Healthy Shifts...

I woke this morning after an EXTREMELY long, appreciated and restful sleep to a house with no electricity and no running water…it was interesting…luckily there was ready-squeezed orange juice and coconut water to hand to get me through a morning with no Vita-mix to juice with…it was a good reminder of the importance for me of what I’m doing for my health – there is no way at this point that something like that would stop me from getting the juice I need and staying on track with juicing…no Vita-mix? Then show me the nearest coconut tree ;)

My Interview with Sally Jesse Raphael is now available on Google Videos – see here:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6501742535334801864&pr=goog-sl



I am going through a lot of shifts at the moment in my life concerning the way I connect with this physical world. In the last couple of years, there have always been certain things I have done in the mornings to being me back fully into this body and connect – prayer, meditation, yoga, reading, writing. These tools have served me immensely well. Yet of late, I have started to feel my tiredness at repeating the same activities each morning – there has been a definite shift to discover new and exciting things for myself to connect with joy. In terms of my yoga, for example, I do the Five Tibetan Rites and have done so every morning for the last two years…the maximum number of repetitions recommended for this series of movements is 21. A couple of days ago I moved myself on to 14, from 13, where I had been for a very long time – it amazes me how much difference I feel each time I simply add on one more movement to this sequence – my body feels it immediately…well, now I am 2/3rds of the way to the maximum of 21 and that feels good to me – I have set an intention to move onwards quickly over the next weeks, adding one more repetition a week perhaps, until I max out at 21 and my chakras glide into the day in resonant unison ;) It just feels good to me to shake up the energy and move my patterns on – that is SO much a part of this journey after all, letting the creativity flow and side-stepping stagnation…
(For a great site on the Five Tibetans, see: http://www.mkprojects.com/pf_TibetanRites.htm)

Today I have had:

300ml (1.5 cups) water
500ml (1 pint) orange juice with hemp oil
600ml (2.5 cups) coconut water with green powder
1 litre (1 quart) pear/celery/greens juice
2.5 litres (2.5 quarts) greens/celery/coconut water
1 tbsp hemp oil w/kelp with cayenne
500ml (1 pint) water

which makes…5.4 litres of liquids today or…about 1.43 gallons…

I had two unexpected and welcome visitors today – one a friend-of-a-friend just arrived from England who is on her way to visit Pacha Mama – a raw-friendly ecovillage settlement further north here in Costa Rica, which holds many amazing retreats – hope to get there sometime soon…and the other visitor was a really sweet massage therapist who came for an appointment and while he waited to do that, decided to give me some impromptu reflexology. It was GREAT – really appreciated and relaxing and I learnt some more things about this body – apparently my overall health is very good right now – there was nothing that stood out for him – he said I seemed very relaxed and healthy. Hurrah… :)

All blessings,
Angela. xxx

Raw with Sally Jesse Raphael...

PHEWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW…today has been a real whirlwind for me…I’m wiped out…
I did my interview with legendary talk show host Sally Jessy Raphael this morning. I really enjoyed the interview and am excited to spread this message of healing with raw foods ever-further. The audio file is now available to listen to HERE: http://www.sallyjr.com/radio.htm (My segment begins at around 59.12 minutes into the show).
This whole show will be up on Sally’s site from midday Jan 9th to midday Jan 10th, then again this weekend (Jan 13-14th) when the show archive goes up. I am currently working on trying to edit my section of the show out to put up on the RawReform website…but technology has not been very cooperative with me today and I have surrendered for now…I hope to have it arranged by tomorrow…
If you listen on past the end of my segment, it seems my story and comments raised a lot of controversy for Sally and her crew, who could not understand where a raw foodist gets protein from…this, as all raw foodists know, is the perennial question we face…I am sorry that they did not seem to resonate with the idea of alternative protein sources than meat/beans/legumes, but am happy nonetheless to have got this message out there…just keeping on spreading those seeds of consciousness ;)

Today I have had:

250ml (1 cup) water
500ml(1 pint) orange juice with hemp oil
2 litres (2 quarts) pineapple/greens/celery
½ tbsp coconut oil
500ml (1 pint) water
250 ml (1 cup) pear/greens/celery/coconut water
300ml (1.5 cups) coconut water w/ green powder
1 tbsp hemp oil with kelp/cayenne
1.5 litres (1.5 quarts) greens/papaya juice

making…about 5.3 litres of liquids today or…1.4 gallons...
It was hard for me to keep on top of juicing today – very full-on day of interactions with people, but I made the gallon threshold and feel fine…just very ready for sleep…also the pineapple/greens combo in the middle of the day felt very harsh to me and I started to get the prickly sensation on my tongue that tells me my body has had enough pineapple for the time being…
I had some interesting talks with David Rain today about juice feasting matters and this was the outcome for me in terms of new info gleaned:

