iresi | Entries tagged with health

It is a dark dark world outside but one gotta stay positive and feel happiness for every little thing in the right direction. I try my best to focus my energy on things that makes me happy and don't think so much about things that makes me less happy. I got a smile on my face today when a friend told me he was going to try being a vegetarian/vegan for one month and asked me for recepies. I'm not asking everyone to become a veggie but when someone does it makes me smile for sure :) That's a safe card to make me happy at least (and a couple of animals too ;))

I have respect for everyone and don't judge but this is so awesome. I feel that the acceptance is growing more and more. I feel the love (as the hippie I truly am :P)

Watched two interesting videos today. Didn't work to get them displayed here unfortunately. But one can always paste the links.

First one are about two lovely vegan twins who grew up as vegans in a vegan family and here is what they have to say:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJWQ_yV9roA&list=LL4BXoqvRfx1jXdXzT6uQrBw&index=2

The other one is much more offending but the guy is right of course. Many vegans already know about this guy. It is Gary Yourofsky. I usually don't watch his videos because I don't want to see animals suffering. This one seemed quite harmeless though but I still had to look away, yup that's how sensitive I am. So if you also are you are warned. But I think it was a quite kind video, well not for the reporter I guess but maybe she learned something.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYP1GGdRMYo&index=1&list=LL4BXoqvRfx1jXdXzT6uQrBw

One doesn't want to be the arrogant vegan, hope people could view vegans as the caring kinds instead :) They might seem annoying but it is just because they care so much, like parents can be annoying too but if one just think about that they care so much and focus on that then it feels much better :) And if one turns the coin one gets a lot of questions if one is not like the norm, like if one does not eat meat, it is nothing strange at all to not eat meat and it is so cool that more and more people want to try to be a vegetarian/vegan :) I'm almost thankful now for my kidney stone attack which gave me a good reason to become a vegetarian that few would question. It strarted for health reasons but my thoughts were with the animals before that. That was over seven years ago now and no new kidney stone attack, in fact no more health issues at all except for some small colds, but I can live with that :P And also feel great to not being part of harming other individuals. Every animal has their own personality just like humans, if one ever had a pet one knows about this :)

I should try to put some veggie recepies here. It seems like that's the problem in the beginning. One doesn't know what to cook. But there is so much so I don't even know were to start. One can cook just about anything one like. I can barely remember what I ate in the beginning. I guess quite much quorn, which I almost never eat nowadays. Quorn is not natural and not vegan either. I buy much kidney beans, tofu, red lentils, zuccini, aubergine, paprika, mushrooms and some soy stuff. I also make pancakes with "noegg", oatsmilk and butter without milk. There is definately room for not liking all veggie food when there is so much to choose from. There are a lot more vegetables one can eat then there are kinds of animals one can eat. At the moment I'm crazy for kale, but mostly my homemade kale chips, my new favorite snack. Maybe I share my tips on that some time :)

Current Mood: happy
Current Music: Tesla Boy - Strong (Instrumental)

Ever since I heard about coconut oil being the healthiest oil to cook with I have read more and more about it and I just keep on learning new things about it and new ways of using it. So this evening I even tried coconut oil pulling and I must say that my mouth feels very fresh. Of course ones teeth won't get whiter after just trying it once for 5 - 10 minutes. But I think I'll try this again. I haven't read anything negative about it. The only negative people turned out to be people who hadn't even tried it themselves, nor doing any kind of research about it and who seemed very narrow minded. The only "bad" thing would in any case just be that it would have no effect. Because even the negative ones could not say anything worse then that it would have no effect. So in worst case nothing happens and in best case the health gets improved. And after using coconut oil for 2 weeks I have noticed that I have gotten more energy and my skin feels softer. I have no negative experience so far except a few pimples but they quickly dissapeared so that was nothing. I like discovering "new" things. The use of this oil is defiantely not something "new", it is just "new" to me and many others. But in asia they used this oil for thousands of years...

