Consequences

So, after my frustration with a low fat, high fruit raw vegan diet and my longing for having more fun with food again without feeling guilty (I am human after all), I get to experience the consequences. Some things I have learned in the past few weeks:

• Having a soy cappuccino at Starbuck's equals a sleepless night.
• Eating meals at restaurants which contain salt, heated oils and sugar are not a good idea to improve my skin condition.
• Eating cooked food is not going to kill me (right away ^^).
• I feel very clearly that I long for a low fat vegetable based diet. I know I am doing great with vegetables. I am longing for the plain steamed sort of dishes, along with herbs etc.
• I like green tea and oolong tea and if I drink them not in the late afternoon they don't cause any big problems with my sleep, and they make me feel good and mildly energized as well as help to sharpen my mind.
• I don't need salt. Why are they putting that stuff into everything again?
• I don't need oil. Seriously. Who came up with this?
• I really enjoy the taste, smells and textures of Thai vegetarian food.
• I really appreciate to have pleasant to no body odor, good deep sleep, a flat stomach, healthy digestion and glowing healthy skin. Heated oils, lots of salt and refined sugar are not taking me there. 
• Searching for fun is not a bad idea nor is it a sin.
• I can have a deeper satisfaction with my life if I take radical care of my self, internally and externally.
• If I am 100% honest with myself I can see that eating those foods I have been ingesting is not what I truly want.
• There are so many things in life that can be fun. Food is only one of them.
• I fell in love with Yoga, and I really enjoy cycling and running, as well as hiking and reading - and, of course, dancing and hooping. 
• I can still make my food fun - I simply need to take care of this myself instead of relying on others.
• I can find a diet that makes me happy - emotionally, physically, spiritually, mentally. I think and feel I already have a clue what that diet may look like. In fact, I have been clear about this for about one or two months now. I have just needed some time to get to experience other things in order to be certain about my next move. That time wasn't wasted - it brought me clarity.
• I love my life, I love myself for the choices I make and the consequences that come with it as it promotes my personal growth.
• And yes, others might look at me and observe what I am doing as failure. Finally I am in a place where I can smile at that. They don't know what I know, they don't feel what I feel. They do what they do and experience what they experience, they get their results and make choices according to that. And that is what I am doing as well.
• As I have no clear goal except for experiencing my life in all authenticity, I don't have failures anymore in my life - that is a mental program I no longer subscribe to.
• My mind is like a theater, a movie, a TV show. There are some films running that I know already - they are getting old. It's ready for a new tape, I am ready for switching the channel. And that is a channel called unconditional love.

Peace everyone!

loving food that's loving me back

Alison is presenting her interview series 'Living on Fruit' and the video below features long term low fat raw vegan Andrew - there is no doubt that he genuinely enjoys his food and whole lifestyle. And I know exactly what he means. Right now, I am experiencing such high levels of happiness, contentedness and well-being resulting from my raw vegan fruit-based diet that I don't see myself eating something other than fresh, raw, ripe, preferably organic plant foods anytime soon or ever again. I am just too much in love with my current food and the results coming from it.



Do you love your food? And equally important: does it love you back?



Sometimes people think I am an ascetic eating this way, when actually the TASTE of these foods is one of my main reasons to choose this diet. Whole, fresh, ripe, raw fruits and vegetables are the most beautiful, tasty and satisfying foods I know of. I have not always viewed it this way, I am still evolving and growing more and more into it. Practice is a crucial factor: The more you practice being low fat raw vegan, the better you will become at sticking to it. It takes time to change habits, change your perspective and change your actions, I made so many decisions in the past that were not serving me - but in the end, they brought me to where I am now.
Doug likes to tell one of his many great anecdotes and it goes somewhat like this: He once asked a very successful and popular man about the secret behind his success. The man answered: All comes from good judgment. Then Doug asked, how do we gain the ability of good judgment? Experience, is the answer. And how do we get experienced? Poor judgment!
Failing is part of life, and part of success, if you handle it the right way. It is a vital source of experience and so it can be very valuable for making decisions in the future - hopefully decisions, that serve you much better.

Don't stress yourself with thinking too far into the future ('Oh my god! I can never have candy/pizza/french fries (whatever) ever again!'), but stay in the moment and ask yourself, if you are willing to experience the uncomfortable consequences resulting from your choices in the now. Change your focus from a deprivation point to an ABUNDANCE point of view - because that's what this lifestyle is ultimately about for me anyway: abundance. I love to eat. And I love to eat A LOT.

