5 tips that will make the raw transitions easier

Well, no one said that it's going to be easy. But again, nothing in life worth while is easy. So as a person who is personally going through the process of going from cooked foods to raw foods... here's a few tips that will help you succeed...


1. Keep it Simple
Dehadrators? Sprouting? What? As a newbie I definitely don't want to deal with all that stuff. I mean if you want to go all out, then go for it. But in my case it is definitely easier, at least for now, to keep it simple. And by simple I mean basing your diet on mostly fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts and of course juices and smoothies. For the latter two, you do need some equipment like juicer and a blender but again those are easily found and obviously not too difficult too use. And if you still can't figure out what "simple" means, here's an example:
Breakfast - Green Smoothie or Fruit Juice
Lunch - A fruit salad
Dinner - A large green salad
Snacks - nuts and seeds
Of course, you don't want to eat the exactly same thing everyday which brings me to my next point...


2. Get Creative
With so many health food stores popping out everywhere you have more than enough choices to get creative. Many raw foodists like to stock up on raw products so they always have many choices and never have to reach for cooked food. I usually stock up on fruit so I can always make a fresh juice or smoothies, but as far as lunches or dinners go I tend to follow my taste buds and go day by day. So you'll often see me in a local Whole Foods or other health food store, by the salad bar creating my own Salad Creations. Also with raw food getting more and more attention everyday, you can now purchase raw goodies like Raw Granola, Raw Cookies, Sprouted Bread, Raw Honey and chocolate... as you can se the possibilities are endless. And with the endless possibilities comes the pressure so...


3. Take it Easy
Many people try to jump into raw food overnight and some are successful but some not so much. When I started out, I would go for few days 100% raw and then give in and eat some cooked food which is not a bad thing but for some reason made me feel like a failure. Which in turn would make me think that "hey, since I ate some cooked food, now the whole day's ruined and I might as well go and pig out". This is the kind of thinking that made my efforts fail one diet after another. Start slowly, it's ok not to be 100% raw right away. It's better to be 50% raw and 50% healthy cooked food than 100% raw for few days and then eating a large pizza in one sitting. So once again, take it ease.. take it slow! You might want to start of with just a raw breakfast then when you're comfort do raw breakfast and raw lunch... you get the point. Another way of transitioning is to slowly go from a meat eater to vegetarian, then to vegan, then to raw. Start with eliminating red meat, then all other meat, then fish, then dairy products... just go at your own pace and see what works for you. The main thing is not to punish yourself. We're all humans and we make mistakes. And speaking of humans, it brings me to my next point which is...


4. Make New Friends
Now a days there's so many online communities which of course includes raw food communities. Go online, do your research. Join groups, talk to people and learn new things. There are meet up groups in every city. There are people out there just like you looking to help you and make new friends. Seriously, just be open and willing to learn and the opportunities to make new friends will just present themselves. This doesn't mean you have to forget all your all friends, but now you can be the teacher too. You can inform your friends on raw food diet and healthy food choices. Take your friends and go explore some raw food restaurants in your city. Just be open and have fun with it. Yes, that is the main key...


5. Have Fun!
Seriously...what does it all matter if you can't have fun. There's no way you can stick with something if you don't enjoy doing it. So learn, research, involve your friends, get out there, move, walk, run, laugh...do it all. Do it now! Because there's no time like today and the benefits are tremendous! Love and Sunshine to all of You :-)

Oh Yumminess!

I had the best breakfast ever today... and to think I probably spent like 20 minutes laying in bed deliberating if I should have raw breakfast or go for SAD breakfast. So with all my planning and goals, I came to a conclusion that I'm just not a person who can stick to an hour by hour plan... but is anybody really. With that figured out (what a genius I am) I decided that I'm going to make it easy on myself. So here's my simple yet workable plan... ready? Are you sure? Because this is a groundbreaking concept...here it goes... Have a Raw Breakfast, Have a Raw Lunch, and for dinner have whatever my little (big) heart desires. I really think this will work for me, at least for a while and until I know that I'm ready for the full 100% transition. So the rules are pretty simple as long as I don't overdo the dinner part. Which, of course I'm not gonna run to McDonalds to get a Big Mac or anything like that. But I might share a dinner with my family (which is usually 100% cooked) and which I can usually modify and make it just a little bit healthier or just eat the "healthy" part of the dinner. I mean whatever, just go with the flow. I am tired of restriction and just want to enjoy living my life with freedom and joy. Same goes for working out... why torture myself on the treadmill when I can go and do something I actually enjoy. For example, yesterday early morning I took my dog to the local forest preserve and trust me we both enjoyed it greatly. We got to walk and play for over an hour, all while enjoying a beautiful day in nature. Another thing I enjoy doing is going to a yoga or pilates class, even a weight training class as long as I'm not stuck at the gym by myself trying to lift weights on those miserable machines. Balance and enjoy... it's all about finding the happy medium and sticking to it... the rest will fall into place at the right time.

