As Americans, we have spent most of our lives eating the Standard American diet of meat, cheese and heavily cooked vegetables. This makes it hard to imagine eating only raw plant based foods. As such, many people feel overwhelmed just at the idea of change.Accomplishing the transition to a healthy diet feels like such a drastic change that most people become overwhelmed at the thought of it. Often quitting before they even begin and often letting their health suffer instead. But it doesn’t need to be overwhelming. We don’t need to live in fear of disease.
Why Choose Raw Food?
I will start by saying that my personal journey to a raw foods centered diet did not happen overnight. Most people who transition to a Raw Foods centered diet, do so gradually, as they become more educated about nutrition and food choices. However there are many people, particularly those who are already sick, who choose to jump right in to Raw Foods 100% from the start.
I had been a vegetarian for a large part of my life, since 1992, but by no means a healthy eater. For most of my Vegetarian life my diet focused on Bread, Pasta and Cheese with the occasional Veggie “meat” convenience foods.
In 2011 I transition to a Vegan diet, but this was not much of an improvement to my diet. I simply swapped the Cows Milk cheese for oil based “Vegan” Cheeses and the junk food for Vegan versions.
However I did feel a dramatic benefit from just removing dairy from my diet. This benefit was reinforced if I accidentally ate something without realizing it had dairy in it. I felt so sick after eating just these tiny amounts of dairy that it really reinforced how much impact just one wrong food can cause on draining our health away.
However, my Vegan diet was still very Starch heavy, cooked food centered and included very little fresh fruit. I was still tired all the time, depressed and feeling and looking old well before my time.
So I began researching nutrition more heavily. Nutrition has interested me since I first read the books Diet for a New America and Never Be Sick Again shortly after college. So I knew there was a better way of living, I just had to find it. This research led me eventually to the Raw Food, Fruit Centered Diet, and while the transition was not always smooth, I can say confidently that it was worth every moment.
Benefits of Raw Food and Why I choose Raw Food still today
Here are some of the benefits that I have seen from my transition to a Raw foods diet.
- I Lost 40 lbs over the course of about 6- 7 months, effortlessly, and without ever feeling hungry or deprived and without joining a gym. (My primary exercise comes from walks and hikes with my dogs and gardening.)
- My physical endurance has increased astronomically, I feel like an athlete now, something I have never felt in my life.
- My self confidence is greatly improved. I wake up happy, grateful, joyful and full of energy.
- Cavities in my teeth have begun to repair themselves.
- My joints no longer ache and I recover quickly from strenuous hikes, bike rides and other exercise.
- My complexion has cleared up, my skin looks brighter and younger and my hair is extremely long, shiny and healthy.
- I have abundant energy from morning to night.
- My sleep has improved drastically. I no longer have insomnia or restless nights. Waking I spring from the bed ready to tackle the day.
The list of changes could cover pages so I will stop here, but overall I feel amazing and that is what keeps me motivated. That and the food is delicious and I can eat as much as I want.
What has kept me on the Raw Foods diet is realizing just how bad I feel when I eat cooked and processed foods. It took several months to detox all of the junk, but now I can’t believe that I let myself go on feeling so tired all the time.
The craziest part though, at the time I was eating cooked foods, wheat and cheese, I had no idea how bad I felt. It wasn’t until I started eating a natural biologically appropriate human diet and started to feel really good that I even realized that I was feeling so bad before. If you have never felt this good before you have nothing to compare it to.If you have eaten cooked foods and science projects your whole life, like I had, you have no experience of what eating vibrant foods feels like. You have no idea how much you are actually suffering. So it wasn’t until I started nourishing my body that I truly understood how weak and sick I was. I just thought it was normal to feel that way.
So this is Why I choose Raw Foods. I can not emphasize how important real food is to our health. Try Real Raw Food for just 30 days, I can say with the utmost confidence, you will feel better, you will look better and you will live longer. You will never want to go back to eating science projects again.
