THE "PURE RAW JOY" OF ARNOLDS WAY GALS!!!

Hello, Lovlies,

I experienced so much 'pure raw joy' today....the only problem was...none of it was coming from me!!! More about THAT unfortunate-ness later. But, first, to the beautiful parts of today.

THE PURE RAW JOY OF TALIA PALANT
Today at work, we were gifted with the presence of the beautiful and lovely Talia Palant, our former coworker, and forever friend. Talia is a raw foodist, animal advocate, potluck leader and psychologist. She is a giving, caring, kind, sweet person and an old fashioned beauty. Alabaster skin, auburn curls. She looks like a model right out of a Renoir painting, but her inside is as lovely as her outside!!!! Sweet, Kind, Funny, Thoughtful.

Talia brought fresh organic homegrown tomatoes and Kohlrabit as a gift today. (Along with photos from her potluck. I wish i had them digitally to show you, but they are prints...) Have you ever tried Kohlrabi? it's like a very mild HUGE radish, kind of like pineapple in texture and sort of reminds me of a cross between an apple and a cauliflower. I believe it is in the cruciferous family. I sampled them for the first time at Talia's potluck and was hooked. What a yummy veg!!! You can shred it. You can chop it in chunks. Today at work, I was just happily snacking on it. Thank you, Talia!

Talia also arrived with news of her 10 day cantaloupe fast that she just completed. WOW! She said she actually began to CRAVE the cantaloupe!!! When she stopped her fast and ate a pickle, she woke up the next morning with her eyes all puffy and swelled up. Pretty amazing when we cleanse the body and then introduce something into that it doesn't particularly like, it lets us know!

Talia is such a sweety, she brought US a huge cantaloupe and proceeded to put the entire fruit, seeds and all, except for the skin, into the Vitamix, and blended it up into a creamy, frappy, thick, sweet soup to demonstrate how she's been ingesting her cantaloupe during the 10 day fast. What a TREAT! I could NOT believe how yummy this was and how the seeds imparted such a creaminess. I LOVED this!

Talia, you are such a dearheart. BIG hugs and kisses to you for sharing your personal triumph with us and introducing us to some new favorite foods...cantaloupe soup and kohlrabi! We both agreed the soup would be AWESOME with a little mint or cilantro, maybe some lime... But, honestly, just as it was, it was delicious.

P.S. Do all of you know that melons are suppossed to be eaten for cleansing and ideally, we are to eat our melons alone? Meaning not with any other fruit. Melons take probably LESS than 15 minutes to digest. They are so full of liquid, they just practically disintigrate in the mouth and are predigested by the time they hit the belly. Ingesting them in this way, blenderized, probably speeds up the process even more!

God, that soup was good. I bet watermelon would be good like this, blenderized with the seeds.

As I mentioned, Talia is also an animal advocate. She does pet-sitting and teaches people to feed their pets raw meat and bones. To see Talia's video about feeding animals raw foods, check out her youtube with arnold: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUVvauMh-b4

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THE PURE RAW JOY OF ARMENA
We were also blessed by Armena's visit to Arnolds Way today. Armena is a long term raw foodist who is an 80-10-10 believer. For the past two years, Armena has been following 80-10-10 very strictly!

Armena is so passionate about sharing her love of 80-10-10 with raw foodists (and those still on cooked foods) who are still struggling with less than perfect digestion, she wrote two songs to help educate and remind us of the rules to follow for perfect digestion.

After singing for us today, Armena said, "I like to FEEL perfect. I don't like my tummy to feel upset."

By eating very little fat, all fruit and greens, Armena is able to be energized all day and never have an upset stomach, gas, belching. She feels good always.

The other evening, she accompanied her sister out to dinner and ordered a salad and guacamole. A less than perfect choice for 80-10-10. Her reaction to the high fat meal reinforced her beliefs in 80-10-10. As soon as she got home from the early dinner, she needed a nap. The excess fat zapped her of energy. She had sung the songs for us yesterday, but came again to Arnolds Way today so we could tape her. "i realized how badly eating too much fat made me feel, so i knew i wanted to come again today to sing the songs again."

I can relate to feeling drained after ingesting too much fat. HELLO!!! Zzzzzzzzz.....Zzzzzzzzz....

I really enjoyed Armena's songs and would love to share them with you now. These videos were not shot at arnolds way, but soon her renditions of these same songs filmed at arnolds way today will be on youtube.

ARMENA SINGS ABOUT FRUIT
"Bananas with Banana" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K62J5ckt4-4

LYRICS:

BaNAna With baNA na And a GRAPE With a GRAPE, NUT or Seed with
GREENS (not Sweets) we diGEST As an APE, boNObos', Chimps', and HUmans'
Plumbing's SAME In the PIPES, sweet FRUIT with Greens (not FATS) digest WELL for PRImates of our TYPE.

Refrain: DiGEStion, SepaRATE sweet Fruit from FRUITS of Fat or ACid
and your TUMmy Will NOT Have a FIGHT diGEStion, SepaRATE sweet Fruit from NUT or Seed or avoCAdo and your BELy Will FEEL All RIGHT

AVoCado, DURiAn or NUT Or SEED, these FATty Fruits diGEST with
Greens, only a LITtle FATdo we NEED, ONE Time per DAY at Most, of ON-Ly one
KIND, these FATty Foodsdigest WELL with Greens (butnotwith SWEETfood of Any KIND).

