Isn't it?
Just think about it and what is 'spiritually', 'ethically' more 'right' and so on.

If you eat something living, it's like eating something that already has gone a way, and you just take it ready made.
If you eat dead matter you have to process it back to something that is pro-life or life itself maybe.

The former is a bit evil because it requires taking life to stay alive yourslef, and easy, the latter is hard and not really that evil if you consider that you don't have to take life to gain access to dead matter.

Eating Death is much easier than eating Life for most people. It all depends on where you are and how you feel about yourself.....WY

I hear you Vlad. In a mechanistic sense....anything you 'eat' ceases to have locomotive life as we know it. But if you entertain, for a moment, that what we know as 'matter' is actually 'information' then just think for a moment about the information that we are telling our cells on a daily basis?

-If you eat animals and processed food, you are telling your body a story of slavery, confinement, crisis, fear and pain. If you eat vegetables you are telling your body about a striving for life, ending in separation. If you eat fruits, your are telling a story of a new chance for life, freely given, and a chance to create anew.

-This is simplistic language. But eating foods whose stories involve life...give rise to a natural growth within us as well. When one's focus in on growth and life....then the fuel/food will naturally fit the inclination.

-Just some thoughts. What do you think?

-David Z. Mason

WWW.RawFoodFarm.com

In my opinion,most people dont even know they are eating dead,inert material most of the time.
And alot of them wouldnt even care if they knew,as long as it satisfies that small patch of tissue on our tounghes called the taste buds.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/24/2008 09:00PM by Raw1228.

davidzanemason Wrote:
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> -If you eat animals and processed food, you are
> telling your body a story of slavery, confinement,
> crisis, fear and pain. If you eat vegetables you
> are telling your body about a striving for life,
> ending in separation. If you eat fruits, your are
> telling a story of a new chance for life, freely
> given, and a chance to create anew.

mouth hanging open in slack-jawed wonderment...

You kill food when you eat it, no matter what kind of diet you are on. I see the sort of poetic beauty here, but it scientifically doesn't work.

When and how it was killed are certainly different. There isn't much scientifically to be said, though I believe animals release certain stress molecules before they are killed, and certainly during the slavery and confinement--wouldn't want that coming into my body.

davidzanemason Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> -If you eat animals and processed food, you are
> telling your body a story of slavery, confinement,
> crisis, fear and pain. If you eat vegetables you
> are telling your body about a striving for life,
> ending in separation. If you eat fruits, your are
> telling a story of a new chance for life, freely
> given, and a chance to create anew.

^^As a vegan, I never thought twice about "live" or "dead" food. Yeah, sure, I wasn't killing any animals, but it wasn't until I stopped cooking the life out of my food that I came to nearly identical conclusions on my own.

I used to be a very detached person. I hated children. On the winter solstice, a few weeks into being 100% raw, I had a huge spiritual/emotional breakthrough in which I became aware of how connected all life on earth is, and made a lot of peace with myself. There was a significant reversal of my own energies: everywhere I went after that, children of all ages started reaching out to me. I realized life and love were basic parts of the human consciousness, they are what sustain us in every way.

The depth of emotion and intensity I have for these things is always just beyond the grasp of words.

But I only started eating raw, and a lot of fruit, to heal myself physically. As it turns out, there's a lot more than just "science" in fruit... I got a lot more than I bargained for. And considering it all has to do with harmonizing myself in love with all living beings--every little insight, little feeling, as I feel my consciousness growing and expanding--there really is something special about fruit.

I just read a PHENOMINAL book called "Left In the Dark" by Graham Gynn and Tony Wright that suggests (with spectacular evidence) it was fruit that was responsible for man's rapid, anomalous evolutionary increase in brain size. Basically, a diet of tropical fruits reduces a cocktail of sex-related hormones that delay puberty, thereby extending the period we have for brain development--this is what happened in the past. When we left our natural habitat, for whatever reason, started cooking, then eating grains, etc., not only did we lose what was keeping us in perfect harmony, but the foods we replaced the fruits with had the opposite effects on our neuroendocrine system--making us aggressive, hit puberty earlier (lesser time for brain development => man's brain size is shrinking today), and spiraling us into this giant negative feedback loop that is exalted by the SAD diet today.

