Life is an experiment. That’s how I’ve seen it at least since about age twelve.
And in this oxygenated test tube where trial and error sometimes scintillates and sometimes stings, the only rule is to keep testing…
Many of us enjoy the dance that comes with testing other people. Sometimes by pushing buttons and outright manipulation, other times via that heavenly connection with another that makes us more aware of ourselves by finding where our edges are; and ultimately aren’t.
But the deepest experiments are those where we are the subject and the observer. If you look at my recent foray into raw foods as an experiment, then you’d also have to see the years of near abuse with food & drink that brought me to that jumping off point as a kind of experiment too…
And now a new level of experimentation has begun for me. Now I notice nuance in relation to my body-mind. Whereas before I simply slumbered, drugged by white processed flours and grain alcohol, now I can literally feel the difference between just OK and fucking fantastic.
While completing my 60 day raw challenge I rarely exercised. It was enough to take on that new way of eating. Even without exercise I lost 37 lbs in 8 weeks…
After completing that challenge I committed to a new one–90 straight days of exercise. For over two weeks now I’ve been pushing myself and intensely exercising every day. I still eat very clean (raw until dinner and then cooked vegetarian meals for dinner) and I have lost exactly zero pounds.
Now, I have noticed increased musculature in my chest, shoulders, and legs…so most likely I’ve lost fat which has been replaced by new lean mass…but I don’t feel lighter. While I’ve still been careful about what I eat, adding “healthy” cooked foods into my life again has left me feeling soft and lackluster.
I miss the clean and almost endless energy that came with all raw…and I miss how succulent and hydrating that way of eating was.
So, I’ve decided to spend at least the rest of January back on a 100% raw diet. More experimentation and more data to crunch…
The main thing I’m curious to see is how I will feel eating 100% raw again, but this time coupled with daily intense exercise? Only time will tell.
I have tickets for 8 screenings, and am psyched because I have two screenplay projects that I want to complete/figure out, but haven’t had the motivation…so I’m looking to the festival for some inspiration.
The trick is going to be keeping up with the 90 day Natural Fitness Challenge, bartending full-time and catching all these films…
But I’m pumped, I feel good, and I don’t have kids, so don’t shed any tears for me–the next two weeks will be great.
I may even throw in a movie review or two…
Day 7 (yesterday)
24 oz. of h20 w/ 2 tbs apple cider vinegar for my sinus thing
juiced a grapefruit and 3 oranges and blended the juice with half a bag of spinach
had a coconut water just before Bikram Yoga class
drank a quart of water during my 90 minute Bikram class
24 more oz. of ACV & water
watermelon juice
leftover grilled veggies & potatoes before work
road bike to work and snacked on a tangerine and a LARA bar at work
Fresh pesto w/ loads of raw garlic, fresh tomato, tossed with warm quinoa after work for dinner! Frickin good.
Uli Mana’s cacao date rolls and a glass of vino
more water and ACV before bed (sinus thing is still lingering in background and I want it GONE GONE).
Day 8 (today-Friday)
quart of h2o
my favorite breakfast–a whole pineapple
a small iced green tea, spicy blue corn chips & organic hummus for lunch
rode bike home from work and splurged with baked nachos–blue corn chips, black beans, organic raw cheese (unpasteurized and aged), hot sauce
For exercise I did push ups ALL day. I think I will be doing this once per week. Whenever I thought about it today I dropped and did 10 here, 6 there, 12 there, and they added up to…70 push ups. Next week when I do the pushup thing again I want to DOUBLE that number!!! I am sore and got a nice pump from today though.
Still feel a little under the weather and can’t wait to feel a 100%. I’m one week in and I’m ready to be more intense…
Tomorrow is Farmer’s Market and another screening!
I have to level with you and share that I have a real problem with the following words:
Natural – What the hell does that mean anyway? Aren’t we all natural, even when we’re not?
Fitness – It’s kind of a gross word, that for me conjures up images of treadmills and those stupid giant balls people workout on.
Challenge – The word itself is a challenge, and in an abrasive way. Sometimes we like a good challenge, but most of us don’t like to be challenged.
beats me
So why would I call this a Natural Fitness Challenge? Because I only have words to work with here 😉 and because the three words together, kinda sorta almost convey what I am trying to do for the next 90 days of my life. Actually I have 84 days left!
The whole package, aka, stronger & longer lasting.
Looking good Kim...must be all those Carl's Jr. salads...
I have tried–successfully & unsuccessfully–to “tranform” my body in the past. Unfortunatley, even when I did succeed it was short-lived. And something else always bothered me too…those transformations weren’t really about me.
Having only external goals like “I wanna lose weight and have big muscles,” or “the most important thing in my life is that I can wear a bikini this summer,” doesn’t get you to a place where the transformation sticks. I want you to wear a bikini this summer too–I really do–but I want you to be wearing the polka dots every summer after as well.
One of the biggest parts of the package is health. What’s the point of getting super fit but in the process flooding your body with cancer causing artificial sweeteners, meat & dairy full of hormones and antibiotics, and “fat burners” that quickly wear down your nervous system?
