Breaking all my own rules!

Well, the last 24 hours have been nothing short of sheer indulgence in carnal pleasures, and while at one point in my life I’d have been an introverted mess of self-punishment, I love the fact that I’m totally at peace with my toxicity.

In fact, I had a marvelous time, but, naturally, I like better the way I feel when I’m my spritey self exploding in a orchestra of sensations for the “little” things.I believe it does me some good now and again to find myself here… stuck in the thick thud and heavy energy of what life is like for a lot of people every day.

Kinda puts my two feet back on the ground and reminds me why I do why I do.And I impress myself, frankly. Because at one time I’d have been engaging in self punishment and regret. But I’ve got no more room for regret in my life. Just the appreciation for what I learn along the way as I stumble about — like a diva with a busted stiletto sometimes. 

If life was always blissful, orderly and predictable, I think at least half the fun of living would be gone for me. The fun is in the adventure and my best learning has always come AFTER I fall!

Here’s to honoring the process–to living in love with a thirst for adventure and willingness to learn from the slips, rather than slow down the journey getting lost in regret, blame or self-punishment. The serenity of being can be found within us, and when we have that, then we can stand up against the bumps and blips that would otherwise knock us about.

When you know WHO you are, the little stuff like what you eat holds less significance somehow. I don’t care what anyone says, I am NOT what I eat.  I am much more how I think and what I am willing to create! And by golly, the more I get to know myself, the neater I think I am and the more FUN life gets! 

Love and hugs to delicious divas EVERYWHERE!

Off for some beauty sleep…xo

The Crimes We Commit Against Our Stomachs

I’m always surprised when I do private consultations with clients, how few people actually know how to identify real hunger. We have become accustomed, and admittedly indoctrinated, to think of rumblings in the stomach, irritability, dizziness and impatience as being indications of “hunger.”

Unfortunately, this couldn’t be further from the truth.These symptoms that are mistaken for hunger are actually indications that the body is detoxing or in a state of imbalance. Rumbling in the tummy indicates that things are NOT being digested well or easily, and that’s one of the worst times you could possibly be eating more food.

Headaches, irritability, and dizziness are signs of a body out of balance. Hunger is as natural as the urge for sex, and it can be a very pleasant, persistent and pulling sensation. Far from the torturous affair it can sometimes have the reputation to be.

It’s true that eating will often stop the headaches and irritability, but that is because it is halting the effects of detox! The body can no longer invest the energy in cleaning out the toxins, because it must be redirected to processing the foods that are coming in. That’s the cycle that most people undergo every day—keeping them in a chronic state of toxicity.

What Hunger Should Really Feel Like

Personally, I love feeling hungry. My senses are heightened, my stomach “pulls,” my mouth salivates and I feel like ANYTHING tastes good. I can recall clearly in my early days of being a raw foodist having gone to a restaurant with some friends. I’d decided not to eat that night—not even a salad—and preferred to wait until I got home. But I knew I was getting hungry.

At a certain point I looked up and noticed the decorative plants in the restaurant and felt an overwhelming urge to go and snack on the leaves! I was amazed and excited to have recognized, maybe for the first time, a natural and innate drive to feed my body the kind of food I would find in nature.

It was a moment of triumph for me! I’d wanted to nibble on plant leaves instead of pile my plate with assorted cooked classics.

It is as important to know when to eat as to know what to eat!

An alarming majority of people mistake thirst for hunger! Just try it sometime. Next time you feel the urge to go to the fridge or pop another banana down the pipes, grab a big glass of water instead and see how you feel.

It’s true that those of us on the raw food diet don’t consume the same dehydrating foods as most people, but I think many of us still underestimate our needs for water.

If you’re consuming salts, spices or concentrated foods, you’re going to need water to help your body process and eliminate these toxins. Ensuring you are well hydrated is preventative medicine for over-eating and eating without hunger. It sounds simple enough, but before you eat, just ask yourself if you’re really hungry. If you’re not sure, wait! True hunger persists. Grab a glass of water. You’ll not have hurt yourself by holding off a bit longer.

How to Reset Your Body’s Hunger Button

One of the most empowering things you can possibly do for yourself is a 24 hour fast where you really allow yourself to re-experience the genuine sensations of hunger. In our 30 Day Body Enlightenment System, participants start off their journey this way and it makes all the difference in their ability to start off on the right foot and carry through with the program! It’s like hitting the reset button on the body.