That's only scratching the surface of a lot of awesome theories they suggest--but with my own experiences in adapting a high-fruit raw diet and reaping all these benefits... it just makes me wonder about the awesomeness of fruit even MORE! (Actually, I don't have to wonder, I am living proof. ^.~)

Itzdavey, it DOES scientifically work. Animals that are terrified before slaughter have bodies pumped full of adrenaline, which has been linked to cancer in humans. There's also leukocytosis. Look at how people cleanse/heal on fruit. The science is there. It hasn't been fully explored. I don't think we have any real technological means of determining (aside from the alleged scream) what vegetables feel vs. fruits when we eat them, at present. But as our own perceptions enhance/clear up on the raw, I don't think it's too far-fetched. I am starting to notice subtle differences between veggies and fruits, myself...

More peace and fruit to you all! =)

phantom Wrote:

> Itzdavey, it DOES scientifically work. Animals
> that are terrified before slaughter have bodies
> pumped full of adrenaline, which has been linked
> to cancer in humans. There's also leukocytosis.
> Look at how people cleanse/heal on fruit. The
> science is there. It hasn't been fully explored. I
> don't think we have any real technological means
> of determining (aside from the alleged scream)
> what vegetables feel vs. fruits when we eat them,
> at present. But as our own perceptions
> enhance/clear up on the raw, I don't think it's
> too far-fetched. I am starting to notice subtle
> differences between veggies and fruits, myself...
>
> More peace and fruit to you all! =)

I wasn't talking about meat vs. vegan, or saying that there wasn't a benefit to raw. I'm here aren't I?

What I am pointing out is, as much as people want to feel righteous about eating raw vs. cooked food because it is more "alive," they are still taking (plant) life in order to support their own. It's one of those things you can either delude yourself about or learn to accept and cope with.

-DaveK

Hi Vlad,

Yes, i am a blatant outright murderer of fruits and vegetables. i take life to sustain my own life.. but you know what?

I'm worth it.

I hear you ItzDavey. Of course anything you eat ceases to have life. The proposition is what is written into the story of the matter that you are eating? Might that be different for animals, vegetables, fruits?

-David Z. Mason

WWW.RawFoodFarm.com

I hear you, too, ItzDavey. But when you eat an apple, you don't kill the apple tree. You can say the same for many of the fruits, but I'm wondering about the leafy greens. When you eat spinach, do you kill all of the spinach plant, or does it then grow back? Excuse the ignorance here, I'm no farmer...

^Exactly. I'm not sure about the greens...

Some thoughts:

Right. There are things that grow vegetatively. Most often, the plant is killed 99% (or maimed - 1%) at harvest. The plant MAY have died shortly on it's own anyway...but that is not the issue. Let me s'plain:

-Any organism has a 'story' encoded into it (if you believe such things). Why it was created, what it's life is, what it wants to do, what it's purpose it, and so on. As such....you can think of food as an 'informational drug'. Whatever the 'story' of the food you are eating....CAN (and often does) become YOUR story.

-What is the story of the food you are eating? Why was it made? Was there any love in the story? Any care? Any consciousness? Why was it killed? Was there any love in that either?

-David Z. Mason

WWW.RawFoodFarm.com

It's still a good subject to bring up. People may think it's funny to talk about killing plants, and somehow that's less serious than killing animals. But it does make you consider our role and our environmental impact, if not as individuals, then in aggregate.

