So, you’re looking into a raw food diet and wanting to make it easy on yourself.  First thing I want to say is  “congratulations.”  Going raw, even just part way, can transform your life in more ways than you can imagine.   I’ve been doing it now for 10 years and I feel like a different person altogether.  Over the years I’ve  helped a lot of people transition to raw food lifestyles and I’ve learned quite a bit about what works and  what doesn’t.  I’ve put this little guide together to make raw food easier.  I hope it helps you.

TIP ONE: When you first start out with raw foods you’re going to see some amazing looking dishes like raw  pizza and raw chocolate.

If you’ve got a restaurant where you can eat them, great!  If not, please do not  stress about learning to make them right away.  Raw food chefing is a skill that takes a while to master.  I  had a lot of success with doing things like eating 4 or 5 avocados with some seaweed when I first started into raw.  The main point is, don’t try to get to fancy to early or you might just get frustrated.

TIP TWO:  Learn about superfoods and get them into your diet as soon as you can.

Here’s the thing.  Not all foods are created equal.  Some are incredibly high and dense in nutrients, proteins, minerals, fatty acids and so on.   You’ll have a much better chance of succeeding on raw food if you start eating them early on.  That’s  because these foods will give you much of the nutrition you need while you’re making the transition.  Some examples of superfoods include goji berries, flax seed oil, coconut oil, bee pollen and spirulina.  A great way to get them into you is to blend them in a smoothie.  My morning superfood smoothie usually takes me through the day until 3 or 4pm.

TIP THREE: The sooner you can complete a thorough herbal cleanse the better.

For years, you’ve probably been eating some kinds of food that don’t digest well.  When you change to raw, some detox will happen automatically.  But you can really improve your results, if you complete an herbal cleanse quickly in your raw path.  I waited two years to do it, but I really wish I hadn’t.  I can’t really describe to you how great I felt after my first cleanse.   The one I use is called the “ultimate cleanse” by Brett Elliot

Following these tips will save you some time and get you to the “juice” of the raw lifestyle faster than most people.  Soon enough you’ll have some friend or family member coming up to you and asking why you’re looking so much younger and healthier.

Click here to succeed on the raw food diet can transform your health. I’ve made it easy for you with a great introduction

If you’re interested in following a raw food diet plan, I highly recommend you read ths article and follow the guidelines. It will save you some time in the long run. As a raw food coach and trainer, I’ve noticed that many people go on a guilt trip about what they eat when they start eating raw. That is totally not helpful. But what is helpful is to learn to listen to your body and how it feels after you eat certain kinds of food. Doing that you can transition to eating raw naturally and effortlessly. This exercise, though it seems simple, is very powerful. It’s power is in the watching. During it, you should merely watch yourself and receive the valuable information that will be given from doing it.

As you practice with this exercise, let go of any idea you have that you are eating or doing something “wrong.” Avoid criticizing or judging yourself in any way and commit to being real and honest with yourself. Trust that your body is an amazing instrument and that it gives you valuable information about which foods are supporting your wellbeing. You are likely to get some surprises here, so stay open.

To complete this exercise it’s helpful if you get a small notebook and divide it up into the following sections: What I ate What were the ingredients? (look at labels) What was my motivation to eat? Hunger? Habit? Boredom? Emotion? How I felt afterwards

Once you’ve done this, simply eat whatever you feel like eating. Don’t worry if you think you “shouldn’t” eat it. Just take time to answer the questions in your notebook honestly. Also avoid putting too much meaning to your answers. The point is to get you to listen to your body. This is an art that many people have lost and it may be the most important thing you can do for overall health and wellbeing, so give it some time. You’re likely to find that within 3-4 days you really feel what the food you eat does in your body.

Most people who have been eating as normal diet based on cooked food find it difficult to feel how their body responds to different foods. This is mostly due to years of blocking out uncomfortable feelings that come after eating a meal. I always recommend to my clients that if they have this difficulty they should use the following affirmations to begin to reconnect with the body. To use them you simply need to feel the body and give it attention while saying the words to yourself. Be patient and remember that children, you included, easily knew what was good and bad for them. If they ate something they didn’t like, they simply spit it out. Following this guideline, you’ll be eating healthier and more raw food without naturally and effortlessly in less time than you might imagine.

“I am now aware of what I eat.” – ” I now feel my body’s response to food.” – ” I slow down and feel my body.”

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One of the easiest ways to detox and cleanse the body is to follow a raw vegan diet.  Raw vegan food helps the body to cleanse in these 5 ways:

• Dietary Fiber: Raw foods, especially leafy greens contain high levels of dietary fiber which is absolutely critical for digestion and elimination.  The recommended daily allowance of dietary fiber is 27 grams, which is easy to achieve on a raw food diet.  Fiber is only found in plant foods and is only valuable as a cleanser when it is raw.  Cooked fiber becomes soft and passive and loses its magnetic cleansing properties.

• Enzymes: Raw food that has not been heated above 43C or 118F for any significant length of time is still full of life giving enzymes.  Food enzymes help to break food down in the digestive tract fully and quickly, thus leaving the digestive system to function more smoothly and rapidly.   Enzyme therapy is sometimes used to help people start a cleanse and regain their health.

• Water: Water is nature’s universal solvent, capable of breaking down anything in its path.  Raw foods contain high levels of water – up to 85% for some fruits.  This helps digestion and prevents dehydration, which allows for smooth and regular elimination.  Dehydration is considered to be a major cause of chronic constipation.   With a diet high in raw foods this is not an issue.

• Chlorophyll: Chlorophyll from leafy greens is a fantastic deodorizer and detoxifier.  Fresh green juice made from grasses and leaves is particularly powerful as a cleansing tool.

