Accepting where I'm at

Life's been challenging lately, and I have to admit that maintaining the food-lifestyle that I aspire to has not been one of my priorities. At the time, I didn't feel like I had the energy to let it be... ironically, if I really think about that though... eating a low-fat, raw vegan (LFRV) diet probably would have given me more energy to deal with everything, than not doing so... but that's in the past.

Eating LFRV often leaves me airy and in-touch with the ethereal side of my reality. Lately I've been so in-touch with the physical reality—trying to get stuff done—that the idea of eating LFRV seemed like it would put speed bumps in the way of what I wanted to get done... whether or not that's true, I don't know... but that's how I was feeling at the time, and it seemed valid.

Yesterday a lot was accomplished, and I now feel like I have the clarity and stillness available to me to allow myself to let go (slightly) of the physical reality I've been grasping onto the past few weeks. James is feeling the same draw back toward a LFRV lifestyle, which makes it much easier for me. The temptation of take-out lately has just been too hard to resist.

Things still need to get done—lots of things. Perhaps now more than before... but it just feels different... I know... you're wondering, what on earth has been going on?

Well, here is a link to the joint blog that James and I have going about our journey away from density and toward light; and another link to a post I put onto my knitting blog. I'm not sure the whole story is explained through those two resources, but it gives a general idea of what it is we're hoping for... at least short term. Our long term goals are much more undecided—there are SO many different possibilities, so I'm not sure they're really worth mentioning yet.

Now is all there is, so right now, we know that our landlord is expecting us to move out on Aug 31st, and we need to figure out what we'll be moving into... and fruit is my fuel!

Cleansing chakras through yoga

I attended a workshop on Saturday for cleansing the chakras using a vinyasa flow. I’m in total awe of what happened to me during that class. It was entirely a mind-altering experience that seems to have adjusted the flow of my life. At least for now.

The instructor, Jacqui Bonwell, was amazingly peaceful and had a beautiful, powerful energy around her.

She walked us through each of the 7 main chakras explaining which poses help to balance each of them, and asked us to concentrate on a particular color while working with the poses.

For example, the Root Chakra benefits from downward dog and warrior 1. Concentrating on the lower portion of the body—legs, ankles and feet. The element for this chakra is earth. Involvement with the earth helps balance the energies in this chakra. We concentrated on red.

The Sacral Chakra benefits from hip-opening poses such as warrior 2, horse, malasana and half-pidgeon. The element for this chakra is water. We concentrated on orange.

The Solar Plexus chakra benefits from poses I consider to bring fire into my body—poses that burn. Crescent lunge, various twisting poses and runners lunge. The element for this chakra is fire. We concentrated on yellow.

We were told that with a healthy Heart Chakra, all can be healed. Back bending poses helped balance energies in this chakra—bridge, wheel, fish and bow. We concentrated on green. I do not recall what the element for this chakra is.

Chakras 5-7 are less involved than the first 4, and the poses we worked for each of them were more subtle and concentrated more on meditation than the physical aspects—at least, that’s how I experienced them.

For the throat chakra, we concentrated on a light blue color. The element is air, and we worked with inversions.

For the Third Eye Chakra we sat in meditation, exercised our eyes by keeping our heads still, but moving our eyes as far to one side as possible, resting there, moving them back to center, then to the other side, resting there, moving back to center, then looking up. We then closed our eyes very tightly for a brief moment, and opened them abruptly allowing in much light. The element for this chakra is light, and the color is a sapphire blue. Child’s pose was also worked.

For the Crown Chakra, she asked us to concentrate on either white or violet. We rested in savasanah and breathed.

If anyone ever gets an opportunity to work with Jacqui or any other chakra yoga instructor, I highly recommend giving it a try. After class I felt like an entirely new, fresh being, completely reborn and ready to slowly adventure out into the world—a very emotional experience.

