I am considering going on a raw retreat. Looking at OHI, Tree of Life, The Garden Diet, and Hippocrates. Any recommendations?

Hello? Is anyone there?

Tree of Life is one of the bests and has a variety of programs for everyone. Definitely not Hippocrates.

Simple Raw Recipes & Health Tips

GilmoreGirl,

Just curious--why "Definitely not Hippocrates"?

Many reasons. Mainly it's fine for someone very sick with something like cancer who has zero or very little knowledge about health. It's not a bad place, there's just much better especially for the price. I've spoken with former employees too, which has confirmed my original opinion from when I visited. Like I said, it can be wonderful when there's no other options. Tree of Life-if you just watch some videos with employees, you will see how happy and healthy they are and how well it's run. Many of the top raw/health experts have studied through them and have attended their programs. They also offer more than just learning about raw. They have juice fasts and incorporate spiritual methods into most that they offer. A few other centers are good too. If one is able to visit any place first, that's even better because you can get a feel for the place and can make a more informed choice.

This is just my opinion from research, speaking to different centers, employees (or former ones) and past attendees.

Simple Raw Recipes & Health Tips

OHI, TOL, Hypocrites etc are all ok if you want to starve, get emaciated, spend a lot of cash on superfoods and bogus cleanses and learn why sweet fruit is the enemy and eventually come to the conclusion that raw foods is just too hard and you need animal products like David Wolfe, Franky G and other TOL students are promoting thesedays.

Raw retreats? The only ones worth attending are ours, raw aussie athletes or Doug Grahams. You learn how to do raw and stay away from the chronic fatigue/weight gain that all the other 'guru's seem to be having thesedays sadly.

I shall ponder over all your thoughts. thank you

durianrider Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> OHI, TOL, Hypocrites etc are all ok if you want to
> starve, get emaciated, spend a lot of cash on
> superfoods and bogus cleanses and learn why sweet
> fruit is the enemy and eventually come to the
> conclusion that raw foods........

Santa,

Ya gotta put Harley on the naughty list!!

Kref

Krefcenz Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> durianrider Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > OHI, TOL, Hypocrites etc are all ok if you want
> to
> > starve, get emaciated, spend a lot of cash on
> > superfoods and bogus cleanses and learn why
> sweet
> > fruit is the enemy and eventually come to the
> > conclusion that raw foods........
>
> Santa,
>
> Ya gotta put Harley on the naughty list!!
>
> Kref

Kref, gotta run. Global warming is melting my yard (I tend my garden with a hoe hoe hoe), the elves are on strike, and a polar bear ate Blitzen.

Regarding Harley, I got him another copy of 80-10-10. But this one is in Serbian.

Santa

durianrider Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> OHI, TOL, Hypocrites etc are all ok if you want to
> starve, get emaciated, spend a lot of cash on
> superfoods and bogus cleanses and learn why sweet
> fruit is the enemy and eventually come to the
> conclusion that raw foods is just too hard and you
> need animal products like David Wolfe, Franky G
> and other TOL students are promoting thesedays.
>
> Raw retreats? The only ones worth attending are
> ours, raw aussie athletes or Doug Grahams. You
> learn how to do raw and stay away from the chronic
> fatigue/weight gain that all the other 'guru's
> seem to be having thesedays sadly.

Doug graham is a mass proposer of water fasting for every condition so ill give that a miss as after reading his forum for the past month some of the recommendations are a joke. The biggest cause of chronic fatigue is adrenal gland dysfunction which in 9/10 cases causes hypoglycemia in which case fasting is very dangerous. Not only that foods high in potassium i.e 70 odd bananas a day can be fatal to someone with adrenal gland disorders also.

So the cure all which you prescibe Harley of bananas to cure chronic fatigue syndrome is quite far fetched and even potenially dangerous. Chronic fatigue syndrome has many causes as i stated before adrenal gland dysfunction, low thyroid, viral causes, candida overgrowth, nutritional deficiency. If carbs can cure all that then i guess i was eating the wrong fruit for 7 years lol.

Wow, and I thought I was hard!! Oh s.hit, Mrs. Claus says the artic air has killed my broccoli sprouts. And my lawyer has told me burning reindeer dung causes global warming. Where do I get a federal buyout?

