for saying that you had to complement proteins, and there was none. And what I got instead was some interesting insight from people who were knowledgeable and actually felt that there was probably no need to complement proteins. So we went ahead and made that change in the paper. [Note: The paper was approved by peer review and by a delegation vote before becoming official.] And it was a couple of years after that that Vernon Young and Peter Pellet published their paper that became the definitive contemporary guide to protein metabolism in humans. And it also confirmed that complementing proteins at meals was totally unnecessary.8.5"
Let me repeat this: The person who wrote the American Dietetic Association's position paper described above said that complementing proteins at meals is "totally unnecessary".
There's a very easy way to see the completeness of plant proteins, that most nutrition writers haven't bothered to do: Look at what's actually in the food! It's not like this is a secret; that data has been publicly available from the USDA for decades, and now the USDA's database is even online.4'"
Did you know one teaspoon of sea kelp dissolved in water has 1,000 times the calcium of a glass of milk? 1,000 times the calcium! If we care so much about calcium, why don't we know that? Green leafy vegetables are a fabulous source of this essential mineral. The average person knows nothing about nutrition save the ridiculous claims and myths perpetrated by those who stand to gain from our purchase of animal products.
Vitamin B12 is one a lot of people have heard about because we have learned it can't be had without meat and dairy, and this PROVES we must eat meat and dairy! Humans need five millionths of a gram per day. The average meat eater can go vegan and not come up with a deficiency in this for over a decade because there is a massive quantity of it in a piece of meat. This is how out of proportion meat is with human dietary needs. Yet animal products are not the only source; otherwise, how could traditional vegan cultures survive without this necessary vitamin? Traditional vegan cultures do not have a deficiency in B12 for a simple reason: it is present in dirt and they do not meticulously wash their vegetables as we do. You can go without washing your (organic) produce and take in enough B12--again, only 5 millionths of a gram per day is needed.
What IS so special about meat? I have yet to hear of a miracle meat or egg that has helped eliminate free radicals in the body or protects against cancer. Yet we learn of new miracle plant foods every day from superfoods, to cancer-curing plants, to everything in between.
The human body, based on its teeth, saliva, stomach acid, and intestines, is an herbivore's body. As this website states, "we are most similar to other herbivores and drastically different from omnivores and carnivores." My best friend was Pre-Med in college, and her Anatomy & Physiology teacher, a Ph.D., said the same thing. The most common cause of choking death is eating meat, and animal omnivores and carnivores do not have that problem.
If you don't believe me...please, see for yourself!
To start: no dietary concept has been more hyped up than the one of protein.
This has an extremely simple reason, and it is that certain powerful people stand to gain a lot of money from their businesses if we think their product is nutritionally superior a.k.a. the meat and dairy associations. Otherwise, why wouldn't the average person know how much selenium, potassium, and vitamin D they need? Yet everyone knows about protein and calcium. This is sly corporate marketing and nothing else.
Did you know the beef and dairy associations supply free "educational" materials to children in schools? They get to color in pictures of happy cows on the farm to learn about nutrition: protein and calcium! What else is there?!?
I started doing some research to see which plant foods are complete protein because a few were mentioned in my raw food book, and I was surprised because of course I learned that no plant food contains all essential amino acids. Well, if I'm not the dumbest vegetarian that ever lived.
Here's some plant foods that contain all essential amino acids:
brown rice, tomatoes, potatoes, green peppers, corn, lettuce, celery, cucumbers, oats, carrots, broccoli, pinto beans....and more. Maca contains all essential and unessential amino acids, along with some other superfoods.
The most everyday, common foods any American eats...
We have been duped.
The plant food with the lowest percentage of protein is the potato at 10% protein. Even the poor Irish farmers from the old days who had to sometimes survive on potatoes and water didn't have a protein deficiency.
Again, from this website:
"It's really meat that's incomplete:
When you think about it, it's kind of silly to single out protein, just one of the many nutrients, just so we can declare plant proteins to be incomplete (although they're not). Why aren't we declaring meat to be an incomplete vitamin? Because it is, you know. For example, beef is completely devoid of Vitamin C, an essential nutrient without which you'd die. And beef doesn't just have a lower level of this essential nutrient, it has zero. So why didn't the authorities ever caution us that we need to combine beef with chicken to get a complete vitamin?
But actually, no combination of meat will make a complete vitamin, since every single kind of meat has zero Vitamin C. And it's deficient in other vitamins as well. So while plants aren't actually deficient in protein, meat is definitely deficient in vitamins. But I'm sure you never heard about vitamin deficiency in animal foods. All you've heard about is the supposed deficiency of protein in plants.