For fun today I also saw some clips about the 10 healthiest fruits and 10 healthiest vegetables and concluded that much of it I ate today (well it is yesterday now but anyhow I meant litterly what I ate, that's the frutis I ate and the vegetables I had for dinner, like banana, citrus fruits, red grapes and for dinner spring onion, garlic, spinach, avocado, tomatoes, lemon... things I eat very often and all of this was organic of course) :) But I learned about a few new fruits and vegetables that I should eat more often. For example apples and blueberries. I don't eat apples that often but apperently it is true that an apple keeps the doctor away... I'm rarely sick anyway. I do believe that most of our health has to do with what we eat, (that's quite logical) and then of course it is good to move your body some as well and not just sit and stare in front of the computer the whole day, but that's it. So this is why I'm very interested in reading about healthy things to eat. I guess this "interest" for food started after my kidney stone attack in 2007. When I realised that what I ate probably had caused the terrible pain I got and it was quite scary. (I've heard that a kidney stone attack even hurts more then giving birth! :O I have not tried the later so I can't really compare but I find it quite hard to believe... but if one can compare it then one knows that a kidney stone attack hurts) The doctors told me it takes 5 years to build up new kidney stones. I haven't had a kidney stone attack since 2007... This was in October 2007 so it is over 7 years ago now and no new kidney stone that I know of :) and last year I was only sick once with a cold that I got from a friend who I shared hotel room with. In the beginning of 2008 I became more or less a vegetarian. I still had seafood though. Nowadays I rarely eat seafood. But it can happen as I'm not that strict about it. But I try to think of which fishes I eat in that case as some contains more mercury then others. But I also rarely eat any diary products so I'm almost a vegan nowadays (and it is not only for health reasons but it made it easier for me to finally make the decision to not eat meat, of course I never liked when animals suffer but I hadn't thought or read much about it until around the time of my kidney stone attack. I thank it for my healthier eating. It is strange but non vegan people seem to think that being vegan for health reasons is better then for the reason one cares for animals...). I'm not 100% vegan though but maybe 90% vegan. Which means if I cook at home it is vegan at least 95% of time and if I eat out (which I don't do much at all) it is often vegetarian because it is easier to find then finding vegan. If I can have vegan though, then I'll have it and if there is a buffet I have more control and can chose only vegan food. And I started to take additional B12 almost every day too.

Anyhow, I think that because I keep my mind open about food and already read a lot about different kind of health benefits from organic fruits and vegetables I got very interested in this coconut oil and I love to learn new things. So here are some information. An article that is not over optimistic (there are tons of those if you google) but still shows that there has been studies about it that shows it has benefits: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/12/oil-pulling_n_4943808.html

And some videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pKK4tWfYT4&index=3&list=LL4BXoqvRfx1jXdXzT6uQrBw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtFzd3TBYiI&list=LL4BXoqvRfx1jXdXzT6uQrBw&index=4

Maybe I seem naive for trying out those kind of health stuff but it is just food and a big reason that I want to use cocnut oil more is that then I wouldn't need to use stuff on my skin that have chemicals in them and a bonus is that it gets cheaper to just use coconut oil instead of for example deodorant, deep conditioner, body scrub, lip balm, body lotion etc.

Current Mood: good
Current Music: Simple Minds - Kill Or Cure

I think I used coconut oil for about a week now and I'm quite obsessed by it :P I already consumed a jar of 225 ml coconut oil and bought three more bigger jars with coconul oils. And I just want to buy more and more because I want to try all different brands of coconut oils I can find. I already know which one is the cheapest but don't know if that one is the best. I can't believe I missed out on coconut oil until now... apparently it has been a "trend" to use this oil for years now. I had no idea. I never really read blogs about beauty and such so I guess that's why I missed out. Because the "trend" seems to be mostly in beauty contexts but also in health contexts.The reason I got to know about it was of course because I was reading an article about unhealthy food and then in the article the author said that there is only one healthy oil to cook with and that's coconut oil. And after that it got my attention. I googled it a lot, I still google coconut oil every day to learn more and more about this fanstastic oil that you can not only cook with and eat like it is, you can use it on your body and hair too! And a lot of other different things. But it is most fun to use it on myself but my wooden spoons has got a treatment too and my bike could get a treat too since one could use it to grease the bicycle chain... If only I had known this earlier, then I wouldn't have to buy that unhealthy oil I now have for my bike... But I'm really glad I found it.
I already made my own deodorant using coconut oil, bicarbonat and potato flour. One should only put things on ones body that one can also eat because the skin also "eats" and you wouldn't want the skin to eat chemicals, now would you? I want to make my own soups with coconut oil too, but haven't found a good organic reciepe yet but maybe someday I'll do that as well. I already have bought soups containing coconut oil before I even knew what it was so.