Santa, you're scary looking. Are you sure it was the "polar bear" that ate Blitzen and not a certain jolly man's doppelganger?

Hi I am a former employee of Hippocrates Health Institute in West Palm Beach Florida and am pretty shocked at the negative comments. It is expensive, true. It is also a little piece of paradise and it most definitely is NOT filled with desperate sick people! Hippocrates and the other places mentioned and there are more....are not CLINICS.One has to be able to take care of themselves. The food at Hippocrates is DELICIOUS. GOURMET EVEN. Yes it is an intense cleanse, isn't that why you want to go? Lots of green juices, made up mostly of sprouts. Very little if any fruit. When you go home you can add fruit back in. The education at Hippocrates (HHI) is just top knotch it can not be compared to any other programs and it's divine setting, gorgeous rooms (some aren't depends on price), magical property, lovely pools: salt, cold, hot etc...etc...and really yummy food with lots of classes on how to prepare it once you go home are really good. And they go WAY beyond the basic Ann Wigmore approach, the director of Hippocrates is aware of very cutting edge alternative therapies and is happy to tell you about them.
I am sure TOL would be a wonderful experience, I have heard very mixed reviews about their food from long term raw fooders such as myself, but they do have a medical component there that other retreats just don't and can't have as Dr. Gabriel Cousens IS a medical doctor and they have a medical doctor on staff. It is breathtakingly expensive to go there.
What kind of retreat exactly would you like? If I had a nickel for every person I've recommended go to OHI I could probably have a nice week in Europe.
There's places in Mexico, not that I'd recommend going to Mexico at ths moment, or you could give yourself a retreat at home, having all juices for a few weeks, check out the juicefeasting site.


In the original question you mentioned The Garden Diet-that is an online course as far as I know, not a place to GO.
Other places to consider: OHI in San Diego and Texas, good bang for the buck probably about 1000 a week for three weeks, the Ann Wigmore style places in Puerto Rico and Michigan.
If you are interested in water fasting you can look into True North in Northern CA, Santa Rosa, I'd like to go there, I did have a meal there a few months ago a mix of simple raw and simple cooked. I have large water fasting experience and am ready to do it again. You have a ton of choices.
The fact that the person who slammed Hippocrates seems to have a little inside info about dysfunctional aspects..well all companies have dysfunctional aspects I've spent years at Hippocrates and months at OHI, from the guests points of view they are both great places.
Whew I didn't mean to go on like this!

Nomi Shannon
The Raw Gourmet
[www.rawgourmet.com]
[yourrawfooddiet.com]

Nomi, thank you. Having attended many of Cousin's lectures I have to say that I've always been impressed with his knowledge and desire to reach out and educate/help others. I would choose Hippocrates if I could take the kids there with me. Unfortunately, I don't think any of the retreats welcome children (ridiculous, if you ask me. If we can't start people on the path to health when they are young we'll never create true healing in our communities). I'll have to recheck that though, it's been a while since I was told this.
A friend of mine went to OHI this year with wonderful results, she was very happy with her 2 week stay there.

Remember, in this as in all things you get what you pay for. Research, ask questions, read the client feedback online and choose what most meets your needs and fits your budget. Anywhere you can learn about how to maintain great health will be of benefit. It doesn't have to be "the best". Even really great is going to be, well, Really Great!

Thank you Nomi for sharing your thoughts

The thing I see with people that try and live on sprouts and little fruit is that they usually have weight issues. Either being really really emaciated from starvation or overweight from starvation followed by binging.

The 3 retreats mentioned to nothing to teach people HOW to eat healthy when they are at home. Ive talked with a lot of people that have attended these 3 retreats and they have great things to say about the staff/friends they made but ALL of them are still confused on how to eat a healthy lifestyle be it raw or otherwise.

These places are ran by nice people. Nice people that are fruit phobic and fatigued as a result. You wont see Brian or Gabriel with flat stomachs or stimulant free energy unfortunately.

I mean put the raw food authors/speakers today in a bikini/pair of swimming trunks and you dont see any healthy looking ones but the 811 active crew. That sounds harsh but its true. The GREAT thing is that ANYBODY can become really fit and healthy if you just take advice from the people getting the results you desire.

