I keep flip flopping. I've never had my health significantly challenged, and I'm full of faith that if I ever had some strange disease that switching to raw for a couple months would help my body heal itself without surgery or chemotherapy, but I'd rather not test that faith!
I felt how wonderful it feels eating raw, but there were other variables, like being in love, being inspired, being in a new place, And so I test the difference between diligently eating nutritious food, and indulgently eating temporarily gratifying crap.
Today I woke up and ate an orange, a banana, an apple... And then, because I was sleep-deprived I ate two ginger snap cookies, a birthday cookie, a coconut pecan cookie and a oatmeal raisin walnut cookie. Then for lunch I ate pasta with egg and avocado, and for dinner I ate some pieces of chicken with more pasta. I don't really feel great. I'm very dehydrated and I can't seem to catch up.
Child, REMEMBER THIS!!! There's really no need to keep testing it, is there? Just make the switch already?
I have a few obstacles: I live with my mother who cooks quickly and deliciously. She doesn't share my views, has a cultural attachment to rice, loves ice cream and swears she needs sugar because she's over 40.
Secondly, I have a child. He likes eating fruits and veggies throughout the day, especially if we're out and about. But sometimes when he's cranky and I give him rice with natto and a raw egg, he's beaming with energy, and i can't ignore that. How can I separate what I eat and what I feed him? Not very easily.
Thirdly, Its expensive to eat raw food compared to eating pasta, rice, and beans. I have to eat more than 10 dollars worth of fruit in a day to have energy whereas $5 can feed me and my child with mac & cheese. I intellectually understand that I will be provided for, but I've been trained by my economical parents to seek a better deal. I Also understand intellectually that eating well is a great insurance plan, but it still hurts me when I pay $60 or $75 at the grocery store, only to have to go back again a few days later for more.
Fourthly, I never know quite what to eat. I can eat fruit and salad all day, but after a few days of this I get bored. And I can start preparing a raw meal that will be done the next day (with soaking and dehydrating and all of that preparation) but then what can I have NOW that would satisfy my dissatisfaction? Eating more raw food is an emotional journey!!
Fifthly (sounds funny, i'm sure its incorrect, but i'm gonna keep going) I'm just not that convinced that I need to be doing this 100% right now.
And that's probably sufficient reason to go easy on myself. Today, after a day of shitty eating, I feel like I want to eat only fruit to morrow, and spending $20 at a grocery store for some plums and whatever catches my eye in the produce aisle, that sounds doable.
I keep reading in raw recipe books to "go at your own pace" and I guess this is what that means. I have this perfectionist attitude i inherited from my mom where i want to do everything 100%.
I'm 24 years old, and aware of how my body feels after eating a lot of refined sugar and not drinking enough water or eating enough juicy fruits. I think I'm going to be okay.
I really want to eat a plum tomorrow, and I'm so grateful that i can just go to the grocery store and get one. The days of hunter gatherers have sure evolved. Now we're shopping and gathering.
On another note, today before i devoured the rice+egg+natto mixture, I thought about how everything was grown and harvested, and how the spoon and bowl i was eating from were produced, and how everything was transported, and how many people were involved and how many processes were involved in getting this suboptimally nutritious meal to me, and I thought about how perfectly sufficient it was to sustain me. I also thought about how high caloric grains like rice, wheat, and oats were responsible for human civilization progressing the way it has, and that it was really myopic to see rice as 'bad for me,' when i owe my gratitude to whoever first planted those seeds and thus gained some free time to be creative and progress humanity.
We're gonna be okay!
No comments:
Post a Comment