I decided to quit the juice fast after 4.5 days. It just wasn’t working for me.

I made the first video a few hours ago, and then spoke to my friend Joshua, who inspired me to add more – hence the 2nd video.

(I’m sorry about the lighting the second time, I wasn’t thinking about any of it as it was totally impromptu. I’m wearing my PJ’s in it. )

This was an excellent learning experience for me and I thank you for letting me share it with you.

I posted this from my 5am – 9am experience:

This morning wasn’t super-awesome.

I woke up, sat at the edge of my bed for a while (because every time I got up yesterday I blacked out for a good 30 seconds), and got up. Luckily today I could see, so I thought today might be a better day. I know Steve Pavlina mentioned his Day 4 was much better than Day 3, so I hoped for the best.

When I went to go stand up to make juice, I had very little energy. I put the first bunch of celery in and found myself dwindling. I put a cucumber in and was REALLY dwindling. When I went to cut up the second cucumber, I knew I was about to pass out so I went to go sit down on my couch for 5 minutes. After I got up to try and finish, I had to sit down again. Finally I was able to finish the juice, but I had no energy to drink it so I put it back in the fridge and went back to bed.

Oddly enough, during the juicing this morning, I had almost no motor skills or brain function. It was very weird. I went to go throw some cucumber mash away and put it right in the hole part of my cutting board, so that when I lifted the cutting board, the cucumber fell right through again. I went to go pick up a plate in my sink and didn’t account for all the water on it, and ended up soaking myself. Those were just some weird things that obviously normally I would remember to do.

After I took my nap, I felt a lot more clear-headed but still didn’t have a lot of energy. I put one sock on, finished some emails, and then put the other sock on. I couldn’t do them both at the same time or it’d wipe me out.

On the good side though, I’m not feeling nauseous or light-headed today if I sit down… only when I exert any energy on anything.

All of this is making me strongly consider how long I should fast for. I started out intending 30 days, then thought 14 days at minimum, but now I’m thinking maybe I’ll do 7 days this time and then next time I’ll do another 7 days. While I know it’s very healthy for all this to be happening, I also don’t want to overwhelm my body.

I mean, I have no desire to eat or anything (even though I keep having food dreams. Last night I dreamt about these popcorn chicken things I used to eat all the time when I was 16-22)… it’s just that I read that these days are supposed to start getting better, and so far, no dice.

I know Jaime said after 7 days she started feeling worse and worse too…

Hmm, I guess I’ll play it by ear.

Oh, and I’ve lost 6 pounds in 3 days.

From 9am – 2pm:

I was randomly crying a few times throughout the day. I knew there’d be a lot of emotional detox from the getgo so I was prepared for it.

The thing is, any emotion one feels is really meant to last for a short while. Normal people are supposed to feel through an emotion and then let it be done. When you emotionally eat, you block those emotions and that energy stays stuffed in your body. Since I emotionally ate my weigh into being over 100 lbs overweight before, I clearly have a ton of stuff to detox. I knew that going into this.

I also forced myself to drink some more juice (36 oz so far) and also 40 oz of water. I’ll be drinking more of each later.

In the beginning of this time period I couldn’t even sit without feeling lightheaded, but now I can sit for a few hours… I just can’t stand for more than a minute or two without wanting to collapse.

I’m thinking more and more about ending this after 7 days. That’s because:

a) I don’t want to screw up my metabolism, and quite frankly, I’m afraid I’ll gain the weight I lost with a quickness if I do this too long. It’s well known that this fasting WILL slow down your metabolism. Advocates of fasting say that if you eat an all raw diet afterwards, it won’t matter.

I don’t want to eat an all raw diet after and don’t think that’s what’s best for my body.

I was also thinking it might be nice to do 7 days now, maintain my new weight, and then do 7 days later.

b) The idea of laying around in my bed for 30 days is a pretty crappy one. I know there are times when I’m supposed to feel euphoric, but I seem to be having the same reactions Jaime did… and she said she was bedridden from the middle of week 1 through day 12.