I mean thesedays ANYBODY can give advice behind someone elses photo or no photo/video at all and just ramble on about nothing but what makes for valuable advice is if you can hang with person, ask em questions, see their blood tests on youtube, talk with people that know em, check out their race results etc.

Critics are a dime a dozen but real life examples of direct action personified...thats really rare.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/13/2010 02:25AM by durianrider.

durianrider Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The thing I see with people that try and live on
> sprouts and little fruit is that they usually have
> weight issues. Either being really really
> emaciated from starvation or overweight from
> starvation followed by binging.
>
> The 3 retreats mentioned to nothing to teach
> people HOW to eat healthy when they are at home.
> Ive talked with a lot of people that have attended
> these 3 retreats and they have great things to say
> about the staff/friends they made but ALL of them
> are still confused on how to eat a healthy
> lifestyle be it raw or otherwise.
>
> These places are ran by nice people. Nice people
> that are fruit phobic and fatigued as a result.
> You wont see Brian or Gabriel with flat stomachs
> or stimulant free energy unfortunately.
>
> I mean put the raw food authors/speakers today in
> a bikini/pair of swimming trunks and you dont see
> any healthy looking ones but the 811 active crew.
> That sounds harsh but its true. The GREAT thing is
> that ANYBODY can become really fit and healthy if
> you just take advice from the people getting the
> results you desire.
>
> I mean thesedays ANYBODY can give advice behind
> someone elses photo or no photo/video at all and
> just ramble on about nothing but what makes for
> valuable advice is if you can hang with person,
> ask em questions, see their blood tests on
> youtube, talk with people that know em, check out
> their race results etc.
>
> Critics are a dime a dozen but real life examples
> of direct action personified...thats really rare.

really??? based on what???? your good word I imagine.


I think the interesting thing is how young both men look even though both are older than Doug and not athletes. But the real problem is that the measures are wrong. The most important outcomes from a healthy diet are not flat stomachs but healthy hearts and long lives. And the reversals of heart disease and diabetes at both Tree of Life as well as HHI under both Brian and Gabriel are truly remarkable.

Kref



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/20/2010 07:05PM by Krefcenz.

Both of them have looked great and had amazing energy every time I've seen them. And they've both been calm, friendly, vibrant people with terrific communication skills. Not like some of the pushy self-righteous people on the internet, ahem.
I've met tons of people who went to Hippocrates and came out with great lifestyle skills as well. As with anything, you take what you want out of it. If you want to learn how to live a healthy life and aren't just looking for someone else to fix your problems for you, you'll learn how to live a healthy life at any of those retreats. It's not impossible, just hard work. But then, the personal trainer isn't going to stand over you at home counting out crunches either .

that first pic the guy in it kinda reminds me of a much younger Robert Downey jr...its almost like he must be saying "I am Iron man." in that photo...lol

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, mirror in the sky
What is love?
Can the child within my heart rise above?
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life?

Nomi wrote:

"In the original question you mentioned The Garden Diet-that is an online course as far as I know, not a place to GO."

Actually, Storm and Jinjee have gotten into hosting raw retreats:

[thegardendiet.com]

They were among the first raw food teachers I came across. I like their very low-tech ethos in terms of food (no dehydrator, no superfoods, very little if any supplementation) and their emphasis on exercise. I've not gone to any of their retreats but I did want to say that they do offer them.

Me too, Storm and Jinjee were the first raw fooders I had come across that I really connected with. I too like their approach, not just the food but the attitude. Also, I think Jinjee is beautiful, inside and outside. <3

@klomasius: She is really beautiful! And a very good person infact! She has been always so giving and caring about everyone!

@rawlibrarian: yes, even for me she is the first one, after meeting her, i never found the need to go to someone else for anything else. She is just a package of everything!

Gabriel Cousins promotes a 80/10/10 diet for diabetics now.

[mydailynutrients.com]

I like Brian and Gabe as people. Im just pointing out that these guys change their programmes like they change their jocks and NOBODY coming out of their courses stays raw/vegan/fit very long cos they just end up so carb phobic and confused. Look at David Wolfe/Franky G etc. Now promoting raw as extreme and fanatical and saying you need animal products.