And now that I got a little side tracked, back to my yummy breakfast... I call it "Banana & Pear Cereal"... even though it's not even cereal :-)

Ingredients:

1 banana
1 pear
couple tablespoons of raw granola
couple tablespoons of raw nuts (any kind)

So this is very simple as you can see, just make sure both fruits are very ripe. Take your fruits, cut them into small pieces and sprinkle the granola and nuts on top. The ripeness of the fruit will make the other ingredients stick to the fruit making sure that in each bite you have the texture of the fruit and the crunchiness of granola. Oh it was so yummy and perfect... just a perfect combination!

Failure

Oh how I hate that word... and I really don't hate a lot of things. I don't even wanna write about the last few days... they were days of feeling like crap, pigging out, and not working out. I actually even started couple of days correctly but by the time noon came, I was already on my way to pig out. But I will not give up...oh no, not that easily. I need to regroup, rethink and come up with a new plan of action. I am a kind of person who needs a schedule so I can stick with things and I think that in this diet thing I'll need to approach things in a similar way. So.....let's try this out:

Goals for tomorrow:

1. Get up no later than 9:00 o'clock
2. Drink a bottle of water n take my green supplements
3. Do 1 hour of callanetics
4. Eat a healthy breakfast (fruits, fruit juice)

I want all of the above done by 10:30

4. 10:30 - 12:00 take care of appts. emails, job hunting
5. Around noon and depending on the weather either do half hour on treadmill or ride bike outside
6. After the work out have a healthy lunch (preferably salad)
7. Spend at least half of the rest of the day working on my website

As far as food options - breakfast and lunch will be all raw and dinner will be vegetarian. Also dont forget...water water water!

Does this sound doable? I hope so... I really hope so...because I refuse to fail...and I will keep on going until I achieve my goal. By the way if anybody has any insight on making this easier... please, please share!

Day 2

Well, I would say I had another successful diet day. Could do a little better with the raw part...but overall I'm satisfied with the process. For breakfast I once again had my Yummy juice (carrot, orange, and apple) with some raw granola. For lunch I had 2 slices of sprouted bread with 2 fried eggs and a tomato and green onion salad. After that I had a glass of chocolate almond milk and in the evening it was couple carrots with Tomato basil hummus and a cup of tea with honey. Oh wait I also sneaked in a couple small pieces of the cold smoked salmon from the day before.

As far as the work out goes...another successful day. In the morning I did my half an hour on the treadmill and in the evening I went to a weight training class at Bally's. And, man was that class great. I can already feel my sore muscles throbbing. But it's a good pain. I actually like the after work out burn... it gives me a feeling of satisfaction and accomplishment and I love it.

Other than that... I'm feeling a little stuck in my life. But I have a feeling things will get better soon... I mean it has to, once you hit the bottom the only way to go is up. Once again, I just have to keep myself busy and on track and hopefully I'll have work soon and start bringing home the bacon, or in this case lettuce :-)

Move Day

This move really is breaking my heart.  Now I'm here unpacking and on the outside I'm calm but on the inside I'm torn apart.  After living by myself for years, moving in with my family is not easy.  Dealing with their prejudice and negative attitude is even worse.  I honestly don't know how I'll make it.  I guess I'll just have to try and keep myself super busy...which might not be exactly the easiest thing to do, especially since I do not have a job at the moment.  Which I guess brings me back to the point of doing and trying different things to finally hopefully get results.  Raw starts tomorrow.  I'm excited!  At least the fridge s stocked with all the yummy veggies and fruits.  Also, running starts tomorrow.  This is pretty much the only thing I'm excited about.  I want to find a little bit more about the Chicago's Raw community.  I think it would be fun and interesting.  I also want to sign up for the Web Dev. seminar going on on the 26th.  It would be another great networking opportunity.  As, I said before, my biggest goal while I'm here is trying new things, improving my body, networking and meeting new people, and learning new things which will help me be more creative and bring money in.  Hopefully, I'll be able to do this without losing my sanity while living with these lunatics... don't get me wrong, I love my family but some of them are just on a whole 'nother level... and not in a good way.  Well, I just have to stay positive and do what I need to do.  By the way, did I mention that tomorrow's my birthday.  Big 28... A perfect day for a new start, right?