* being liquidarian as a lifestyle, in the long-run, on just juices is not really recommended… ;) a combination of blended drinks/smoothies WITH juices, yes, maybe…but not just juices…the fibre helps to slow the rate at which things move through the body and can help us access different nutrients in the blends. It can also help move things out that may be lodged in the colon still. Also, there is a desirable effect in the body from chewing – pressure points are activated that do not otherwise get triggered and if we don’t use the jaw to chew, we may lose that ability in the long-run/weaken our jaws.
* By this far into feasting, I do not really need to be using cascara sagrada anymore to stimulate peristalsis. It will be good to start a parasite cleanse soon though – around day 60.
* I could be doing coffee enemas once or twice a week at the moment to help stimulate the liver to release…have never done a coffee enema…may try it soon…feel resistance though…

David has also just put up some great videos explaining the basics of Juice Feasting at the new site – www.juicefeasting.com – check them out…

Ok, that’s it for me for today – sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep really needs to happen… ;)
All blessings,
Angela. xxx

50 DAYS in...

WOW, DAY 50 of Juice Feasting today…how exciting…and amazing, to think how quickly it has all gone…I can’t imagine that in just 42 days, solids will come back into my life again – it all seems very swift…and in terms of my 100 day outlook on this whole process, today marks my mid-point…wow…I feel kind of sad to think about that…this really is such an energising, clean and amazing way to live…

Today I have had:

750ml (3.5 cups) water
2 litres (2 quarts) pineapple/greens/aloe
1 tbsp pollen
1 tbsp help oil with kelp/cayenne granules
1.5 litres (1.5 quarts) watermelon juice
500ml (1 pint) water
1.5 litres (1.5 quarts) apple/beetroot/greens/ginger/aloe
250ml (1 cup) water

Making…6.5 litres of liquids today or…about 1.7 gallons…
I notice that my juice choices are getting so simple these days…in the beginning, we wanted to try lots of different combos and it was more experimental. Now I know which things feel and taste good to me and tend to stay more with those. It saves me time and energy, as I can knock juices out so fast now and know I’ll very likely enjoy them…I am becoming very sensitive to both the things my body says ‘yes’ to when I open the fridge door to choose juice ingredients and also the combinations of things that will taste good together. I am using SO much fresh aloe right now. A friend gave me a stack of freshly cut, juicy leaves, straight from his organic garden and my body is LOVING it – inside and out…
I did an enema with probiotics in the middle of the day today, for the first time in days...maaaaaan...I always feel pretty wiped out after that...my body is still releasing surprising amounts of mucus...a mixture of old and new...well, better out than in ;)

Today I made a new section here on FAQ about Juice Feasting, which you can access at the right side of this page – to cover those main questions that seem to arise for people when they first come to juice feasting…enjoy :)

Tomorrow morning I am doing an interview live on radio with legendary talk show host Sally Jessy Raphael. I am excited to spread this message further. Listen in at www.sallyjr.com. I will post a recording of the interview asap for all those who can’t listen live.

Here is a mixture of disturbing and encouraging news from a USA Today article on food trends in 2007:

“Phil Lempert, editor of supermarketguru.com

•High-tech safety: "We'll see a whole new level of technology getting involved in food safety. There will be a Radio Frequency I.D. tag in the ears of cows so when you have an outbreak (of disease), it won't take months to trace. We'll see plastic films where, if there are bacteria on the produce in a bag of salad, the bag will change color. There are already machines for consumers at home where you can take fruits and veggies, put them in a container and pump bacterial-killing ozone into it."

•Go hemp: "It will be a huge year for hemp: hemp milk, cheese and oil. All these products are being imported from Canada now, and there is a huge opportunity because so many people don't like the taste of soy or have allergies to it, and people need a new alternative that is vegan." “

Hmmmmm…go hemp indeed, but hold back on the bacteria-killing plastic film and containers, thanks… (???) See the whole USA Today article here:
http://www.usatoday.com/travel/destinations/2006-12-28-food-trends-for-2007_x.htm

All love and blessings to all,
Angela. xxx

Crazy...

Today has been a really relaxing day for me...
I became very enamoured with the song ‘Crazy’ by Gnarls Barkley…I have listened to it perhaps 25 times already today…songs really get under my skin in that way and I want to hear them over and over again for a day or so at a time – until they’ve really integrated into me…I have put it up on my ‘MySpace’ page for people to hear too…
I LOVE this part of the song especially:

Come on now, who do you think you are?
Ha ha ha, bless your soul,
You really think you're in control?