I have work to do.

c) Most people say they love green juice during the fast and want tons of it afterwards. Everything about that damn drink nauseates me right now (and I used to drink tons of celery, cucumber, or celery-cucumber juice pre-fast).

d) Even though I set up some conditions to make this easier than normal, they’re still not optimal. When Jaime did her fast, she was able to have a plethora of spa treatments to help make things easier – tons of massages, oxygen treatments, a sauna, elixirs to ease the pain of detoxing, and a full staff of support to help her with any concerns that came her way.

Maybe I should go to a retreat or set myself up with better conditions in the future.

e) Most people that do best on extended fasts do it when they’re eating raw or vegan for a while. This wasn’t the case for me.

I guess my hesitancy is that I don’t want to look like a quitter. I talked to Jaime about this though and she made me feel a LOT better. She too, ended her fast a few days earlier, and was worried about what people would think. She ultimately decided that it was HER body and she knew what she was feeling better than anyone else could.

I know I’ll probably be judged if I end the fast after 7 days, but to be honest, unless someone has gone through the fasting themselves, I really could care less what their opinions are. This is a very intense, grueling process that I underestimated.

Even if only do 7 days (the bare minimum), I’ll be really proud of myself.

Today has been the worst day by far.

I woke up feeling great. When I stood up, I was dizzy for a good 30 seconds before I could see anything again, but once that passed, I felt fine.

I had my green juice and then almost all of my liter of water with MSM and lemon (still drinking it now).

I also weighed myself because I knew I had a colonic today and I wanted to see what the weight difference would be between today and tomorrow. So far, I’ve released 3 pounds.

As far as the colonic – it was absolutely awful.

As I posted about earlier, colonics are very important because without a clean intestine, toxins can re-enter your bloodstream which is incredibly dangerous.

I felt very wary about going in and getting one done – anxious, a little disgusted, and nervous about how it would unfold.

It turns out the privacy part of it was nothing to fear at all.

I’ll go through the procedure – I know it can sound kind of gross, but I guess I don’t care. I’m in a weird, half-cranky half-muted to the world mood.

Anyway… when I went to the spa, they told me to undress from the waist down and put on a robe. After I did that, the procedure really wasn’t gross or weird at all. The practitioner inserted a tube in me and then I laid back on my back. The practitioner and I talked the whole time, so I didn’t have time to focus on anything “off”.

The reason that it was so awful, though, was that she had to pump me with water in order to soften my intestinal walls. Every time she did that, I felt intense pain. I pride myself on toughing things out, so I let her fill as long as possible… but it was really, really bad. I was closing my eyes, thinking of other things, trying to talk to her… but it just sucked.

I ended up pouring out a ton of toxins – a lot more than the average person does on their first try. The practitioner said this was likely because I was juicing for 3 days already.

The rubbish part about that, though, is that as the toxins come out, the body gets stirred up as toxins are moved around. I felt a massive wave of detox that left me feeling absolutely horrible.

I have my next appointment set up for Wednesday at 10am.

I haven’t been able to drink any juice since the colonic and even the thought of drinking water makes me nauseous – which means that I’ll probably only have the 16 oz of juice for today.

I took a nap once I got home but I still feel groggy. I’m planning on getting some more work done, watching a movie, and going to bed.

Blech.

I read some people’s blog entries saying that Day 2 was the hardest day of all for them, so I prepared myself for the worst.

That being said, it wasn’t as bad as I thought it might be.

I woke up VERY groggy and dizzy, and could barely see when I stood. I promptly had my liter of water with lemon and MSM, and then went back to bed because I had literally 0 energy.

After I woke up, I made my juice and got a spark of energy. This seems to be the theme – I’ll be super low-energy, and then a glass of green juice will perk me up for a little bit.

In the beginning of the day I was exceptionally dizzy. Jaime told me I should bend my head down at one point, so I did, and I thought I was going to fall over and pass out. It felt awful.

Slowly throughout the day, I got more and more energy. I had 16 oz of juice at 1pm to give me energy to go to get my nails done (I was afraid I’d fall asleep). I was OK throughout the appointment and ended up telling the woman who did my nails all about the juice fast (she was super-interested in it and may do it herself).