In one interview Gabe says you should eat lots of carbs from fruit and in the next he says you should get your carbs from kale. Brian says eat sprouts, algae and sea weed and forget that every cell in the body runs on glucose and that Doug Graham and all the bouncing and thriving fit raw vegans are actually holograms put out by the banana industry.

People that follow these low carb plans ALWAYS struggle with their weight, fitness, health, cravings etc. Then they get taught that they are not spiritual enough and need to do more cleansing, praying, thousand of dollars worth of supplements etc.

Fred Patenaude writes a bit about his experiences working at the TOL in his new book raw food controversies. He was DW's first employee and has some juicy stories to share. [www.1shoppingcart.com]

How about seeking a place to go forward, rather than a "retreat" (LOL)

But more seriously, because optimal dietary issues (and derivatively thus which retreat might be best to choose) are so vital.....for some a matter of just taking a break or finding a path to extended life or wrongly to early death (my beloved girl friend died last October shortly after going to an abysmal retreat that just about starved her to death and caused her cancer to recur) ...So for me it’s important to have careful reasoning about such issues - and an openness to new information and ideas - a cosmic larger mind - rather than any and all small, rigid, personal, cultural, ideological, I'm right, your wrong stances.

In this light, I think the major schools of dietary thought, at least within the raw and living food movement, all add something of GREAT inestimable value.

I love the major leaders of the movement, one and all - and the sacrifices they have made to disseminate what they know. I have personally been to TOL, Hippocrates, and Anne Wigmore center in Puerto Rico and am going the Woodstock Festival that follows Dr. Graham's 80/10/10 approach.

I also know well the Gerson Therapy. I helped Charlotte set up a juicing center/retreat in Sedona. There I saw how it miraculously helped roughly a 1/3rd of the patients that otherwise might have died. But what of the rest? Is there a still better way?

I like to thus examine all sides of critically important issues and to have an independent and especially open mind.

Sometimes a certain diet is EXTREMELY good for one individual (to even be life-saving or athletic performance adding) but terrible, degenerative, debilitating and even deadly for another. This is why often personal experiences are really not adequate. They are too small in their perspectives. "Oh after a year or two of following this diet, I feel great or I feel lousy." "Oh because we have such and such teeth we should be meat eaters, or omnivores or vegans or God knows what, munching dirt?

Such combinations of personal testimonials and/or personal ideological stances for me always fall short and are open to doubt. Yes they are well meaning and generally true accounts. They also express often wanting to help others by sharing what seems to either work well or make logical sense to a person. But still that is not enough.

There is a deeper problem in that our whole culture has adopted a math-based, atomic, mechanical worldview (the vision of Sir Isaac Newton in his Principia and that is embedded in modern chemistry, physics and biotech) - or the larger cultural cosmic bias towards nature. It is, in my humble opinion, a misguided view that is HUGELY flawed. Mathematics abstracts universal principles of separation. One cannot logically or effectively connect a vision best thereby. It’s great for building atom bombs. And for me, this is the primary reason that modern conventional medicine is so harmful and in a shambles. I cringe when naturopaths use that vision to justify an alternative approach.

So people develop very strong, culturally supported opinions based taproot false assumptions not seen as assumptions. But that is going to another much higher level of discourse.

To bring this back down to everyday affairs, what are foods really made of? Are they really made up of carbs, proteins, sugars, fats, water, and various vitamins, minerals, micronutrients, and so on (ALL of which is chemically and atomically defined). To me this does not describe the objective essence of foods, and is ideologically biased and flawed. But it’s me against our whole culture - so why take me seriously? Right? Well our world is a mess, our healing sciences are a disgrace and so I have a different view.

But again to get back down to earth, I think one can best know what retreat to go to, what diet to follow via a larger perspective. One way to tap into that is to see who really gathers information clinically minus ideologies - and so reviewing the records of thousands and hundreds of thousands of patients

Those who have not even begun to gather such information need to open their minds to reconsider their entrenched views.

For example, and this is an important example, if a person has been eating devitalized foods for decades, especially denser foods we call proteins and fats.. Then the cell membranes which are built out of those denser foods begin to lose their aliveness, their consciousness. I think Graham is right in that because these dense elements build thin cell membranes and hormones and a few other things that are not so pervasive, we don't need a lot of them physically. Too much taxes the kidneys and builds adipose tissues that house toxins.

