Know Any Literary Animal Lovers?
Hi there PureJeevan readers! We wanted to let you know that Jim's new novel CHROO is available on Amazon. It's a crazy adventure involving a billionaire heiress, her Chihuahua BFF ("Chroo") and a host of human and animal characters. Find out more on Amazon! Here are some links:
Since Pure Jeevan specializes in raw food weight loss, we receive a lot of questions about what is required in order to lose excess weight. Many individuals want to know if they need to go on a 100% raw food diet in order to release excess weight.
The answer is, "No, you do not need to switch to a 100% raw food diet in order to lose weight." If you're asking if a 100% raw food diet works better for losing weight than slowly transitioning and increasing your raw food intake, the answer is still, "No."
Jim here... Certainly, we're all familiar with the old saw, "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink," right ? So often, the life of a raw foodie is perfectly captured by that saying. We are, of course, the ones leading our equine brothers and sisters to the sweet trough of raw foods, just as others coaxed us into the barn for our first drink.
Have You Been Led To This Post ??
So, what is this post It's a big old horse trough to which, if you're a raw foodie, you can lead others. Or, if you're someone unfamiliar with raw foods, and have been sent here by another, what you'll find below is the water. No one can make you drink it. And, please don't be offended at my comparing you to a horse because (1) we're all horses, (2) this is all just my strange opinion, and (3) horses are beautiful, magical beings! Being compared to a horse is a compliment!
Jim here... Here's a short video from last Saturday when we were out distributing literature about reversing diabetes naturally and the raw foods lifestyle. In it, we interview a local man, R.T., who had stopped to talk with us, went on his way, and then returned again to where we were standing a few moments later rather astounded.
You see, he'd seen a "before / after" flyer showing Wendi's "pre-raw" pic next to her "raw" pic and couldn't believe the two pics were of the same woman!? Many people who have significant weight to lose (or, like R.T., know someone who does) wonder whether losing so much weight will result in saggy skin. He was so amazed at the transformation, he decided to come back and ask. So, here's the raw answer to that question...
Read more: Common Before & After Weight Loss Question: "Will I Have Saggy Skin?"
As many of you know, Kevin and Annmarie Gianni (of Renegade Health) have now started their RV tour, for which they selected Pittsburgh as their official kick-off location. While here, we at Pure Jeevan took a special ride in "The Kale Whale," their veggie-oil-powered RV. Inside, we enjoyed a comfortable ride (which included hanging out with Johnny 5 -- their cat -- and drinking some hot tea prepared right there in the Kale Whale). Outside, we endured the freezing cold temperatures of Pittsburgh while pumping filtered used veggie oil into special holding tanks in the RV. Here is some video footage from our Kale Whale encounter!
I've already posted the recipe for this, but I wanted to talk about the orange pudding a bit. Since going raw, I've become a mostly intuitive eater. Whatever I feel like eating is what I eat. This usually means I am eating the same food for an extended period of time until I feel drawn to something different. Lately it has been the orange pudding.
I've been starting my mornings with a large bowl of it. If Jim is making lunch then I'll eat the salad or nut dip that he makes, otherwise it's orange pudding again. Then, if I didn't eat a salad during the day I usually have a salad for dinner and...a dessert of--you guessed it!--more orange pudding.
Those consuming a raw food diet sometimes use a dehydrator to prepare raw food dishes. They do this at low temperatures, below the point of actually cooking the foods, to intensify flavors, reduce the amount of moisture in the dish, and sometimes to take the chill off something they'd rather serve a bit warmer than straight out of the refrigerator. There is a practice that we've seen, however, that is actually cooking the very foods were taking such great measures to consume raw! Let me share an experience I had when I first started eating raw foods, that will help explain how some of us may be cooking our foods by mistake.