I had a good amount of energy afterwards and felt super-happy so I drove around for a while, singing in my car. I also stopped at Barnes & Noble and stood for a while in front of the Humor section, randomly reading books.

(I was excited that I could stand for such a long time!)

When I got home, I had another 16 oz of juice and used my energy to unpack my luggage from my Philly trip.

It felt great to have so much energy, and I felt REALLY happy at the end of the day.

I went shopping today for more greens, so I ended up drinking all of this throughout the day:

Spinach
Celery
Cucumbers
Kale
Dandelion Greens
Green Pepper

The juices have been really yummy. I like them the best after they’ve been in the fridge for a few hours and they’re nice and cold.

It’s only 4:15, but I’m thinking the end of my first day will probably be pretty soon. I’m still on east coast time and very sleepy. The dark conditions outside aren’t helping either.

The first day of the fast went well.

I woke up feeling hungry (I usually feel hungry in the mornings) and had a liter of water with lemon and a tablespoon of MSM. That subsided me until I went to Whole Foods at 11amish. When I was there, I got a juice of:

Spinach
Celery
Cucumber
Parsley
Ginger

I realized I’m really not a huge ginger fan and didn’t enjoy the drink too much, but I did finish it.

At 2:22 I decided to make more juices for the day (you can make a bulk amount of juice in the mornings for the rest of the day, so I just made the rest of today’s juices then).

I made:

Cucumber
Celery
Broccoli
Kale

That was super-yummy. I had about 16 oz and still have some left for later on.

Since I don’t really crave food usually, I’m not too worried about cravings. The only exception is this amazing “Tsoynami” they have at a vegan restaurant around here called Green. A “Tsoynami” is basically the “Blizzard” at Dairy Queen, but made out of soy. It tastes just like ice cream, and I get it with Oreos, walnuts, peanut butter, and chocolate chips. AMAZING.

Jaime mentioned she had tons of food dreams on her fast, and I actually ALREADY had one during my afternoon nap. It was about the Tsoynami.

Jaime has brought home some food already, and ate a bit in front of me. I told her I’d be fine with her bringing anything home except for that Tsoynami.

(I didn’t think about them at all during my Philly trip, but Otto mentioned going to Green last night after the airport, and then I started dreaming about them again. )

I think I should be fine cravings-wise though. I read the first 2 days are the hardest hunger-wise, so if I can get past that (which I know I will with flying colors), I’ll be fine. I know there will be foods I crave during the fast on a psychological level (probably mostly foods from when I was growing up – mozzarella sticks, chicken nuggets, french fries, Doritos, cheese doodles… not the best ever).

I made 2 big realizations today as well:

1. I have been very focused on “30 days”. I think that’s foolish. I’m going to do this as long as my body wants me to do it. I remember when Steve Pavlina set out to juice for 92 days, but his body didn’t respond favorably at all and he ended up stopping at 30.

Jaime wanted to do a 14 day fast but her body told her to stop at 12.

I need to get out of the disciplined “warrior” mode all the time and listen more to what my body wants. So who knows, maybe I’ll stop after Day 8?

(I doubt it though… I’m really feeling 30 at the moment. )

2. While health is a huge factor for the juice fast, I know there are going to be days when I’m thinking, “What the hell is this damn fast for?” I thought I would use the weight loss to show myself some instant results. After I thought about it though, I realized that’s actually going to be detrimental to me.

Because my lowest weight since 4th grade is 4 pounds less than I weigh now, it’s almost out of my mind’s realm of possibility to weigh less than that. I actually LOVE how I look 4 pounds away. I’m afraid if I weigh myself and see that weight or less, I won’t feel a need to keep fasting.

Because of that, I’m hiding my scale. I’ll weigh myself either weekly or at the end of the fast… but definitely not daily.

Anyway, those are my thoughts for now. I’ll blog again soon.

I’ve wanted to go on a juice fast for a little over a year now. I have several books on it and have been studying it a ton… but no time ever seemed like the “right” time.