Well,
I think you're crazy...
I think you're crazy...
I think you're crazy...
Just like me.

I love that. Putting that message out there into ‘mainstream’ mass consciousness of how crazy-making it can feel when we attempt to control everything in our environments…I know for myself that there is no greater release for me than to surrender my will to the universe on a daily and moment-by-moment basis, letting myself be guided rather than trying to control it all myself…

All that matters in the end, is how well did you live, how well did you love and how much did you learn to let go?

So…where did the universe guide me today? Well, it led me on a lovely journey, out into the sun, for a walk in the hills and to meet some bulls. I gave one of them some massage and it was such a lovely experience. He was kind of…well, bullish ;) to begin with – wasn’t sure abt it – but as I worked across the back of his head, behind his ears and up his neck, his face was quivering in bliss and he was completely still. It was so sweet. I had the feeling it was his ‘best day ever’ :) Big animals like that enjoy very hard scratching as their muscles are so huge and skins so thick. Luckily my nails are very strong – like claws – and can get into all those hard-to-reach-with-cloven-hooves places ;) I love the way animals are so responsive with massage too – there’s no element of potential ‘politeness’ to consider with them, like can occur with humans. When animals are ready for you to move to the next bit, they just move their body to meet your hand – they don’t keep still, waiting for you to move on. It feels very flowing and beautiful…it was a lovely experience :)

Today I have consumed:

500ml (1 pint) water
500ml (1 pint) orange juice with hemp oil
500ml (1 pint) master cleanser (first time in weeks)
1.5 litres (1 quart and 1 pint) watermelon juice
1tbsp pollen
1.6 litres (1 quart and 2.5 cups) pear/turmeric/aloe/fennel/celery/greens juice
½ tbsp coconut oil
½ tbsp kelp with cayenne
1.4 litres (1 quart and 1.5 cups) pineapple/greens/radish juice

making…about 6 litres of liquids today or…1.59 gallons…

More questions have been coming in today…

Firstly: ‘What is a durian?’

WOW…where to start with that one…? ;) Durian is a huge, amazing, stinking, spiky fruit from South-East Asia that ‘smells like a sewer, but tastes like heaven’…see picture…it is known as ‘the king of the fruits’, is very rich in sulphur and fats and is THE food of choice for many raw foodists – it is quite an acquired taste for many, but just SUBLIME…
I first ate durian less than a year ago and am now deeply passionate about it – it’s one of those foods I would happily live on…it has been a big part of my life this last year – including a dramatic episode with one on the roof of a London townhouse, which I wrote about in a newsletter HERE.
See www.durianpalace.com for more info…


Next: "How do you ingest the bee pollen if you are doing no "solid" foods?"

At the moment I am taking the bee pollen into my mouth directly and simply chewing it until it disappears. There is no fiber really in bee pollen, so it just dissolves. In the beginning I also mixed it in with the coconut water and green powder, to have it soften a bit first. I understand your concern with this though – it is a bit of a ‘grey’ area – like with any of the powders used while on this programme too – the seaweed granules, the cascara sagrada caps, enzyme powders, etc. I guess the point with all of them is that the particles are very small and therefore very quickly and easily integrated into the body, which is really what we’re aiming at here – giving the body a break from daily digestion of large amounts of solid matter, so it can concentrate on cleansing old stuff instead. So, as using these things does not interfere with that process, it is beneficial to use them.


"Are you doing probiotics during your feast? Recent correspondence I've read suggests that lots of enemas/colonics clears out good bacteria in the colon possibly causing gas and difficult digestion. But it doesn't seem to make sense to pour in probiotics only to whiz them out with colonic irrigations/high enemas! "

No, at the moment I am not taking probiotics orally. I was advised by David Rain to wait with them until later in the feast, as the beginning is more about clearing old stuff out than re-building. So, as I’m at day 50 tomorrow, I will likely start to begin working them back in to my life more soon. I have however put probiotics into my enemas a couple of times in the last weeks, to get them directly into my colon.

Thanks for your questions and I hope those answers are useful to you,
One love,
Angela. xxx

Pass the vibes on...