Old emotions were brought to the surface. I couldn’t tell you exactly what they were, but I was sobbing after class. It took me a little while to readjust to being in society. As I walked into the parking lot, everything seemed so foreign, and I was amazed how we humans can live in a world of sidewalks, buildings and cars.

As I sat in my car and cried, and “pulled myself together” I wondered why I had to do such a thing to function. I felt as though I had to close something down, that had just been opened during the class, in order to continue my day in society. I can’t help but wonder about that.

Day 2

Why am I counting?
Because I've started working toward a goal again. No more b-12 supplements. I want to encourage myself to eat an 80/10/10 diet, and tracking my progress seems to help my stick-to-it-ivness.

Today's Food (so far):
• ½ a watermelon
• 5 bananas
• 3 mangoes
• 5 small pieces of broccoli with some sort of chinese food sauce on it
• a box of vegan macaroni & cheese. (rice pasta & nutritional yeast basically)
I've been having a craving for macaroni and cheese lately. I used to be quite the pasta, cheese, milk & butter addict... but it's been awhile. I had a box of gluten and dairy free mac & cheese in our emergency food box, and decided to give it a try. The last time I tried it, I hated it. That's why it was in the emergency box. Now, since I've been away for so long, it was a pretty decent substitute. I won't be craving it much though.
• some dark chocolate

Lets start counting again! Day 1

Back in March I experienced something I NEVER want to go through again—vertigo, nausea, lack of short term memory, energy loss... My boyfriend suggested I try taking some B-12 supplements, and within hours of the first pill the symptoms got SO much better.

I took the supplements for a few weeks, but when I began eating a low-fat, raw diet, I stopped taking them. However, Recently I've been eating more grains than I probably should be. They don't treat my body well. From what I've read about how our bodies absorb b-12, I know I shouldn't be eating grains.

A few days ago, I noticed some ringing in my ears, and had some slight vertigo experiences. My warning flags went up. I need to stop eating grains and overt fats. Especially cashews, hummus, pasta and pizza. Just because they can be vegan, doesn't mean I should be eating them.

So, I'm going to start counting days again, and tracking my daily food/exercise intake. Let's see how I do, shall we?

Today's Food:
• 13 bananas
• almost a half of watermelon
• ¼ cup of roasted, salted cashews
• ½ cup of rice noodles with some veggie broth, broccoli and carrots (cooked)
• some dark chocolate

Working harder

I'm pushing the time that I allow myself to eat freely up to 8PM—rather than 6pm. I find that if I tell myself that I can eat anything I want after 6PM, then my drive home from work, all I can think about is what I'll be eating for dinner when I get home... I often have fantasies about vegan pizza, or burritos, or indian, or thai foods. Often, these fantasies lead me to call in an order and pick it up during my drive.

This isn't helpful.

Tuesday I found myself fantasizing about WATERMELON! Then thoughts of pasta, or leftover pizza came to mind. So, I told myself that before I ate anything cooked, that I had to eat ½ a watermelon. So, I stopped at the store and bought 2 of them, then went home.

That half of watermelon was delish!
I had ¼ a watermelon for breakfast, then another ¼ for lunch. Then that ½ for dinner. A few hours later I finished off the leftover vegan pizza that was in the fridge.

I do have some leftover pasta still, but my plan now, is to make a fruit dinner my priority.

Today's a banana day.
6 for breakfast, 5 for lunch. I'll work on eating another 5 during my commute home. For some reason I've noticed that eating bananas in the car is much easier than trying to sit down and eat them when I'm at home. Meh. Whatever works! ::shrug::

I'm also getting a stronger urge to actually get into the yoga studio. I've accepted that I'm only going once a week, and I think that's where I had to start—with acceptance.

For about a month now, I had been telling myself that once a week wasn't enough yoga, and I've probably been subconsciously resisting more yoga because it's what my inner-authority figure has been telling me is what's needed. I went to class yesterday, and realized, that once a week is indeed **enough** yoga. Any yoga is a good amount. Better than none! :)

So, I feel more open to the idea of maybe going tomorrow. No commitment, no expectations. We'll just throw the possibility out there, and see what happens.