And why undergo a trans-formative process that leaves you feeling only more critical of yourself? That’s never healthy.
We live once. We are these bodies, which I don’t believe are separate from us as most of us have been taught.
We can live incredibly with all kinds of savory sensory input and loads of dynamic energy and skin on skin and bellowing laughter, or we can drive around town with cheetohs on our dash and a big gulp in the cup holder with cigarettes burning our upholstery and our lungs hating the world and…you get the picture.
And yeah..I’m dramatizing both realities..we are all somewhere in the middle of that picture…which is right where we should be.
What I did on Day 6:
I am so blown away by how fast you can heal if you get out of your own way! If you read the last couple blogs I mentioned I had to slow down a bit because of a debilitating sinus infection. I rarely get sick, but when i get sinus infections they are serious business.
Gabrielle Brick, who I am a not so secret admirer of, gave me some great advice on how to make my sinus infection “cease to exist” quickly. I used to have month long infections, following her advice it’s almost completely gone in 2 days!
Today I will be going for another strenuous hike since it’s my last day off for a bit and I must be outside in this gorgeous weather (it’s absolute sunny perfection and in the 70’s in Palm Springs).
2 glasses of h2o each with a tbs of Apple Cider Vinegar (for my sinuses)
Juiced 2 grapefruit, 4 oranges, and blended with 2 big handfuls of spinach and some blueberries.
2 more glasses of water w/ ACV.
took a slow hike at a pace that would get my heart rate up w/o stressing my immune system.
ate a LARA bar on the hike.
bought a new matcha green tea raw bar at health food store and ate it–so delicious! like a sweet graham cracker.
made chickpea tacos with spicy mexicn seasonings and lots of fajita veggies: zucchini, carrots, onion, red pepper. served on steamed corn tortillas and with spicy corn on the cob. i skipped the organic sour cream because of my sinuses.
swallowed 2 big cloves of garlic (immune booster) in a tbs of raw honey (anti-bacterial).
Tomorrow I think I’ll feel good enough to get back to a Bikram class!
TONS of people are asking me how they can participate in the challenge! But a couple questions keep being asked. Here’s the scoop!
What is “natural” fitness anyway?
Someone asked me yesterday what I mean by “natural fitness” challenge.
I struggled a bit with what to call this thing I’m trying to do, and settled on alternating between “90 straight days of exercise” & “90 day natural fitness challenge.”
Ninety straight days of exercise is pretty self-explanatory. Most modern peeps don’t do some form of exercise every day. Many haven’t exercised in 90 days! So my plan is to get moving every day for three months.
The reason I chose to use the word natural in conjunction with fitness is that much of the fitness world has nothing to do with health.
Looking back…
In the eighties it was assumed the two words (health & fitness) were synonymous…
Remember when everyone was obsessed with eating low fat and sugar free?
Remember when endless cardio sessions and massive bowls of low fat pasta and bread were the hallmarks of health and fitness?
Not to mention the massive amounts of supplements people were taking! Vitamins, minerals, protein powders, ginseng, memory aids, sleep aids, super dieters tea…
And the one that cracks me up the most is remembering how cool & “healthy” we thought we looked with a cold diet coke in our hand!
A lot of that mentality is still around, and most of it can be found in gyms. Have you seen how massive some of the tubs of whey & soy protein powders are that they have for sale at gyms? And yes, people are still popping creatine and testosterone pre-cursors like candy.
I did all that. Years ago I completed a 12 week fitness challenge called “body for life” sponsored by EAS (a huge supplement company). I looked damn good after that 12 weeks. I also spent well over $1500 on body building supplements. Including fat burners, creatine, whey, and HMB. It was effective, but not necessarily about health.
2010 and beyond!
After eating only raw foods for the last two months of 2009–and losing over 33 pounds–I now have the motivation and desire to get incredibly fit! But I am not interested in anything other than a natural approach to doing so…
No way am I going to embrace an artificial, chemical, fear-based approach to fitness. We all want to look great naked–no doubt about that–but NOT at the cost of our health.
I believe we can do both. And I believe that journey will take people mostly out of the gym and into nature. I think the fitness revolution of the coming decade will happen in yoga studios, in the ocean, and on mountain tops!
I think fitness can be the way we actively meditate, the way we give back to ourselves, and a way to share and connect with the people we are closest to.
What are the rules?
The next question I am being asked is, “so what are the rules of the 90 day challenge?”
Rules are a funny thing. We need guidelines and even full-blown rules sometimes. But for the most part they aren’t really the thing that’s important…it’s just that we feel uncomfortable without having them.
When people start eating raw as an example they are often hyper concerned with the “rules.” Is tamari (wheat-free soy sauce) raw? Can I eat these olives? Is it ok to have a glass of wine on a raw diet? After time you begin to realize that what you are after isn’t some prize, or to be able to label yourself a raw foodist, but health, energy, LIFE!
Food
I am very comfortable with how I eat now. I did a ton of research and experimentation during my raw challenge and I believe I have found what is best for me:
2/3 or more of my diet is raw fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds.
I do not eat refined sugars. When I have “sweets” the sugar comes from dates, raw honey, agave, etc.
