Gene’s Blog

I believe that we are here to express life to our highest potential.

Just in case you ‘accidentally’ landed on my blog, that’s no accident! In fact, I believe that there are no accidents! Stick around and see what comes up for you here.

You’re probably reading this because you are interested in your own clear vision and eyesight. This blog is dedicated to sharing with you– from the heart– my experience, strength and hope about clear vision, eyesight and nutrition.

Even though my eyesight has been excellent for over 23 years, I intend to do everything within my power now to preserve and maintain it into my later years.

Preserve Vision and Eyesight

What can you do to preserve your eyesight? This day and age is fraught with stress and strain in the midst of a very toxic environment. We are bombarded with toxins in everything from the water we drink to the air we breathe, from the food we eat to the media we attend, to the advertising blitz,
24/7/365.

How can we escape this toxic burden to mind, body and spirit?

We filter our water and in some cases even filter our air. Some of you may filter your mental and emotional intake by censoring the news you receive on radio and TV. The constant barrage of ‘bad news’ (sin, sex and shooting) tends to keep the mind enslaved to the ‘machine’.

Have you ever thought about filtering your food? What would it be like to begin to get in touch with what we eat and drink? Could we see how much life force is left after all the processing and before it gets to our tables and our mouths?

Stop, Look and Listen

Stop! Take a moment and stop what you are doing. Close your eyes and take a deep breath. Go within and get in touch with your inner self . . . your Higher Self.

Ask this question: Is what I eat and drink on a daily basis giving me the best possible supply for a
healthy and enjoyable life? Is what I eat and drink the best I could do for my vision and eyesight?

Ask yourself: ‘Am I being supported spiritually by my intake of food and drink?’

Did you get a ‘no’ answer to one or more of these questions?

Then Act

A great Teacher once said, “You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free. And when the truth sets you free you will be free indeed.” In other words you will be free, free, free. Free to live, free to express and above all free to love. He also said. “Seek and you shall find.”

Please join me on my journey as I seek to learn more about the benefits of ‘raw food’ and how to shift to a cleaner lifestyle. Clean from the standpoint of putting or allowing the least amount of toxics into my body, mind and spirit.

Review

So much has happened since I made a conscious decision to ‘clean up my life’ that it would take a book to tell it all. So I will just summarize for you here. In the past few months, I . . .

1. Withdrew from caffeine
2. Got inspired by Victoria Botenko’s DVD to try raw food
3. Dramatically reduced the consumption of white or processed sugars
4. Joined and began attending raw food potlucks
5. Learned how to make green smoothies
6. Planted a garden in a community garden spot
7. Began riding my bicycle as much as possible (also saves gas)
8. Bought a Vita-mix blender
9. Gained almost 20 pounds in lightness (you could say I lost 20 pounds of unwanted weight)
10. Demonstrated raw food at a local wellness fair
11. Began harvesting large quantities of greens for making green smoothies
12. Joined a new ‘raw food potluck’ closer to home

The Proof of the Pudding is in the Eating

The best part is how I feel with these changes in diet and lifestyle.

In my very first blog I mentioned, “With the old standard ‘all American diet’, I did not have enough energy and suffered from general aches and pains most of the time. I always seemed to get fatigued in the late afternoon and did not feel like going out at night much. My immune system was not up to par and resisting or getting over colds and minor illnesses was difficult.”

Wow, how this has all changed!

I have more energy now than I remember having at half my age! Since going ‘mostly raw’ in early March of 2008, I have added about two to two-and-a-half hours in my day. I am actually getting more quality living out of my life each and every day!

Before, I usually got fatigued around four or five o’clock and wasn’t worth a plug nickel for any enjoyable evening activity after six p.m. You would find me going to bed early or just ‘vegging out’ before the TV or computer.

Now, I am full of life and vitality so that I am enjoying attending evening activities several nights a week. Sometimes I don’t get to bed until eleven p.m. and am still awake, alert and I get my day
started at six or seven in the morning.

Clearer Mind

As my energy level has dramatically risen, my mind seems sharper and my memory is quicker and clearer. I confess that I still have to search for a word or someone’s name now and then but it is getting much better. The time lapse between when I look for a word and when it comes to me is getting shorter and shorter.

Victoria Botenko Came to Town

Last Saturday the lady who inspired me to actually try ‘raw food’, Victoria Botenko, came to Portland, OR and made a presentation at our Portland Raw Food Meetup. Victoria in a veritable encyclopedia of information about health, lifestyle and raw food.

Victoria shared information about edible wild plants, including weeds, that are readily available everywhere this time of year. Her son, Sergie, leads special hikes in southern Oregon teaching people how to identify wild edible plants.

Since Victoria’s presentation, with the help of my friend, Liliana, I have been able to identify at least four (4) edible plants growing in and around my garden plot. Victoria says that wild plants have more vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients including chlorophyll than plants we grow for food in our gardens.

