Ever the 1980s, my focus has been on personal growth, spirituality and lately a more grounded and centred transformational path. If you've got an inner yearning for conscious inner transformation and are looking for a bit of company, a different point of view or even validation, then this blog might be for you! Over the coming months, I intend to provide helpful insights and reviews of transformation techniques, drawing on my own experiences and inviting others who's wisdom I value. All that, and a little humour along the way!
Just a quick note to record my weight loss so far. Since I’ve been following Dr Fuhrman’s eating advice, I’ve lost – or should I say released – 3.2Kg (7.1lb) since 6 January.
I’m pleased with that, as I’m really focused more on health and vitality, but a part of that will definitely be assisted by weight loss.
Eating in this way, and regularly exercising (walking the dog at a fast pace, karate and swimming) are all undoubtedly helping this to happen fairly effortlessly and gradually.
I’m certainly enjoying the variety of recipes found in Dr Fuhrman’s Eat for Health book. Here are a few more reviews after trying them myself and offering them to my ‘boys’ (husband and son).
As I’ve mentioned in another post, while I am very happy following a predominantly veggie and fruit based diet (having spent seven years as a vegetarian at one point in my life), my husband is a confirmed meat lover. Actually, he apparently tried to become a vegetarian before we got together, but said he ended up feeling very weak and needing meat. Its quite possible that he didn’t source enough protein during that time, but it may also be that his body needs animal proteins as per the Eat for your Blood Type way of thinking. We don’t know what blood type my husband is, but with his predilection to meats for instance, he may well be Blood type O. Anyway, the important thing is that I honour his personal eating needs and don’t try and convert him to my way of eating. If it happens fine, if not, I have found that giving him meat as his staple (only a smaller cut than before) and then whatever I have as my mains – he has as his vegetables, then he’s getting a good balanced diet.
My son who’s only eleven as I write this has a typical child’s sweet tooth and aversion to anything green or fibrous (unless its the small green round variety i.e. peas) LOL. He does however know that veggies are good for his body and eats what I give him. I don’t overwhelm him with a massive portion, but am encouraging him to eat them and reminding him that his taste buds will eventually become used to the flavours and he may actually enjoy them one day! Despite his look of skepticism, he eats them. He’s much better with the fruits and loves the desserts an a lot of the smoothies.
I made the first version as per the recipe but I’m not a blueberry lover myself so the next time I substituted frozen strawberries. This presented two problems, 1. the strawberries were really hard and took an age to process (next time I process frozen fruit bigger than raspberries, I’ll par-defrost them first). And 2. they actually didn’t complement the flavour of the recipe as well as the blueberries (surprisingly to me)!
Next time I will try raspberries, but if they aren’t that tasty in the recipe, I’ll go back to the original one with the blueberries. After all, like I said to my son, my taste buds will readjust!
Despite this containing chocolate, my son really didn’t like the taste. He’s definitely better with the simple fruit based, or milk/soy and fruit smoothies.
This recipe contains chilli, which my son hasn’t quite got the hang of yet. So I made the recipe up with a bit of sweet chilli sauce, dished out my son’s portion and then added Sambel Olek to the rest for my husband and me.
It was still a bit too spicy for my son (oh well), but my husband liked it and actually asked for leftovers the next day. I froze what was left, as it made up quite a large amount. I enjoyed it too and will definitely add that to the family dinner recipes, although I’ll cut back on the initial sweet chilli sauce even more for my son – but adding the chilli afterwards for hubbie and me.
I was also surprised that my husband didn’t ask for more salt as I didn’t add any to the cooking which is a part of the Eat for Health guidelines. However, for any occasions my husband does want more salty flavour, I’ve got that lovely pink Himalayan crystal salt that he can grind on just before he eats.
The thing I like about the Himalayan pink salt is that it contains heaps of trace minerals, which is an added bonus. We live in a sub tropical locality and for a large part of the year lose a lot of water and minerals through sweating. I know that the eating plan I’m following sources many micronutrients directly from the foods, but I personally don’t see a problem – and think it may be quite sensible – to have a sprinkle of the Himalayan salt every now and then, especially during our summer.
