The Earth Diet begins....

The Earth Diet begins!!!!

Tomorrow I will take on the healthiest and most demanding challenge of my life!

Who: Me!!!!
Let me know if anyone else out there wants to give this a go too!  We can do it together :)

What: I will eat only natural and wholesome foods provided by the earth for 365 days. The Earth Diet challenge! No processed foods, no artifical anythings, no sweetners, no additives, no enhanced flavours and preservatives!

Name: The Earth Diet

Where: Where ever I am in the world, under any circumstance I must say no to any processed food!

When: Starting tomorrow Sunday 25th October 2009 for 365 days until October 25th 2010!

Why: To empower myself and others in choosing what we put in our mouths. To create a healthy, balanced eating lifestyle and look and feel vibrant!! I believe that doing this I will begin my healing process, achieve weight loss, I will feel beautiful inside and out, have peace of mind, tone up, tighten up, be healthier, gain confidence, have control, restore self love, have courage, self confidence, be free from resentment, guilt and regret on myself.

Biggest Fear: I am afraid of failing. I am afraid of finding out that I do not have control over my food addiction and that I will live with the pain and suffering of the binge eating for the rest of my life.

I declare: I declare my binge eating and addiction to pain complete as of right now!

Inspirations: You!! If I have a craving for junk food I will think of you. Whether anyone actually reads this  it will keep me accountable. I will have to be true to my word, because I will think oh no I’m not eating that because I will check in at my blog tonight and I will not write ‘today I failed’ or ‘I couldn't do it’. I’m sick of my ‘I can’t do it’ attitude when it comes to food, it’s now time for ‘I CAN’. Control over my eating experiences.

Rules:
Yes: Whole natural organic foods from the earth; fruits, vegetables, nuts, eggs, meat, fish. Anything that comes from a tree, a plant, the ground, the ocean I will eat.

No: Refined and processed foods, anything with chemicals, preservatives, additives, GMO's or anything ingredients I cannot pronounce this includes:  Soft drinks (soda), lollies(candy), chocolates, chips, cakes, cookies, bleached flours, breads.

If you want to hear my “story” and more “whys” for my Earth Diet challenge then read below. I will check in every night and post a blog about my day doing the Earth Diet!

I wasn't joking when I meant that this is going to be the biggest challenge of my life!  Because I’m afraid of failing. For five years I have battled with finding a ‘balanced’ eating lifestyle. My weight constantly yo-yos, as does my energy, vitality and social activities. Basically my whole life revolves around food. I let it get out of control 5 years ago. I was 17 and modelling, I was energetic, fit and healthy, I didn't worry about food, focus on it or put attention or energy on what I ate, I basically ate anything and everything but in moderation and balance. Then something ‘happened".  I got a disappointing grade during my final year of school for one subject. I got this underlying feeling of guilt and thoughts of ‘I’m not good enough’, ‘I can't do it’ and ‘I’m not in control". I would scoff down on ice cream and chocolate and not even remember what it tasted like. I was totally unconscious, then I would feel so guilty that I was ruining my body with toxins, then I feared I would get fat and ugly. This experience felt like a vicious cycle and that I was punishing myself for not being good enough. This guilt I created inside me would create a resistance in my body and that would make the food hard to digest and excrete. Now I have bowel issues, and if I am stressed, it just doesn't work at all!

For 5 years this has gone on, until tomorrow. Tomorrow I will commit to 365 days of process free food and only eat foods that the earth provides naturally.  For 5 years I have struggled with bouncing back and forth from extreme organic healthy person, to a junk food binger. I would hide this from my friends and family. I would only want them to see me as a healthy person, so if I was in binge-mode by myself, I would silence any phone calls I received and reject any social offers to go out or meet with anyone! One week I would detox and have a colonic, along with beetroot juices, and all natural foods, and I would feel great, and clean and vibrant, and once I got to this feeling I would sabotage it and binge on as much junk food as I could in one day! This became an exhausting vicious cycle! I learned that I had an addiction when it got to the 5 year mark. In the dictionary an addiction is described as “the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming” and I felt I had no control over what went in my mouth and that I wasn't able to go for longer than a week without a binge. I had no power or integrity around it at all, I would have a thought ‘I should eat some chocolate’ and then feel I would have to go and eat it, that I had no choice but to just do it. Once I learned I had an addiction I realized I was addicted to the pain of this experience. Each week my moods would change with the foods depending on the amount of chemicals I would consume. I always seem to be more calm, more relaxed, happy and peaceful when I eat wholesome real foods as opposed to a nervy, yoyo moody stress head when my body is full of toxic foods. It is very hard for me to feel good and live my dreams when I am eating soo much junk foods. The last ‘binge spree’ I had was today, I started the day with white bread with peanut butter and vegemite, a small packet of special k (cereal), a piece of chocolate fudge (loaded with sugar) a ham and egg wrap, a white chocolate and macadamia chunk cookie, a packet of gobstopper candy, 2 scones with butter and vegemite, a picnic bar (chocolate) and a chocolate freddo frog, a kit kat and another freddo frog, French fries and a chicken wrap. Then another chocolate bar ; snickers. I didn't enjoy any of this, I felt tired, drowsy and dizzy.

I believe that doing this will empower me – so I will have a deep confidence of knowing that I do have control and I can choose what I eat, instead of feeling like a victim to a food/pain addiction.

I also hope this empowers you to want to be healthy and to know that you can choose health.
I’ve tried so many things and ways to get rid of this over the past 5 years. I've had colonics in the hope that it would wash out my craving cells so I wouldn't crave sugar – didn’t work, I tried detoxing with beetroot and ginger juice to get it all out of my system, I tried yoga, meditations, I was even hypnotised, I’ve tried ‘starting again’ hundreds of times! I would have a massive binge and say ‘this is definitely the last time, I’ve had enough, tomorrow I will start, tomorrow, tomorrow’, Tomorrow never came until NOW!

I believe that the earth provides us with all the natural resources we need – including food. The aboriginals lived off the land for hundreds of years with a natural lifestyle.  I am hoping as a last resort that by me taking on this Earth Diet challenge, and eating wholesome foods from the earth, my bingeing addiction will totally disappear and I will be able to maintain a happy and healthy balance when it comes to food and health!

I’m actually starting to freak out now. I just realized what I have created and that tomorrow I will not be able to eat an ice cream, how will I know how to be? How do I ‘be’ without an addiction? It’s been part of my identity for 5 years.

I told my friend about the challenge and after a silent pause he said “That sounds crazy. That sounds full on. Yeah totally crazy. Liana that’s crazy. You know go for it, but it’s going to be expensive.” That’s something I had not taken into consideration. Will it be cheaper eating earth foods or processed foods? When I told my other friend about my new Earth Diet challenge he laughed and said “But why?”.....I guess we will see.....