And speaking about biases, the whole protein-combining idea supposes that vegetarians are eating just one food, which is allegedly incomplete. Okay, how many people do you know who eat one food? And since nobody eats just one food, the whole idea of protein combining would be unnecessary anyway, even if it were true. So here again, what would be the point of harping on protein combining when it doesn't matter?"
The World Health Organization recommends the diet be 5% protein. Mother's breast milk is 2% protein (although this website says 5%--I have always read 2%). There is no known death on record from lack of protein. The only way NOT to get your required protein is to not get a significant number of calories per day.
from http://michaelbluejay.com/veg/protein.html :
"We never talk about protein anymore, because it's absolutely not an issue, even among children," says Marion Nestle, Ph.D., chair of the Department of Nutrition, Food and Hotel Management at New York University. "If anything, we talk about the dangers of high-protein diets. Getting enough is simply a matter of getting enough calories."4.3
"'There was no basis for [protein combining] that I could see.... I began calling around and talking to people and asking them what the justification was for saying that you had to complement proteins, and there was none. And what I got instead was some interesting insight from people who were knowledgeable and actually felt that there was probably no need to complement proteins. So we went ahead and made that change in the paper. [Note: The paper was approved by peer review and by a delegation vote before becoming official.] And it was a couple of years after that that Vernon Young and Peter Pellet published their paper that became the definitive contemporary guide to protein metabolism in humans. And it also confirmed that complementing proteins at meals was totally unnecessary.8.5"
Let me repeat this: The person who wrote the American Dietetic Association's position paper described above said that complementing proteins at meals is "totally unnecessary".
There's a very easy way to see the completeness of plant proteins, that most nutrition writers haven't bothered to do: Look at what's actually in the food! It's not like this is a secret; that data has been publicly available from the USDA for decades, and now the USDA's database is even online.4'"
Did you know one teaspoon of sea kelp dissolved in water has 1,000 times the calcium of a glass of milk? 1,000 times the calcium! If we care so much about calcium, why don't we know that? Green leafy vegetables are a fabulous source of this essential mineral. The average person knows nothing about nutrition save the ridiculous claims and myths perpetrated by those who stand to gain from our purchase of animal products.
Vitamin B12 is one a lot of people have heard about because we have learned it can't be had without meat and dairy, and this PROVES we must eat meat and dairy! Humans need five millionths of a gram per day. The average meat eater can go vegan and not come up with a deficiency in this for over a decade because there is a massive quantity of it in a piece of meat. This is how out of proportion meat is with human dietary needs. Yet animal products are not the only source; otherwise, how could traditional vegan cultures survive without this necessary vitamin? Traditional vegan cultures do not have a deficiency in B12 for a simple reason: it is present in dirt and they do not meticulously wash their vegetables as we do. You can go without washing your (organic) produce and take in enough B12--again, only 5 millionths of a gram per day is needed.
What IS so special about meat? I have yet to hear of a miracle meat or egg that has helped eliminate free radicals in the body or protects against cancer. Yet we learn of new miracle plant foods every day from superfoods, to cancer-curing plants, to everything in between.
The human body, based on its teeth, saliva, stomach acid, and intestines, is an herbivore's body. As this website states, "we are most similar to other herbivores and drastically different from omnivores and carnivores." My best friend was Pre-Med in college, and her Anatomy & Physiology teacher, a Ph.D., said the same thing. The most common cause of choking death is eating meat, and animal omnivores and carnivores do not have that problem.
If you don't believe me...please, see for yourself!
Monday, January 25, 2010
100% Raw for 2 months!
I woke up today, feeling kind of groggy, and thought, "I can't wait till I do my next raw food experiment and have that amazing, energized feeling again, it will feel so good." And I have had this thought every single day for at least a month. I figured I'd start in a week or two, after having received another new raw book in the mail that I ordered. But today, the absurdity of looking forward to starting this eating plan when I can start it any minute I want finally hit me. So...nothing to look forward to--it's here!
The book I ordered is The Sunfood Diet Success System by David Wolfe, and it is fantastic. Everything you need to know is finally in one book. The other books I've read still left me with a lot of unanswered questions, mostly about the science/nutrition aspects. This guy has degrees in mechanical and environmental engineering, law, and a master's in nutrition. Both his parents are doctors. So he doesn't do anything that doesn't hold up scientifically, and he explains every detail to you in this book....at last. I am so totally fired up.