This is where it’s important to pay attention to one’s body, and become familiar with what it is telling us. We’re all individual and any ‘diet’ we follow needs to be ‘tweaked’ according to our body’s unique needs. That’s not an open door to sneak in high fat, stodgy, salty, processed, sugary foods by the way! I’m simply saying to become more aware of your body’s true needs for optimum health and trust your instincts about meeting those needs – obviously within ’safe’ and sensible guidelines.
This may be easier said than done, because during the first days/weeks/months of changing an eating plan from unhealthy to healthy, the body will likely exhibit withdrawal symptoms and may even crave things that you know are bad for you long-term. So if you are looking to eat in a more healthy way for the short and particularly long term, it will pay to listen to wise advice, such as Dr Fuhrman’s – and also become aware of your body’s healthful nutritional needs, while at the same time learning to be patient and kind to yourself as you go through the tranformation to excellent health.
I liked this but not as much as Fuhrman’s Anti Cancer Soup. I think next time I will add more lentils, as it lacked ‘body’ taste for me. To be fair to the recipe however, I did find it improved with keeping, and quite enjoyed it on the second day. I’ve frozen the rest in portions for a stand by. My son and husband haven’t tried it, as we’ve had some really hot weather and they’ve been favouring salad. But my son’s not really a soup or stew lover.
I took this to a bring-a-plate party and everyone loved it! I really like the blend of ingredients for the dressing and will definitely use this again with other salads.
I’m not a cinnamon lover and may try a different spice next time, such as cumin and maybe a squeeze of lemon juice. My son pukes at the sight of carrots, so I gave him a wide berth with this one and my husband just raised an eyebrow at the mix of fruit with vegetables. Crikey! Do you see what I’ve got to work with here! Its a good thing I don’t take it personally if my food preparation’s rejected lol.
I really like this one. My husband didn’t and said it was too bitter. I think that might be the high proportion of oregano, so next time I will use sweet marjoram with a dash of oregano instead. This vinaigrette keeps well in the fridge.
My son didn’t try it as he doesn’t like the acidic taste of vinegar, and favours mayonnaise. I usually get a proper egg mayo for him, this time I’m using an organic soy-based mayo, which he also likes.
This afternoon, I’m making the Turkey-Vegetable Meatloaf and the West African Lentil Okra Stew and will post my review next time.
It had to happen sooner or later. Since I’ve changed my eating habits to include mainly fruits and vegetables and cut out stodgy, starchy and fatty foods the inevitable happened today. Well, its been building for a few days, if I’m honest. Some of those emotions that I’ve avoided dealing with in the past and instead ’stuffed down’ by overeating comfort foods, has started to bubble up and make themselves known, in no uncertain terms!
That’s the thing with suppressed emotions; if you take the lid off, eventually they’re going to make their way to the surface and scream to be let out! And if you’re into Conscious Inner Transformation, you’ll welcome them. Well, maybe not welcome them exactly because if you’ve avoided them, you’re probably scared stiff of them, or in judgment of them in some way. So welcome may not be the right term – perhaps grudgingly acknowledge their presence as an ongoing aspect of your finding true inner freedom. If you look at them in that way, you can at least allow them to come up, knowing that you’re on the way to releasing more emotional baggage that you don’t want weighing you down.
When I say ‘release’, I really don’t mean you have to fly off the handle in rage, or literally pull your hair out with grief or whatever – although sometimes, if you’re feeling particularly overwhelmed, there’s nothing wrong with some time out to shed a few tears or stamp your feet, if that’s what you need to do.
Release in terms of consciously transforming is more a grace-ful letting go of what has been long held within and giving it up to one’s higher/greater/divine self, or whatever term you use to describe your higher conscious awareness. What is happening at this time (and forgive me if I’m telling you something you already know – this is for anyone who is new to this process) – is that what you have chosen to avoid in the past – an emotion that you may have judged as being ‘wrong’, or one that was simply too overwhelming to deal with – is that you are now feeling it returning after its release from your subconscious. ‘Sub’ – in that its below your consciousness, and at the time you experienced the emotion or judgment about yourself, the way to preserve your equilibrium was to nicely suppress it where you weren’t aware of it. Hence it ended up in your sub- (or un-) conscious.
As this section deals with eating – and experiencing transformation through changing your eating habits to healthful ones – then the most likely way these unwanted emotions were stuffed down were by the use of food. Some people overeat to do it, some eat ice cream (although I can’t see the draw in that one myself lol), other like myself as I said above, go for starchy, fatty foods. Whatever you may grab out of the kitchen in times of emotional crisis though isn’t really that important, its that when you decide to eat healthfully, you will find yourself facing whatever you chose to ignore the first time around.