The uses and benefits with this oil seem to never end. I have very dry hands now in the winter and they even have a bit of eczema so my hand has got a lot of coconut oil now but unfortunately I wash my hands a lot too so not sure it helps that much but I do think my hands has gotten softer. And I think my hair has gotten softer too. But I think I have to use this oil for a bit more to notice more difference. I haven't dared to try it on my face much yet as I read that in the beginning it can give you acne and I already noticed a bit of it after applying a lot of it to my hair and going to bed with it. In the morning I had a pimple on my chin were my hair had been and I had several small pimples on my back were my hair had been. They were just small so no big deal but I wouldn't place this oil all over my face if it would make me get a lot of pimples... so maybe I just carefully add it on some spots to try a bit or maybe in time of isolation in the summer at the summer house I could try it out more :P This oil also works as a sun screen so I'll definately use it for that. It seems you can use this oil for just about anything... So I already have three jars waiting to use at home and I'm obsessed with buying more even if I haven't used up what I got because I know I will use a lot of this fantastic oil :) I have used it every day since I first bought it.
I don't even know were to begin, before I thought my extra energy came from that I started to train a bit in the evenings (after a long lazy period with no more training then my daily biking to work) but now I wonder if the oil hasn't been adding me extra energy as well ;)
This oil is really super healthy and I read that it was the stupid americans with power in the food industry who removed this oil from the market in the 1950:es and has made people suffer so much by removing this oil and replacing it with unhealthy fats. But now the coconut oil is back and I hope more people will use it! I saw a picture of a 70 + old photomodel and her skin looked amazing, the skin of a 30 year old it seemed. It said she has used the oil since she was 20 something. This oil is of course only not good for dry skin but for wrinkles, faster reparation of injuries and scars (I do not believe it can do anything for my big surgery scars on my knee that I had for years but it doesn't hurt to add oil to it), bruising also disappears quicklier etc etc. Lowers heartdeseases, easier to lose weight (not that I need that... but I can't get all benefits) etc. I don't know what you care about but I'm sure that with an oil this good there is always some use for it and now I feel like an advertiser :P But I don't care about which brand you use. Just wanted to say that I'm totally nuts about this oil ;)

Here are 107 uses for coconut oil: http://everydayroots.com/coconut-oil-uses

Current Mood: good
Current Music: Simple Minds - Dolphins

I just saw a very inspiring documentary called "The beautiful truth". It is about a diet that has been claimed to cure cancer. And you know what that diet is? ;) I'm not at all surprised. Everything I learned so far points to this. But there were a few things in this documentary that I didn't already know so I could still enjoy it and it is nice that many documentaries and books says the same things :)

So the diet to prevent/cure cancer is this:
* Vegan diet
* Organic fruits and vegetables (lots of fresh juices and raw salads)
* No animal fat
* No salt

(This can be seen at 1:03:40 in the movie)

I didn't know about the salt before. I know that it is not good to eat too much salt, but haven't heard you shouldn't eat it at all... that would be hard. For example I love poping popcorn in a pot with oil (nowadays in coconut oil, the healthiest oil of them all) and I usually have sea salt to that. But I guess I can at least lower my intake of salt and eat more healthy salt like mineral salt. I just looked it up and mineral salt seems to be the healthiest salt. That's the salt I already been using since years ago... (I only use the sea salt for the popcorn) but I also use herbal salt for salads. I thought that the sea salt was the healthiest though, but I was wrong about that. Hadn't looked it up properly and seems like a common misconception. Mineral salt contains the most magnesium and iodine of those salts (that's a good thing).