That was for 2 reasons:

1. I knew I’d have huge detox issues, and I didn’t want to put my business at risk (I’ll be pretty useless work-wise for some days)

2. I had social activities lined up and didn’t want to be the “party pooper” while other people were drinking/eating.

After staying in Philly for a few days and eating like crap, I’ve decided it’s now or never, and have committed to a 30 day juice fast once I get back to Scottsdale.

I’ll be tracking my progress as much as I can throughout my blog (like I said, there will be huge detox issues and there may be some days I have no desire to be near the computer).

Why I Want To Go On A Juice Fast

There are a few reasons. The more and more I learn, the more the importance of each reason changes (ie first it was because I was really psyched about weight loss, now the health is more important to me).

Here are some reasons why:

- The amount of toxins in the food we eat is insane. Our body is constantly consumed by digesting the food we keep taking in. On a juice fast, the body can STOP putting energy into that and instead put energy into flushing toxins out of our body.

They say that for every day on a juice fast, you can heal 120 days worth of crappy food.

- I’ve seen lots of people talk about old injuries, etc… clear up while on a juice fast. I don’t have any old injuries, but those stories help me me see how healthy juicing is for your body.

- Not only do you flush out physical toxins while on a juice fast, but you also flush out emotional toxins. A lot of people (especially me when I was younger) eat to avoid having to deal with other things. I know even now, if I get sad or angry, I emotionally eat. Juice fasting helps “detox” these emotional issues.

(While I know I have a lot to detox there and am very excited about it, I anticipate this being the hardest part of the fast. I’ve read about people having days full of very severe emotions – some days being incredibly mad, some days being really depressed, some being gleefully happy.)

- Weight loss. I will still eat lots of calories from the juice, but as I put in all the alkaline foods, my body will help get rid of the acid ones, any excess fat, and all cellular toxins.

- I think my intuition is going to go through the roof once my body is more “clear” (and have read of other people experiencing that)

- Will have much more vivid dreams (Again, I read/heard about a lot of people experiencing this)

Obviously, I have to set up conditions to make this inevitable.

A juice fast isn’t the easiest thing in the world, so I’m setting myself up for success.

Here’s how:

- Jaime is coming to stay with me for 1 or 2 weeks. She actually just got off a juice fast herself (which was another reason that pushed me to do it. Like I said, I’ve been wanting to do this for a while now, and when Jaime did her 12 day fast, I envied all the amazing side benefits).

When Jaime did the fast, she went to a retreat in Patagonia, Arizona. They specialize in fasts, so she learned a TON. She’s going to share the info with me, and then she’s also going to help me make juices, bring over elixirs, and just be with me as I go through the detoxing. I am so grateful for her.

- Otto is going to call me every day and walk me through, visually, getting to the 30 day mark.

I’ve read about the power of visualization through Psycho-Cybernetics and several other books, but saw the power of it in person a few times myself (for example, when Steph coached Mona and I through our 5k run).

- This may be “TMI”, but I don’t really care. When doing a juice fast, you have to either get colonics or do daily enemas. As you detox, the toxins can pile up in your intestines. If you don’t get them out, then they can go back into your bloodstream which is INCREDIBLY dangerous. I know I won’t want to do the daily enemas, so I’m purchasing a package of 20 colonics administered for me.

- I set up dates to do it (I’ll start Nov 28, 2009). I decided to go with Nov 28 because it’s the day after I get back from Philadelphia. I’m going to be super-honest with myself: I wouldn’t be able to do it here in Philadelphia. Thanksgiving is coming up, there’s too much yummy food around to tempt myself with, and my mom would be upset. I set up a time when I knew I could succeed.

- I’m purchasing a 30 day bikram yoga package as I do the fast. Jaime mentioned she used a sauna at her retreat, but since I’m doing this at home, I had to find an alternative. Luckily I had been planning to do a 30 day fitness challenge in December anyway, so this hot yoga works out perfectly. I’ll sweat out a lot of toxins through it, while also getting to move my body and get my exercise in (hiking at Camelback – my normal exercise – is going to be way too strenuous for me at first).