Refrain

paPAYa, Peach, perSIMMons, Pear will GIVE our NATural FUEL. such WHOLE fresh RIPE raw JUICy Fruits, and baNANas Are the RULE, EAT eNOUGH CALories of Fruit, and HAPpiNess will BLOOM inyourBODy And your MIND
and Mood, you'll FIND you Want to ZOOM.

Refrain

"Peace in the Pipes" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nbyep4TU5_U

LYRICS:

Peace In the Pipes gives Hea-lth of all Types,
clear Stomach, flat stomAch, thank mono-Meals of Fruit. (repeat whole section).

Bright Eyes, bounce-in-Step, It's ElementaRy,

eat-less Fat, exercise-More, eat-more Fruit, eat fruit More
and Leaves and tender Shoots, it's eleMentary.

sweetFruits, and-veggieFruits, and Greens 'n sweet young Shoots,
whole-fresh Fruit mono-Meals, Our Fou-ntain of Youth,
it's Elementary, it's "elfeMemfary"!
it's :Elfemenfary"...

it's "elf" (eat less fat),
"em" (exercise more)
"emf (eat more fruit),

its Elfemenfary, its elf em emf ar Ry!

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THE PURE RAW JOY OF MEGAN 'MEGABYTES'
Earlier in the day before Armena arrived, my darling friend and coworker, Megan arrived for a visit to Arnolds Way, as well. I tell you, we do have such a lovely little 'family' there. I feel blessed to be so supported by such lovely ladies and friends.

Anyway, "Megabytes," as we nicknamed her, is also 80-10-10ing. Today for lunch, she fixed a big bowl of cut up tomato and cucumber. She said her mouth was watering!

She is very inspiring. Megabytes showed me a picture of herself taken many years ago. You've the adorable and sexy pics of her dancing at Brad's Raw Chip party. Well, you would NOT recognize her at ALL in these photos taken years ago. She must have been well over 50 or 80 lbs heavier than she is now. To look at Megan today, all you see is a beautiful, waif-like Audrey Hepburn-esque adorable girl. How she looked in these old photos, bloated, dark circles under her eyes. I am still awed thinking about it. I'll have to interview Megan for an upcoming blog entry so we can hear all about her diet. I know briefly that she tried to do a fruit free diet for many many months to rid herself of candida only to give up in frustration. When she listened to Arnold that fruit was not CAUSING candida, but could actually CURE it, her candida dissappeared. He taught her that FAT was the problem. Not fruit. Now she eats very little fat and her candida is bye bye.

Megabytes also said something today that impacted me very very strongly. I was sitting with her and Arnold and talking about how much stress i've been under and my recent weight gain and how upset i am about it but how my eating is not getting back in control. I recounted to them how eating used to be for me when i first started at arnolds way. I picked literally ALL DAY on high fat living bread and spreads and avo and nuts, etc... Well, i have returned to that non-stop craziness. I asked if they thought it was the STRESS...or the FOOD.

Megan had something interesting to say.

"I cope with stress SO MUCH BETTER on 80-10-10. When i go off and eat high fat, all of a sudden, i'm stressed and everything stresses me."

OTHER COMMENTS
Earlier in the kitchen, Talia, who is also on 80-10-10 and just came off of her cantaloupe diet, was picking on raw bread. "THIS is my downfall. Salty raw bread. It's the herbs and spices in it. According to Doug Graham, they're excitotoxins. They excite the mouth and make you want more and more. You see? I started to eat this and now i want to keep eating more!"

I remarked, "I thought it was just ME. Like there was something wrong with ME. It's that way for you, too, with raw bread?" She confirmed that eating exciting food makes us crave it. I had to agree that is the pattern with me. Only i am such an addictive personality, i don't just take a bite of raw bread, i eat the whole box, or a few boxes!!!

My wish for many weeks has been to morph myself into a controlled happy sensual gourmet eater who enjoys her food, but never loses control. I've only had glimpses of success, short term success. I have to be honest and say that the most success i've had binge free on raw has been on 80-10-10. It's just the facts. I'm not good at controlling excitotoxins. I get excited by them!!!

My lovely catering partner, Susan Aman, mentioned the other day when we were out shopping for the Beckwith event, that raw bread is a trigger for her, as well. And other foods, like regular cheese, she finds difficult to control. She remarked, "I just don't even START eating it anymore because i can't stop. I don't take it in the house."

This used to be my philosophy until i decided i was smart enough to beat this myself using a book not even geared toward raw foodists. I haven't been working the "Overcoming Binge EAting" book by Dr. Fairburn as he outlines, plus...i'm just becoming more and more convinced that if i change the type of food i eat again, suddenly, all of the stress...will just leave. It's the FOOD causing the stress. Not the stress causing the food, as Megan suggested today.

My out of control eating got even worse today. And i didn't get on the scale, but i am pretty sure i've gained 15 lbs at least back.

One good thing is i had a wonderful singing practice at work tonight while doing the dishes alone after hours.

Perhaps until the craziness dies down and i can work again on 'legalizing' gourmet and improving my eating habits, i will go back on 80-10-10.

I have also noticed, and so has Arnold, that i am not as productive a worker as i was on 80-10-10. I had soooo much more energy then. Now, i'm tired always. Dragging.

I didn't take any Betaine today to see what would happen. I've been on and off hoarse and i wonder if somehow the large doses of Betaine i've been taking have been contributing.

xoxoxo michelle joy