Welcome back: mental clarity, physical energy, total calmness, no food cravings, no under-eye circles, reduced weight, and 7 hours or less of sleep a night.
I am going to focus more this time on meditation and Pranic Healing and what changes happen on this food because it's common knowledge that the lighter the body is, the more energy it can hold. This will make you more sensitive and more powerful as a healer. I am really excited to see what happens with meditation experiences as well.
I did one month of 100% raw last June and loved it but caved into social pressure in the end. I have never been able to sleep under 9 hours for some strange reason, and I enjoyed 6.5-7 hour nights and woke up feeling like a million bucks. It is a huge time-saver, as you can imagine. The most amazing thing besides that was the total calmness I experienced. I have read many times that bad food makes you mentally negative, impatient, and generally miserable, but I didn't really believe it. I always thought, "I'm in control of my emotions, and if I'm negative, that's my fault for not being in control of my own mind." That may be true to some extent, but if you want to stop trying to be calm and peaceful and have it just come upon you effortlessly, eat only raw vegan food. Even when my husband did something "irritating," it didn't even irritate me, I literally didn't care and just felt love and happiness toward him. Some of the things that happen to you when you eat this way sound literally impossible. But if you don't believe me, try it yourself! The above book is the best one I've read (out of 4). It's the best place to start, I recommend it to everyone.
The book I ordered is The Sunfood Diet Success System by David Wolfe, and it is fantastic. Everything you need to know is finally in one book. The other books I've read still left me with a lot of unanswered questions, mostly about the science/nutrition aspects. This guy has degrees in mechanical and environmental engineering, law, and a master's in nutrition. Both his parents are doctors. So he doesn't do anything that doesn't hold up scientifically, and he explains every detail to you in this book....at last. I am so totally fired up.
Welcome back: mental clarity, physical energy, total calmness, no food cravings, no under-eye circles, reduced weight, and 7 hours or less of sleep a night.
I am going to focus more this time on meditation and Pranic Healing and what changes happen on this food because it's common knowledge that the lighter the body is, the more energy it can hold. This will make you more sensitive and more powerful as a healer. I am really excited to see what happens with meditation experiences as well.
I did one month of 100% raw last June and loved it but caved into social pressure in the end. I have never been able to sleep under 9 hours for some strange reason, and I enjoyed 6.5-7 hour nights and woke up feeling like a million bucks. It is a huge time-saver, as you can imagine. The most amazing thing besides that was the total calmness I experienced. I have read many times that bad food makes you mentally negative, impatient, and generally miserable, but I didn't really believe it. I always thought, "I'm in control of my emotions, and if I'm negative, that's my fault for not being in control of my own mind." That may be true to some extent, but if you want to stop trying to be calm and peaceful and have it just come upon you effortlessly, eat only raw vegan food. Even when my husband did something "irritating," it didn't even irritate me, I literally didn't care and just felt love and happiness toward him. Some of the things that happen to you when you eat this way sound literally impossible. But if you don't believe me, try it yourself! The above book is the best one I've read (out of 4). It's the best place to start, I recommend it to everyone.
Friday, January 22, 2010
I miss going out
I still go out pretty frequently, so I don't miss actually going--I miss how it used to be. I could eat and drink anything and feel fine, even healthy. I didn't over-analyze it or feel too guilty. There were lots of restaurants I loved to go to, and it was fun to choose which one I would eat at.
Now, to go out to dinner, we spend a bunch of money on food that isn't healthy--it's loaded with oil and salt and probably plenty of cheese (we are vegetarian and sometimes go for cheese-involved dishes). The portions are big so we always over-eat. The food tastes good but doesn't give you a good feeling after eating it. There is no way to eat vegetarian and avoid the foods I am trying to now cut out: deep-fried food, cheese, bread, and pasta. I know, laughable to even try! When we try to choose where to go, it's just a question of which is the "least bad" for us and still has enough atmosphere to be enjoyable.
On top of that, the food is not organic. The strict standards we have for household food disappear when we go to restaurants, so we will consume genetically-modified food and food sprayed with chemicals. In the case of dairy, we are purchasing cheese from tortured, drug-injected cows--products we would never buy at the store. I used to not bother with that because eating out doesn't happen every day. Yet I still work at a restaurant, I end up eating there or bringing food home a couple of times a week in addition to a once a week or so dinner out together. It does add up.
If there was just a restaurant that actually prepared food like what we eat at home! (That was affordable.) I can't stop going out. I'm a libra! I love to go cozy up in a candle-lit restaurant where I can sit and be waited on. I like sitting next to my husband with no television or laptop nearby where we will just talk. Sometimes I even get fancy and wear something besides my sweatpants!
