Raw Diet?

A place to discuss health and fitness, healthy diets. A fit body makes for a fit mind.

Have you tried Raw diet?

I'm already eating raw foods.
6
14%
Once, I might try it again.
4
10%
Once, I'm not interested.
2
5%
I'll try it.
5
12%
I'm not interested.
25
60%
 
Total votes: 42

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Late_Lotus
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Raw Diet?

Post by Late_Lotus »

I eat a lot of garbage here at my moms, and I want to eat healthier. I keep all my animals on really healthy diets and pay close attention to what types of nutrients they get from different foods. So I told myself it's time for me to treat myself as well as I treat them. I'm not overweight or anything, but I've noticed I'm often tired and becoming lazy. So I began reading. One book in particular had a great rule system: "Eat FOOD (not garbage). Not too much. Mostly Plants." I always eat my meat last anyways, when I get around to it, so I figured this won't be difficult for me to hop into, and started looking at vegetarian diets.
Then I came across Raw diets. Based on the idea that when we cook our foods we actually destroy many of the nutrients found in them.
Most people on Raw diets are vegetarians or vegans, and I decided to try it out for a couple of days. I only ate fruits, veggies, and nuts for those two days without cooking anything and I couldn't believe how much ENERGY I had. You feel very alert, happy, and awake!
I wanted to see who else on here may be on Raw Food? I know there are many vegans and vegetarians and if there aren't many people on Raw, perhaps some of you will try this.
Just TWO days! Even just ONE day, and I began feeling a change. I'm going to research more, but I think it's safe to say I will be following this simple way of eating. I suggest you try it!
Individual
Posts: 1970
Joined: Mon Jan 12, 2009 2:19 am

Re: Raw Diet?

Post by Individual »

I don't think it's healthy.

Maybe it has something to do with gut bacteria having to adjust to a new diet, but I tried the raw fruits and veggies thing once, and no matter how much I ate, I was constantly tired and hungry.

Plenty of info here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_foodism" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Of particular interest is this study:
A study surveying people practicing raw vegan diets of varying intensities found that 30% of the women under age 45 had partial to complete amenorrhoea and that "subjects eating high amounts of raw food (> 90%) were affected more frequently than moderate raw food dieters". The study concluded that since many raw food dieters were underweight and exhibited amenorrhoea "a very strict raw food diet cannot be recommended on a long-term basis"
Amenorrhoea is a side-effect of malnutrition.

I think it's good to eat lots of raw fruits, but vegetables should be cooked. They taste better cooked and they're better for you.

The Buddha also specifically forbids monks to eat raw meat and grain (somebody else can dig up the sutta reference).
The best things in life aren't things.

The Diamond Sutra
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Viscid
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by Viscid »

These types of diets, I find, just lead to people getting neurotically obsessive over what they eat.

"Is this raw? Is this organic? Does it have xyz ingredient?"

Then you can never take them out somewhere to eat, because you have to be considerate of their delusional obsessions and spend considerable time deliberating on a suitable venue for face-stuffing.
"What holds attention determines action." - William James
alan
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Location: Miramar beach, Fl.

Re: Raw Diet?

Post by alan »

By your own admission you ate a lot of garbage. Just getting off that will make you feel better. It's not the raw foods, it is the fact that you are off the garbage, that makes you feel better.

There is no reason to eat only raw food.
tahariel
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Location: Poland

Re: Raw Diet?

Post by tahariel »

I have some experience with vegan, vegetarian and raw diet. What I can recommend is vegan diet. I have never been for long period (more than 6 weeks) on raw diet but for me from time to time it is very good.
@Viscid any obsession is not good, so if you from the beginning give this label to people who consciously and freely choose what they eat is not fair.
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Viscid
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by Viscid »

tahariel wrote:@Viscid any obsession is not good, so if you from the beginning give this label to people who consciously and freely choose what they eat is not fair.
You're right, of course, but there are people who take it too far.
"What holds attention determines action." - William James
Sanghamitta
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by Sanghamitta »

tahariel wrote:I have some experience with vegan, vegetarian and raw diet. What I can recommend is vegan diet. I have never been for long period (more than 6 weeks) on raw diet but for me from time to time it is very good.
@Viscid any obsession is not good, so if you from the beginning give this label to people who consciously and freely choose what they eat is not fair.
Show me a culture more than a couple of decades old where a group of of human beings choose to adopt a raw food diet and i will concede the point. The fact is that conscious choice does not come in to it...wacky food propaganda does.
The going for refuge is the door of entrance to the teachings of the Buddha.

Bhikku Bodhi.
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Ytrog
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by Ytrog »

I heard/read somewhere (could be radio or a science news site, don't know anymore) that scientists suspect that eating cooked food allowed humans to develop the brains we have today. Cooked food is easier to digest than raw food, so more energy could go to the brains instead of digesting the food. This resulted in more brain growth.

