Yikes, have I ever been busy! Yes, I did take that trip to the U.K. and Ireland, and since then things have been popping. It was a really fun trip and it triggered all sorts of internal changes. Hard to explain, really, but it has led to a clarity that I've been seeking for years.
For one thing, I just finished watching all 15 of Kevin Gianni's Rawkathon videos. WOW! I feel vitalized just from getting all that information. In a nutshell, I finally feel like I have all the information I need to achieve perfect nutrition. The big questions for those on a raw and/or vegan diet are where do you get your protein? Vitamin B12? Omega 3 fatty acids? and Iron?
Some sources claim that you can only get those things from animal products. Turns out, that is total hooey.
According to Dr. Rick Dina, who is a raw food vegan medical doctor who has done numerous nutritional studies, leafy greens provide all the protein, iron, and Omega 3 fats that we could possibly need. Furthermore, every whole food, even fruit, has enough protein to sustain life, as long as you eat it raw. Cooking destroys some amino acids that are the building blocks of protein, so cooked foods like meat are actually not the best sources of complete protein.
The iron in green plants is abundant and it's the kind that will never become toxic to the body, because the body only takes in as much as it needs. The iron in meat can overload the body.
Green leaves, and especially algae like spirulina, contain lots of Omega 3 fats. The body can make it's own DHA from these fats, or you can get DHA from marine algae. And of course flax, and hemp seeds are loaded with Omega 3 fatty acids.
As for B12, a large percentage of meat eaters are deficient in it, as well as vegans and vegetarians, so it is not a vegetarian issue. If you are concerned about your B12 level, you can get a blood test to see if it is optimum, or take a sublingual B12 supplement. Dr. Dina says that Vitamineral Green also raised his B12 level. It's not cheap, but it's a great product.
Whew! 15 hours of raw food experts talking about their own experience was nothing short of enlightening. I hope Kevin keeps making those videos available so others can watch them. The best news for me so far is that I dropped 8 pesky pounds by eating more raw foods! After hitting menopause, the pounds started creeping up, ever so slowly, and nothing I tried seemed to get them to leave -- until I went back to eating raw foods. Yay! For more info. on that subject, visit
http://healitall.com/weightmanagement.html
On a whole different subject -- well sort of, but not really -- I finally got my "mission statement." This is the phrase that encapsulates my life purpose. Of course it is nothing really new, just a new way to speak about what I've been doing all my life.
I went to a spiral dance that Starhawk was leading for Samhain (Halloween) and we did a shamanic journey to the Underworld. There I met a faery guide. I asked her to help me define my life purpose. Without missing a beat, she smiled and said, "You are here to teach the Faery Way." That was it.
Now -- I've had people make fun of me because I "believe" in faeries. I tell them it is not a "belief;" I've seen them. Still, it's sort of hard to communicate with people who are not aware of something that seems so obvious to me. So I'm thinking, how am I supposed to "teach the Faery Way" when most of the people I encounter think anyone who "believes" in faeries is nuts, or at least somewhat deluded?
I realized then that I've been teaching and living the Faery Way all my life. It's nothing new. It is all about compost and gardens and compassion for animals and eating fresh, whole plant foods. It is about healing with energy, and magic -- and singing and dancing and creating art.
I had to laugh when I realized that I don't even have to talk about faeries to teach the Faery Way. But, because it has helped me feel more confident about my own perceptions when others have spoken or written about their encounters with the fae, I will stick my neck out and testify that yes, they are here in our forests and our gardens, and I have personally met some of them.
By the way, that's a photo of my friend Judy visiting a fairy grotto. She wasn't holding anything in her hand when the picture was taken. What do you think?
For more information about the Faery Way
visit http://fairysource.com/faery-way.html