The good news is that this time you know that rather than being in the actual situation you were in at the time, this is now an old emotion, an old memory, and in the past – although the emotions themselves will feel absolutely real as they come up. One thing that can also happen is that your subconscious does not know the difference between the past, present and imagined and you might think these emotions are as a result of what’s going on now – or project onto the present situation, making Out There the bad guy. If you do that, you will find yourself stuck in a loop and will keep coming back to this place again and again, a bit like Ground Hog Day.
I’ve found the best way to deal with strong emotions – and really, it doesn’t matter if they are old emotions being released or from something you’re experiencing in the present – is to simply let them go.
Easier said than done maybe, but a process that in itself is simple, and yet deeply healing and ultimately, profoundly liberating.
In the next post, I’ll describe the process.
Not everyone takes to transformation as quickly as others. Making the transition from eating unhealthy foods that are prevalent in today’s western world to a diet based on nutritional excellence is not always readily digested by everyone. It can be hard to change years of conditioning, even if one knows why one wants to change.
In his book Eat for Health, Dr Fuhrman addresses this by breaking the process of eating healthily into four stages, leading readers into a world of healthful food, which I think is a good idea.
As an ex-vegetarian returning to a much more highly nutritious way of eating than my recent years, I’ve jumped in at the last stage with both feet, which works for me. However, my boys (husband and son) are much more reluctant to give up what they know and love in exchange for what will give them more vitality in the long run. Fair enough.
I’ve decided that rather than cook two menus at every meal, I will basically eat as per Dr Fuhrman’s suggestions for the most part, while giving these as side dishes or the vegetable portion of a ‘normal’ meal to my boys. I’m hoping that with time, their taste buds will become accustomed to the more natural and nutrient-dense foods (with or without meat) and that this will be accompanied by a gradual choice on their own part to eat these by preference. One can live in hope, while at the same time surrendering to the process and dealing with each meal at a time!
Both boys (I’ll use this term in future as its quicker to type than “husband and son”) enjoy a fresh fruit platter with low fat Jalna berry yogurt in the middle as a ‘dipping sauce’. This has become a regular weekend breakfast (often replacing bacon sandwiches). Its a bit time consuming to cut up the fruit, so its not something I do during the week as I generally have to be at work around 7.30am, with the boys leaving for work/school by 8am.
My husband’s not really a smoothie person, but my son loves them. I’ve often made him a banana smoothie with full fat milk, yogurt and bananas. As this is now a fairly regular choice and he’s not that keen on soy milk, I’m buying low fat milk instead.
I’m also trying out various fruits in the smoothie base and apart from blueberries (which I’m learning to like as well because they’re so good for you), he enjoys these.
Favourites: Banana/mango/raspberry (anything with banana or mango really)
I tried the Chocolate Smoothie from Eat for Health and I’ll substitute some raspberries for some of the blueberries next time I make it.
I like this one, although I think I preferred the soup as it looked before I whizzed the greens and cashews into it. Next time I will whiz less and see how it looks.
We had this tonight. I cooked the boys lamb, rosemary and garlic gluten free sausages with basmati rice with the Soup on top of the rice. As per the recipe, I didn’t add extra salt or stock cubes and although both boys ate it, my husband said it was bland on bland, so next time I may add a bit of veggie stock.
I think his taste buds are just shot from over-stimulation with chilli and salt, and he will probably have a way to go before (if ever) he likes/loves the recipes as they are laid out in the book. But, so long as they’re eating their veggies, I’m happy. Even if we add extra seasoning to start with, we’re one step in the right direction – the direction being inner health and vitality.
As I’ve said before, making a sudden transition could tip them right over the edge and walk away back to the meat and starch diet, so I’m prepared to go at a pace that works for them, as long as we’re quietly moving towards a better diet.
Again, my husband’s not really a dessert person, so I’ve been quite happy to experiment with these myself and with my son!
Basically all the desserts we’ve chosen have been eaten with gusto, including Frozen Banana Fluff, Jenna’s Peach Freeze and Mixed Berry Freeze. Apart from the crunchy taste of the added LSA mix (in place of flax seeds) which my son wasn’t that keen on, we both love the blended frozen fruit and I can see this continuing. Yay!
