Raw Food and Green Smoothies

Raw Food - Can We Really Live on It?

My daughter has been interested in raw food for several years. She has read about people who eat a diet of raw food and she has tried it for days at a time. Now she is interested again and has a friend who is teaching her all about the benefits of greens. Healthy eating interests me. I am always open to new ideas.

But in the past when she has mentioned this to me, I haven’t thought about it for myself. I have always been eating the foods I have found that make me feel good and not searching for any answers. Basically, I eat healthy foods. I drink soy proteins shakes with soy milk. If I think I need something that contains sugar, I remind myself that sugar feeds cancer and remember how bad it makes me feel; after the “good feeling” passes!

But this doesn’t always work. I have to get a mindset of how healthy I want to be and how bad junk food is for me and I have to stick with it. Usually, after 3 or 4 days of this routine, I don’t even want anything that’s on my “don’t’ eat” list. I begin to feel so good with so much energy and have such clear, creative, thoughts that I don’t want to mess my body up. But, as I said, this sometimes comes to a halt when company comes or other situations arise.

Now, I have proven to myself that I can go through Christmas, holidays, trips, vacations, and not go crazy “eating”. When I do eat something ‘not so good for me’, it's because I have chosen to, not given in to peer pressure or a craving (well, maybe a craving!). This is what frustrates me even more because I know that I can resist. I also don’t do well rewarding myself with a ‘treat’ every week. One bite of a sugary cookie makes me want several bites of several more cookies.

I say all of this to get to my point. I am not a control freak. I have never wanted to or controlled anybody. But it does feel good to control my eating. It will never get to be a dangerous control that will lead to an eating disorder. If that was going to happen, it would have already happened. This isn’t something stemming from an emotion that I want to have control. I just want to know what to expect in my eating habits. I want to have off-limit foods and stay away from them. I just can’t go throughout my day eating whatever comes along.

Now my daughter has handed me the book ‘Green for Life’ by Victoria Boutenko. This is just the inspiration I needed. Once I read about healthy lifestyles and the reason why I could benefit from eating certain foods, that’s all it takes. I have never studied raw food benefits before. And as I read last night, (couldn’t put the book down) the wonders of raw food, I was amazed.

Victoria starts out by comparing a human diet to the diet of a chimpanzee. I don’t believe in evolution or that monkeys and humans are the same, but God made us both. I know that any animal, unless ‘spoiled’ to eating sweets and junk food, will choose a healthy diet. They choose healthy foods naturally, and God made them to eat raw food. So Victoria writes that the chimpanzee diet is 50% fruits and 45% greens. The remainder percent is bark and seeds. Compare that to the Standard American Diet, (SAD), the majority which is meat, rice, potatoes, bread, and pasta. When I looked at those pie charts in her book, I knew that most of Americans are on the wrong track. No wonder the initials spell out SAD! can even be much improved by eating the correct foods. Acne can even be much improved by eating the correct foods.

As I said before, I am careful about my food. I don’t eat much meat. I stay away from sugar. And I hate the feeling I get after eating breads and pasta. But I was missing something in my diet. I can go for awhile and not want anything but soy shakes, a few organic crackers, and some nuts. But then I start wanting meat and other foods.

Victoria told that her family has eaten raw food for years, but would still crave cooked food at times. When they started drinking green smoothies, this craving completely stopped! This was important because she was convinced that the raw food diet was healthy for them. As I read further in her book, I was convinced that I can live better, healthier, longer, and be free from diseases if I add green smoothies to my diet. Her research just makes perfect sense!

Victoria explains that kale, romaine lettuce, spinach, carrot tops, and others got classified as vegetables, but they are greens. They have a completely different set of nutrients and look different. I had always wondered if a tomato was a fruit or a vegetable. She cleared that up for me. Not only is a tomato a fruit, but so are cucumbers, zucchini, squash. They are called non-sweet fruits.

There is a chart in her book that shows how much protein these greens contain. Greens are high in amino acids. It shows how these proteins are easier for the body to break down and use compared to proteins in meat, dairy, fish, etc. I will gladly drink my antioxidants in the form of raw food! I think all of us know the importance of fiber in our diet. She has a chapter that explains how fiber helps our body and why we need it. This book is so easy to read. I have read about these subjects before, but never understood it all as I did last night.

My daughter said that the book has made such an impact on her life as no other health book has. And my daughter studies health books constantly! I have to agree with her. I believe that the small book is about to change my life!

Victoria explains homeostasis. I ‘kinda’ knew what this is, but her explanation is so clear! Here is a quote speaking about homeostasis: “This extraordinary ability of all living organisms to repair themselves is the only power that can heal any illness.” And, “If we are helping our homeostasis – we are taking the best possible care of our health.” And, “By drinking green smoothies we support our homeostatic balance in the most optimal way.” By this chapter, I’m sold. One of my main goals in life is to eat a diet that helps my body fight disease. Raw food is now on my list of 'things to do to prevent disease'!

I haven’t thought much about stomach acid, but Victoria has. There is a chapter about how many people don’t have enough of the hydrochloric acid in their stomachs. Greens to the rescue!

