Live Longer by Eating Less on a Raw Food Diet (Putting it All Together)

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Originally Posted by robh

It's funny. This fact came up on one of those *other* raw food boards where the diet consists of 3000 calories of food everyday (they eat a lot as opposed to a little).The response on that board (because they eat so dog gone much) was that these studies and the science that established these finding were based on cooked food diets. Therefore, cooked fooders eating less makes them live longer because they are consuming fewer toxins.I think if every raw fooder lived into triple digits, we would have heard all about it. It seems that people who have been raw for many years and have exposed their bodies to fewer toxins should live longer, if the above argument is correct. To me, it seems that this is not the case. Raw Fooders tend to live a typical number of years.I think eating all the time (even if it's raw food) will slow the rate of healing and detoxification.The culture I live in seems to condition people to eat eat eat. 12pm is lunch. 5pm is dinner. You just woke up? It's time for breakfast. Because of this, I'm not sure I even know what hungry feels like. I've tried fasting but I encounter feelings that I associate with hunger and cave in.Anyway, I just wanted to bring the topic up. See if anyone else has thoughts on the topic.

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While there are no long term studies on the effect of CR on humans, I think it's well established that it has benefits. I don't think it has anything to do with cooked/raw, but about triggering your body's natural survival responses by not over feeding it. E.g. A simple thing like fasting is known to increase HGH, one of the very few things apart from exercise which can do so. Struggle is good for survival, being stuffed and sitting on your couch is not! It's actually quite interesting that when you compare health of primitive societies to ours, after taking out factors such as disease caused by infection, natural factors etc, they were actually healthier. Same applies to people living today in tribal areas, those not eating a western diet etc.I need to learn about benefits of sprouting and whether it can become a main source of nutrition, I never really thought about that till now.

I think the problem is we do t kow what hunger truly feels like. We eat because we want to, and we dont stop when we are full. Listening to your body is I think a key part of health, and it's not easy.Food used to be a necessity, and it still is for billions who go hungry :(, but it's also a source of pleasure and its hard to deny that.

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I need to learn about benefits of sprouting and whether it can become a main source of nutrition, I never really thought about that till now.

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Go to the sprouting! thread ot learn more about sprouting. The thread is huge but the whole thing is full of good information, so read the whole thing (eventually) if you have the time.

As for it being a major source of nutrition...it is. Sprouts, grasses and weeds (wild greens) are the most nutritious land foods on the planet, and if you top that off with some algae and sea veggies (the most nutritious water foods) then you'll get the absolute best nutrition you possibly could.

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and of course longevity has a lot to do with your own genetic make-up as well. Some people just go on and on and on living even though they have a "dreadful" lifestyle.

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It's a pity that most people end up coming to this lifestyle because they're sick...I can only imagine how healthy those people who never get sick even with a horrible lifestyle would be as sproutarians. But sadly you can't convince them to try it (I've tried), because they figure there's nothing wrong with their current lifestyle - because they never get sick. Maybe they'll learn in 50 years.

At which point they'll wish they had done it 50 years ago.

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Originally Posted by Living Food

It's a pity that most people end up coming to this lifestyle because they're sick...I can only imagine how healthy those people who never get sick even with a horrible lifestyle would be as sproutarians. But sadly you can't convince them to try it (I've tried), because they figure there's nothing wrong with their current lifestyle - because they never get sick. Maybe they'll learn in 50 years.

At which point they'll wish they had done it 50 years ago.

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So many never need to learn.

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Originally Posted by MysticTree

and of course longevity has a lot to do with your own genetic make-up as well. Some people just go on and on and on living even though they have a "dreadful" lifestyle.

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I have seen this too. It makes me wonder how much these people are eating.

I agree it's genetic. Some people (like me) are programmed to eat. My mom said that's the first thing I was good at right out of the womb ("chow hound" I think was her term). Yet there are other people that just don't like to eat. They take a bite or two and the rest is left to waste. Those people are always thin, wiry, hyper and bouncing off the walls with energy. It kind of seems like you have the thick, large people (the eaters, like me) and you have the thin, skinny people.