I literally almost never eat “white” processed flour, i.e., pasta, bagels, bread.
I avoid foods cooked in oil, while I liberally use cold-pressed oils and avocados in my daily intake.
I eat no artificial ANYTHING! No artificial sweeteners or preservatives. Nothing that says diet, sugar-free, low-fat. None of that. And that includes supposedly healthy processed soy products or other “fake” meats, etc. I only eat real food. If I have a veggie burger its made of veggies and legumes, not texturized soy protein isolates or seitan (wheat gluten).
Very rarely will I have beer or hard liquor. I have 2-5 glasses of organic red wine a week.
I love raw superfoods like cacao (chocolate), maca, and spirulina–but they aren’t a huge part of my diet and I don’t spend a lot of money on them.
I eat very little meat or dairy, and when I do I am committed to only eating grain-fed, hormone/antibiotic/and confinement free beef, poultry, eggs, and dairy.
Most days start with a simple green smoothie followed by snacking on fresh fruit throughout the day. Some days I make a cool raw dinner and have a 100% raw day. Other days I make a healthy cooked meal or go out to one of few places I know I can purchase REAL food.
Greens are a BIG part of my intake each and every day. I support local farmers and purchase most of my produce at my local farmers market. Some of it is organic, all of it is at the very least pesticide-free.
Is this the only way to be healthy? Of course not. Is this the right way for you to eat? I have no idea.
This is just where I am at and I feel really good about it. Maybe you will find these guidelines helpful.
I will say that I think most people will never really get the raw thing without committing to being 100% raw for a period of time (at least two weeks, and preferably a full month).
It is very empowering, illusion-shattering, and awareness-inducing to eat 100% raw for a time. If you want to commit to it, get in touch with me and I will help you any way I can!
The bottom line though is this…in order to benefit from this 90 day natural fitness challenge you need to be eating what you consider to be a healthy, natural diet!
Exercise
The rules of the challenge are more clear cut when it comes to exercise–do it EVERY day!
A note about rest. Rest is critical in order to “recover.” Recovery is when your body repairs and grows new muscle. So you need one day a week where you give yourself a break. But that doesn’t mean you lay on the couch all day. It just means you take a long walk and smell the roses, or ride your beach cruiser around the boardwalk. Rest by moving.
The other six days show no mercy! Seriously. Six days a week of intense exercise. It can be in a gym. But it doesn’t have to be…
Maybe you have a favorite workout DVD you like to pop in. Maybe you do Pilates or yoga (just make sure it is real hatha yoga and that it is intense). Maybe you get up early and run/walk around a lake or hike straight up your favorite climb for 60-90 minutes. Whatever it is–PUSH! Really truly push and get your heart pounding and your ass shaking.
Thirty minutes of intense exercise is the BARE MINIMUM, and if you are only exercising 30 minutes you better be sweating like crazy after. Most days you should be shooting for a solid hour of exertion.
If you are out of shape like I am, don’t use it as an excuse. Instead take heart knowing that your fat ass will be easily taxed by almost any form of movement or resistance! That’s right! It’s actually easier for out of shape people to do this challenge! Have you noticed I haven’t said one thing about how far you should run or bike? This isn’t about distance if you are using this to get in shape. This is about getting in shape.
The pose that eludes Annie...the Pigeon...LOL!
The people who have it toughest are those who are already fit but want to use the 90 day challenge as a way to go further.
As an example my girlfriend, a Bikram Yoga teacher who already eats very healthily and exercises six to seven times a week, EVERY week, is doing the 90 day challenge along with me.
Her unique challenge involves attending a once weekly advanced Bikram class. In addition to her daily exercise she is now going to once a week put herself through a 5 hour session of hellish and uber-intense advanced hot yoga. A process that is an extreme physical and mental challenge. Makes me feel like I’m getting away with something…
I think it will be fascinating to see what people come up with. Maybe some snow-bound people will be cross country skiing, maybe there are people who are ready to train for their 1st triathlon or amateur mountain bike race…
So the bottom line is that in order to participate in this challenge you must commit to 90 straight days of exercise! There are no make up days, this is meant to be tough.
So how do I start?
The rest of this is optional but highly recommended:
Let me know what your start date is! I would love to stay in touch throughout the process and it will motivate me & others to know you are doing the challenge.
Take before pics. Trust me, you will be glad you did. Nothing is more motivating then comparing before and AFTER pics of yourself side by side! If you are thrilled with your results and are open to it, I would love to post them on a blog and tell everyone about your personal experience with the 90 day challenge!
Get an initial weight and any other measurement that you think are key: waist, dress size, bicep measurements, resting heart rate, blood pressure. After you take these initial measurements DO NOT take them again for another 30 days! Once every 30 days retake the measurements and record them.
Tell other people. Let your Facebook, Twitter, and (gasp) even people you actually see in person each day know that you are doing this and you are pumped about it. Feel free to include a link to my blog any time you like. Maybe you will get some 90 day workout partners!
Write stuff down. Every single day record what you ate and what you did that qualifies as intense exercise. I don’t know why writing stuff down makes such a big difference when it comes to accomplishing things–but it does. That’s the whole reason behind this blog…it’s a way for me to write it down.
