Monday, May 3, 2010

90 GREEN SMOOTHIE FEAST - DAY 3!


Hello there!

Still happy here! Yip, yip, yippee!

[What a wonderful turn of events from my depressing blog posts the past few months!]

I had a wonderful day! Most of the day was spent on catering planning with Susan. What a huge job! We have two big jobs...one for 200 explained more below, and the following week, one for 50 people in Swarthmore. We run a little business called, "Mostly Raw Catering," where we do fabulous gourmet raw faire with some cooked vegan bean dishes, should the party request them.

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Food wise, I did GREAT! I had lotsa fruit! It felt good and natural! In fact, it felt like OLD TIMES.

I had for breakfast several oranges. Was running late and no time to make a smoothie, so i brought smoothie ingredients to Susan's house, so I could make some later. [PROACTIVE PLANNING, see that?]

For brunch, I had fruit salad out with my "Mostly Raw" catering partner, Susan Aman, and Bruce Baber. Bruce is one of the hosts of the "YOU ARE THE GIFT" mostly raw dinner and celebration on 5/22/10, which we are catering...

YOU ARE THE GIFT CELEBRATION 5/22/10 - You're invited!
...And which YOU are invited to! We have seats left, so email me to RSVP right away if you are local and would like to come! The party takes place in Chestnut Hill (Phila, PA) and is FREE to the raw/vegan/earth consciouse community. The party is in celebration of our community and of sustainable living.

For lunch, i had a wonderful raw gaspacho. Fabulous, but i was hungry like a half hour later.

For snack, while visiting Arnold's Way I had a banana-durian-cacao whip. This was BEYOND BEYOND!!!

For mid-day snack, later, I finally had plenty of Green Smoothie, several glasses. I vitamixed 4 gorgeously ripe organic pears, 2 organic bananas, 1/2 giant tub of organic spinach, filtered water and icecubes. YUM!

For dinner, I had several more glasses of green smoothie followed by a salad that Susan made. Delish!

There were a couple of little snacks in between of fruit. I recall an apple at some point when i felt hungry, and there was a snack of frozen banana while driving in the car after brunch when I was still hungry. I ate frequently. I'm still a hungry mama with a big appetite!

My plan is to be low fat (one fat source a day, such as 1/2 durian pod, or 1/4 avo, or 10 nuts), lots of green smoothies, simple fruit and veggies in between, no oil, salt. I accomplished that for the most part with the exception of the salad Susan made that had some Udo's oil on it and a small amount of avo, and the salted gaspacho I purchased out.

But, i was really OK with my day, and quite PROUD of myself, actually. You control what you can control. You do the BEST you can.

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I dressed colorfully, felt skinny, and looked cute :-) Feelings of pride. Feelings of self-worth. JUST BY CHANGING MY DIET.

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SUPPORT IS KEY!
I'm calling Arnold 2x/day. How fabulous is that?

And I had a fantastic visit to Arnold's Way, where Arnold, Josh (another employee who leads raw empowering transformational workshops: http://www.radbod.org/), and I filmed a video to commemorate my new start.

Little did I know, I am actually STARRING in the 90 Day Green Smoothie Revolution taking place at Arnold's Way, in all of Lansdale and Montgomery County and Philadelphia and in New York and all OVER the world! Arnold wants to turn EVERYONE on to green smoothies!

Won't you JOIN me???

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VIDEO VIXEN!
Be sure to look for the video we shot today at Arnold's Way soon here at 'pure raw joy.' You'll also soon be enjoying weekly video'd updates of my progress.

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WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES!
Only 3 days ago i was car binging and filled with shame...and today, life is SO different. I can't believe how a life can turn around in such a short time. I feel so GOOD about ME.

I suppose I hit a "bottom," and to my credit, didn't allow my misery to go any further. I could have. But, i guess i'm learning that i actually DESERVE BETTER. :-))))

I'm SO entirely, peacefully, gratefully, blissfully glad to be back on the raw track...for the next 90 days!

Giving myself a number (90 days) soothes that insane part of my brain that wants to eat cooked food. I keep telling myself I can have it after my 90 days are up. I bet i won't even WANT it then! Because NOTHING TASTES as GOOD as THIS feels!

I told Susan today as i was luxuriating in my fabulous green smoothie, that if someone put a plate of fried onion rings in front of me right now, i wouldn't want them. Something's changed. A light switch has switched.