One of my favorite chapters is called ‘Greens Make the Body More Alkaline’. I know that bodies need to be alkaline rather than acidic. But, again, her explanation is so simple and clear! Cancer starts in a body that is too acidic! How important it is to keep your body in an alkaline state! Here again, greens and raw food to the rescue.

Here is a quote from this marvelous book that I will make one of my favorite because it’s so simple!

“Today we have an ocean of confusing information as well as articles in which different experts state many different reasons for illness. However, I think the main reason for illness was stated very clearly in 1931. Over 75 years ago Otto Warburg was awarded the Nobel Prize for his discovery that cancer is caused by weakened cell respiration due to lack of oxygen at the cellular level. According to Warburg, damaged call respiration causes fermentation, resulting in low pH, which is acidity, at the cellular level. Dr Warburg, in his Nobel Prize winning study, illustrated the environment of the cancer cell.

A normal, healthy cell undergoes an adverse change when it can no longer take in oxygen to convert glucose into energy. In the absence of oxygen, the cell reverts to a primal nutritional program to nourish itself by converting glucose through the process of fermentation. The lactic acid produced by fermentation lowers the cell pH (acid/alkaline balance), and destroys the ability of DNA and RNA to control cell division. The cancer cells then begin to multiply. The lactic acid simultaneously causes severe local pain as it destroys cell enzymes. Cancer appears as a rapidly growing external cell covering, with a core of dead cells.

Dr. Warburg finished one of his most famous speeches with the following statement: “Nobody today can say that one does not know what cancer and it’s prime cause is. On the contrary, there is no disease whose prime cause is better known, so that today ignorance is no longer an excuse that one cannot do more about prevention.” This statement was made 75 years ago! So, as Victoria says, why doesn’t everyone know what pH is? And my question is, why hasn’t Dr Warburg’s findings been taught to doctors and to us? Why don’t we know this simple truth? I have thought for many years that cancer could be cured easily but now I see, it’s so easy to prevent! I want everyone I know and you that I don’t know to know this truth! I am convinced that green smoothies and raw food are the way to health.

The next chapter is on chlorophyll. So important for our health! Here are just a few of it’s many healing properties:

Helps prevent cancer

Makes the body more alkaline

Counteracts toxins eaten

Cleans and deodorizes bowel tissues

Cleans tooth and gum structure in pyorrhea

Helps sores heal faster.

“Considering that greens are a major source of chlorophyll, it is difficult to find a better way of consuming chlorophyll that drinking green smoothies.”

Henry David Thoreau’s quote from ‘Walden’:
“One farmer says to me, ‘You cannot live on vegetable food soley, for it furnishes nothing to make the bones with’; and so he religiously devotes a part of his day to supplying himself with the raw materials of bones; walking all the while he talks, behind his oxen, which, with vegetable-made bones, jerks him and his lumbering plow along in spite of every obstacle.”

Below is a quote from ‘Raw Food Life Force Energy’ by Natalia Rose about depression. I have gotten some good information from this book and some great recipes. But she never talks about God as our Creator and this is important to me that I don’t get anybody off on the wrong trackWhen she talks about the “Life Force Energy”, I know that this Life and Energy come from God, our Creator. So I am able to enjoy her book and quote from it while keeping my own beliefs. The following is about depression and how it can be helped by eating raw food. Here is what Natalia writes:
“Happiness is our naturally intended state.
With all due respect to those who have experienced deep suffering or hold fast to the belief that life is a constant struggle, I firmly believe that happiness is our natural state. When you live in a body flowing with abundant Life Force Energy, you are you are filled with a natural contentment.
Westerners today are so far removed from natural sources of energy, sustenance, and joy that we are inclined to believe that depression is normal. Joy is something extraordinary in our society – only a very few among us walk through life joyfully. Meanwhile, instead of pausing to consider the deeper implications of the widespread diagnosis of depression, we simply treat it with pharmaceutical drugs.

I believe that the root cause of depression can almost always be traced to abnormal living, eating, and spiritual unrest – and that correcting these imbalances of modern living will effectively eliminate depression. How often, though, do we propose dietary and lifestyle adjustments as a course of treatment for the disease of depression? How often do we educate those suffering from depression in our culture about the effect of unfit foods on our physical and emotional balance? Very rarely, if ever. Instead, we prescribe drugs and occasionally add some talk therapy to the mix. Although antidepressant drugs can be a valuable aid for those who are going through a time of intense stress or trauma and are struggling to transition back to a balanced life, the cultural norm of knee-jerk prescription writing is shameful.”

She goes on to say that she doesn’t suggest that everyone suffering from depression could be fully cured by a raw food diet. But in the case of the average depressed Westerner, there is a better way than medication. And on this I agree with her 100%! I know that what I eat affects everything in my body and I feel so much better eating raw foods. They are alive! How simple is that! Would you want to eat something dead (anything cooked) or something alive? I have made my choice and I continue to study and learn new recipes for raw foods.

I consider myself welcomed into the world of raw food! I am excited and happy. I have made many positive changes in my diet in the past 10 years and I think that raw food and green smoothies is the icing on the cake! (Sorry for that comparison.) I think this finding will complete my diet and is something I can live on the rest of my life!

To learn much more about greens, raw food, and what I am so excited about, click here to go to Victoria's site!

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