Today I did my first juicing talk/demo here in Costa Rica. I really enjoyed it. I did it with my friend, Laine who has been juice feasting here with me and we had a great time sharing the concepts with the guests at the BEAUTIFUL Namaste Ashtanga yoga studio here in San Jose. We made juice for everyone and gave out info sheets on how to juice and answered questions. They seemed to get a lot out of it and all enjoyed the juice too – even the straight greens on their own (see picture)... :O wow…hardcore :)
We’ll be holding more such events in the future, so email me at angela@rawreform.com if you’d like to come along.
We were gifted SO many beautiful things this evening too – HUGE juicy fresh aloe leaves, bundles of turmeric, fresh raw honeycomb, oranges, sweet lemons, an abundant amazing green called katuk and big sugar cane sticks…EXCITING – different nutrients :)

Ok, today I have had:

600ml (2.5 cups) water
600ml (2.5 cups) orange juice with hemp oil
2 tbsp pollen
1 litre (1 quart) greens/apple/beetroot juice
1.6 litres (1 quart and 2.5 cups) pineapple/greens
250ml (1 cup) water
1 litre (1 quart) celery/greens/carrot/beetroot/cucumber/turmeric/cayenne
500ml (1 pint) water
100ml (1/2 cup) sugar cane juice

making…around 5.5 liters of liquids today or…around 1.45 gallons

Today one reader – Allison - wrote with a handful of questions about my feasting journey – I’m going to answer them here, as they’re probably things that are useful for many people to read…

Are you considering staying with juices permanently, instead of eating? Can one do that healthfully? I would think so.
Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeell, there’s a question…yes, people do indeed go for looooong periods of time on just juices, or just liquids and there its definitely something very appealing about that for me at this point, but I cannot say in the long run how it will go…the one food that really calls to me from beyond the realms of juice is…DURIAN…so, maybe if I could work that into smoothies and have juice the rest of the time, I might stay in a fluid world…we’ll see…one day at a time right now…;)

Do you make each juice fresh, or do you make, say a quart in the morning, and then only drink some of it, saving the rest for later? Wouldn't it go bad that way?
I make each juice fresh. As I am using the Vitamix/nut milk bag combo and not a high quality juicer – like the Norwalk or Green Star, the juice oxidizes pretty fast and needs to be drunk asap. (With those kind of juicers, the juice will last for many hours in the fridge – up to 72 hours for Norwalk juice). So, I drink whatever I juice, immediately. Not everyone has to do it this way though – if you’re using a juicer like the Green Star for example, you could make juice in the morning, drink some then, take some with you wherever you’re going (keeping it cooled), then juice again in the evening when you’re home. It is really dependent on the quality of your equipment and the time you have for juicing.

In the beginning did you experience hunger and the desire to eat (instead of drink)?
No, not really. I have experienced very little hunger on this feast. I think in the beginning I was SO stuffed up from months of raw food restaurant eating and raw festie food and so on, that my body was just hugely RELIEVED for the first few days – which tend to be the toughest for most people when starting fasting, in terms of hunger pains. Since then, whenever hunger arises, I just get some nutrition into me – juice, pollen, oil, whatever flows best for me at that point. No, the desire to eat has been almost completely absent for me during this feast – it just doesn’t interest me at the moment. I get tiny flashes of it – like when the guy offered me a slice of guanabana a couple of weeks back in the market, or the thought of durian ;) etc – but nothing strong…just like little peeks into a different reality…

When you started, did you plan your juices and the times you would drink them ahead of time?
There was a small element of planning, I guess, in that we would buy in produce that we knew would fit well together in taste for juices, but other than that, it has all just been very ‘of the moment’. Just getting to the point of hunger, choosing which fruits/vegetables are going to meet the Vitamix at that particular point, then bam – drinking juice…it does feel important to get a good pace going right from the start though – 1 gallon AT LEAST a day is a LOT of liquids to be getting down you - a lot more than many people are used to. Start the day with something with greens and keep the pace up well during the day – every couple of hours at least – keep the metabolism ticking over so that it does not go into lulls or ‘starvation mode’.

When you list, say 2 quarts pear and greens juice, do you drink all of that at once? If not, about how many juices a day are you drinking, and how much time goes between each juice?
Yes, if I list 2 quarts pears and greens, that means I’ve made a whole huge jug of pears and greens and drink it all in one go. (Well, I pour off one quart and chill the rest in the fridge until I’ve drunk the first bit, then get the rest.) I get juice/some kind of nutrition into my body every couple of hours or so, more or less.

Have you ever figured out how many calories you are getting each day while juicing? If so, how many?
I have not actually calculated that very well yet – just roughly at times…I feel it is definitely at 1500 calories or even more per day. I will attempt to work it out someday soon. The site www.nutritiondata.com has great tools for working out how many calories you’re getting in each juice…

Thanks for your questions Allison, hope that helps :)
All love to all,
Angela. xxx

Free From Food...