Enjoy yourself and be your own best friend. This is about feeling healthier, looking great, and enjoying life. It’s tough to enjoy life if you don’t like yourself. So be a true friend and thank yourself at least as hard as you are pushing yourself! It’s not the 90 day challenge that actually matters, so don’t ever get discouraged. What matters is you!
I truly hope this is something that will continue to spread and benefit people. It may seem far-fetched, but I truly believe that anyone can completely reinvent themselves in just 12 weeks! It’s one of the coolest things about being human, this capacity we each have to change…
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What I did on my 3rd day of the challenge:
Slept in and missed my chance to do Bikram today.
Drank 3 glasses of water.
Juiced 2 grapefruits & 2 oranges. Blended w/ spinach & spirulina for a green breakfast.
Road my bike and did errands (including buying tickets for Palm Springs Film Festival screenings!).
Did an hour long “training” ride on my fixed gear bike. Fixed gears only have one speed, are geared pretty high, and don’t “coast.” That means if I ride for an hour I am literally pedaling for an hour. I like to find hills and race up them until my heart feels like it will explode, then ride steady until I am breathing normal again, and then repeat over and over for an hour or more.
Drank 2 glasses of water.
RAW superfood energy chocolate shake: almond butter, maca powder, cacao powder, cacao nibs, raw honey, and raw hemp seeds (great protein) all belended with some water and ice! Delicious, full of antioxidants, and gives me tons of energy.
Snacked on a couple tangerines at work and probably drank another quart or more of water.
Tossed brown rice noodles with homemade pesto (raw walnuts/basil/cold-pressed olive oil/garlic cloves/sea salt/lemon squeeze), some diced fresh tomato, and some raw goats milk cheese. Enjoyed with a glass of organic wine.
Drinking more water as I type this before bed. I may sneak in another one of those Uli Mana raw chocolate truffles!
Tomorrow I am taking Annie’s Bikram class fershizzel my wizzles!
Cheers to everyone and I look forward to hearing about your 90 day challenges!
Insomnia has been a painful issue with me for some time now. I’m hoping that 90 straight days of exercise will help me fall asleep earlier and that I can experience deep rest. Deepak Chopra says that dynamic activity begets deep rest which begets dynamic activity…
So this morning I crawled in bed at 3AM and lay there unable to fall asleep until about 4:30AM. It was real TOUGH to get my ass up at 9 for yoga. But that’s the great thing about a commitment to something bigger–like the 90 day challenge–I got up.
And I am really glad I did. I was able to take Damon’s class (he is one of the owner’s of Bikram Yoga Palm Desert) for the first time. Damon is hilarious and his class is fun while still being focused on max exertion. When I used to practice on a regular basis I was always blown away when I learned something entirely new. Today Damon taught me two things in class that I had never heard before:
In the balancing stick posture Damon actually did a breath count with us! I’ve heard teachers simply say to make sure you breathe in this posture, but he literally guided us through 3 or 4 deep inhalations and exhalations. It changed my entire perspective of this posture and what I could potentially do with it as I progress.
The man and the pose...Damon doing balancing stick pose
The other thing he said which blew me away has to do with a pose that’s almost at the end of class and that in the past I always payed little attention to and sort of treated like a “cool down” stretch. It’s called janushirasana with paschimottanasana or “head to knee pose.” But the last part of this poses name is “intense stretching posture.” I had NEVER heard that before and a light bulb went on and I did stretch more “intensely” and it was amazing! So thanks Damon.
The other thing I love about being a beginner with Bikram is that it’s actually easier as a beginner. Sounds weird, but when you are new, just trying to breathe and stay in the heated room is an intense workout. You get a little better and just doing all the postures is a big thing. When I practiced every day and got a little more proficient is when it got really difficult. Suddenly I was flooded with nuances that make the practice even more hard core. So I’m going to relish being a beginner again!!!
One last observation about Bikram has to do with listening. We all suck at it. Seriously. And Bikram is this place where you can practice listening, not just to the instructors voice, but your body too.
Today is a 100% raw food day for me
My plan is to continue eating a ton of raw fruits and veggies every day. But several times a week I will eat 100% raw for the entire day. It’s such a powerful way to not let food cravings get out of hand and I have a lot more energy when I go all the way…
Today so far:
Quart of water before yoga
Coconut water before yoga (only thing I like having before a Bikram class, a little natural sugar & tons of electrolytes)
Another quart of water during class
Shopped at Farmer’s Market
Made a delicious smoothie: Juice from 2 grapefruits & 2 oranges. 1 cup frozen blueberries. Packed the remaining space in the blender w/ organic spinach. Blended and drank down this perfectly flavor balanced combo!
A tropical tango smoothie from Luscious Lorraine’s Juice Bar in Palm Desert. It’s packed with coconut water & coconut meat and tropical fruits!
Tonight when I get back from a late night working at the bar I will make raw nachos. I top Leaf Organics raw corn chips with heaps of fresh guacamole, cut up black olives, cilantro, and my favorite raw hot sauce made by Cafe Gratitude which I bought extra bottles of last time I was up in the Bay Area!