What I’m Going To Drink

I’ll be filling up my juicer with lots of yummy veggies. As I mentioned, Jaime will help me make the juices at first (I’ll post what she recommends), and then I imagine my body will guide me to know what to drink next.

I read in one of Victoria Boutenko’s books about the experience of her putting her children on a raw food diet. She said one day her son asked for some blueberries (I think that was the fruit). She brought a flat of them to have them on hand for a while, and he ended up eating all of them in one day.

The same sort of thing happened to her daughter. She asked for some grapefruits (again, I think that was it) and ended up eating massive quantities in a day. It surprised Victoria, but it turns out that the foods they requested are known for helping to cure what their respective illnesses were at the time – asthma and diabetes.

I say this because I trust my body is going to clue me in to what’s best for me.

What’s Next:

I’m fasting today (day before Thanksgiving). Even though I’m going to a juice fast soon, like I said, I’ve been putting lots of crap in my body and want to flush at least some of it out. I’ll go on the extended 30 day fast starting Saturday, and I’m REALLY excited for it.

So today’s day 18 of raw food, and I’ve got to say it’s not as hard as I thought it would be.

I mean, I knew I was pretty disciplined, but I thought I’d be suffering a lot more than I was.

I’m still not sure what I’m going to do after 30 days – if I’m going to go to 80% raw, or if I’m going to stay 100%.

My friend Adrian Bye showed me a site that had some negative information on raw food, which made me question a bit.

(For what it’s worth I hate 99% of the site – but the bio struck a chord with me.)

I went on one of the raw food boards (I paid for a bunch of raw food information, but my favorite board is free – RawFoodTalk.com) and asked people who’ve been raw foodists over 3 months what their experiences were with 100% raw. They said much more positive things than that site said, so I guess I’ll end up seeing what feels right.

Here’s my experience of raw food so far in a Pro/Cons context:

Cons (To end on a good note )

Hard to be in traffic – I’ve always had problems breathing around smoke, but now that I have an extra-keen sense of smell, there have been quite a few times where I felt like I was going to pass out while near cars. I was sitting on a public bus one day (no air conditioner, windows were open) and we were stuck in traffic for near an hour – I was contemplating death.

Sleepiness – There are some days when I’m ridiculously sleepy, and there were a few times when I was downright lethargic. I know this is part of the detox process, but one day I couldn’t even stand up and see straight. Literally, every time I got up, the world was spinning.

Social Aspects – I’d love to go to a churrascaria, or go out to fun restaurants with Brian sometimes – not for the food (I really have no desire to eat cooked food), but because of the “normalcy” that comes with it. Food is an important part of culture, too, so I’m missing out on that.

Boredom Of Foods – Like I said, it’s not that I crave cooked foods, but it gets boring looking at the same foods over and over again. I know there are better raw food options outside of Brazil, but even still, I think a lot of those “gourmet” things aren’t so superhealthy – tons of fat, sugar, etc. – the best way to go raw, in my opinion and according to my research, is to eat mostly fruits, veggies, and minimal nuts (those are supposed to be eaten at night before you go to bed since they take so long to digest). Healthy, but boring.

Pros

Energy – Like I said, there are times when I’m sleepy – but there are also times when I feel like I can take on the world. Many raw foodists say that this is the normal feeling all the time after the detox process.

Focus – Not all the time, but there are times when my focus is on like nobody’s business. I’ve always been a morning person, and get TONS done then – but on raw foods, I can get tons done all day.

Inexpensive – Sort of. I’ve been eating a lot of raw granola (each package is $5) and have been going to a raw food restaurant once in a while, so it hasn’t been outrageously cheap – but fruits and veggies are pretty cheap here.

Healthy – This trumps every other way of eating (I’ve done a ton of research). Even if I had a zillion cons and this was the only pro, I’d have a solid case pro-raw.

Spirituality – A lot of people say they have much greater spiritual developments while raw. This has definitely been the case for me.

Excellent community – Most raw-foodies are awesome, positive, growth-minded people. They care about themselves, about others, about community – and they all tend to be pretty intelligent (at least the ones I’ve come across). I was checking out places in Sydney, and I saw there’s an amazing raw food community with tons of events going on all the time. Something like this (especially because of how it effects social situations) really bonds people.