I think they should had added no sugar to the list as well, but also hard to get rid of but not healthy to eat much of as most people knows, but still we drink unhealthy sodas and eat candy etc. The reason I don't have to go to the dentist in 2 years time because my teeth are so healthy (my own dentist told me this) is not because I'm very good at brushing my teeth, it is because I almost never drink any soda/soft-drinks, don't like candy and don't each much cookies or other stuff full of unhealthy sugar.
I must sound so boring, but I can still enjoy a lot of good food and I consume a lot of popcorn (but of course not the ones you warm in the microwave oven (do not use those! and the use of microwave ovens is another subject too...) but the ones you pop in a pot), but will no longer have much chips. Also very bad. No wonder that poor girl who lived only on chips looked so sick... I could talk all day and night about this subject because it is so interesting and I haven't even told you half of the things regarding food that I've learned over the years. It is scary how little people seem to know about this (or rather how little they care even if they know about it). It is our health and without it then the quality of life gets much less and I want the best quality of everything! And believe me vegan food is really nice, one just have to read a bit about what to eat. It is not that complicated. I only add a bit of B12 and I'm all good. Found a nice B12 spray that tastes really good. Vegan food is the only thing I cook at home and I even eat raw food sometimes. And organic food has always been a given to me.

It is easier if you just watch the documentary below now so I can stop writing so much ;) (I could watch all of it, which means no animals are suffering in this movie :) there is even an elk being feed a banana from a guys hand! :))

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: Sébastien Tellier - Aller vers le solei

I try to live my life as organic and free of poisons as I can, but it isn't easy. Until this summer I mostly just focused on buying organic food. And of course to eat organic is a big part of it but there are chemicals in a lot more things we live close to and even things we get inside of us even if we don't eat it, like body lotions. Since this summer I'm much more aware of what kinds of body lotions or sun creams I'm wearing but better yet is to not wear any of it at all. One can avoid being dry and avoid the sun in other ways. At the moment I'm obsessed with organic soaps, shampoos and conditioners. I heard of "no poo" where you don't use schampoo and instead use bicarbonate or something like that but I haven't dared to try it. Instead I tried a lot of other shampoos since this summer. I even feel a bit scared of using my old shampoo witch I still haven't used up since unfortunately I had bought a whole new bottle before I started to learn more about the chemicals in shampoos... so after that I immediately bought shampoos more friendly for humans and nature. It should be a given that one doesn't put chemicals on your body but the sad truth is that we all do :( Even if I'm trying to avoid it now I know I get chemicals inside of me but maybe I could at least lower the amount of chemcials and by doing so lowering risks of allergies, cancer and damaging the environment.

My dad is a really wise man, I remember him telling me not to color my hair many years ago because of the chemicals but I never listened to him. But now I haven't colored my hair in months. I can't say that I won't do it again but if I do I guess I would try to find some healtier colors like henna.
My dad also had a thing for solid soaps instead of liquid soaps. Turns out that that's also a wise choice that I didn't think of before so this is why I now own a lot of solid organic and vegan soaps and if I do buy liquid soups then they are all parfume free and free of parabens and other bad stuff.

One thing I'm still bad at though is clothes. I know at least that I have bought some clothes that had organic cotton, which is of course good but I haven't put this in focus when buying new clothes but on the other hand I buy much less clothes and if I do I often buy clothes in second hand stores. It is of course good for the environment to reuse old things but old clothes can contain chemicals that are bad for the health and environment, but I think that they might be better then new unworn clothes that has chemicals anyway. I'm not sure what is the best thing to do here. But if one wants something new I guess a good thing would be to look up an organic store. Probably much easier to find online then on the streets in town but I know that there are ecological stores in Gothenburg. I just haven't explored them that much yet.

Another thing that is also important is that the products are made from vegan ingredients and that they aren't tested on animals. A company that is good on this part is LUSH. They also say that they are ecological and I think they are pretty good on this and it is great that they write the ingredients for all their products but I have analyzed the ingredients and most of them contains perfume and other substances that aren't that good, but I still think LUSH is good. But I have been looking at other alternatives too and I found a webstore called Clearlife.se that sells ecological products both for your inside and outside. I could recommend it to everyone interested in vegan and ecological products. I bought several soaps from this webpage and I bought a shampoo and conditioner which I absoltely love and they seem to have everything I look for. They are vegan, paraben free, ecological and gluten free! and on top of all those amazing things they smell incredibly good! So good that I feel like I'm at a spa when using the products and especially the shampoo. My top favorite in the shampoo jungle so far.