Today…the local newspaper is interviewing me about my raw foods “transformation!”
Read All About It! Crazy Guy Eats Only Raw Fruit & Veggies!!!
It may sound terribly cliche, but SO much has happened in just 1 1/2 months! Enough apparently, to get the attention of others.
I lost 2 more pounds this past week eating only “raw foods.” That means in only 6 weeks I’ve lost 26 lbs! But weight loss has really been the least significant change for me in all of this…
If you are new to my blog, go back to late October’s entries and you won’t have to read between the lines to find loads of anger and despair. I was numbed out 90% of the time, and flat out angry the other 10% of the time.
Depression and Diet
Numbed out is just another way to say depressed. How could I have NOT been considering what I was putting into my body?
I was:
Flooding my system with depressants (over 100 alcoholic beverages a week).
Trying to get back “up” with stimulants (coffee, sugar and other “white” foods) that spike you harder than a hot beach volleyball star.
Mucking up the works with bad fats made even worse by cooking with them.
Eating polluted grain-fed (and who knows what else) animal products filled with hormones, antibiotics and fear.
Rarely eating fruits or vegetables (like almost never), and when I did; eating nutritionally deficient, pesticide ridden, genetically modified produce.
Putting all of that “food” into a sedentary (nearly lifeless) body.
Looking back now, after such a rapid improvement in my sense of well-being, I have to ask myself, how much of that depression was completely physical and self-induced versus “emotional?”
Having grown up in a family comprised mostly of fat depressed souls, I also can’t help but truly wonder how many of their “emotional” problems would have been solved by just changing our families diet to a healthier one?
Would we have had a completely different childhood/home-life if we had just eaten different foods?
Comfort Foods and The Mirror
Of course the problem with a whole family, or even one person, making that kind of shift is this…when we’re depressed we want even more crap food to (here comes the irony) make ourselves feel “better.” It’s called comfort food for Fuck’s sake!
I remember night after night of trying to comfort myself into a frickin coma with pepperoni pizzas and cartons of Ben & Jerry’s. I also remember how uncomfortable I felt in my own body and how angry I’d feel looking at the “fat Elvis” version of myself in the mirror.
How ridiculous it really is to grow to nearly twice your size! How out of control that feels! How strange it is to be fat, even if it is quickly becoming the norm here in the U.S.
Just as bizzare and sad is getting to a place where its a burden just to be an active human being. To see walking as a necessary evil that you engage in only when after circling the Walmart parking lot ten times you are forced to park more than 10 feet from your destination…
Real Food feels Real Good
So I don’t know where my life is going to go from here. No one ever knows that. I don’t know for sure if I will feel this elated two weeks from today. I certainly don’t want to sound like I am preaching or proffering some kind of deluded salvation strategy (I don’t actually believe we need saving). But I do know that changing what and how I eat is changing me.
In very little time I look much younger, feel like early sexy Elvis more than pills washed down with liquor Elvis, and am no longer in self inflicted coma land…
Six weeks ago I could barely get out of bed to go to work at 5pm! I was resigned to being broke and basically being unhappy with my life. Now I am having trouble sleeping because I have so much stuff that interests me hitting me all at once…
Yesterday I crashed a UC screenwriting lecture, and am beyond excited about getting back to work on some scripts I started before, as well as a new one I’m dying to outline and get started on.
I now spend a lot of time communicating with all kinds of people about food through Twitter and this blog. I’d never blogged before, and had no idea how fun it can be or how much time it can take.
I have a growing reading list of both fiction and food-related stuff. Business ideas that flashed across my previously drug addled brain are once again clamoring for my creative attention.
And, I have this interview with the paper I have to get to…
Read the following little diddy and ask yourself if you think it’s true. Even better, leave a comment and tell me what it made you feel…
Better to eat beer and franks
with cheer and thanks
than sprouts and bread
with doubts and dread.
It’s sometimes recited a little differently and is often credited to a “wise old man once said…” But to me it’s simple and powerful.
Raw Food Diet
Eating only raw foods is something I think everybody should experience. Not eating animals or their “product” is another important thing for people to experience. Both open some kind of awareness portal that can have long-term affects on how you see the planet, it’s food, and yourself.
Perhaps it will cause a sudden flash and with moral certitude you will disavow flesh consumption until the day you yourself perish. Or maybe your connectedness with flora and fauna will instead manifest itself in greater reverence for whatever passes your lips. Either way you are going to get closer to understanding what food really is, and how much of it you actually need.
Vegan-ism
If you are a vegan, and you’ve never spent a few weeks or months eating only raw vegan foods I would really encourage you to do so.
Years ago (many many) I read “Diet for a New America” and it influenced me enough as an 18 year old that I became “a” vegan. For a little over one year the only qualifier I used when deciding what to eat was whether or not it contained anything from an animal.
