What are the benefits of raw food on the brain? LOL! I just realized that can be taken so many ways! I can only imagine that anything that improves the body must also benefit the brain. what is your experience? Did you discover your more creative? Have better memory? Improve your intellect?

Sure raw food will detox all kinds of things from the brain (like fluoride and mercury) and it will help you think clearer.

Fruit is also high in glucose and the brain runs on glucose. My experience is that I'm easier to live with on raw which is probably due to giving up things like chocolate. If I go back to a high-cooked diet I get depressed and moody.

Also raw food is often a wheat-free diet (unless you are making something like Essene bread) and giving up wheat can have a huge effect on the brain:
[heartscanblog.blogspot.com]

"I wouldn't have believed it, but after witnessing this effect countless times, I am convinced there is such a phenomenon: Wheat withdrawal.

You'll recognize it in someone who previously ate bread and other wheat flour-containing products freely, then eliminates them. This is followed by extreme cravings, usually for bread, cookies, or cake; profound fatigue; shakiness; mental fogginess; blue moods. The syndrome can last for up to one week.

Then, bam! Sufferers of wheat withdrawal report mental clarity superior to their wheat-crazed days, improved energy, decreased appetite and cravings, heightened mood, and, of course, fantastic drops in weight. "

The transfer of data through the nerves is faster when you are powered by fruit sugar! Your brain will run like a supercomputer!

As

a) human consciousness is a product of brain chemistry

and

b) eating a raw food diet is (in my experience) the most powerful thing that one can do to raise one's consciousness

it therefore follows that raw food is very slowly changing (optimizing) one's brain chemistry over time.

I'm not sure how many raw foodists actually realize this.

All I can say is that since June I have greatly increased my consumption of raw fruits and vegetables and the effect it has had on me personally is that I feel up most of the time. I feel healthy and I feel good and happy to be alive and I'm not going to let anyone rain on my parade or burst my bubble or take the wind out of my sails.

Great topic!
I am very fascinated by this.
I believe eating raw goes as far as having an effect on you spiritually (it may just be corrected brain chemistry),but even if its just that,the benefits are amazing.
And the whole thing about the wheat.I believe that if the world went wheat free,it would indeed be a better place.

Vinny

I found an interesting article on brain cell regeneration. It used to be dogma that brain cells do no repair or regenerate.
[www.brainlightning.com]

That's very exciting info Mislu! I always found the idea that you couldn't grow more brain cells very depressing.

Tropical,
I find it exciting also for the same reason. I just tried to open the link above. Yikes! it changed into another webpage for selling supplements. Sorry about that. The study was at Princeton, Elizabeth Gould and Charles Gross. Its interesting, but I don't know if I like the intrusive nature of the study on macaques. The difficult thing about science is where it interfaces with ethics.

I think I heard some other people say that the kidneys do not regenerate. But maybe that will be overturned as well as a possibility. I find in curious that perhaps people got these ideas from observing people with a less healthy living habits. Maybe it takes more energy to regenerate brain and repair brain cells, and it might not have been observed in people living on the margin nutritionally.

The concentration of Vitamin C around the brain is 100x the concentration of Vitamin C anywhere else in the body.

The brain is DESIGNED to feed on fruit. Vitamin C and fruit sugars are SO important to the development, protection, and preservation of our minds!!

The RDA of Vitamin C is somewhere around 45mg. That is closer to a bare minimum to maintain what society perceives as normal healthful functioning. A lot of primates close to us in the wild will ingest around four GRAMS per day.

Fruit fruit fruit fruit fruit fruit fruit!!

The only problem with adding lots of fruit could possibly be aggravating candida after a lifetime of white sugar addiction. =\ But this is not the fruit's fault.

phantom Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The concentration of Vitamin C around the brain is
> 100x the concentration of Vitamin C anywhere else
> in the body.
>
> The RDA of Vitamin C is somewhere around 45mg.
> That is closer to a bare minimum to maintain what
> society perceives as normal healthful functioning.
> A lot of primates close to us in the wild will
> ingest around four GRAMS per day.

That's very interesting. Where did you read that?

[www.leftinthedark.org.uk]

^^I have a LOVE AFFAIR with this book.

There's also an interview on conscious.tv if you want more information, and an article here: [www.brainwaving.com]

We ALL need to eat a lot more fruit~

It's crazy to me, too, what Codex aims to do with RDAs in light of this kind of information.

wow, what I have been missing all these years. Can commercially available foods meet the brain and bodies demands for flavinoids, vitamin c etc? It might not be enough, but its certainly better to obtain what is available than none at all.

I think there might be something to drinking tea... lots of tea. >8)

People also knock cacao, but again, from a flavinoid standpoint, maybe it's not always so bad?

These are just random thoughts. I think SOMETHING is definitely better than nothing! We have to start somewhere...

Phantom,
I have mixed feelings about tea. I used to drink it every single day, now it just tastes bitter to me. My partner loves green tea, especially matcha and sometimes spends incredible amounts of money for it. Hes sold on the nutrients it has, and the lift it gives him. I worry about the stimulation and the adrenal wear. Its better than coffee, I think, still I am concerned as he often feels worn out, and is a very light sleeper.

I think that for some people the addition of green and white tea could be very much an improvement, and maybe some high flavinoid cacao. I tried some raw chocolate last week, I was surprised at how much it tasted like regular. It didn't bother me, but I have tried raw pods, that made me feel sick. I found that it didn't do much for me, which was surprising, I usually feel an intense but short lived euphoria...nothing. Maybe its because I feel so good in general, maybe I don't need it? A variety of fruits, berries, sprouts, nuts etc... maybe thats providing what I need.

I have experienced improvements in the brain and the entire nervous system from raw foods. No more brain fog, no need for coffee to compensate for fatigue from digesting cooked foods. My senses are heightened from the raw foods.

There are plenty of teas, not all of them are black and loaded with caffeine. I have experienced some awesome healing with Cat's Claw--definitely bitter, but has even been used in successfully treating AIDS, feeding the immune system to help fight cancer, etc. (And from what I understand, it's not just a "stimulant" effect with a price to pay later, like some people argue about XYZ superfoods, the pharmacology is quite interesting!) There are other teas in the mate family that are also highly anti-inflammatory and used specifically in treating menstrual discomfort--again, makes me wonder about the hormonal side, if these things were once present in our diet evolutionarily, and now we suffer because they are absent. Hmm.

/tea rant Tea is not the answer to everything, but it is just an interesting case in point. Fruit > tea.

I TOTALLY have to agree with Brian--the mental clarity that comes with time can't be exchanged for anything in the world!!

Phantom,
I have read somewhere that various berries used to make up a substantial portion of the diet for much of the world. Now it seems like its a minor portion for most people in the way of jams, additions to muffins etc... Some have speculated that people used to rely heavily on acorns. But that information seems suspect, because most acorns require leaching of tannins, and roasting. If it was a staple, it must have been an emergency, or limited resource kind of use. Although I have heard that one acorn, a white acorn can be eaten as is, but I have never tried it.

cauliflorous fruits could provide a lot of speculation in the way of co-evolution of fruit with humans, and related animals.

"Cauliflory is a botanical term referring to plants which flower and fruit from their main stems or woody trunks rather than from new growth and shoots. This can allow trees to be pollinated or have their seeds dispersed by animals which cannot climb or fly."
[en.wikipedia.org]
[waynesword.palomar.edu]

It would be interesting to know if some of these fruits contain more good things for humans than other fruit. I don't know if this analysis and comparision has been made yet on that basis.