Much happiness! Enjoy!
Jasmin

time to post again, huh?

i kind of re-discovered this blog of mine yesterday and i thought that it was a pity that it was forgotten for such a long time! much has happened since my last post... where to begin?

in february i had a hard time dealing with my bulimia. when i came back from thailand to austria, i felt like an alien coming to a new galaxy. i didn't care much about my old 'ideals' (all ego anyway which doesn't really matter, so... what the heck?!) anymore... i went out with cool people, i kissed food dogmas goodbye (stayed veggie though), i tried to go back to uni again. yes. i tried. didn't work. (i found that out in the beginning of march which changed everything).

so, january and february were all about not giving a damn, partying, shopping, losing weight (well, with not eating much and/or purging it actually worked a bit), meeting people... oh. yeah. and i had a short affair, too. that was interesting! i wanted to do the ABC so bad. wonder what 'ABC' means? it's short for Ana Boot Camp. i actually made friends with ana and mia again - i felt betrayed by 811rv/30BaD. i did it for 3 months and the results were frustrating, and i want to see results, people!

but then i started to feel bad, life was so meaningless, there was no-where to turn to ... especially not inwards, there was simply too much pain and too loud a silence. i checked out 30BaD again... only to receive attention from people who wanted to support me. i was so grateful. people cared about me! and my sanity! and i realized that i couldn't do ABC for the rest of my life. i thought that maybe fruit is the answer. i could see myself sticking to 811rv/30BaD lifestyle. i threw ana and mia out of the window and started the hardcore 30BaD lifeystyle. 100%. no slip-ups. for 6 freaking months!

what did i get? i gained weight. my skin was still not flawless. my mood was still not as stable as it could be. i got a few cavities in my teeth. more cellulite than ever. sleep could still be better. and i really, really followed the plan! i worked out daily - an average of 60min, i stopped using shampoo/soaps etc., i ate mostly big mono meals of fruit, i ate fat very rarely and never got about 10% of my daily calories of fat, kept a food diary (alas, cron-o-meter deleted it for no reason), tried to talk good to myself, relaxed, went to 3 fruity workshops/festivals, i even stopped studying at uni, left vienna and moved back in with my parents to start a distant study course in natural hygiene! what else can i do?!

6 months. no sign that it would become better. where are the results? why am i doing this? isn't this supposed to work and give me the best health ever? i decided to jump off the wagon to see what it feels like. i ate a sandwich (grains, salt, fat - not the best option, but anyways). had some tea. didn't feel as bad as feared. didn't feel much like repeating it either. heck, i love fruit and veggies. i felt a bit toxic afterwards, but not too bad. i could blame my chubby cheeks on the puffyness creating cooked food. went back to eating 811rv.

i fasted for 4 days. that was a nice experience! eating the bananas after the fast was very special, it felt really, really good. ate fruits and greens for a couple of days. didn't feel as good as i hoped. went to buy green tea. felt better after drinking the tea. (: [no. i'm not a 'good hygienist' and i doubt that i will ever be. as doug says, ' the philosophy is always ahead of you'.]

i re-discovered Dr Joel Fuhrman's 'Eat to Live'. i will order and read it asap! i read some of his articles. saw some of his vids on YT. i'll give it a shot. this weight i'm carrying around needs to come off, guys. i don't feel like being 'my self'. i started working out a lot more (which makes me feel better). i incorporated cooked veggie dishes back into my diet. i don't care about any dogma. (back to basics, that's how this blog started *lol*). high fruit, high raw, low cal, no salt, no oil, mostly whole plants. vegan (of course). direction: fruitarianism/frugivorism. guess, i'm considered a frugivore already anyway. i've been eating most of my calories from fruit for over 1 and a half years now.

let's face it: i simply eat too much, yes, too many cals and yes, that means too much fruit. deal with it, 30BaDers. restricting calories is the key to weightloss, i simply didn't want to see that. you need to build a caloric deficit in order to lose fat. easy. simple. true. and restricting calories on 811rv simply doesn't work for me (feel to deprived and binge on junk - well, i guess i could simply eat cooked veggies then instead), i tried it many times. but restricting calories on a cooked vegan (high vegetable) diet, seems to work for me. high volume low-calorie foods, savoury tastes (which i missed on all fruit), different textures, some spices and condiments (won't kill me).

fruit. fruit. fruit. is and will be my favourite. but eating lots of it caused me to gain even more weight (and i wasn't skinny to begin with).

i'll let ya know how it goes!