It was one of the least healthy periods of my life. I got fat. I felt shitty. I was eating mass quantities of stuff that is downright bad for you; processed soy products, low quality wheat gluten, and other “proteins” whose SOLE “value” are derived from the fact that they aren’t from animals. Sugar in all it’s many forms is also vegan…
Some vegans I have met eat very healthy, feel great, and wouldn’t feel right eating any other way. They eat their greens and they do agave instead of table sugar and corn syrup. They get protein from quinoa, spinach, and raw nuts. They limit the amount of “vegetarian” fried foods they eat (like McDonald’s french fries). And they are not stuffing themselves with soy protein isolates, seitan, and tofu.
But many others aren’t eating any more veggies than the meat & potatoes crowd, and from a health standpoint have just substituted one “bad” thing (industrial toxic meat & dairy) for another (industrial toxic soy & other bullshit–potentially carcinogenic fake foods).
If you’re a conscious healthy vegan eater, more power to you for making a decision that’s congruent with your point of view. And congrats on choosing a lifestyle that causes less harm to sentient beings and obviously makes a substantial positive environmental impact as well.
But…if you’re the second type of vegan, please don’t try to take any credit for lessening your negative impact on the planet. Do some research into the environmental havoc of your industrial vegan food. You may be very surprised.
Meat-less versus Less-meat
Once, while waiting tables in San Francisco, I encountered a man who knew exactly what he didn’t want to eat. He was originally from India, and was ordering food for his large family. The soft spoken patriarch looked me in the eye and asked me to please listen closely. He wanted to make sure I was paying attention and understood fully his one request. I’ll never forget the way he put it…
“My family doesn’t eat anything with a family.”
Fair enough! I thought it was a simple eloquent way to express it, and a nice take on life. So they eat cheese and eggs and butter and don’t mind if there is milk in the pizza dough. But under NO circumstances would they ever consider eating even a tiny bite of pepperoni…
Are Baby Animals Harmed Making SALT!?
Interestingly though, it doesn’t have anything to do with health. It’s another ethics based dietary choice. And while a nice sentiment, it also doesn’t necessarily ensure that animals haven’t been harmed in the process of preparing his families dinner.
The issue we all face with food is that there is so much “information” being thrown around (my blog included) that it’s become nearly impossible to compare mangoes to mangoes. Think about it. How could someone compare the ethical, environmental, and personal health impact of any two people?
Could you honestly argue that someone eating countless chemically processed, cleared rain forest grown, soy patties, whose ingredients have been shipped from the other side of the planet, is eating better than a family who mindfully includes some hormone and antibiotic free, free range, organically fed meat from a local source they know and trust?
What I propose
What if the individual goal is simply more conscious eating and less judgment in general?
Me? I need nothing.
That question/statement brings us full-circle back to having periods in ones life where regardless of whether we are a Jain Monk or a Tyrannosaurus…we eat mostly raw, and mostly vegan.
Not necessarily as an end in itself, or permanently; but because it may be the easiest way to learn exactly what works for us, and how to be the healthiest, happiest, ascetics or flesh-eating dinosaurs that we can be.
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If you are curious…today I ate: a blueberry smoothie, a nectarine, some raw pistachios, and a weird green/cacao smoothie.
It’s 5 am and I never went to bed. In a few minutes my girlfriend will wake up and go to yoga and in a couple hours I’ll be filling up reusable cloth hippy bags with loads of fresh organic produce from the Palm Springs Farmer’s Market!
I think someone put too much Yang in my smoothie. Or maybe it’s Yin… I can never remember which is which.
Anyway I have way too much of the crazy untethered in the stratosphere floating through electric fields kind. And while having a lot of energy is a nice change–I certainly don’t want to go back to that numbed world I was living in just 5 weeks ago–what I am experiencing is unnerving and does NOT feel balanced.
Every other day I don’t go to bed. I almost never want to eat–I’m just not hungry. When I do eat anything other than fresh succulent fruit; I regret it and wish I had fruit. It’s like there is nothing in my stomach to “buffer” anything more substantial than fruit and it’s juiciness.
My nut consumption is going way down. I don’t want salads or cabbage. And when I do try to make a new gourmet raw food recipe I’m usually disappointed. Why? What happened to all the fun I was having in the kitchen? I’ve always enjoyed traditional cooking, and was getting off on experimenting w/ raw menu items.
Let me be real about where I’m at after this past week experiencing truly manic levels of unfocused energy. I can’t wait for this 60 days I committed to to be over! I want lentils. I want potatoes. I want some grounding ,requires digestion, so you can rest medicine.
Maybe 100% raw is just TOO much?
TO be fair I want to quickly point out two semi-related issues that I know are contributing to the insomnia and my feeling off-kilter…
1. I started blogging & tweeting at exactly the same time I started my 60 day raw “challenge.” I thought it would be cool to share the experience with anyone interested. I didn’t know I would be throwing myself into a new universe whose steep learning curve and addictive nature are it’s price of entry. I also didn’t know that it would be a place with large stretches of haunting emptiness and occasional noxious gas clouds back lit by glaring red stars…
2. I need a more intense physical outlet. Now that I’m lighter and feel so much better I’m doing myself a huge disservice by not rigorously exercising every day.