I even bought a new toothpaste which is vegan, ecological, contains aloe vera, no fluor or other bad chemicals. One has been told that flour is good for your teeth... but I don't know anymore. I can't say I read a lot about this because I barely read anything about it but one just need to google it to see a lot of stuff about flour being a neurotoxin. We even joked about it at my job some time ago. That if you use a lot of toothpaste you get nice shiny teeth but get braindead and if you produce a lot of saliva you get tartar (like I do) then your teeth will fall off... It is good to question things and not just swallow everything you hear. If there is money in an industry they do what they can to sell it. Even if you think that you can trust the dentist or the doctor. But actually you can't. You just have to look back on history to realise how wrong they have been. Just look at the tobaco industry or what's happening in the milk industry right now. So yeah, maybe in the future we will realise that fluor isn't good for us either.

I like to get to know about new things and I should definately read more about fluor. Now when I know something about it I don't enjoy as much to use toothpaste I know contains fluor so my plan is to only use it once a day and use the flour free toothpaste once a day too. Then I at least reduced my flour intake by 50%.

I don't care at all if anyone thinks I'm silly, because I read my facts and I don't try to reduce the chemicals because I'm scared of cancer, but if I know that something increases the risk for it then why on earth would I use it? It is like with cigarets. Why on earth would I smoke when I know it destroys your health? Is it worth it? No, I don't think so. And worth what? I don't really get that thing. I never understood what's so cool with getting cancer. Because it isn't. It is just fucking stupid. Period.

What's really cool is following your heart and live like you learn.

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: Zola Jesus - Dangerous Days

They say "don't worry, be happy". But it is always easier said then done. But just to remind myself that good things happens I wanted to write down some things that happened lately that made me very happy :)

I have wonderful co-workers and if I feel a little bit low and dare to say that I do I get assured that I don't have to feel low and that others also feel like I do, that was the best thing at work this week :)

My parents called me yesterday and they told me that they went to a food exhibition and told me that they have started to drink less milk and even that they realised that cow milk isn't good! I got very surprised but also very happy. They told me a lot of what they learned about healthy food and I felt very happy about this. They know I don't drink milk and that I care about healthy food, that animals get treated well and the environment. So we had some talk about being a vegetarian and eating raw food too. My mum seems very interessted in raw food too but I know that she is also interested in healthy food. What surprised me was my dads positive attitude. I felt so very happy that he was so surportive and that they finally realised that cow milk is not good. I'm not sure if my dad would stop eating meat but at least I know that they are supporting and understanding and also started to think more about what they eat themselves. It feels like all of my talk about this has given some result after all :) I really do not like to tell others what to eat but when I know something is good then I want to tell them. I believe more in saying what is good then saying what is bad. But it is of course important to avoid bad food. I can indulge myself with some unhealthy food sometimes too. Like a real Homer Simpsson donut when I was in Berlin. As long as one doesn't eat one of those every day and just at some special occation then it is fine. Just think that over all it is good to think of what one eat so one stays healthy. I hadn't been sick for the whole year until I got a cold from the friend I shared a hotel room with in Berlin. I think I'm more likely to get sick by taking the bus to work then biking in the rain. However I need to be more careful to use rainwear when I bike to work, because I didn't feel 100% this weekend due to that my pants got wet when biking to work one day.

I also felt very happy when a friend told me he has started to eat vegetarian food (but that was several weeks ago). I wouldn't call him vegetarian since he doesn't eat it all of the time. But only knowing that one more of my friend eats more vegetarian food is very nice news for me :) (This guy is a really smart guy too ;) Fun to see that smart people eat vegetarian/vegan food) I try to look on the bright side for everything. There is no meaning being sad about what others eats, it is their choice. But when they do make good choices I of course feel happy and feel I have one more friend on my vegetarian side :)

When I talked to my parents they also happily said that they heard that Berlin is a good town for vegans. They are too cute :) They also said that Gothenburg is good for it and I told them about one good vegan place I know of and my dad wanted to go there to eat next time they visit! :) How wonderful parents don't I have? :)