In the beginning of eating raw foods, my entire family loved the Vegetable Stir-Dont-Fry I used to make (you can find that recipe in the free eBook you downloaded when you first visited our site). One day I created a double recipe so we could eat more the next day, without going through the process of preparing it again fresh. The following day I took the bowl of Stir-Dont-Fry out of the refrigerator and put it into the dehydrator to take the chill off. It wasn't warming up fast enough on such a low temperature, so I thought I'd just cover the dish a little bit to trap in some of the heat that seemed to leave each time I checked the dish and stirred it around. So, I took a plate and placed it on top of the bowl with about an inch, or two, opening.
***** DISCLAIMER: As with all of our posts here at Pure Jeevan, and particularly those coming up over the next week and a half (which will all be tagged with a new term, "Nadi Balance"), please refer to the disclaimer that runs at the bottom of all Pure Jeevan Pages. Wendi and Jim are health researchers, educators, and extreme self-experimenters; not doctors. ******
Nadi Balance: Part III
To summarize yesterday's post, even though this sounds dramatic, the truth is: Wendi was dying. The first doctor essentially sent her home saying there was nothing wrong. The second doctor confirmed she had Lyme disease, but was too late for his method of healing, since the Lyme had already become chronic at that point. He could only offer understanding of her situation and a trial and error method of conventional medications, which rarely (if ever) heal Lyme patients. A supplement that many raw nutrition gurus recommend as essential to health for all people was actually putting Wendi's body, already struggling with Lyme bacteria, into an extreme state of distress. And finally, our own knowledge of health, diet, and healing (even though extensive and accumulated over 30 years) wasn't adequate for healing Wendi's body of Lyme, either.
***** DISCLAIMER: As with all of our posts here at Pure Jeevan, and particularly those tagged with a new term, "Nadi Balance," please refer to the disclaimer that runs at the bottom of all Pure Jeevan pages. Wendi and Jim are health researchers, educators, and extreme self-experimenters; not doctors. ******
If you've been following this Nadi Balance series, you're probably as fascinated as we are with the body and the myriad ways in which we can peer into our physical health through observation and experimentation. Yesterday, we learned about a blanace being necessary in the human body between fatty acids and sterol fats. (This is but one of the many balances we'll eventually talk about under the larger umbrella of Nadi Balance.) We shared how Wendi's body was in an an extremely unbalanced state, with her fatty acids far outweighing the amount of sterol fats.
To keep all of you inspired while we are away, we've asked some
remarkable individuals to share their raw food stories with you. Enjoy!
Jim here... I'd like to mainly talk about organics today, but thought I'd wrap that subject into a longer, rather quirky piece on ranking produce on some sort of a scale that would indicate how awesome (or awful) it is. See what you think...
Have you ever thought of arranging produce into a sort of "heirarchy of quality"? Well, I'm not going to attempt to do that here, but I would like to discuss the concept for a moment in order to at least explain what I'm getting at. While I've not yet attempted to do this exercise, I nonetheless occasionally envision a large chart or something that conveys my feelings about how I personally rank the quality of fruits and vegetables I put into my body. This all probably sounds vague, so let me share some examples.
Read more: Pure Jeevan's "Produce Buying Tips" Series, #2: Buying Organics
I was grocery shopping in Giant Eagle with a friend the other day; I was just there to keep her company. When we left the Nature's Basket area (where they sell organics and more natural items), I felt a strange feeling. I hadn't realized it, but over the past two years I stopped shopping in the other areas of the store! I told her that by the time we hit the packaged shelves of the Nature's Basket area, I'd already be done shopping and my cart would be filled. We had a good giggle and went on shopping.
Anyway, that has since brought my attention to the shopping carts of those around me. We do about 5% of our shopping in Giant Eagle (last minute things that we've run out of, that don't merit a trip to our Food Co Op), so lately I've found myself in Giant Eagle looking into the carts of those around me. I'm not judging anyone, I'm just curious. On average, just about everyone has a small bunch of bananas in their cart. There are the occasional carts with something like a cantaloupe, a bag of apples, and once I saw a single tomato and a bag of lettuce. The rest of the carts have been filled with packaged foods. There is next to no living food in the carts.