I don't think it will be long before someone capitalizes on our interest in healthy, organic food at a nice restaurant--for cheap! I can't go to a $30/plate dinner every week. I mean a regular restaurant with a happy hour menu and all of that with something besides french fries on it.
And one last thing: Coffee shops. Can we please get something to eat besides bread and sugar products in the morning? These so-called breakfast foods of scones, chocolate croissants, bagels, and banana breads are nothing more than desserts wrapped in breakfast food vocabulary. I allow myself the coffee indulgence already, do you have to push my discipline by putting that pastry case in front of me every morning??
Now, to go out to dinner, we spend a bunch of money on food that isn't healthy--it's loaded with oil and salt and probably plenty of cheese (we are vegetarian and sometimes go for cheese-involved dishes). The portions are big so we always over-eat. The food tastes good but doesn't give you a good feeling after eating it. There is no way to eat vegetarian and avoid the foods I am trying to now cut out: deep-fried food, cheese, bread, and pasta. I know, laughable to even try! When we try to choose where to go, it's just a question of which is the "least bad" for us and still has enough atmosphere to be enjoyable.
On top of that, the food is not organic. The strict standards we have for household food disappear when we go to restaurants, so we will consume genetically-modified food and food sprayed with chemicals. In the case of dairy, we are purchasing cheese from tortured, drug-injected cows--products we would never buy at the store. I used to not bother with that because eating out doesn't happen every day. Yet I still work at a restaurant, I end up eating there or bringing food home a couple of times a week in addition to a once a week or so dinner out together. It does add up.
If there was just a restaurant that actually prepared food like what we eat at home! (That was affordable.) I can't stop going out. I'm a libra! I love to go cozy up in a candle-lit restaurant where I can sit and be waited on. I like sitting next to my husband with no television or laptop nearby where we will just talk. Sometimes I even get fancy and wear something besides my sweatpants!
I don't think it will be long before someone capitalizes on our interest in healthy, organic food at a nice restaurant--for cheap! I can't go to a $30/plate dinner every week. I mean a regular restaurant with a happy hour menu and all of that with something besides french fries on it.
And one last thing: Coffee shops. Can we please get something to eat besides bread and sugar products in the morning? These so-called breakfast foods of scones, chocolate croissants, bagels, and banana breads are nothing more than desserts wrapped in breakfast food vocabulary. I allow myself the coffee indulgence already, do you have to push my discipline by putting that pastry case in front of me every morning??
Sunday, January 17, 2010
A New Idea of Healthcare
It's not only hard to imagine our world without a gigantic medical industry with its gigantic health insurance industry and gigantic pharmaceutical industry, it's hardly even been attempted.
I watched a David Wolfe video (prominent raw food expert), and he mentioned that you can't ask a fish about water because it's "right here," and he put his hand on his face, covering it with his fingers spread out. In the same way, we are so used to our diseases, doctors, pills, that we have never even looked at it. They are the water we're swimming in.
Conversations with God says what we have is a "disease-care system," not a healthcare system.
Consider this: In some traditional Indian villages, the village doctor would go around to each home in the village on a regular basis, and was paid by every healthy person present. Does this make sense to you? It's such "backwards" logic to us, we have to think about it. The presence of sick people meant the doctor had not done the best job.
Who do you owe your health to? I hope you're buying their book! I am happy to pay PCC or the farmers at the market more, for they keep me from having to go to the doctor in the first place! I am saving not just money but suffering and pain.
By a simple flip of our thinking, the solution is so obvious, we wonder that we never saw it before. As my parents used to say when I couldn't find something I was looking for that was right by me, "if it gets any closer, it's going to bite you." Enough of us have been bitten by the obvious to be paying for prevention, saving our short- and long-term health on top of the environment in the form of supporting organic farming.
Things will go on much longer this way. Nowadays, when someone is diagnosed with cancer, they go home and get on the Internet before they submit themselves to drugs and radiation. Some have healed themselves through their own self-education in ways their own doctor SAID was physically impossible. They go back to see their doctor after their full recovery, and the guy or gal literally can't believe they are seeing the person alive in front of their eyes. When an uneducated common person can read some free stuff online, change their diet/lifestyle, and CURE CANCER, how much longer do you think we'll have to fund these research studies that cost millions upon billions of dollars to "find a cure"? It's just a matter of time.