If it may not be easy or comfortable for you to do a fast, you can at least make sure that you allow your body a good 12-15 hour break from foods during the night! Eating late at night can do significant damage to your body’s natural hunger cycles and general energy.This one has been my last great hurdle to overcome, and I still have to work quite a bit at it. (Anyone who has those purple bags under the eyes may want to consider this factor as a potential culprit, although there are a few others.)Your body needs TIME to process the events of the day.

It’s not just what you eat, it’s all the environmental “toxins” and experiences that stress the body, too. If you’ve got a belly full of food before you hit the hay, your body isn’t given the chance it needs to rest your internal organs and do some deeper cleaning.

Allowing yourself at least 3 hours between your last meal and the time you tuck yourself into the sheets will make a big difference on your energy when you wake up in the morning.

If you start the next day with water until you experience that tugging, but pleasant, natural hunger you will be well, well on your way to a successful way of eating and making huge improvements in your overall relationship with food.The more you implement these habits, the easier and more natural they become.

Soon you’ll get to a place where you really know and recognize your body’s natural signals and will have confidence in your ability to decipher its needs and respond accordingly.

We include a lot more tools, tricks and tips like these in our soon to be released program: A Diva’s Guide to Cravings and Emotional Eating!

Raw Divas In Action

 Ooooh! My cheeks are grinning from ear to ear! This just came in, hot off the diva streets:

Dear Friends at Raw Divas, I wanted to share something funny that happened to me, as it pertains to healthy lifestyles. My phone rang, and when I answered it, I heard thunderous laughter. It was a man. He was laughing so hard, that he could hardly speak.”Umm, Miss Nicky?” asked the man. “This is the Director of the Zoo. We received your letter of protest about Hot Dog Day at the Zoo.”Yes, I’d written a letter to the zoo. I told them that loving animals meant not eating them. That’s right, “if we really love animals, we will not eat them.” What a travesty, to serve hot dogs to our children… when this “food” is made of the cheapest meat by-products. Stuff like ground up cow parts and animal hair.My letter asked the Zoo to consider serving soy hot dogs. I talked to the Zoo Director for a while, and he was still stifling his laughter. The man had never heard of vegetarian hot dogs, but I told him where he could buy them, at any grocery store. Unfortunately, the Zoo Director didn’t change his mind. But I bet I made him think (and laugh!) He’d never heard from a Raw Diva before. I bet he’ll never forget either.Sometimes change takes time. Even if I plant a little seed, I cannot be ignored. I’m a Raw Diva, and proud of it. Perhaps someday, the Zoo will change there mind. For now, I’m just happy that I had the courage to speak up and take action.All the best Nicky

Now THAT’S the kinda stuff that makes my day and that makes life interesting. If every diva doubled her ripple puddle we’d be making such huge waves out there in the world, there’d be no stopping us. It takes a TRUE diva to believe in her own ability to impact the lives of others. And when she does things she’s aware of how her choices affect the delicate human ecosystem around her. Thanks so much, Nicky, for sharing this with us and for making the world a sparklier place to be! Love and hugs,Tera

I’d rather kiss a persimmon.

I know you’ll probably think me silly, but yesterday I had another erotic encounter with fruit.

Persimmons are in season, and I dare say I can’t hold myself back!

I can hardly even write this to you without blushing or dipping into the realm of steamy stories. The other day, the woman at the counter actually said I looked like I was having an ORGASM! She actually said THAT word!! I blushed.

But it’s true.

I mean, honestly, if I had to choose right now, at this moment between a handsome boy or a persimmon…

I’d rather kiss a persimmon.

If you didn’t read my article on sensation last week, you can find it below. You get as much out of your experience with food as you’re able to put in.

If you’ve ever experienced a persimmon, you know what I’m talking about.

Just think of the shape and soft, delicate skin…

The texture as it slips and glides through your mouth and down your throat. Slightly cool and refreshing!

The taste, the color…

A boy kiss is just wet and not very colorful.

It shouldn’t feel so taboo to write these things, but they are absolutely how I feel when I bask in the pleasure of eating my foods, of LIVING!

No salty stack of crackers could ever give me the same succulent, sweet satisfaction as fruits and vegetables.

If you’re having trouble losing yourself in the appreciation of your foods, try getting fat and spices off the table.

Come back to the sexy simplicity of food at its finest–naked the way nature intended. I’m not trying to be erotic, for heaven’s sake it IS EROTIC!

*shiver*

And if this sounds completely ridiculous, then you’ll want to be on the watchout for our cravings and emotional eating program that we’ll be releasing THIS WEEK! All the tricks and tools to persimmon seduction will be included.

Love and hugs,

Tera

p.s.