Maybe this is something to think about when you're pondering eating raw food. There was an evolutionary advantage in prehistoric times for people who ate cooked food. There is a reason that fire was so important for survival other than keeping you warm. :anjali:
Suffering is asking from life what it can never give you.
mindfulness, bliss and beyond (page 8) wrote:Do not linger on the past. Do not keep carrying around coffins full of dead moments
If you see any unskillful speech (or other action) from me let me know, so I can learn from it.
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poto
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by poto »

Ytrog wrote:I heard/read somewhere (could be radio or a science news site, don't know anymore) that scientists suspect that eating cooked food allowed humans to develop the brains we have today. Cooked food is easier to digest than raw food, so more energy could go to the brains instead of digesting the food. This resulted in more brain growth.

Maybe this is something to think about when you're pondering eating raw food. There was an evolutionary advantage in prehistoric times for people who ate cooked food. There is a reason that fire was so important for survival other than keeping you warm. :anjali:
From what I understand any cold food that you eat has to be warmed by your body. That takes energy from your body to produce that heat. Warm food does not drain energy from your body and can actually add some thermal energy to your system. I have read some speculation that heated and cooked food may have been one reason our species has survived through numerous ice ages.

Personally, I consider a raw food diet to be an ascetic diet. While it may work for some people, I wouldn't recommend it for most people.
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." -- C. S. Lewis
Laurens
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by Laurens »

Its not healthy at all. Cooked food arguably might lose some of its nutrients in the cooking process, however it also helps to break the food down which means our body requires less energy to digest it. Cooking played a role in the evolution of our species, getting more energy from less food is key to our success.

Eating a raw diet would mean subjecting oneself to tiredness and lack of energy. The energy you would normally use to be active during the day would be spent digesting food, and one would have to spend more time eating to be able to keep one's energy levels up.

You might lose weight, but you wont be healthy.


"If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?"

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
alan
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by alan »

Good point, Laurens.
Fact is, there is no reason to eat raw food only. It is just another dumb fad which is not based upon reason.
timmbuktwo
Posts: 22
Joined: Tue Nov 16, 2010 2:19 am

Re: Raw Diet?

Post by timmbuktwo »

Fruits go through your digestive system in mere minutes , vegetables hours and meats days . Raw or cooked is not the key , although raw fruits are ideal . Your body needs virtually no resources , energy , to process fruits.
Jhana4
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by Jhana4 »

Late_Lotus wrote: Just TWO days! Even just ONE day, and I began feeling a change. I'm going to research more, but I think it's safe to say I will be following this simple way of eating. I suggest you try it!
I've been a vegetarian over 30 years. I started off with a raw diet, got very ill, got educated and started a life long hobby of being a nutrition buff.

Living off of just produce is a nice tonic for and break from sloppy eating, but it isn't a sustainable diet.

Like someone else wrote earlier, you feel better because you gave your body a break and stopped putting garbage into it. You probably got more vitamins and water into your body by the simple fact of eating more of any kind of produce.

Most authors of raw food books have no expertise in nutrition and often write many things that contradict basic science that has been known for centuries.

Brenda Davis RD, is a coauthor of the American Dietetic Association's Position Paper On Vegetarianism. She recently became interested in raw diets and incorporating ( partially ) many more raw foods in her own diet. She published a book called "Becoming Raw". It is probably the only book on the subject based on facts and written by a researcher.

I would encourage you to enjoy more produce on a regular basis, but I would discourage you from trying to eat raw food 100% of the time.. If you must, for your own self interest, do it after reading "Becoming Raw" and following the advice in the book.
In reading the scriptures, there are two kinds of mistakes:
One mistake is to cling to the literal text and miss the inner principles.
The second mistake is to recognize the principles but not apply them to your own mind, so that you waste time and just make them into causes of entanglement.
kansascoder
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by kansascoder »

Late_Lotus,

The best thing to do is to follow your body's urgnings and honor your consicence. Some people get sick on raw and others thrive. no one but you can how your body will respond. I was on an all juice and raw diet for about 3 months and felt fantastic. Check out this fellows site: http://www.therawfoodworld.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;. I'm sure you already have but it's worth mentioning. He has lots of youtube videos and I personally like his energy.

There are endless variations in our diet. I began to attend to my conscience when eating meat and now eat almost entirely vegetarian foods. Lots of folks tell me it is unsustainable to live this way but I feel fine. I find it less and less necessary to eat meat but in the beginning if I felt a need for it I ate it. A comment here about getting hung up on diet is in my opinion wise. Listen to your conscience and be conscious abouthow you're making choices. It'll be interesting for sure!

Rich
Love them all ... regardless!
Jhana4
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Re: Raw Diet?

Post by Jhana4 »

Laurens wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKKvmFZBALo" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tD11em1uXgk" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.
I thought these videos were excellent. I like to read up on nutrition as a hobby so I had a sense that what Concordance had to say was correct. I was disappointed that I could not find out what his name, education or research experience is. To me that is a bit ironic as the raw food movement exists because its members believe what they read without checking into the background of who is saying what.
In reading the scriptures, there are two kinds of mistakes:
One mistake is to cling to the literal text and miss the inner principles.
The second mistake is to recognize the principles but not apply them to your own mind, so that you waste time and just make them into causes of entanglement.
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