Aesthetics - Have you SEEN some of the people who eat raw? There’s tons of 40, 50, even 60+ year olds that look like they’re in their 20s. They look incredible. A lot of people say they release a lot of weight with raw food, too (this hasn’t happened to me yet – but I’m told it can take a while and I’m in no rush).

There are tons of other pros and cons that other people experience, but this is just my own experience so far – 18 days into it.

So I’m still doing the raw food challenge and absolutely LOVING it – and for a lot of reasons.

First of all, even though it’s only day 4, my energy levels have catapulted. Absolutely catapulted. I’m surprised about that because I thought I’d still be in detox mode as the toxins flush out through my body – but I’ve had a mild headache at best. My body is usually pretty sensitive and It’s not even like I ate super-healthy the past few weeks before, so it is REALLY weird that I’m not in more pain. Also, a lot of people who go into raw are vegan to start with – I definitely wasn’t.

I actually considered going on a water fast to get myself through the pain and get the healing done quicker, but then decided there’s no need to be a glutton for punishment.

I did ask in a forum and was told there’s no “law” that says I have to go through pain… guess I just got really lucky and my
process will be a slow, smooth one.

Ever since I even started eating raw, I haven’t considered cooked food at all. I look at it as pure poison and think there’s no reason to do that to my body which I love so much. I’m experiencing so many positive things with this way of
eating.

Here’s Just A Few Of The Benefits:

First of all, I usually go to bed around 10 and wake up at 5:30. 

Last night I wasn’t tired until 11:30 and I woke up at 4:30.I was INSANELY energetic yesterday, getting tons of stuff done and
wanting to move around all over the place. It felt awesome!

I was able to reach meditative states with a quickness, too. I can usually get there, but I have to concentrate for a little bit. I
got there near-instantly two different times yesterday, and was able to connect in a way like I never have before. I was even able to have a conversation with my deceased grandma. I’m still shocked it’s working so quickly, but I’ll take it.

(And for the record, I know stuff like that might sound weird to a lot of readers and that I might disconnect them, but it comes back to it being MY blog. I wouldn’t feel right holding anything back. And fyi, this conversation didn’t come out of nowhere – I’d been communicating with my “main” guide for quite some time, this was just a new development in the process.)

The next benefit is,

I Found Reason To Enjoy Internet Marketing Again!

I felt back “in flow” with Internet Marketing for the first time in a LONG time yesterday. I was getting thoroughly disgusted with
the whole thing and was strongly considering going back to school for psychology. When I got to Rio, Brian asked me what my goals were for my time in Brazil, and I told him I really just wanted to do some soul-searching and figure out what my next life move should be. I’d totally lost passion for I.M. – even a little bit for yayFOOD because all the non-action takers frustrate me.

Thing is, with yayFOOD, I do believe in it – strongly – but it’s just like… I don’t know, you teach people how to release weight, which is awesome… but the majority of people don’t want to go healthy after that, so they’re just good-looking unhealthy people and I feel almost responsible. I do think it’s great for people who want to release weight quickly and then go healthy once it’s easier for them… but I just feel “wrong” sometimes if they don’t.

And then the money-making markets… same thing with the non-action takers. I don’t know, I know everything I put out is high-value, but I still can’t help but feel almost feel snake-oily. I’m doing one last product on membership sites that I’ve been working on for a REALLY LONG TIME, and then I’m going to seriously re-evaluate what I want to do in that space.

With raw food, it’s different. I’m teaching people how to be SO MASSIVELY HEALTHY and do something that’s so amazingly good for their body.

Chris Brisson commented here on the blog yesterday about possibly doing a raw product together, and it felt INSANELY right.At first I thought, “I’d rather just give people the information for free” – but again, whole thing about people valuing what they pay for. And I need to make a living. And to be honest, I haven’t seen any comprehensive package of excellent quality in the raw food market at all. I have a LOT of ideas and this one feels SO RIGHT.