So…how is life on the other side of the ‘half-way’ mark of 92-day juice feasting? Well…GREAT, thanks :)
I came to a point today of solidifying things that have been on my mind the last few days into a cohesive form…I finally really understand why it is that juicing like this now feels so ‘solid’ to me and natural and easy…

it frees me from thinking about food...

...almost completely. That is something I do not feel I have experienced in my life as an adult. As an obese overeater, my mind was more or less nearly always ‘in the food’ – if I wasn’t actually eating, I was thinking about food and when I would next eat and what I would have and so on…SO much of my time and brain space and energy went into things related to food…life was lived for me literally like a series of opportunities to eat…(see picture to the right of me back in 2000 for evidence...;)
What I experience now is that juice feasting frees me from that whole pattern. Even as a raw food EATER a lot of my time and energy and interest was around food – though my compulsions and patterns were vastly different and healthier than in my obese days, food still occupied so much of my head space…now, on just juice, I feel SO liberated from all that.
Now the pattern is like this: I am working/jogging/watching a film/whatever and get the sensation of hunger. I recognise it and think ‘oh…time for nutrition’. I go to the kitchen, prepare a juice using whatever seems right in that moment for my body and the time of day and that’s it – I go back to whatever I was doing, drink the juice and get on with life. It’s so simple. In between, my mind is almost TOTALLY off food. No obsessing. This is a revelation for me…so liberating…I have unconsciously moved into a space where I have SO much more time, energy and space in my life to use on more constructive things than thinking about food…I am truly grateful for that…I can also feel pretty much secure that my body is getting all that it needs, as my intake is so nutrient dense, I feel and look vibrant and I simply don’t crave anything…wow…what a blessing…

Today I have had:

800ml (3.5 cups) water with lime
1.6 litres (1 quart and 2.5 cups) apple/beet/ginger/parsley/spinach/celery
500ml (1 pint) orange juice with hemp oil
2 tbsp pollen
600ml (2.5 cups) coconut water with green powder
2 litres (2 quarts) pears/greens juice

which be-eth…5 litres of liquids today…or…1.32 gallons…

I’m noticing that my intake seems to be getting less and less these days…it’s like I more or less go very little over the 4litres/1 gallon mark for juice in a day…not consciously at all – that’s just how it’s working out…I can see/feel now why David Rain chose that as the minimum threshold for juice intake in a day – that just seems to work as the right kind of amount to run this body on optimally…nice…my choices for juice seem to be getting more simple too and the whole process a lot easier – I just knock out a couple of litres of juice in one shot and then tank up on that and keep going for hours…I’m just finishing my last greens drink of the day as I write this and smiling to myself as I remember HOW HARD it was for me a few weeks back to get my greens down – especially in the evenings – maaaaaaaaan…I was almost impossible…I always had about a cup/250ml sitting there at the end of the night and this scowl on my face, knowing I needed the nutrition, but not wanting to face the greens…wow…things feel so different now…I guess I’ve got very skilled at making good juice combos I enjoy and masking the tastes I don’t like so much – like celery…

I also noticed today that my body seems to be falling into a pattern with bowel movements. My first juice of the day tends to be around 11.30am. Soon after that my bowels move. It always happens like this at the moment: I’ll be drinking the juice and suddenly start to feel pain building in my colon. I will get goosebumps/goosepimples and feel cold and sometimes nausea rising too. Then I go the bathroom and once the stuff has moved through, I feel fine again. It feels like a very natural rhythm for my body to be forming, though the painful bit is not so enjoyable – it always feels like something significant has exited the premises afterwards…and I’m happy for that…

All blessings for now,
One love,
Angela. xxx

My new pictures, Day 46...

Hellooooooooooo,
Well, here we are then, Day 46 – officially half-way through the 92-day juice feast…and by popular demand, here are some new photos of how I’m looking now – these were just taken today…

Since starting this juice feast back on Nov 20th, I have lost around 15lbs. I was surprised at the start of this process to find my weight had crept back up to 153lbs. Now I am back down to 138lbs, which feels comfortable and good for me - a good size for my frame. I don't feel the cleansing work is finished for me at all though - it feels like there's much more detox to get through, so I will very likely lose more over the next weeks while that old junk clears out, then will re-build to around where I am now. I'm excited for that to happen. A couple of years back someone at a raw pot luck made what was for him probably a 'throw-away' comment, but is smthg that stayed with me from that day. I was telling him how I'd lost around 160lbs and was at that point about the weight I am now - around 138lbs. He looked at me and said -
'oh, so you've never gone completely into the cleansing stage then, when you get really skinny, but get it all out, before you rebuild?'
The answer was no...and it stuck with me...knowing that this was smthg I would like to do for this body - to cleanse it out to a deep level...I didn't come to the point of actually DOING that process though until now...and...here I am, 46 days in and feeling GREAT - very stable and solid in this process and enjoying it.
It just seems to flow so easily now - I'll get a feeling of hunger and there's no drama, just a simple, quick juice prep and that's it, issue dealt with and on with life - it feels so 'fluid' - no pun intended ;) So, I guess my hope for myself is that by the end of this feasting process I feel like I have once and for all really gone to that level of cleansing and re-created this body to a point where that comment made all those moons ago no longer feels like a shadow lurking on my raw path...