How many people have already fired their doctor? You can now go to an un-trained energy healer who can accomplish more in an hour than many have accomplished in years of advice from mainstream health practitioners and pills. Doctors will claim to be the most scientific-minded folks of anyone, yet they are in total denial of their abysmal success rates in healing. At the same time, they deny the better success rates of natural, nutrition, and energy healing remedies!
The sad truth for mainstream medical practitioners is that the combination of proper, natural, organic nutrition and energy healing would eliminate or heal probably 80-90% of ailments and prevent the vast majority from ever occurring in the first place.
I get a thrill when I imagine our future: herb and vegetable gardens at every home, farmers markets in every neighborhood, an energy healer in the average health office. High school health class requiring instruction in honest nutrition education (without the free "educational" materials from the Dairy and Beef Associations), herbal remedies, energy anatomy, and simple vegetable gardening skills. In California, some elementary schools have school gardens which the students work in and then EAT FROM at their school cafeteria! I cannot think of anything smarter or healthier.
I watched a David Wolfe video (prominent raw food expert), and he mentioned that you can't ask a fish about water because it's "right here," and he put his hand on his face, covering it with his fingers spread out. In the same way, we are so used to our diseases, doctors, pills, that we have never even looked at it. They are the water we're swimming in.
Conversations with God says what we have is a "disease-care system," not a healthcare system.
Consider this: In some traditional Indian villages, the village doctor would go around to each home in the village on a regular basis, and was paid by every healthy person present. Does this make sense to you? It's such "backwards" logic to us, we have to think about it. The presence of sick people meant the doctor had not done the best job.
Who do you owe your health to? I hope you're buying their book! I am happy to pay PCC or the farmers at the market more, for they keep me from having to go to the doctor in the first place! I am saving not just money but suffering and pain.
By a simple flip of our thinking, the solution is so obvious, we wonder that we never saw it before. As my parents used to say when I couldn't find something I was looking for that was right by me, "if it gets any closer, it's going to bite you." Enough of us have been bitten by the obvious to be paying for prevention, saving our short- and long-term health on top of the environment in the form of supporting organic farming.
Things will go on much longer this way. Nowadays, when someone is diagnosed with cancer, they go home and get on the Internet before they submit themselves to drugs and radiation. Some have healed themselves through their own self-education in ways their own doctor SAID was physically impossible. They go back to see their doctor after their full recovery, and the guy or gal literally can't believe they are seeing the person alive in front of their eyes. When an uneducated common person can read some free stuff online, change their diet/lifestyle, and CURE CANCER, how much longer do you think we'll have to fund these research studies that cost millions upon billions of dollars to "find a cure"? It's just a matter of time.
How many people have already fired their doctor? You can now go to an un-trained energy healer who can accomplish more in an hour than many have accomplished in years of advice from mainstream health practitioners and pills. Doctors will claim to be the most scientific-minded folks of anyone, yet they are in total denial of their abysmal success rates in healing. At the same time, they deny the better success rates of natural, nutrition, and energy healing remedies!
The sad truth for mainstream medical practitioners is that the combination of proper, natural, organic nutrition and energy healing would eliminate or heal probably 80-90% of ailments and prevent the vast majority from ever occurring in the first place.
I get a thrill when I imagine our future: herb and vegetable gardens at every home, farmers markets in every neighborhood, an energy healer in the average health office. High school health class requiring instruction in honest nutrition education (without the free "educational" materials from the Dairy and Beef Associations), herbal remedies, energy anatomy, and simple vegetable gardening skills. In California, some elementary schools have school gardens which the students work in and then EAT FROM at their school cafeteria! I cannot think of anything smarter or healthier.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Green Smoothie Experiment
I almost called this the "The Accidental Experiment" because I wasn't trying to learn anything, but after drinking green smoothies regularly, I got kind of bored with them and stopped. I've never been nuts about them, but I learned about the health benefits of consuming raw greens, and it seemed like the easiest way, so I started doing it.
For those that have not read a bunch of raw food books as I have, eating food raw keeps the enzymes intact which the body needs for various functions. Cooked foods have no intact enzymes, and the body then uses up its own stores to digest food which is very taxing, especially after doing this year after year all your life. Some people really connect loss of enzyme reserves to aging. Aside from that, cooking food destroys 75-97% of the vitamins and minerals. This is huge. Even if you are eating spinach for dinner, if it's cooked, you're not getting many of the vitamins and minerals. (Add onto that if it's not organic. Non-organic fruits and vegetables have significantly less nutritional content.) It's a big shock to realize most of the food the average person eats isn't feeding their body at all.