But when those cell membranes (built out of largely dead proteins and fried fats) no longer can properly recognize insulin and sugars (and which normally and optimally fuel energy) then the sugars can't fuel life and remain in the bloodstream unable to enter the interior. The sugars then begin to do something opposite, to deteriorate the vascular system. This especially true for diabetics, and most often the degeneration manifests after two decades of mal-eating because it is a process of slow dying. This has been documented in different countries and cultures. So a young person drinking soft drinks and eating white floured breads, etc. slips into a process of such slow dying it is unnoticeable. This is what makes this so evil.

But in the raw food movement we know the good news. Such conditions can be turned around in as little as a month. Without revitalizing the body and just taking drugs, there ensues a further progressive dying -especially noticeable in the eyes and/or extremities. Diabetics can become blind. My step dad went legally blind after 50 years of being on insulin.

So to sum up, a high fruit sugar or fruitarian diet (and a retreat that advances it) can be off the chart GREAT for healthy athletes but not for certain very ill patients who are far gone.

It thus seems to me, and let me know otherwise, that both sides of this dispute have a true story to tell, and both will appear right and both will appear wrong in some different circumstances.

We thus, in my opinion, can embrace opposite approaches as true sometimes... not always ...and with a loving/understanding posture... or admitting yin/yang truths are possible.

Nathan Batalion CTN
Global Health Activist
www.healingtalks.com
www.raw-wisdom.com

i would go to the bahamas
virgin islands
somewhere beautiful and fun
just choose my fruits and veggies
and have fun in the water and in the sun

durianrider Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I like Brian and Gabe as people. Im just pointing
> out that these guys change their programmes like
> they change their jocks and NOBODY coming out of
> their courses stays raw/vegan/fit very long cos
> they just end up so carb phobic and confused. Look
> at David Wolfe/Franky G etc. Now promoting raw as
> extreme and fanatical and saying you need animal
> products.
>
> In one interview Gabe says you should eat lots of
> carbs from fruit and in the next he says you
> should get your carbs from kale. Brian says eat
> sprouts, algae and sea weed and forget that every
> cell in the body runs on glucose and that Doug
> Graham and all the bouncing and thriving fit raw
> vegans are actually holograms put out by the
> banana industry.
>
> People that follow these low carb plans ALWAYS
> struggle with their weight, fitness, health,
> cravings etc. Then they get taught that they are
> not spiritual enough and need to do more
> cleansing, praying, thousand of dollars worth of
> supplements etc.

The Hippocrates diet is very high in carbs by eating sprouted grains, sprouted beans, pea shoot juice, sprouted peas and grass juice. Brian describes the diet as 90-05-05 (90% carbs, 5% fat, 5% protein).

Sprouted grains are roughtly twice as high in carbs as bananas.

lt's much easier to stay raw on the sprout diet because the high amino acid/high nutrient diet (high amino acid, but low concentrated protein) stabilises blood sugar which in turn stops silly craving for bad foods. No starvation of a sprout/weed/grass/algae/sea weed diet...easy to build muscle because it is high amino acid food, + plenty of carbs for energy.

Folks often mention calories as being the ultimate truth, but it's not, it's only a partial truth. Many animals eat only grass and are full of muscle, it's the same with a sproutarian when he juices his grasses/weeds and sprouts and copnsumes the algaes and seaweeds. The main thing to do is consume a green diet high in amino acids, sunlight and electromagnetic vibrations(fresh); despite being under calories, you will find that muscle will develop on this type of diet, so it does show it works. The only time calories in diet are important is when you eat foods that are much less nutritious such as fruit and vegetables and unsprouted nuts and seeds, especially when foods are bought from farmers markets and shops. With a sproutarian diet (done correctly), calories do not count.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/21/2012 04:33PM by The Sproutarian Man.

This is all very interesting about calories and different types of food, to this I would also add the factor of good digestion.

I sort of believe in calorie restriction approach, and I am trying to learn about nutritious and digestive properties of various food combinations and diet approaches, with the aim to find a diet which would allow me to maintain my weight and muscle while 1)being as easy on digestion as possible (this includes having smaller meal portions), and 2)involving the least amount of calories possible.

>Banana ice-cream rocks!<



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/21/2012 04:45PM by chat.