I quickly whipped up an outline yesterday and came up with A ZILLION ideas of things I haven’t seen yet – things which’ll really
help people make the transition. It’s going to be damn phenomenal.Guess that’s it for now, time to go make a smoothie!

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So I’ve been thinking of altering my eating habits for a while now. Yes, I have an awesome weight release site at yayFOOD and I 100% stand behind everything it talks about. It does help people release weight, and it does it in a way in which they can slowly become more and more healthy.

Thing is, if I told yayFOOD customers to go raw right away – or even organic, for that matter – it wouldn’t sit right with the great majority of them and they wouldn’t do it. It’s my opinion that it’s much, MUCH better for me to show people how to release the weight with foods they love (and don’t feel as if they’re neglecting themselves with) – and then tweak afterwards.

Now That That’s Out Of The Way…

I’ve decided to try a 30 day raw food challenge. I’d been thinking about altering my eating habits for a while, so I figured I might as well jump into the healthiest way of eating possible.

At first I was going to get a raw food related domain name for my blogging, or a spiritual related one (because I know this’ll help me advance spiritually by leaps and bounds), but then decided it best fits right here.

I don’t know what most people think of this blog – if they see it as Internet Marketing, or ramblings in my life, or whatever… but I like to think of it as whatever happens to be in my head at the time, and so I’ll keep it that way.

So I started eating raw today. And…

I Screwed Up Right Away!

I hadn’t gone shopping yet, so I ate a ton of raw almonds in the morning. You’re supposed to eat only 10% worth of fat for the day, so I’ll be a bit over – but at least they’re still raw, which is what I was primarily concerned with.I went out and bought a bunch of ingredients, too. It was really interesting because yesterday I considered going raw but decided I’d slowly make the change. I went to a neighborhood that has a raw food restaurant, but walked for 4 hours and couldn’t find it anywhere.I woke up today and was 100% committed to going in full-speed-ahead… none of that “slow” crap… and the day went completely different. I got the random feeling to get off at a bus stop in Ipanema (town before the one I wanted to go to) and ended up finding the “Ipanema Hippie Fair”. It was awesome! I got a really cool ring and met an awesome dude from Portugal.

When I got back on the bus to head to the town I was supposed to go to, again, I got the random feeling to get off somewhere in the neighborhood I was at. I walked half a block from where I got off, and the raw food restaurant was there.

From There, I Got Mixed Results…

Turns out the restaurant I went to was pretty rad. I mostly went there because I heard they sold ingredients and I wanted stuff for my own smoothies. There’s a lot of stuff they don’t have in Brazil – hempseed, a lot of the fruits in the recipes in The Best Day Ever, agave, sprouted grain bread, spirulina, or lemons.There are also some interesting tweaks – for example you can buy cacoa nibs, but you need to bite them open and suck out the cacoa.The owner of the raw food place was REALLY cool. She gave me so much information and I’ll definitely be able to make do with what I was able to buy from there and the market. Produce in Brazil is ridiculously cheap too – I got 2 mangos for $.90!

I’m not too sure about the cacoa bars and the “junk food” type things that I found. One of the guys in my mastermind, Tom, mentioned that people from the raw food forum HE frequents – HowToGoRaw.com says that people there scoff at the typical “high fat raw food diet”. I know Steve Pavlina did the high fat thing before and didn’t like it, and did much better eating solely fruits and veggies. I guess I’ll play with it and see.

As Far As My Progress…

The main reasons I want to do this are…

*Because I love myself, and I should treat my body accordingly. It’s almost evil to be putting downright poison in myself on a daily basis. The more I read about what actually goes into our food, the more disgusted I get.I know I’ll have a detox period where I hate the world for a week or two, but I’m considering it “tough love”.

*Improved energy

*Greater spiritual development. It’s a lot easier to connect when you don’t have crap clogging up your body.

I’m not really doing this for weight loss (though I wouldn’t complain). I don’t have a scale here to see how my weight fluctuates anyway, so it’s a moot point. I can certainly post my measurements if people care since I record them anyway (my genetics make it far too easy for me to gain weight).