Today I have had:

750ml (3 cups) water with lime juice
1.7 litres (1 quart and 2.5 cups) apple/beetroot/celery/ginger/aloe/parsley
2tbsp hemp oil
1 litre (1 quart) pear/turmeric/greens/celery
800ml (3.25 cups) apple/beet/ginger/celery/aloe/parsley
1 tbsp coconut oil
1 tbsp kelp with cayenne
500ml (1 pint) orange juice with hemp oil

making...4.75 litres or...1.25 gallons of liquids today...
The apple/beetroot etc drink today was absolutely FABULOUS...I just had to take a picture of it to share here as the colour was phenomenal - I've never seen a colour like it - the pinky-magenta was almost neon - soooooo vibrant and beautiful...I juiced the apples, beetroot, ginger and aloe together first, before the greens and WOW - the taste of this combo alone was just amazing...I'm actually excited to get up tomorrow just at the thought of having more juice like that...lol...once mixed in with the greens it also totally masked the celery taste, which is such a boon for me too...YUMMY :)

Today I launched a contest on the RawReform website. To enter, just send your answer to the following question and one lucky winner will receive a $10 gift voucher for www.rawveganbooks.com, where you can kick-start your own healthy new year by choosing something from their huge range of products – from books to raw foods to kitchen appliances, supplements and DVDs… Just answer this question:

What is THE most valuable piece of guidance you picked up in 2006 for having a healthy raw lifestyle?

If you'd like to participate, send your answer to angela@rawreform.com and the winner will be picked at random and announced in february…
Good luck ;)

One love,
Angela. xxx

No-winter-blues blues...

Day 45…and something unexpected is happening to me at the moment. I feel like I’m missing winter and especially the sensation of winter in Europe…this is so not what I anticipated…lol... I have spent the last five winters in cold places – 3 in Iceland, one in England, one in Wales – and vowed to not subject myself to more of that this time round…thus, here I am in Costa Rica…and yet…there is something in me that yearns right now for the stillness and subtlety and ‘down time’ of a European winter…I recall a good friend in the UK remarking to me last year on the importance for our bodies and beings of experiencing the entire range of seasons and cycles, to reach a point of wholeness – the winter time is our true time there for inward reflections and stillness and recuperation of energies…if we avoid that and seek ‘perpetual summer’, there can be a tendency towards feelings of ‘burn out’ for us, as our bodies are used to a different pace…for someone raised in a different culture and climate, with temperate weather year-round, for example, that would of course be very different, but I am northern European by descent and what I’m feeling right now is that if I could be instantly transported back to Iceland for…hmmmmm…a day or two ;) I’d be there in a flash…I might need to borrow a coat or something though…

So…today I have had…

750ml (3 cups) water with lime juice
juice of 1 green coconut with green powder
2.6 litres (2 quarts and 2.5 cups) watermelon juice
2 litres (2 quarts) pineapple/greens/celery juice
2 tbsp hemp oil
1 tbsp kelp with cayenne

making…about 5.8 litres of liquids today or…about 1.53 gallons…pretty simple menu today…I like it – just making up a couple of litres of something in one go, then getting on with life – makes it much easier…I am also LOVING the combo of the hemp oil and the kelp with cayenne granules together. I get some hemp oil in my mouth, then shake some kelp with cayenne in too and it feels really yummy to me – again, like another way to ‘cut’ the heaviness of the fat and get my metabolism up a bit…

Something else that surprises me right now is that I still have body odour being produced – 45 days into this…wow…I feel like I must be a toxic minefield inside…to have been taking almost nothing but pure fresh fruit and veggie juices into this body for 1.5 months and my body to still be producing body odour really says something to me…and you know what? It smells like CAKE…my body smells like cake…well…I guess I ate so much of it in my past that a fair percentage of my cells must be structured from icing and sponge layers ;) still...it’s a bit odd…often in the last few years I’ve awoken in the mornings to find that the palms of my hands smell like digestive biscuits (cookies) …lol…I always attributed that to the fact that in my obese days I could literally sit and easily eat a 500g (abt 18oz) packet of chocolate-covered digestives in one go…wow…now my body seems to be letting all that rubbish go…and considering that a single average digestive biscuit tends to pack in about 80 calories of fats, sugars and processed starches, it’s no WONDER I ended up like I did, eating around 30 of them in one sitting, just as a 'snack'... :O