Better Eyesight

Victoria travels extensively and shares her expertise with ‘live food’ enthusiasts all over this country and Canada. She testifies that she has met many folks who, after going raw, got rid of their glasses. She did not say what else they did to heal and improve their eyesight and vision, but I do know that having a qualified vision coach is a huge advantage.

Conclusion

As my gran’pa used to say at the close of his sermons in a little country church in the hills of Alabama, “Well it’s about time I brung my scattering remarks to a close.”

There is much more to share so I commit to you that I will begin blogging more often.

Acknowledgements: Amy Morita for reminding me, Ami Goldberg for editing, and Arden Goldberg for his formatting and publishing the blogs.

Hello Visionaries,

You have chosen to take charge of your own health and that’s a good thing. It shows vision and foresight on your part.

Thank you for checking out my blog. I am a ‘virgin blogger’. This is my very first entry to my very first blog.

My intention is to share from the heart about what’s going on in my life.

Right now my major focus in my personal life is on nutrition.

Let me share what’s going on.

Even though proper nutrition was a central topic during my training as a certified vision educator, up until now I have given nutrition very little emphasis with my clients.

I confess that I did not teach about nutrition mainly because I was not ‘walking the walk.’ I was not setting a good example with a good diet and nutritional program. I was still eating the ‘all American diet’ and consuming things not beneficial to good healthy mind, body and eyes.

And I’ll admit that I have tried to change and made some advances always to fall back to the diet I had grown up with.

With the old standard ‘all American diet’ I did not have enough energy and suffered from general aches and pains most of the time.  I always seemed to get fatigued in the late afternoon and did not feel like going out at night much.  My immune system was not up to par and resisting or getting over colds and minor illnesses was difficult.  When I tried to change things, like getting off refined sugar, it was always an uphill battle.

I bought an expensive juicer and began juicing fruits and vegetables for a while.  It was a lot of work and did not solve my problem.  It may have made it worse since it gave false hope of getting better.  It certainly did not slow down the cravings I had for certain foods and certain substances.

Little did I know that I was addicted to food!

My addition became evident when I learned about high fructose corn syrup (HFCS).  I asked my friend, Garry Renschler, a nutritionist at the local YMCA, why I could not break the sugar habit.  He showed me report after report of research that indicated that high fructose corn syrup is a ‘non-food’ and very highly addictive.  HFCS is in almost every processed food on the market in America today.  Not only that, but it is widely used in soft drinks and in food prepared in restaurants and fast food outlets.

HFCS, according to Garry, gives our body false signals and leaves a person hungry no matter how much food one actually consumes.  This sugar substitute then stores itself in our body cells as fat.  It is put into food to make it more palatable and create an appetite for more.  It is cheap to manufacture and much sweeter than refined sugar.

Garry teaches his clients that just removing most of the HFCS from ones’ diet is the first step to breaking the sugar habit.  And I found out that it is not enough.  So I began reading labels and doing my best not to buy anything with HFCS as an ingredient.  My previous training as a Drug Abuse Counselor told me that if HFCS were addictive it would take strong measures to rid oneself of this substance.  And I probably could not be successful by myself.  I would need support.

It is true that ‘God always supplies our needs according to his riches,’ as it says in the Bible.  I sincerely wanted to change my diet and nutritional program.  I tried and failed many times and was very frustrated with the process.  My prayers were answered when a close friend of mine invited me to watch some DVDs by Victoria Boutenko of Ashland, Oregon.  Victoria told about how her family, also known as the Raw Family, embarked on a diet of entirely raw foods in 1994 after they became seriously ill.  Victoria had arrhythmia and edema and was obese and depressed.  Igor suffered from painful rheumatoid arthritis and had severe hyperthyroid.  Sergei was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes and was supposed to go on insulin.  Valya had asthma.

At first I said, “Raw food: YUK!” I could not imagine myself eating nothing but salads, raw vegetables, fruits and raw nuts all of the time.

But as she talked, Victoria demonstrated how easy it is to make ‘green smoothies’ and other delightful raw food dishes.  I began right away to buy fresh organic greens and fruit and blend them in my blender.  It is quick, easy and very tasty using her formula.

To make a long story short, this led to my being invited to a weekly raw food potluck hosted by Thomas and Gabrielle Chavez.  At the potluck I met some very radiant folks who ascribe to the raw food diet.  They told me more stories of how eating raw food had changed their health and their life.  When I attended their potlucks I witnessed firsthand that raw food can be prepared quickly and is beautiful and delicious.  Gabrielle says that it is less expensive over the long run to eat raw as they were able to cut their food bill by one third, and eventually to less that one half of what they had been spending.

After several potlucks and reading Gabrielle’s book, ‘The Raw Food Gourmet, Going Raw for Total Well-Being,’ I am hooked!

Now my diet is changing rapidly to raw food and I have planned a spring garden in a community garden plot nearby.  Next time I will give you an article from a well respected vision educator on this subject.

Stay tuned and I will keep you posted on my progress with how this big change in diet affects my health and well-being.

Gene Younger