Greens like kale are full of calcium and other vital nutrients. Consuming them raw is the absolute most nutritious way. The problem is that raw kale is a little tough to chew and doesn't taste great. For some, it can even be difficult to digest and give some feelings of indigestion. The reason for this is simple: we are meant to chew our food into a liquid, and doing this breaks down the tough cellulose wall of the plant. When we don't break down this wall with our teeth, our stomach can have a tough time with it. Your options are to chew your kale to death or stick it in a blender. Thank you, Vita-Mix!
In casual experiments, raw food teachers/coaches have noticed that consuming these raw greens regularly drastically reduces peoples' cravings for unhealthy cooked food such as fried foods, sugar, and cheese. Most will tell you that if you want to go raw, start first by adding green smoothies to your regular diet, and after you don't crave your usual foods, you know you'll be able to cut them out completely.
SO... as I said, I stopped drinking these, not thinking about any daily impacts to my life. I forgot I had made this important move but noticed I was feeling cranky, impatient, and then started thinking about food all the time, craving sugar, cheese, and fried foods. Now, if I hadn't eaten any of these all this time, I wouldn't have suddenly gotten cravings for them out of nowhere, but I occasionally do indulge. This time, though, a couple of indulgences turned me into an addict! The crappy food made me feel more sluggish and crappy, and it was this downward spiral. It wasn't until yesterday that I realized this had all started a couple of weeks ago when I took this extremely important component out of my diet! (duh)
Today, I am on to PCC Natural Market for some kale, collard greens, and spinach.
If you are interested in trying this yourself, here is the general formula to make one: 60% fruit and 40% greens. This makes it sweet and very drinkable. About 2 cups of water. Make sure there is enough water or you'll feel like you are chewing what should be a drink. You can go online for some more specific recipes. The Vita-Mix is the best blender because the blades turn at something like 500 mph which obliterates those cell walls quickly and easily. For other blenders, I would recommend leaving it in to blend for a good minute or two so it's broken down as thoroughly as possible.
This is the most powerful "diet" drink out there. Try it for yourself, and you will be amazed that you don't crave unhealthy foods anymore. It's miraculous.
A great way to drink these is to have them handy when you're doing something else like working on the computer. You'll mindlessly keep sipping away and consume a large quantity without thinking, "ok, here's my smoothie, now I have to drink it."
By the way, most people love them. You will probably just love the smoothies. I am weird and don't even really like fruit smoothies, I don't know why. My sister doesn't have any special fascination with raw food but makes one every day and LOVES it. So don't let ME get you down!
Enjoy!
For those that have not read a bunch of raw food books as I have, eating food raw keeps the enzymes intact which the body needs for various functions. Cooked foods have no intact enzymes, and the body then uses up its own stores to digest food which is very taxing, especially after doing this year after year all your life. Some people really connect loss of enzyme reserves to aging. Aside from that, cooking food destroys 75-97% of the vitamins and minerals. This is huge. Even if you are eating spinach for dinner, if it's cooked, you're not getting many of the vitamins and minerals. (Add onto that if it's not organic. Non-organic fruits and vegetables have significantly less nutritional content.) It's a big shock to realize most of the food the average person eats isn't feeding their body at all.
Greens like kale are full of calcium and other vital nutrients. Consuming them raw is the absolute most nutritious way. The problem is that raw kale is a little tough to chew and doesn't taste great. For some, it can even be difficult to digest and give some feelings of indigestion. The reason for this is simple: we are meant to chew our food into a liquid, and doing this breaks down the tough cellulose wall of the plant. When we don't break down this wall with our teeth, our stomach can have a tough time with it. Your options are to chew your kale to death or stick it in a blender. Thank you, Vita-Mix!
In casual experiments, raw food teachers/coaches have noticed that consuming these raw greens regularly drastically reduces peoples' cravings for unhealthy cooked food such as fried foods, sugar, and cheese. Most will tell you that if you want to go raw, start first by adding green smoothies to your regular diet, and after you don't crave your usual foods, you know you'll be able to cut them out completely.
SO... as I said, I stopped drinking these, not thinking about any daily impacts to my life. I forgot I had made this important move but noticed I was feeling cranky, impatient, and then started thinking about food all the time, craving sugar, cheese, and fried foods. Now, if I hadn't eaten any of these all this time, I wouldn't have suddenly gotten cravings for them out of nowhere, but I occasionally do indulge. This time, though, a couple of indulgences turned me into an addict! The crappy food made me feel more sluggish and crappy, and it was this downward spiral. It wasn't until yesterday that I realized this had all started a couple of weeks ago when I took this extremely important component out of my diet! (duh)
Today, I am on to PCC Natural Market for some kale, collard greens, and spinach.