Here’s a little update for anyone interested in connecting with other people on your own juice feasting journey. Stephanie of Bare Necessities Café has set up this NEW wordpress blogspace for those interested to share together your experiences with juice feasting and find support: http://barenecessitiescafe.wordpress.com - this is an amendment to the previous site that was raised, as this wordpress one is apparently more user friendly for multiple authors…ENJOY :)

I was reminded today of the importance of taking care of myself and my own health and needs before those of others…actually it’s a theme that has been re-ocurring the last few days for me and I just wanted to express it here too, as I feel it’s so fundamental to our journeys and abilities to be there for each other. If I am well and happy and healthy in myself, then I am so better able to be there for others too. I am happy to be taking these steps to really heal my own body at the moment and encourage others too, as always, to take the next step for yourself, to support your well-being and honour your truth…

One love,
Angela. xxx

Melon, Mercola and the Moon...

Wow…busy day for me today – lots of exciting opportunities bubbling up and have actually run the fridge bare of greens for the first time since starting juice feasting I think…

Here’s what I consumed today:

500ml (1 pint) water
1.8 litres (1 quart and 3.5 cups) pear/turmeric/aloe/cilantro/celery/chard/spinach juice
1 litre (1 quart) apple/celery/greens/aloe/turmeric juice
500ml (1 pint) water
2 tbsp hemp oil
1 tbsp kelp with cayenne
3 litres (3 quarts) watermelon juice :O

making…6.8 litres of liquids today or…1.8 gallons…wow…that was really a lot of watermelon juice tonight ;) I made a gallon of it for myself and a friend, but he didn’t feel great and only wanted 1 quart. I had 3…lol…I’m amazed that it didn’t mess my blood sugars up though at all – I really do seem to be able to handle it fine – especially as I used the whole melon – skin, seeds and all…yummy…it's amazing to me to think I used to find watermelons so tasteless and 'pointless' as a cooked/junk food addict...they really seemed to have no taste to my de-sensitised taste buds...now it feels like one of the sweetest things I put in my body...
Here’s what another friend shared with me today about sugar cane juice and aloe:

"Congrats on the cane juice and aloe - these are amazing very powerful live super foods. Did you know cane juice contains 13% sucrose and 15% fiber? Thus it's like orange juice- but way better for you!
Suggest you keep on this- also cane is LOADED with key minerals
calcium, magnesium, potassium. I used to eat tons of aloe and really feel it's very healing for our stomach."

Nice…good to know that something which tastes SO sweet and yummy is also so good for me :)

Here’s a fun tool another friend recently showed me on Dr Mercola’s site – it is a rough guide ‘Life Span Test’ to see how long you’re likely to live, based on your lifestyle choices – it’s simple, but has some interesting ideas to share I feel…I came out with a predicted lifespan of 99 years…wow…another 71 years here, eh?…
Try it out for yourself here…:

http://www.mylonglife.com/lifespan.htm

Tonight we wrote our goal lists for this new year. 2007 is going to be an incredible year for massive shifts in consciousness concerning health and as it is also full moon tonight, it seemed like an ideal time to harness some energy flow down onto paper and set out my intentions for this year…it was a good experience. The full moon is in Cancer, resonating caring, compassion, love, emotional connectedness and nurturing…yummy…if you have not yet got your goals for this year clear for yourself, I suggest you get them set out on paper today…it does not need to take you long...just make it clear to the universe what you intend and then let go of it – make your ‘order’ with the waiter and then let go and see what comes back – don’t chase him into the kitchen afterwards, making suggestions and demands…;) try to just relax and let it flow, once you’ve been clear…

All love to you all,
Angela. xxx

New Year's Raw-solutions...

