2009 is upon us. With the New Year almost here, many people are making resolutions to get healthy. The quickest and easiest path to health, in my opinion, is by changing one’s diet. We’ve all heard the phrase ‘you are what you eat’ and it holds true. Your body- your cells- are comprised of the foods you eat. If you eat healthy, fresh foods, you will have healthy cells; therefore, your overall health will be greater. If you eat nothing but junk food, your cells will be made up of junk food, and your health will surely decrease as will your ability to fight disease and infection. Many people ask me what they can do to improve their health and quality of life. My response is always the same: eat raw foods.
I am not insinuating that I think that everyone should become a vegan and eat 100% raw food. But I believe that anyone can benefit from implementing more raw foods into his or her daily diet. The 5 steps below are easy to follow and can help anyone desiring to switch to a raw foods diet.
1. Eat at least 50% raw foods.
I always tell people who are interested in eating raw to begin by making 50% of their diet raw plant foods. This includes vegetables, fruits (mostly low glycemic), nuts, seeds, and cold pressed unrefined oils. By starting with 50% raw rather than jumping to 75% or 100% raw immediately, one can get used to eating raw while still eating some cooked foods, hopefully healthy ones.
Rather than trying to quit cooked food cold turkey, gradually increase the amount of raw foods consumed. This allows for more time to adjust mentally and physically. A lot of mental stamina is involved in making any lifestyle change. There can be a lot of physical changes that occur when switching to a much healthier diet such as weight loss or weight gain (if underweight to start), changes in skin and hair, cravings, changes in digestion, etc. You do not want to overwhelm yourself too early on and end up giving up. Give yourself time to adjust to your new lifestyle.
2. Cut out refined sugar, bleached white flour, and table salt.
Refined sugar and table salt are essentially drugs. At the very least, they are processed much in the same way as drugs such as cocaine and heroin. Refined sugar and white flour both start out as grasses. Sugar cane can be very nutrient dense if grown in the right way. Both start off healthy enough, but after being refined many times, the end product does not even come close to resembling the original. Sugar is produced by cooking raw cane juice down to make molasses, then cooking the molasses down to make brown sugar, then by bleaching the brown sugar to make refined white sugar – which contains no nutrients and not only causes cavities, but feeds candida and cancer as well. Sea salt is full of vital minerals, but table salt is refined similarly to sugar and in the process loses its minerals. To make up for that, iodine is added back into the salt, but that does not make up for all of the other valuable trace minerals lost. Table salt can dehydrate, irritate edema and increase high blood pressure, but sea salt will not.
White flour does not contain the whole grain, only a fraction of it, and has once again, been bleached of all its nutrients. Often, the bleached white flour is then “enriched” with synthetic vitamins to supposedly make it healthier. All pre-ground flour is rancid. Seeds and grains contain volatile oils and should never be ground and then left to sit on a shelf and go bad. Gluten intolerances and celiac disease are becoming increasingly more common as a result of years of eating white bread or pastas made from bleached flour, which essentially turn to glue inside of the intestines.
3. Cut out meat and dairy.
If you are a meat eater and want to stay that way, drastically cut back on the amount of meat you consume. Eat pasture fed meat if any. Or learn to hunt. Factory farmed animals are corn rather than grass fed and are often very sickly and given multiple rounds of antibiotics, hormones, even steroids. I don’t know about you, but I certainly would not want to eat that!
Meat should never be the focal point of the meal, nor should you eat meat with every meal. I am not saying this for the sake of my little furry friends, rather for your health. Years of eating meat can increase cholesterol (which is actually necessary in the small amounts that your body makes), clog arteries, and cause heart attacks. Just ask my grandfather who has had multiple heart attacks, a quadruple by-pass surgery, and an angioplasty what his diet consisted of most of his life. And he even ate vegetables! (Granted they were cooked in lard.)
Cow’s milk is for baby cows. Period. It is not made for humans to consume. I do not understand why people find this so hard to grasp. No sane adult would ever think of drinking milk from a nursing human mother, so why do people think it is ‘natural’ to drink cow’s milk? Most people are actually (biologically) lactose intolerant to some extend. Dairy is difficult to digest, causes mucus, and like wheat, can become thick and gluey in the intestines. Dairy is full of hormones and antibiotics too, along with a lot of other nasty things that come out of the cow when it is milked. Commercial dairy is pasteurized, killing any enzymes that would enable you to properly digest the milk, cheese or yogurt.
The practice of taking milk from animals developed during a time when it was hard to find and grow enough food to feed the family, tribe, or village. The animals were well taken care of and loved, and the milk products were consumed raw. If you choose to eat dairy, then eat local, raw cheese or milk. In many states, raw milk cannot be sold in stores, so you may have to visit an actual farm to get the milk, but many health food stores sell local raw milk cheeses. The raw dairy still contains lactase, the enzyme which digests lactose, and usually the small time farmers do not give their cows antibiotics or hormones and they may even be free range or pastured.
4. Find your support group.
There are raw food potlucks popping up all over the country. A raw potluck is a great place to meet new raw friends, to share recipes, and to try new dishes. It helps to be able to talk to others who are going through the same lifestyle change as you, or to get advice from people who have gone before you. If you cannot find a raw potluck in your area, you can always start one yourself or at the very least, attend a vegetarian or vegan potluck, especially if you are transitioning to raw foods from SAD (Standard American Diet).
5. Do NOT give up.
You may not be able to be all raw right away, or ever. Everyone is different, and everyone transitions at a different pace. Be patient with yourself. If you slip up and eat something you know you shouldn’t have or are trying to avoid, the worst thing you can do is to get upset with yourself. Guilt and shame can be just as unhealthy as poor diet and lack of exercise. Instead, resolve to stay strong.
Keep healthy, raw snacks on hand at all times to help you fight cravings. It is much easier to resist junk food or cooked comfort foods if you already have something healthy in your stomach. Learn to listen to your body and give it what it needs nutritionally, and in time, you will be able to overcome cravings and stay in control.
Photo: http://healthwellnesspost.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/raw-food.jpg
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