If you are interested in trying this yourself, here is the general formula to make one: 60% fruit and 40% greens. This makes it sweet and very drinkable. About 2 cups of water. Make sure there is enough water or you'll feel like you are chewing what should be a drink. You can go online for some more specific recipes. The Vita-Mix is the best blender because the blades turn at something like 500 mph which obliterates those cell walls quickly and easily. For other blenders, I would recommend leaving it in to blend for a good minute or two so it's broken down as thoroughly as possible.
This is the most powerful "diet" drink out there. Try it for yourself, and you will be amazed that you don't crave unhealthy foods anymore. It's miraculous.
A great way to drink these is to have them handy when you're doing something else like working on the computer. You'll mindlessly keep sipping away and consume a large quantity without thinking, "ok, here's my smoothie, now I have to drink it."
By the way, most people love them. You will probably just love the smoothies. I am weird and don't even really like fruit smoothies, I don't know why. My sister doesn't have any special fascination with raw food but makes one every day and LOVES it. So don't let ME get you down!
Enjoy!
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Late Night at a Friend's...
Last night my husband and I went to our friends' house for our typical late-night dinner party. We ate an absolute ton of cooked food--rice, chapati (Indian bread, look like tortillas but wheat flour), dal, garbanzo curry, and a third curry I was not familiar with. There was wine and whisky floating around. Then truffles for dessert. I somehow ended up with a torturous case of the hiccups by the end of the night. I rode home in the car bent over, trying to be upside down, hold my breath, whatever.
Of course, we didn't get to bed until 2:00AM. And slept late. And woke up thoroughly groggy with that fuzzy head. Every time, I ask myself the same question: why? I know this is not good for me.
These are the days I say, "I'm going raw." No more heavy food. No more sugary desserts. No more bread!!!
Then I look in the fridge and see a carton and a half of eggs, a whole package of tortillas (to be treated as chapati), a new package of gardenburgers. How will I explain to my husband I won't eat any of it? He is so beyond-supportive of my nutritional schizophrenia. But I hate to yo-yo with him... "Honey? Can I make curry tonight? Will you eat it?" I've been hinting at him I want to go raw again (we did a month together of 100% raw and, actually, loved it--just got inconvenient in social situations so we set it aside to be decided upon later). I haven't heard any major objections. He likes us to eat the same things together, so I know if I do it, he will, by default, be part of it. Last time we did it, he lost 7 pounds and his skin got really clear. He got tons of compliments on his appearance....so I think he might be happy to experience some of that again!
I just want all those benefits back: never feeling heavy, tired, groggy. total mental clarity, a razor-sharp mind. never bloated. 7 hours of sleep a night and feeling like a million bucks every morning. energy for exercise, work, cleaning, everything. lost a couple of pounds. knowing you never put anything bad into your body that will hurt it or drag it down. better-looking skin. a lighter footprint on the planet and knowing you aren't giving one dollar to those nasty food corporations.
I might try to experiment with a compromise where everything eaten at home is 100% raw, but for socializing, some exceptions can be made. Or holidays with family. Anything with other, non-raw people, basically. Which we probably only do about twice a month. Won't get in the way of the goal...
*sigh* I'll keep you posted.
Of course, we didn't get to bed until 2:00AM. And slept late. And woke up thoroughly groggy with that fuzzy head. Every time, I ask myself the same question: why? I know this is not good for me.
These are the days I say, "I'm going raw." No more heavy food. No more sugary desserts. No more bread!!!
Then I look in the fridge and see a carton and a half of eggs, a whole package of tortillas (to be treated as chapati), a new package of gardenburgers. How will I explain to my husband I won't eat any of it? He is so beyond-supportive of my nutritional schizophrenia. But I hate to yo-yo with him... "Honey? Can I make curry tonight? Will you eat it?" I've been hinting at him I want to go raw again (we did a month together of 100% raw and, actually, loved it--just got inconvenient in social situations so we set it aside to be decided upon later). I haven't heard any major objections. He likes us to eat the same things together, so I know if I do it, he will, by default, be part of it. Last time we did it, he lost 7 pounds and his skin got really clear. He got tons of compliments on his appearance....so I think he might be happy to experience some of that again!