Well, here we are then, 2007…HAPPY NEW YEAR to you… :) I hope your celebrations were joyous and fulfilling…
I had a wonderful day yesterday, seeing out the old year – all very unexpected, enjoying the spontaneous flow of connecting with another raw being here in Costa Rica and venturing out of the city to explore…I got to sample raw sugar cane straight from the ground, met some bizarre freaky mutant-alien-looking clustered bugs (see picture), learned how to make DELICIOUS watermelon and pineapple juice with no equipment other than a knife, colander (strainer) and jug, walked in cloudforest, met some very entertaining lovely older Costa Rican women in the mountains and danced the new year in under the light of the moon at a water park which had been transformed into a big party space for the night…FUN :)

So…here’s what I consumed yesterday, Dec 31st, amidst the festivities…

½ litre (1 pint) water with lime juice
½ litre (1 pint) orange juice with hemp oil
1.5 litres (1 quart and 1 pint) apple/celery/greens juice
samples of: noni juice, cane juice, chlorella
juice of two young coconuts
2 tbsps pollen
1 litre (1 quart) watermelon/pineapple juice
1 tbsp hemp oil
1.6 litres (1 quart and 2.5 cups) pineapple/greens/aloe

Which be around 6 litres o’liquids or…about 1.6 gallons…

The orange juice with hemp oil seemed a bit random, but my body was really asking for it, so I tried it and it was actually very nice…my sense for it was that my body is not as interested in hemp oil now as it was before and now is looking for ways to still bring in those EFAs without it feeling heavy…’cutting’ the fat with the citrus therefore seemed to work out well…the chlorella in the afternoon came in as a bit of a ‘lifesaver’ in terms of my blood sugar…I was really enjoying sucking cane juice straight from the sugarcane, then after a while realised I was a bit spun out from all the sugar. My friend gave me a dash of noni juice and some chlorella tablets and amazingly my blood sugars seemed to balance out almost instantly. It was such a great tip for me to pick up…
I also discovered that my resting heartbeat at the moment is around 60bpm (or actually probably less), which is apparently very good…nice to know…

So, moving on to today – Jan 1st…the start of WEEK 6 of juice feasting for me…and ohhhhhhhhh-so-many new year’s weight loss/getting fit/going healthy resolutions the world over…best of luck, peoples ;)
This is what was on the menu for me today:

1 litre (1 quart) water with lime
400ml (1.5 cups) coconut water with green powder
1.8 litres (1 quart and 3.5 cups) pear/turmeric/aloe/greens (YUM)
½ tbsp chlorella
250ml (1 cup) water
1tbsp pollen
1.6 litres (1 quart+2.5 cups) celery/apple/beetroot/spinach/parsley juice
500ml (1 pint) water

making…about 5.6 litres or 1.48 gallons of liquids today…

I woke verrrrrrrrrrrry late today – around midday…was talking past 3am last night, so my body was not ready to get up until late… hmmm…
The pear and greens juice in the middle of my consuming day was SOOOOOO good – a little spicy from the turmeric (good for the blood), sweet from the pears and greeeeeeeen too, it was one of the tastiest juices I’ve made so far…afterwards though, my body went into this odd state that happens sometimes, where it feels as if there is wind coming in through my ears…lol…I am aware that probably sounds peculiar…but that is the sensation and I have not yet nailed down the cause…it seems blood sugar related to me, so after the sweetness of the pears I tried the new chlorella trick and it worked again – ears were gale-free within a short time…if anyone has any ideas about this strange phenomenon, I’d love to hear them…
I’m also LOVING putting fresh aloe in my juices at the moment…I buy whole aloe leaves at the market, slice off a chunk, fillet the flesh out of it, which goes in the blender and then the remainder of the gooey magic left on the aloe skin gets rubbed into MY skin – wherever I feel needs the most healing attention that day…it’s kind of sticky, but my skin really appreciates it and it helps heal wounds FAST :)
One reader wrote and asked me today why I’m doing this juice feast…she ‘came in late’ as she put it and wasn’t quite with the plot…I replied with my reasons why and decided to share it here again too, as it’s a new year after all and a new month in the blogging archives and good to refresh the memory...so, for all you newcomers, especially, here’s what I wrote…

My main reason for doing this is that I felt like I'd reached a kind of 'plateau' with my detoxing from a 100% raw lifestyle. I still had and have old toxins and strange fat deposits and so on in my system to clear, that just weren't moving on out with a raw lifestyle alone...I was feeling like I wanted to take it to the next level. Then David Rain started to speak to me about 92 day juice feasts...I thought he was a few sandwiches short of a picnic at first, but listened and it started to make sense to me - that cleansing so long with such a HUGE and pure amount of nutrition going into the body would clear out all the old cobwebs and clutter once and for all - any parasites lurking in there, any fungal issues, old toxins, liver complaints etc etc...so...here I am...43 days in right now and loving it :)

Yep…here I am indeed…grace and gratitude to all of you who have shared this journey so far and may this new year see you unfold limitless health potential of your own…

One love,
Angela. xxx