I bet my Prince Chocolate would kiss better than a persimmon. Hmmm…

How I Finally Got Over My Food Cravings

I wish I could count the number of times I sat clenching my fists, gritting my teeth and using any manner of force, will power and sheer brute-strength to resist cravings for certain foods, only to discover much later that ?resistance? really is futile.

If you?re anything like I was, this will likely sound familiar:

It starts innocently enough most times. A little nibble here, a dip of the finger there?

?then before long, the flood gates open and within minutes you find yourself staring in shock at the bottom of an empty bowl, stunned at how little control you seemed to have over the actions that just transpired.

For a long time, struggling with cravings felt like a living horror flick from which I couldn?t escape. Constantly feeling bombarded by ?forbidden foods,? I wrestled internally for a very long time before I finally figured out the tools to handle my emotional eating and food obsessions.

It didn?t feel ?fair,? when I would look around me and see prom queens kicking back bacon double cheeseburgers and then bouncing off like they had all the energy in the world. They didn?t seem to constantly have food on the brain and they were eating 10 times worse than I was.

I?m happy to say, those food-obsessed days are finally behind me and freedom feels great!

But it didn?t happen over night.

I?ve spent thousands of hours studying, trying, butting my head against the wall, falling down then pulling myself up again until finally coming to the realization that I had been missing a few very important pieces of information and tools to handle the situation. Once I discovered these, I finally had what it took to overcome my food obsessions and cravings once and for all.

We?ve outlined many of the steps of that journey and built in the tools that were discovered along the way in our upcoming program ?A Diva?s Survival Guide to Cravings and Emotional Eating?. We hope to release this program next week, so stay tuned!

Today we?re going to share a little something we didn?t include in that program, but has nonetheless had a profound impact on helping me confront my relationship with food.

Why do you eat?

Sounds simple enough, but really, why do you eat?

You eat to fuel your body and have the energy you need to function well, right?

In a perfect world it might stop at that, however, few people actually realize that one of the very biggest reasons we eat is to experience sensation!

If we truly ate to fuel ourselves and get the energy we needed, we?d be much more practical about our food choices, and have way less eating disorders out there. Just think of the shelves and shelves of recipe books in the world, with all manner of shapes, colors, sizes, names and tricks designed to tempt us into foods with the promise of sensation as the reward!

And yet, we know very well that the sensations we get from food, while at times pleasurable, are still of a low grade compared to something like enthusiasm, excitement, love or passion for something more substantial than a slab of cheesecake. Foods that offer sensation at the price of addiction easily drive you into a cycle of dependency.

It?s important to understand that the very ability to perceive anything in the first place comes from you! It is you!

Think about that for a second.

The flavor and perception of sensation (the exciting part) is in YOU, not the food itself! If it was in the food itself, we?d all have the same reaction to the same foods. But it doesn?t work that way.

Any hypnotist knows that you can get a person to go through just about any physiological reaction in the body, simply by imposing commands on the person at a subconscious level.

You could hypnotize a person to have a very violent reaction to specific foods, for example. These are things that are controllable within the person, and are not affected by controlling the food itself.

Fortunately, you don?t need hypnotism or somebody else?s subconscious commands to produce these kind of effects. You can produce them yourself with nothing more than the simple desire to make it happen! You can create any sensation in your body you wish, just by deciding to experience it. That?s what visualization is all about. That?s what hypnotists and therapists make a fortune applying on their patients.

You can experience serenity, joy, fear, excitement, seduction and intense pleasure just by closing your eyes and creating those sensations within you. Just think about something that excites you, and you?ll start to feel excited. Just like mentioning the idea of biting into a lemon is enough to make most people pucker and salivate as if the lemon were right there!

Do you see the possibility of what this could mean for you?

I?ve always insisted that the pursuit of health is about a whole lot more than food. I mean, if people can cure themselves of cancer by watching old comedy flicks, surely we can overcome some insatiable chocolate cravings with a bit of imagination and creative thought!

The sensations you?re getting from your food are actually a very low-grade sensation compared to the sensations of playfulness, joy, enthusiasm or exhilaration that can be gotten from being actively engaged in life. These sensations offer a much deeper level of satisfaction and stimulation, and don?t disappear when you?ve taken the last bite! You can?t get indigestion from having too great of an imagination!

Get your head out of your cereal bowl and set your sites on the stars, the flowers, and the people and places around you! Eat for the sake of fueling your body, and rediscover the pleasure of sensation and perceptions in things that will not bring your body down or get you stuck in a pattern of cravings and emotional eating.

Just play a bit more, take food a bit less ?seriously? and start having fun experiencing life for what it has to offer. In no time you?ll see how cravings and food obsessions just run by the boards effortlessly.