How many large old people do you see? I don't think people get smaller when they get older. I think the larger ones die first. It's a morbid thought (especially given my genetic disposition). I think it all boils down to the rate at which you go through calories. If you eat more calories per day, you live less.

I don't want to live 100 years, frankly. I think it would be sad to see everyone I know die and be left alone. My goal is more above achieving health and improving my quality of life. I'd love to be a 70-year old that looks and acts 30 (I'd be okay with 40 too).

I think putting these concepts together, I see what I need to do to reach those goals. Now I need to learn how to eat less and stay satisfied (quality of life and all that). To be honest, the juices Living Food is promoting sounds like something I should try.

I'm not even just talking about eating. My ex husband drinks a bottle of whisky a day and smokes 20-40 fags a day and he is fit as a very fit flea. That is his genetic make-up. Not fair but that is so.

My father eats tons of food, and lives on a cooked southern diet of fried food, meat, bread and dairy. He's turning 90 later this month.

Of course, I don't advocate this diet, and I've tried for years to get him to eat more fruits and veggies and clean up his diet, but he stauncly refuses.

Just sayin'.

It's a pity that most people end up coming to this lifestyle because they're sick...I can only imagine how healthy those people who never get sick even with a horrible lifestyle would be as sproutarians. But sadly you can't convince them to try it (I've tried), because they figure there's nothing wrong with their current lifestyle - because they never get sick. Maybe they'll learn in 50 years.

At which point they'll wish they had done it 50 years ago.

No matter how well intentioned you are, the harder you try to convert people over to your way of thinking/lifestyle, the harder it will be to get the desired results you'd like to see. Such attempts often alienate/polarize people, and make them less likely to want to - it's just human nature.

I have found that holding onto the "other people should be doing this" or "other people shouldn't be doing that" way of thinking only serves to make me create more unecessary frustration for myself, so have since opted to just live by example.

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so have since opted to just live by example.

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Me too. People don't like being told they're harming their health.

When I said "I've tried", that was a long time ago and I don't bother to do that anymore - now people come up to me asking how in the world I'm so healthy and energetic. They don't normally do anything about it when I tell them, but at least they think about it as opposed to just rejecting it becuase they don't like people telling them what to do.

And recently I've been getting quite a few people into sprouting (without preaching to them, they just want to do it after hearing why I'm so healthy) - normally pretty small-scale, but it's a start.

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Originally Posted by D'vorah

My father eats tons of food, and lives on a cooked southern diet of fried food, meat, bread and dairy. He's turning 90 later this month.

Of course, I don't advocate this diet, and I've tried for years to get him to eat more fruits and veggies and clean up his diet, but he stauncly refuses.

Just sayin'.

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My great grandfather, as well as most of my great aunts and uncles, were centenarians and grew up on the very same food (except you forgot to mention the sausage gravy :lol:). They were all fit and spry well into their late nineties and were still driving cars (at least during daylight hours). GGF even initiated and got a divorce from his second wife when he was 98!

Of course, even the (taboo) food you're mentioning was much more wholesome and nutritious decades ago. And they had far fewer environmental toxins, got far more exercise, probably didn't have to deal with being on drugs (pharmaceuticals), had much less EMR to worry about, etc.

And their parents had it even better then them, so their genetic makeup was better.

Yes, the food was more wholesome, however, most of the men left grade school (some as young as nine) to work underground in the coal mines. W re: to mines - although those operating today as still bad, the ones back then were far worse.

Better genetics back then.

Luckily, genes can be turned on/off with diet, exercise, and your thoughts + emotions, and certain algae supplements (AFA for sure, probably chlorella too, but I'm not sure about spirulina) can actually improve your genetic makeup + DNA.

To tie into the main topic of this thread, eating less food is one of those things that modulates genes.

Yeah much better. Atom bombs going off, widespread nuclear testing, Love canal, thalidamide-type attitudes to marketing drugs, DDT, agent orange etc. Etc. Etc.