This afternoon, I made a batch of Yummy Banana-Oat Bars. Instead of adding date sugar, I added just under a tablespoon of Xylitol (a natural sweetener), but the other ingredients were as per the recipe. I rather like them. My husband said they taste like they’d be healthy for you! But he still ate the bar. My son thought it was a bit boring. He’s more used to homemade muesli bars with a high fat and sugar content, so it will take a bit of getting used to. I melted some cooking chocolate and spread that on top of the squares and gave him one, which he ate readily and said he’d be happy to have one in his school lunch box.
That’s the lot so far. Future recipes and their adaptations and inclusions will be written up in another post!
I’ve noticed that transformation as it occurs, radiates through my life, touching every aspect of it. Lately I’ve been very much more focused on what I eat.
I’ve struggled with my weight off and on – even when I was a beautifully slim UK size 10! I always compared myself with skinnier women and thought that I was fat and ugly. That issue has come up a lot over the years and each time I’ve delved into the pain of feeling ashamed of myself, ugly and unlovable. What I came to realise was that being ‘fat’ didn’t make me feel ashamed and unlovable. I already felt those things – and believed them at a deep level, holding judgments about myself and how bad I must be. My body, parts of my body, and my weight all became areas where I unconsciously projected this self-hate.
As I got into personal transformation I worked at releasing the deeply held emotions and the destructive beliefs about myself – and even though I’m as big as I’ve ever been, I can honestly say that I love myself and my body now. I even prance around on the beach in bathers, unconcerned about other peoples’ opinions of me. (Even though no-one’s probably even looking at me lol!)
Towards the end of last year and the beginning of this year (2010) I began to really focus on my health (rather than a fat/weight issue) and started to feel a strong desire to attain optimum health and fitness that I can enjoy now and into a very long and active and youthful old age. I have long known that my eating habits for the last 12 or so years have been less than ideal for my system, especially since I’ve been married with a child and have made do with what’s easy more than going for excellence in nutrition.
Surfing the Net for information one night, I came across a site called www.peertrainer.com, which I found to be an incredibly valuable resource for people wanting more health and fitness. Among the articles there was information on Dr Joel Furhman’s work, including the first chapter of one of his books, Eat for Health. He has coined the term Nutritionist to describe someone who chooses what foods they eat based on how many micronutrients they contain. To cut a long story short, I bought the book, and also hired another of his books, Eat to Live from my library and am totally enthused by what he presents.
I will let Dr Furhman speak for himself if you’re interested at: www.drfuhrman.com – but suffice it to say, I’ve adopted the mindset of choosing nutritious foods, rather than what’s quick, convenient or artificially tasty.
Now I’m having fun experimenting with healthy food – smoothies, soups, salads, and not only using recipes from Furhman’s books, but also making my own and really enjoying a new eating experience. My family (husband and son) are less veggie-orientated than I am, but to their credit are giving the recipes a go and while I still cook to their tastes for them, always try what I’m having. I don’t believe in converting people, but giving them the opportunity to try and change, if they wish, themselves. Although to me, its vitally important that my husband and particularly my son, adopt a healthy lifestyle (eating and exercise) now, so they can enjoy a full, active and healthy existence.
In the meantime, along with having fun eating (no guilt attached when you can eat as much as you want of nutritious foods) I am losing weight! Since January I’ve effortlessly released almost 3Kg. I say ‘released weight’ as ‘lost weight’ might imply that I want to find it again haha.
If you’re interested in following a day by day account (with photos) of Dr Furhman’s recipes, you might be interested in Jana’s blogspot at http://janadrjoel.blogspot.com . I found it very enjoyable to read, loved the photos and liked how she and her husband graded each recipe.
So in summary, transformation of oneself takes many forms and as we grow, release limitations and embrace more life within, we find that our lives open up and bring us many opportunities for increased health, fulfillment and opportunities. Healthful eating is one of those areas that can give us the opportunity to be more creative and adventurous, enjoy more sensuality in cooking and eating, and discover the unfolding wonder of increased health and fitness now and into our later years.
 | Aannsha on Hello! |
 | Maxwell on Hello! |
| Aannsha on What is a Conscious Inner… |
 | Togara Makova on What is a Conscious Inner… |
| Aannsha on Weight loss so far! |