This evening I saw a documentary about green technique in China. They showed a lot of clever soultions for eliminating pollutions and even getting use of carbon dioxide and how to use plants for clearing water. They showed how wind power stations can also be used for improving farming and much more very positive and interesting things.They interviewed several wonderful people who really put all their efforts into making China and the whole world more green with really clever technique and with great success too! It made me so very happy to see this! I even gave thumbs up in my sofa even if no one could see it :P It made me feel hopeful! There is hope! :)

Current Mood: hopeful
Current Music: Lower Dens - Brains

There are so many things one can learn. I should read more books. I already see a lot of documentaries and read a lot of articles, but I suck at reading.

This summer though I got the time to finish two books and start on a third one... at least something. So what did I learn from those books? Well I learned that I'm on the right path, eating meat is not good. I already knew that. Not good for anything really. But most of all the animals we eat live in a hell to say the least :( I would never watch a documentary about such horrors because it is impossible for me, worse than any horrormovie I could imagine, but reading it and imagining it was very painful too... I can still see images in my head of a tortured pig :(

I also read that there are lots of chemicals around us and especially in our own homes... chemicals that can give you cancer for example or making you infertile... not that nice... not something I had read a lot about before but had seen a documentary about it (of course ;)).

What I've done about it:
1) Continued to eat vegan/vegetarian food with as little products from animals as possible.
2) Bought new shampoo, conditioner, deo, lotions and soaps without "perfume" because it means it contains dangerous chemicals. (They say for "sensitive skin" on them but you gotta have a non-human skin to not absorbe the bad chemicals...)
3) Searched for make-up brands without chemicals. I've found a place. Probably expensive but worth it. I'll check it out or investigate a bit more. I'm sure one could find a good place to order something good on the web.

Books that I read:
1) Eating animals ("Äta djur") : http://www.bokus.com/bok/9780316127165/eating-animals/
2) Slow Death by Rubber Duck ("Förgiftad"): http://www.adlibris.com/se/bok/slow-death-by-rubber-duck-the-secret-danger-of-everyday-things-9781582435671

Book I'm reading: "Badskumt": http://www.adlibris.com/se/bok/badskumt-gifterna-som-gor-dig-ren-frasch-och-snygg-9789170375675
This book is basicly about the same thing as "Förgiftad" but more specified into beauty products. "Förgiftad" speaks about more kinds of chemicals in our daily life, like for example quicksilver in fishes (don't eat tuna! the bigger fish the more posioned) and teflon pans and rubber ducks leaking out lots of bad stuff...

I felt a bit guilty for scaring a friend with all my talk about "poison" around us... after having spent time with me for almost two weeks she got stuck on apples... I don't think I spoke about apples one single time (it was my mums fault)... but oh well, if someone is interested in getting to know more about ecological food then that's good. And of course the best food is the one you culture yourself. Of course I agree with that... but not everyone can be their own farmer...

I think we can all learn from each other. I know things my friends doesn't and they certainly know a lot of things I don't :) It is more about which things you put priority to learning about. What your values are. I'm sure people have good intentions but can sometimes not understand some things because they haven't got all the information. They aren't stupid, just have things to learn. And also one believes in what one wants to belive in ;)

I was blessed by getting a paper from the hospital telling me to eat less meat. I trusted the hospital and I trusted my wise friends and my guts. Even if 95% of people I knew ate meat didn't make them right. They just hadn't thought about it as much as I had. Wasn't as concerned with it and most of them still aren't... but some are. More and more people I meet think about becomming vegetarians or cooking more vegetarian dishes. It is nice to see :)

People should live their own lifes but no one can tell me how to live my life. And if I know that something is good am I not allowed to say how good it is then? I never said that people who eat meat are stupid. We have different values, that's it. And mine are stronger then most in this case but to argue aboit it is pointless if someone doesn't want to listen. I speak if someone wants to listen.

No one can tell me what to eat so I'm not telling others. We are different. But still I must admit that I get happy when I hear about someone becoming a vegetarian or at least eating more vegetarian food. A little less suffering, a little less wasted resources,a little less risk for cancer...