I just want all those benefits back: never feeling heavy, tired, groggy. total mental clarity, a razor-sharp mind. never bloated. 7 hours of sleep a night and feeling like a million bucks every morning. energy for exercise, work, cleaning, everything. lost a couple of pounds. knowing you never put anything bad into your body that will hurt it or drag it down. better-looking skin. a lighter footprint on the planet and knowing you aren't giving one dollar to those nasty food corporations.
I might try to experiment with a compromise where everything eaten at home is 100% raw, but for socializing, some exceptions can be made. Or holidays with family. Anything with other, non-raw people, basically. Which we probably only do about twice a month. Won't get in the way of the goal...
*sigh* I'll keep you posted.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Raw Thai Soup
I made this recipe night before last and loved it. I ate the leftovers for breakfast the next morning. I got it from the book Fresh by Sergei and Valya Boutenko.
Blend together:
2 cucumbers, peeled
2 cups water
1/2 cup walnuts (I grind these in my magic bullet first)
1/4 c. Nama Shoyu
1/2 fresh spicy pepper
1 teaspoon salt (I would actually put less in next time)
2 tablespoons honey
1/4 cup chopped ginger
1/4 cup lemon juice (could do with less of this too)
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
Chop up and mix in at the end:
1 cucumber, peeled (a little too much for me)
1/2 cup dried mushrooms (I will do fresh next time...too chewy)
1 bunch cilantro (a little too much for me)
It's so quick and easy to make, and no exotic ingredients, which I appreciate. I love making raw soups. They are always quick and easy and taste great. It's very hard to screw them up. I just got a new book I ordered from amazon called Eating for Beauty by David Wolfe. He's apparently the stud of the raw food world, and I haven't read anything by him yet so I'm excited. There's supposed to be Kirlian photography pics showing the energy field of a food before and after it's cooked--cooking disrupts the energy field.
Enjoy!
Blend together:
2 cucumbers, peeled
2 cups water
1/2 cup walnuts (I grind these in my magic bullet first)
1/4 c. Nama Shoyu
1/2 fresh spicy pepper
1 teaspoon salt (I would actually put less in next time)
2 tablespoons honey
1/4 cup chopped ginger
1/4 cup lemon juice (could do with less of this too)
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
Chop up and mix in at the end:
1 cucumber, peeled (a little too much for me)
1/2 cup dried mushrooms (I will do fresh next time...too chewy)
1 bunch cilantro (a little too much for me)
It's so quick and easy to make, and no exotic ingredients, which I appreciate. I love making raw soups. They are always quick and easy and taste great. It's very hard to screw them up. I just got a new book I ordered from amazon called Eating for Beauty by David Wolfe. He's apparently the stud of the raw food world, and I haven't read anything by him yet so I'm excited. There's supposed to be Kirlian photography pics showing the energy field of a food before and after it's cooked--cooking disrupts the energy field.
Enjoy!
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Food Labeling
I believe that, aside from the obvious fact that genetically modified foods should be labeled as such, there should be many more warnings on food packaging. The food industry has been totally neglected while all the attention goes to alcohol and cigarettes. There should be guidelines and criteria for what we consider food. Most of what is sold in grocery stores does not fit the definition of food!
White bread, soda, crackers, chips, desserts, TV dinners, boxed food, instant meals, etc. should not be marketed and sold as food. They contain zero nutrition. The public has been completely misled in this area. Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, for example, should have a label on it saying, "This product does not meet the requirements and criteria to be considered food." The FDA can come up with those guidelines which would need to involve a certain amount of vitamins, minerals, protein, and safe/healthy carbohydrates. Food that is not fresh, even if it started out that way, has lost its original nutrient content!
It should be blatantly pointed out to every shopper that these products should not be consumed under the supposition that they can feed themselves with them. My hope would, of course, be that putting these facts in the faces of customers would gradually cause such a loss in sales to these products as to have their presence reduced and eventually eliminated from stores--while the health of the average American would skyrocket!
White bread, soda, crackers, chips, desserts, TV dinners, boxed food, instant meals, etc. should not be marketed and sold as food. They contain zero nutrition. The public has been completely misled in this area. Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, for example, should have a label on it saying, "This product does not meet the requirements and criteria to be considered food." The FDA can come up with those guidelines which would need to involve a certain amount of vitamins, minerals, protein, and safe/healthy carbohydrates. Food that is not fresh, even if it started out that way, has lost its original nutrient content!
It should be blatantly pointed out to every shopper that these products should not be consumed under the supposition that they can feed themselves with them. My hope would, of course, be that putting these facts in the faces of customers would gradually cause such a loss in sales to these products as to have their presence reduced and eventually eliminated from stores--while the health of the average American would skyrocket!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)