Get your but back into a yoga class!

is what I've been telling myself lately.

I NEED to get back into the studio. These past few weeks, I've really been slacking about getting into class. The days have been longer lately, so I've been staying up later... which then means, that I decide to stay in bed longer in the morning.

NO MORE!!!

This morning was the last time. I'll be in class tomorrow. First thing, with a teacher who I've never had, ready to be totally surprised by what comes each moment of the class.

I need to get back in there. I've been feeling sluggish and lazy lately, and I'm ready to have my energy back!!!

I'm also planning on eating 100% raw throughout June, beginning just after James's birthday dinner on the 3rd. I've been eating a lot of cooked meals for dinners lately, and I can't help but wonder if that is partially causing my lack of energy and yoga lately.

How can I eat so many bananas?

Recently, I was asked: "How do you keep eating the bananas without getting sick of them? Right now, I don't think I can look a spinach leaf in the eye and am longing for something cooked…"

I began a short response, but it became really long… so, I figured I'd better make a whole post about it. Here's my response:

Oh, I hear ya! I'm still considering myself in transition, so after 6pm, I'm allowing myself to eat without restriction. Prior to 6pm I eat as many calories as possible from fruit. I've noticed that if I'm low on calories come 6pm, that I CRAVE anything starchy, cooked, greasy and otherwise unhealthy for me. I am slowly learning that eating at least 1700+ calories from fruit before 6pm prevents me from caving into eating cooked foods. Even after 6pm, I do try to stay as raw as possible, but I allow myself the opportunity to eat cooked if I truly feel that it's what my body really wants at the time... even then, I'm very selective about what cooked foods I'll allow into my body.

I choose to eat bananas because they're the most calorie dense fruit available in my area (about 130 calories per 7.5" banana). And yes, I do occasionally get sick of eating them. So, I'll take a day or two off and eat mostly mangos, or watermelon… but during those days, I don't have as much energy and life, and I crave cooked foods in the evening more. So I go back to the bananas shortly after.

I very rarely eat greens. I can totally understand what you're saying about the spinach. Greens are VERY low in calories, and won't fill me up, or leave me feeling very satisfied. Every once in awhile I'll have a big salad for dinner. But I often don't like eating greens. I know that when my body is craving the nutrients that only greens can provide, then I'll begin to get cravings for romaine or spinach. That's when I'll eat them. But I don't rely on greens as a staple in my diet. They just don't do it for me.

I've heard many raw *guru's* say that it's not necessary to count calories when eating a raw diet. And I agree, somewhat—I think that once you've established a comfortable routine eating a raw diet, that you don't need to count calories. But during the transition into eating a raw diet it's important to know exactly what it is you're putting into your body. I'm learning to know what 1700+ calories feels like, and I definitely can FEEL when I'm low on calories.

Before I began tracking my food intake on nutridiary.com, I never realized what low calories felt like... But if 6pm comes around and I'm only around 900 calories, I feel weak, tired, CRANKY, irritable and crave absolutely any food that will give me lots of calories FAST. So, that's when I think of cooked, fatty foods. Yes, FAT. Fat gives us 9 calories per gram, while protein and carbs only give us 4 calories per gram. So, when I find myself craving something fatty, I know I'm low on carbs.

Because I eat a LOT of fruit, it's important for me not to eat much fat. Fat can sometimes take up to 48 hours so leave the blood stream. While it's in there, it prevents insulin from doing its job to its full capacity, thus resulting in high blood sugar if I eat lots of sweet things, which fruits are. So, it's very important for me not to get to the point in the evening I may cave into eating fatty foods. Not to mention how eating fat the night before a yoga class effects my class the next morning. Oy.

So, that's why I eat so many bananas... and why I can get myself to continue eating them without getting sick of them. They're the fuel my body needs.