• Mucus: Heavily cooked foods and especially meat, eggs and milk products cause an allergic reaction in the body which creates mucus in the lining of the intestines and stomach.  Raw fruits and vegetables help eliminate this mucus.  Sea vegetables are particularly helpful for mucus detox.

If you want the best results on the raw food detox diet you should avoid nuts and seeds and focus primarily on eating these foods for a period of 7-30 days.

• All fresh fruits (except bananas)
• Raw vegetables
• Homemade vegetable soups
• Homemade fruit and vegetable juices
• Unsweetened raw yoghurt
• Herbal teas
• Culinary herbs

In addition, my experience is that the more raw vegetables and fruits you include in your diet the better.  Raw food speeds up and intensifies the cleansing process. If you are fit and healthy you can aim for 100% raw.  However, you will still get great benefit by keeping to at least 80% raw foods.

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Eating a diet high in fresh fruits, vegetables along with some nuts and seeds is a great way to lose weight without going on a fast or other restrictive eating programs.   I’ve seen the raw vegan diet  help 100s of people, including my own mother, to achieve a healthy weight.    Knowing how to do it well is the key.

Here is my step by step guide to raw vegan weight loss.

Step One: Write down specifically what your weight loss goals are for one month, six months and one year.  It’s important to write them down so you can remember them and evaluate your progress.

Step Two: For 3 days write down all of the food you eat and whether or not it is uncooked or not.  Use this record to determine what percentage of raw foods you eat on a daily basis.  Once you have done this, continue on to step three.

Step Three: Using the percentage you found in step two, add 10% more raw food each week until you achieve 90% raw food in your diet.  For example, if you discover that you normally eat 60% raw food, next week aim for 70%, the following 80% and so on.

This step is important because if you switch to a 90 or 100% raw diet right away you are likely to experience some uncomfortable detox symptoms such as headaches, nausea, and irritable bowels.

Step Four: Once you’ve reached 90% – 100% fresh raw foods in your diet, continue this for at least one month.  Start measuring your weight loss from the day you begin this diet.

Step Five: Your weight loss will be much easier and enjoyable if you learn how to make some great tasting raw food dishes.  You don’t have to just eat bowls of salads and piles of fresh fruit.   Of course, you can do this if you choose.  But an alternative is to learn to make things like raw chocolate pudding, raw burgers, raw lasagna and raw nut milks.   You can learn this in my eating raw ebook.

You can continue this diet for as long as you like.  It is my normal diet.  Just as a point of reference, though, you can expect to lose 1-2 pounds per week.  If you want to lose more weight, my suggestion is to eat fewer nuts and seeds and to exercise more.

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Like most people in my generation, I grew up eating a standard western diet with plenty of bread, milk, meat and processed foods.  Alongside of that were some fresh fruits and vegetables.   When I was just 25 I already showed the telltale signs of this diet.  I was a few kilos overweight, had chronic low energy, a constant low-level depression, poor complexion and the beginnings of several food allergies.

I didn’t do it for health reasons, but shortly after I stopped eating meat and most dairy products some of these symptoms began to lighten up.   They didn’t disappear totally, but I noticed that I felt better and could not deny that changing my diet was the major factor helping me.

From there, I developed an interest in nutrition and natural health and began researching and attending seminars.  In that search, about 8 years ago, I ran across a simple fact that led me to take one action that has entirely transformed my health.

The simple fact is:  the heat of cooking destroys food.

I hadn’t thought about it before, but when I imagined how I would look and feel after being in boiling water for 20 minutes, in a hot oven for an hour, or in a frying pan for 5 minutes, this revelation made total sense to me.

A couple of weeks later, with the encouragement of some friends, I began eating 95% of my food in raw, uncooked form.

It didn’t take long for me to feel the difference.  Just 6 weeks on a 95% raw vegan diet and I had already lost 3 kilos, had clear skin, more energy and felt more positive about life than I had in years. Since my diet was the only thing I changed, I knew  it was the raw food that was making this difference.   That led me to a deep study of the raw vegan of living food lifestyle and ultimately to chefing, writing and teaching.

Mark Ament

Eating a diet based on raw vegetarian food is one of the simplest, most direct and most influential ways that each of us can improve our own health and support to the health of the earth. Over the past 10 years I’ve met thousands of people who have transformed their health and even saved their lives by replacing devitalized cooked food with fresh, vibrant raw fruits, vegetables nuts and seeds in their daily diets.  Listening to others as well as experiencing major improvements in my own health, I am continually amazed at our bodies’ miraculous ability to heal when given supportive circumstances.  And as our bodies heal with enzyme rich, high fiber raw foods, so heals the earth.

That statement is not an esoteric cliché.  Because of  each of  us who shifts to a raw food lifestyle does make a positive contribution to the health of  the environment.

First, the amount of food packaging – cans, boxes, and bags – that we consume goes down by about 90%. The supermarket literally shrinks when you are raw and all that other stuff begins to seem like such a waste.

Second, there is a major increase in organic awareness and the desire to eat organically grown foods. This supports organic farmers who are committed to producing natural whole foods and to saving and growing heirloom varieties of fruits and vegetables. Third, because you are eating fresh, you are also eating locally as much as possible. That means less transport and less fossil fuel emissions into the environment.

Finally, any decision to eat a natural raw diet means that there can be more food for all.   It takes up to 100 times more land to feed a meat eater than a vegetarian.

From my perspective and in my experience, there simply is no downside to enjoying the raw food lifestyle.   You get to enjoy the benefits to your health, contribute to a healthier planet while you eat great tasting, creative dishes that are nourishing as they are filling.

I encourage you to take  a step in this direction.  It may be the start of something big.

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