Deepak Chopra (Who I don’t follow on Twitter because he tweets way too much) has this thing he talks about which has stuck with me for years…it goes something like this…
DYNAMIC ACTIVITY = DEEP REST
DEEP REST = DYNAMIC ACTIVITY
That’s something I am sorely missing. So understand I’m not blaming this on raw foods, but for me right now it’s all related. I thought riding my bike more, taking a hike on the weekend, and occasionally dropping and doing some push-ups would cover it. It’s not enough for my fruit filled dragster body.
So here’s my plan to try and be in possession of my sanity and other faculties at the end of the next 3 weeks:
1. More Greens & Water. You will read this in almost every raw food context you can find, and I think I can do better with both…
2. Set a cut off time for Twitter and Blogging. Like no Twitter or blogs after midnight. I need to pop in a DVD and be entertained or read one of the countless books piled high in my “READ!” stack.
3. Breathe! Seriously how often do we forget to breathe? I can get so hooked into cyberspace that I forget to drink water and I’ll sit there bouncing around in my chair because I need to piss so bad! That’s also why I’m taking advantage of this gorgeous Palm Springs day and blogging outside by the pool…
4. Start back to Bikram Yoga. It’s been almost two years. It’s time. Not only is this the “dynamic activity” I’m missing in my life–it also will really help me with #3–BIG BREATHS!
Yup. That's a Jesus Pose...
That said, I’m still looking forward to reintegrating some healthy cooked foods (sorry hard-core raw foodists, I know you think “healthy cooked food” is an oxymoron) back into my life.
I’ve been promising a post about some ideas I have for the long-term. That post will come soon, just let me get my finger out of the electric socket first!
Yesterdays blog (part 1) looked at the misconception that eating “raw” has to be expensive. It really doesn’t.
Today (part 2) I share what I think is a much bigger price to pay than money when it comes to the raw foods life…
Tomorrow (part 3) I’m going to look at the innumerable benefits of eating raw and try to do a simple Pro’s & Con’s analysis to see if eating raw feels worth it to me.
Part 2
IS GOING RAW WORTH IT EVEN THOUGH I HAVE TO GIVE UP SO MUCH?
Coffee
I love coffee. The aroma. The acidity. The buzzzzz. And I especially crave the taste. Black tar washing down my gullet.
I know coffee isn’t great for me. Sure every so often there’s a report about it having antioxidants as long as we drink it in moderation…come on…let’s be big boys & girls and admit it…we like coffee because it’s a drug. An upper extraordinaire.
This morning I woke up feeling like shit. Warmed over death. I had almost all juice yesterday and it’s kicking the cleansing back into high gear for me. Now normally, a quick $3 exchange with my dealer in the green apron would instantly change how I felt. LITERALLY.
Yeah-yeah there would be an energy spike and a corresponding drop..blah blah blah…that’s what a second cup of coffee is for. And I like most people ENJOY the coffee roller coaster. Especially because the ride right next to it in the park is the Booze Cruise.
So let me bottom line how I feel about coffee despite the fact that I am better hydrated and overall better off without it. I miss the nervous creative highs & lows I experienced with coffee.
Alcohol
If coffee is creative than alcohol is fun. Right? We’ve ALL had fun drinking. And we’ve all cursed Jack, Jim, and Jose for ever being born.
It’s tough to imagine the world without alcohol. The liquid hazy realm is where we all become stuff of legends…”Dude! I got SO trashed! I woke up in a planter in front of a bank!” and “WTF Lara, don’t you remember peeing on the McDonald’s sign last night
in front of like one million people driving down Wilshire?”
Good times.
I’ve been bartending for about three years. I’m not the kind of bartender who throws bottles in the air. I’m not particularly fast. I’m the kind of bartender that gets to know you and makes you a perfect drink every time.
I love beer & liquor (slowly coming around on wine with the help of Chilean malbecs ), my love of bourbon and tequila drives me to constantly learn and craft each cocktail.
You know how they say that what people choose to drink says a lot about them. It’s true. It’s a fascinating thing and what’s really cool is that it changes both seasonally and slowly over time as someones personality shifts.
For example, when I lived in the cold SF bay area all my drinking revolved around bourbon and dark seasonal ales from NorCal on up through the Oregon coast (My all time fave was Lagunitas’ Lucky 13 Mondo Red). The cocktail I liked to treat myself to was a stiff Maker’s Manhattan.
When I moved to Palm Springs I became obsessed with drinking Hefeweizens during the hot summer days and with meals. My desert tonic of choice? The simplest Tanqueray gimlet: 3 oz of Tanqueray, the juice squeezed from half a lime, and ice go into the shaker. Shake the HELL out of it and strain it UP into a chilled cocktail glass or over fresh ice in a clear plastic Dixie cup if I was taking out to the pool…
If I seem like I’m rambling a little, that’s because I am.
I want to convey that I really like and miss these things. I can’t sit here and type some BS lie like, “Oh…I don’t really miss any of that.” Because I do.
