Feeling Raw Emotions

Ok finally I've got some time to myself to sit down, tea pot next to me, window wide open, my favourite vanilla caramel candle is lit and filling my sun room with a delicious smell that makes me close my eyes and just breathe...

I've had so many things on the past month (at least) that I've barely had proper time to really sit and put what I've wanted to into this little blog of mine. So to have all afternoon to do so today is my little piece of HEAVEN. And I couldn't be happier (bopping along to some John Butler always helps too).

I wanted to write about something that was mentioned to me last Saturday night. I was out for Earth Hour at a house party full of beautiful, loving, generous people I had never met before. There was only person I knew of that would be there - and it was she that mentioned my blog and how much she loved it. It was a beautiful comment she made that touched me. But what really got my thoughts in motion was when she said what she loved most was how I explained and wrote about the emotional roller coaster that you're thrown onto when you decide to start eating a raw food diet. She hadn't really read about this anywhere else and that's what she wanted and needed most.

But I couldn't remember the last time I wrote about that! Even though that's what I love to write about!

I started this blog when I started my raw journey. And I wrote alot more about it all back then, and recently it's been totally different. Sure it's great to throw in a recipe here and there (and who doesn't love to see a mouth watering piccie of chocolate cake that's totally free of all crap so you can digest it easily and your body just screams "yes please") but there is already plenty of that online (don't fear - I will still be doing loads with food). But as much as I LOVE my kitchen fun, to be honest, I'm so infrequently creative in there these days. All I'm doing is making salads. Do I want to be writing about salads every week (well... I'm sure I could coz I have a strange love affair with my salads but it could make for some boring reading, and end up being boring writing for me also)?

So where did I stray? Possibly trying to "fit in" with all the other blogs out there? Sure everyone wants to "fit in" and I know I've sure as hell had my fair share of those feelings... but with where I am right now, I don't really give a rats ass about that anymore. I'm now more than ever wanting to truly, totally, lovingly, beautifully BE ME! 100%. I'm not afraid of not fitting in because I've come to realise that people do infact love me as the real me. Wow. That's even huge for me to write.

I'm crazy! Emotional. Woman. Overly excited at times. A tendency for verbal diarrhoea (especially first thing in the morning). A bit of a dag (quite alot at times). Always that last one to get a joke... they're all me. Big parts of me, and ones I always tried to hide.

But I've come to a place like I said, where I no longer feel a need to hide parts of me. The past few months have been both the worst and the best of my life, and I've learnt more about myself in this time than ever before. It's been like "Soul Boot Camp" hardcore. Not for the faint hearted. You get out what you put in though. And I've been through one hell of an emotional roller coaster.

What does it all have to do with raw foods though? Um, can I say everything? Or at the very least, a hell of alot more than most people would realise.

I still get asked "why do you only eat raw foods?" which takes me back to my reasons. It's like a reminder for myself. A reminder that I choose to eat only raw foods first and foremost for the emotional and spiritual aspects. Only later did I find out and read about all the physical and nutritional benefits.

I got this in my inbox today actually - its from Jinjee who also writes her own blog you can check out here -

"Some people think it is dogmatic to adhere to a 100% raw vegan diet. For a healthy person who has a great relationship with food and their body, a 70% - 80% raw vegan diet may be just fine. This is also called a high raw diet. However, for a person like me with food addictions, and for compulsive over-eaters, and for people with other eating disorders, the 100% raw vegan diet can be a life-saver. In some cases, having a program such as the 100% raw diet prevents people like us from destroying ourselves with food. Also in the case of people with serious physical conditions, especially digestive and food related conditions, the 100% raw vegan diet can be not just appropriate but essential for life."

For me, I was ready and willing. I wanted to reach higher vibrations spiritually. I wanted to literally throw myself in the deep end. I had read about how a raw diet can bring up buried emotions of fear, sorrow, jealousy, inferiority and more, all to be dealt with. These all require healing and to do so requires awareness, direct attention and some truthful expression. But why on earth would you want to throw yourself in the deep end of all that? It all sounds ridiculously painful, hard, turbulent, upsetting, difficult... (I could go on)... and at times it is. But with great pain comes great reward (if you want to look at it as pain). A raw diet is hard. I know. I live it! But for me the rewards far FAR surpass any pain. It's the path I have chosen. And I love it.

I think that the number one reason someone would have trouble in sticking to a raw diet would hands down be the simple fact that they either cannot or will not deal with their emotional and psychological shit that is literally shoved in their face to look at. With good reason - it's hard to look at it! It's painful. It hurts. I know. Really I know. But I want more. I long for more. I know there's more I'm just yet to find it. And when people ask me why I'm raw that single question reminds me; and it almost instantly makes anything troubling seem not so bad. Because I'm reminded that I've chosen the harder path. It was my choice! I remember why I chose it. I can bail whenever I want too...

But here's the catch -

once you begin this path, it's very very hard to turn back. You know you can't just throw a blanket over your eyes and try to forget things. You've seen more. Felt more. Experienced more. Know what it's like. And regardless of how hard things can get at times, when things are good, they are so far beyond the good you once knew that nothing compares. And that is exactly where I am right now.

It's not the first time I've been here, but having had a roller coaster 2011 so far, to be here again... I feel AMAZING! Unbelievable! Alive! I feel the subtleties again - the shivers down my spine. I see the beauty all around me. The twinkle of sunlight on the cobweb outside my window. I sense the love all around me; emanating both to and from me in what I can only describe as connection, and it is between so many it's pure magic. The rush to DO is disappering and the pull to BE is stronger. I sit. I listen. I ponder. And wish. My body vibrates with increased spiritual energy. I know I'm higher. I've pushed myself to consider a more spiritual element to life, dropping the social mainstream, travelling my own path. And physically - I've always had more energy eating raw.

My transition from a meat eater, to a vego eating dairy and fish, to no dairy, then later no fish, to a vegan, and now a raw vegan has taken me up and down over the past 13years. But I can stand tall and say without a doubt that I have never felt any better in my life than the way I feel right now.

Eating a raw vegan diet.