I'm reading a very interesting book called "eating animals" ("Äta djur" in Swedish). You can read more about the book here: http://www.eatinganimals.com/

I've been reading this book since the summer and I'm only halfways in it but this is not because the book isn't interesting, it is because I read too seldom, I get too easily distracted by other things and usually when I'm about to go to bed and I think I should read I fall asleep instead, often with the book beside me in my bed... (I have no problem to sleep at least :P)

But last night I managed to read a couple of pages and it was hard to stop reading because what I read was so interesting. Finally there was really strong evidence too how sick the industry is and then I don't only mean that we kill billions of animals every year just to eat them but that those industries has so big power that they even decide which information we get about what the food does to our health! and even worse they don't inform us that this is very bad for our health and that this caused the bird flue, the swine flue... etc. This whole enormous big powerful business is destroying us. And who's fault is it, it is ours! If we eat meat the indutsrty will continue with this, we will be sick and in pain and of course the animal we eat suffer even more then we do. But if you don't care about animals then I at least think that you would care about your own health (or do you want to have heart problems, cancer and kidney stones? I had kidney stones and that's enough for me, from that moment I had enough). But this industry could be compared to the tobaco industry. it is just that people nowadays have realised how dangerous it is too smoke but they have no clue about how dangerous it is to eat meat.

Eating dairy food is not any good either. I call myself a vegetarian, but on occations I eat fish (not so often though). At home I eat vegan food every week and I never buy milk, eggs or butter made from milk. I buy oat meals, "Noegg" and butter without milk. From this I sometimes makes panncakes or waffels and I don't notice the difference from a panncake with dairy food and one without it. Maybe it tastes even better without it. I don't know. But I can say this; I have been making panncakes for at least two friends who aren't vegans or vegetarians, who in fact likes meat a lot and talks about it, and I let them have it and they told me it tasted good (not only to be polite I'm sure) and I told them it is vegan. I guess they didn't think one could cook good vegan food ;)

Every friday at work we eat sushi and almost every friday (if I don't order dumplings with shrimps in them) I order vegan sushi. But I also drink the soup and many soups contains fish bouillion so it isn't always vegan. This friday a co-worker asked me if I ate vegetarian sushi and then I said "No, it is vegan". Then he asked if I was a vegan and I told him that I'm not really a vegan and then he said: "So you aren't that militant". No I'm not. I'm not so militant :P It would be nice to say I'm a vegan but I'm not, not yet. I'm too lazy. Of course I could. But I guess a part of it is that it is harder to be a vegan in some situations and you become someone annoying. You are already annoying by beeing a vegetarian but of course I don't care about that and most people are very positive and interested in cooking vegetarian food so it is not a problem. But when it comes to vegans they are not as positive... They think of those "militant" people and they think they are extreme etc. I could show them that I'm not extreme and not annoying. I don't care what other people think. I can just blame it on that I'm lazy and also that I love cheese. But honestly I love the cheese better if I knew it was vegan. It feels better to be able to have a good conscience when eating and I feel so happy each time I find something that is vegan that I thought I would have to live without if I become a vegan. For example I found vegan pesto just a few days ago! And actually I even found a whole shelf full of ecological products and I think all of them were vegan too :) I bought some tofu and tahini from there as well :) I feel so happy when I find such things. I wish the whole store was full of those stuff. Anyway that is my new favorite shelf :) It is probably more expensive then other foods but I do not care. I have money, not a problem and even if I was poor I would never sacrifice my health on cheap unhealthy food. Then I would sacrify buying new clothes or going to the cinema or buying alcohol or whatever.