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OPERATING OUT OF OUR HIGHER OR LOWER NATURE
As humans, we have two choices in how to live. The only way I can explain it is with Christian terminology, even though i'm Jewish.

We have the sin self, the old man, the lower, animal, base nature. We are reactive, we are emotionally driven, we are disconnected from our power, we feel hopeless, our destrucitve behaviors are out of control.

And we have our higher self, the born again man, the new man, the part of us spiritually connected to a higher power, who through the power of God, can accomplish anything. Suddenly, we can be PROACTIVE and take CHARGE of our lives!

When i'm doing bad, i'm caught up in a vicous downward spiral of reaction upon reaction upon reaction. Eat bad because i feel bad so i eat bad because i feel bad so i eat bad because i feel bad. I'm definitely not connected to any higher power then. I'm connected to a lower power.

I think sometimes we have to hit bottom to realize how much power we really DO have. When we're out of control, we don't realize it's there. When we don't know where else to turn, all of a sudden, we make a decision, it kicks in, and we're miraculously SUPER CHARGED and doing what we never THOUGHT we could do. I've done my fair share of praying over the past few weeks when i was in despair and feeling there was no end in sight to my out of control binge eating. That I am now back on track means that potential was there...ALL OF THE TIME...I just didn't realize it. Or tap into it.

If you're struggling, I invite you to join me in the GREEN SMOOTHIE REVOLUTION! I know I can't do it alone, that's for sure.

We can ALL be in 'pure raw joy,' baby!

EMPOWERMENT VS. COMPULSION
Think about this. Making green smoothies and committing to a program, FEELING empowered, proud, happy when you look in the mirror, happy when you see yourself looking healthier, feeling SUCCESSFUL and better physically...vs. An Eggplant parmesan enough for a family of 4 sneak-eaten in the car, along with 4 garlic sticks, raviolis, tiramisu, a bag of chips and two yoohoos - resulting in painfully swollen ankles, feet, and legs - and followed by feelings of utter despair, hopelessness and shame...

WHICH WOULD YOU CHOOSE???

WHICH ONE REALLY MAKES YOU 'FEEL' GOOD?

One makes you feel good temporarily. VERY temporarily. In a sick sort of way that ultimately makes you sick, and everyone around you worry about you. The other way involves you reigning yourself in a bit, but makes you feel good LONG after you're done drinking it! And the good feelings compound and compound! You not only feel happy, you make everyone around you feel happy!


SELF DENIAL
My mother recently said to me, "I ate two cookies and realized I'm not going to deny myself anymore."

Well, self denial is a funny thing. She's actually doing really great following the program (green smoothies, salads, vegan dinners), but allows herself a little treat now and again. She can handle that.

But, sometimes, there are people like me, that spin so out of control, things get SO BAD and there is huge weight gain and hopelessness and depression....that SELF DENIAL is EXACTLY what they NEED.

In denying myself, i feel RENEWED, RESTORED, REVITALIZED, REENERGIZED, REIGNITED.

At the wedding I just attended, everyone ate kugel and bagels and cake. I drank green smoothie. ZERO feelings of self-denial. Because i finally KNEW like I knew my own name what i needed to do for ME. I chose a 90 day cleanse, a green smoothie feast, and i was sticking to the program.

It was actually a RELIEF to NOT have to deal with that food. Because i'd only want MORE.

Drinking my green goo somewhere semi-private, I only experienced feelings of JOY. Pure RAW joy! Food had become tranformed to NOURISHMENT and HEALING instead of carnal LUSTFUL gluttony.

Having an eating disorder, I DECIDED to just take a break from it, take a break from what the supposed experts say will cure it, and just, well, take a break. It may very well turn out that the BREAK....is actually...the CURE.

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Most people out there are not as bad as me, but...

Which do YOU chose? Make a committment to yourself...today!

xoxo michelle joy

1 comment:

Pat said...

Great post, I was worried about you. I'm glad you have such a great place to work to get so much support. I'm 100 percent with you in spirit and 85% with you in food.
I'm doing smoothies all day most day (sometimes I bring a salad as a back up plan for extreme hunger)
Dinner is raw except for Friday nights when I meet friends at All Live Cafe, I might get the quinoa which is cooked.

My goal to rely on smoothies to limit my salt and fat intake. I am also picking a fat of the day instead grazing on nuts, and carob balls, salad dressing...

So I will cheer you on and be drinking my smoothies most of the time as well.

Much success
Pat