Raw Foods, Juicing and Greens.......

I moved to London in May this year with my partner, Trevor and my 16 year old daughter, Saatchi (she is studying at a boarding school in Lille, France) - after spending almost two years living in Auroville, an international town next to Pondicherry in the south of India. That was an incredible, enriching experience but more on that later..........

Moving to London after 14 years in Paris and two years in Auroville was a huge change and triggered a positive response. Sometime in June, I gave up all diary, wheat, processed foods and refined sugar. I've never eaten red meat, but I continued eating fish occasionally. I started drinking a lot more alkaline water and eating more green vegetables and salads. I dislike all hot liquids, never been a coffee or tea drinker, so didn't have to struggle with that.
In September I spent two days a week in Paris, doing some Leadership coaching and training for a company, also individual coaching for some of my old clients. Three weeks of this and I fell very ill. Like I said in my previous post, all my aches, pains and health issues ganged up together and my world as I knew it fell apart. It was time to let the old world fade away and to make space for something new.......and the new flowed in as a perfect gift from the Universe.....I came across the whole Raw food movement and learned about Living foods......

It felt so right to me, made total sense.....it was like a breath of fresh air, a wide wide grin and a blooming excitement, all rolled into One.....my body shouted a resounding "YES".......

ah the Internet....what a boon!
I first came across Dhrumil's site We Like it Raw and that led me to other raw food websites. This young wise man is utterly inspiring and has the capacity to pull you along into his world and share precious pearls along the way.....he simply rocks.
And David Rainoshek has put together an absolutely wonderful site on Juice Feasting. It offers plenty of information and resources. I learned about juicing as well as a load of other very valuable things and I'm so grateful because that has changed my life......and membership gives further access to a treasure trove of articles, videos etc.
There are so many other raw food and health blogs/sites that have been helpful to me and I've included some of them in my list of favourite sites.

I started transitioning into Living Foods a couple of months ago and it has been an incredible time. I bought a Vitamix and two weeks after that, a dehydrator. I began by making Green Smoothies for breakfast, delicious and filling. During the day, I usually ate a salad along with dehydrated crackers, sometimes a raw burger or nori rolls filled with avocado, sprouts and other veggies. Fats like flax seed oil and hemp oil became a part of my life. For dinner, I ate a very light cooked vegan meal, usually some quinoa, brown rice or buckwheat groats with steamed broccoli or vegetable curry. I had some detox symptoms but after a few days they calmed down. I began dry skin brushing and doing hot/cold shower treatments and my skin glowed and circulation improved. I was eating raw deserts a couple of times a week made with a combination of nuts, fruits, agave, sometimes raw chocolate and still had intense cravings for sweet foods.....

A month ago, I started juicing and that changed everything for me.....after only ten days of drinking green juices in the morning, my body started craving greens, more and more greens. Nutrient dense, fresh, clean foods. In the beginning I used to dislike the green powders I added to my juices as well as to my water, then I began to love them.....I found myself one morning making a paste with two scoops of green powder and using my fingers to lick it all up......wierd or what!!!! My body started rejecting sweets, those yearnings began to fade away.....no more fruits, no more raw deserts, no more chocolate.
I made smoothies without fruits, using avocado as a base or then nut milk - adding superfoods like maca, green powders - tahini and coconut, and using a pinch of green stevia as a mild sweetener......

One of the things that has helped me enormously has been colonics. More on that in my next post.......I'm going to write about detox too, because things are really beginning to stir up.....
And I'm going to write about what "Integral Dynamic" means to me as well as about the purpose of this blog..........also I'm new to blogging and excited about learning to do it in a way that suits me - I'll post pictures, video links etc little by little........