There's the industry itself to consider. Farmers, farmland, the animals that lived there but don't anymore. Even if all you buy is local, organic produce, the lives of that local farmer are inextricably tied to other people and processes that we have no idea of, and so on. It's something to be appreciated and acknowledged, rather than something you can escape from by choosing a particular lifestyle. Same with the clothes you buy, your car, etc. Much suffering and labor goes into the things you're consuming. That's the "story" behind the food, and it's not always a happy one.

Hope I'm not depressing anybody, but this is something I do think about a bit. I don't brood about it, but it's something I try to seriously reflect on. In Zen monasteries there is a meal chant that starts "First, seventy two labors brought us this food, we should know how it comes to us, Second, as we receive this offering, we should consider whether our virtue and practice desrve it." It's kind of a way of paying tribute to that story and being grateful.

To brighten it up a bit, the consequences of a raw diet are extraordinary both in terms of health and environmental impact. Ani Phyo has some interesting things to say about the consequences about a raw diet and the environment. I haven't hard it all yet, but most noticably is the fact that a raw dieters garbage output is in the form of food scraps that can be composted, rather all the plastic whatever that gets thrown in the garbage on a SAD diet.

I have a vermicomposting system in my apartment. I feed my food scraps and junkmail to my worms and they turn it into wonderful dirt. My mom, who is always hinting about kids (don't I kind of need a girl to make those?) has to contend with hearing about the grand-cats and the grand-worms. But they're great. I'm proud of them!

-DaveK

My friend who came to visit from out of the country made an interesting point. He studies geology--and he said we all have NO idea how many things we use in everyday life that are made from the most beautiful crystal/rock formations in the earth, and ground into a senseless powder to manufacture nonsense.

How did you get started with vericomposting?

phantom Wrote:

> How did you get started with vericomposting?

I think I always thought it was a neat idea, and I really have not had luck with regular compost piles. They just tend to stink and get flies, and the compost they make seems kind of messy. The vermicompost is just pure wonderful earthy-smelling DIRT.

So I just bought a system to do it awhile ago, and it works great. I love my little wormie buddies! And I think I'm giving them the best life they can get too. They can live for up to 7 years in one of those things. And all they do is eat and @#$%& and reproduce. In the "wild" (wierd way to think of worms) the average life span is 3 years. So some day I am going to have ancient, wise guru worms.

Ok I got a little carried away there, but that's just how my mind works.

-DaveK



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/25/2008 06:46PM by Itzdavey.

And that could make some nutritious dirt to, say, feed other plants you'd like to grow? =)

Yup, I have a little mini garden on my terrace, as well as houseplants that I use the compost for. Going to start doing even more of that soon!

Plus you can give it away to people or just give it back to the earth! She digs that kinda thing.

-DaveK

vericomposting sounds neat

shane Wrote:
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> When you eat spinach, do
> you kill all of the spinach plant, or does it then
> grow back? Excuse the ignorance here, I'm no
> farmer...

You don't have to kill the plant, but I don't know how it works commercially. I pick all my greens wild, I only take a few leaves from each plant, so the plant continues living.


Phantom, Left in the Dark has got to be the best book I have ever read. For anyone interested, the website is [www.kaleidos.org.uk] There is a radio interview with Tony Wright you can listen to from this page on my website [www.funkyraw.com] (and you can also buy the book there).

Rob

--
Rob Hull - Funky Raw
My blog: [www.rawrob.com]

Itzdavey Wrote:
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> It's still a good subject to bring up. People may
> think it's funny to talk about killing plants, and
> somehow that's less serious than killing animals.

Did you ever see that BBC documentary hosted by David Attenborough called something like The Private Life of Plants, or maybe The Secret Life of Plants? That amazing movie really changed the way I view plants. Much of the film was shot in time-lapse so you could see plants growing over and under each other, competing, crowding each other out, and in some cases actually fighting with each other. Viewed in this way, plants really seemed like slooooow-moving animals.

I saw that, amazing! The Secret Life of Plants. score by Stevie Wonder (when he was still GREAT, you know, pre-80s...)