Food
Now obviously, I don’t have to give up food. I eat as much of it as I want. As long as it’s fruit, vegetables, nuts…
I’m talking about pizza, steak, hamburgers, mashed potatoes, lasagna, burritos, sushi, cornbread, bacon, chili-cheese fries, artisan goat cheese, nachos, sourdough melts, street tacos, BBQ, potato salad, tamales, Vegas buffets, spanakopita, cubano sandwiches, breakfast potatoes, garlic bread, chips & salsa, pad thai, samosas, baingan bharta, and anything made or topped with copious amounts of sweet roasted garlic…
Making that list this early in my attempt at 60 days raw (and maybe as a way of life) is both a little sadistic and masochistic…but you knew I’d eventually have to get some S&M into a blog called Live Nude Food. Click here for a little amateur food porn I downloaded on a day last week when my food cravings were worse than normal. Go ahead and click it. You know you want to.
So right now you’re probably thinking “WTF!?”. Me too.
I’ve run out of the time needed to delve into the social ramifications of being a raw food weirdo (that IS what people think). Suffice it to say that if you think eating a diet that is contrary in every last respect to what the rest of your family, your friends, and the country eats…carries zero consequences; your crazier than Tom Cruise.
Yeah, you can get all new friends (maybe you need to anyways). You can carry baggies of cacao to the movies and thank the big dipper that raw eateries are coming soon to a corner near you. But it’s not gonna be all fun, and it sure as hell isn’t easy. So why claim that it is?
You can see why I say this is the real cost of going raw. And it’s one I’m still weighing out myself. It’s good that I’ve made the decision to commit to 60 days 100% raw NO MATTER WHAT. If I was trying to ask these same questions over and over every day, it would be a disaster for me. In the meantime my health and overall feeling about life have drastically improved in just two weeks. That’s frickin impressive on any level.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Tomorrow I’ll try and articulate what’s so incredible about the raw foods experience, and I’ll ask myself how it stacks up to the booze cruise…
What I ate today:
Carrot/Orange/Apple juice
Half a Pineapple/Green Powder/Honey/Coconut Oil “Colada”
Notes: Felt full all day. So much buzzy energy I almost don’t feel grounded. Went for a long walk at dusk along a dried out river bed. I’m updating this at 4:45 in the morning and haven’t gone to sleep yet…
Don’t read this if you are easily offended as a raw foodie, vegetarian, or vegan.
For the hell of it today I want to write down some very specific feelings I’m having about food and how it seems to divide us into preformed types and all the thinking that surrounds it. I write now knowing that how I feel may change after I complete 60 days eating 100% raw (yesterday I referred to myself as an ever-changing furnace) and it will be interesting to re-read this then.
I’d also really like to hear your thoughts, so please take the time to comment if you have anything you’d like to share.
Here goes:
1. I don’t think its wrong that some humans eat meat. I’ve gone all over the map on this. When I was 18 or so I read John Robbin’s work Diet For a New America.Really made sense. So much so I “became” a Vegan (see the wording there?) for 3 years.
I also read Harvey Diamonds Fit for Life and started telling everyone that because we don’t have sharp fangs and lack the impulse to chase little squirrels around and tear them apart with our non-existent claws; that proves humans are not supposed to eat meat.
My feeling now is that we need to focus more on eating meat more consciously. And no, I don’t think that means that we should only eat meat we hunt or kill with our own hands. Human evolution happens through implementation of technologies. That’s HOW we evolve.
If vegans and raw food people really want to make a huge impact–work on helping everyday people (most will always eat meat) eat less and better sources of meat & dairy. Stop judging people and start helping them. We need to clean up our oceans so we can eat clean fish if we want to eat fish. We need to support families who raise animals humanely.
That’s my current feeling about meat…
2. The real food revolution has to happen with cooked foods. Regular old cooked food restaurants are where the improvements need to come. If a gal wants to eat a slice of pizza, she should be able to find a place that isn’t serving foods with hormones, pesticides, refined sugars…If a guy wants a big fat patty melt with cheddar and onions, give it to him, don’t hold back and make it diet food or even call it “health food”, just be committed to the INGREDIENTS being the best they can be. And yeah, have loads of vegetarian, vegan, and raw choices on the menu too!
A cool example of this I recently stumbled on is a vegetarian Mexican restaurant I read about called Gracias Madrethe owners of Cafe Gratitude (an excellent raw restaurant in the SF Bay Area) have opened. Why would raw restaurateurs open a cooked food eatery? I think because this is precisely where the BIGGEST impact can be made for the benefit of all. And isn’t that the real spirit of vegan raw food eating?
As a raw vegan community we would do better to villainize cooked foods less (which given the deplorable state of most cooked foods is hard to do–see–that’s why I’m saying the big changes have to come with cooking) and show people how to include more raw foods in their lives. I love the “raw til dinner” concept as an example.
I guess that’s all for now.
I will be weighing myself tomorrow (2 weeks raw) and that scale better budge!
It’s tough to imagine the world without alcohol. The liquid hazy realm is where we all become stuff of legends…”Dude! I got SO trashed! I woke up in a planter in front of a bank!” and “WTF Lara, don’t you remember peeing on the McDonald’s sign last night
from NorCal on up through the Oregon coast (My all time fave was Lagunitas’ Lucky 13 Mondo Red). The cocktail I liked to treat myself to was a stiff Maker’s Manhattan.
the owners of 
Fat Kid Suit 