I will keep looking for vegan things to make my life happier but that is not the biggest problem. It is eating out, if I find something that is vegan then I'll order it but it is very rare so often I settle for vegetarian. Before I sometimes ordered fish but I rarely do that anymore. Although I must confess that I really like mussels. I only had it three times in my life I think. The first time was like 2 years ago when a friend cooked mussels for me and a couple of friends and I loved it and it was hard for me to stop eating it...
Last time I ate it was at a restaurant and I was afraid I was going to get too little food so I ordered fries to it as well but I really hadn't needed too... but stubborn as I am I almost ate everything anyway... the ones who knows me knows that I have a big appetite on food. I seldom leave any food and it is not only because I hate to leave food it is because I'm not really full. One can't notice on me that I have this appetite. I could eat a lot of cookies and stuff too. I try to hold back on those things though :P
And I like to exercise, so then I think it is only good to eat a lot.
But vegetarians and vegans are generally slimmer then people who eat everything. This is only good because it is not healthy to be fat. It is not unhealthy to be slim as long as you are not underweight. But I never cared about my weight, it is just a number on the scale, it goes up a bit sometimes and down a bit sometimes. It was just interesting to noticed it had gone down 4 kilograms after i had been biking a lot.

Anyhow the book I'm reading is very very interesting and I should try to finnish it asap. But this night when reading it I just thought that I have no time to finnish it. I must let other people I know read this book. My brother and his girlfriend has already read it and they seemed very interested in it. Although I heard some about facts that they said were incorrect... I don't know which facts that would be. But if it was that it is not like in the US (this book is based on how it is in the US) it says clearly in the foreword that it looks like this in Europe too. We aren't any better. I only found one fact I question a bit but that is just the authors thoughts, I don't think he actually looked it up. He is thinking of what would happen in the future when the population grows but I've seen documentaries about this and research has shown that no the population will not grow, it will be the same. So the author don't need to worry about that. But he is of course right to worry about the food industry.

I saw a documentary about people who have gotten very old and most of them were Japanese people who ate vegetarian food and fish. So you can guess why I also eat this ;)

I also saw a "documentary" about a fruitarian who said he believed he would live until he is 138 years old. He was 60 something but to me he didn't look young and I don't think he will be 138 years old.. but who knows. I just couldn't help thinking that he probably die in an accident before that... I'm so mean sometimes. I've seen this guy before. He has been on TV before. Probably because people think he is so odd. Even me thinks it is a bit odd. But I still think it is admiring to live like this and not care what other people say. He has been living on this fruitarian diet for 30 years so it is very impressing. A vegan friend of mine where watching a documentary with this fruitarian 2 years ago or so and then my vegan friend tried to be a fruitarian too but he couldn't be that for very long because many fruits gnaws on the mucous membranes in the mouth or something like that and I don't think it sounds healthy to eat 15 lemons in one day... but what do I know. Maybe it is me beeing narrow minded and I don't want to be that. But this fruitarian can be very happy that he can eat avocados ;)

There are even videos on youtube on fruitarian body builders... so everything is possible. It is definately a myth that you have to eat meat to build muscels.

Bla bla bla... I could write about this subject forever and I have so much more to say but for now this will be enough. Just read the book! ;) And question me if you want but you will be wrong ;) I'm right, you are wrong :P At least in this subject. Do your homework and then we can talk.

By the way, the most common myth is dead to me now. It is not unhealthy to be a vegetarian nor vegan (and probably not to be a fruitarian either)!

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: White Lies - Death

I don't know if I meantioned my "Superhealth" ("Superhälsa") book here before. But today I came to think of it when I talked about avocados with my dad because I wanted to show him more about how healthy avocados are. So I had him read the page about avocados and after that he said to mum "We must eat avocados all of the time now!" :P

Yeah, avocados is one of my absolutely favorite fruits (it is actually a fruit even if one use it more as a vegetable). My co-workers observed my love of avocadoes several years ago ;) and to even become more of the avocado-person I even started to grow my own avocado-tree at work and it is still alive and growing although it has seen better days. But it is fine. My avocado tree at work or any other of my avocado trees will never give me any avocados though, it was just a fun thing to do :)

I should read more in my superhealth book. I have just read small parts in it, but there is a lot to learn from it and the book has many healthy recepies as well :) I'm sure that many of them are vegetarian and vegan too.

One of the things that the book says is that red meat is not healthy (and it is not a book for vegans/vegetarians, it is just about health).

When looking through some of my old entries here I saw that I was thinking of starting a blog about vegetarian food. I still haven't done that but we will see. Would be nice to collect all of the nice recepies in one place and also to write about some specific food and what they do to our bodies. Write about the healthy food but maybe also about what not to eat...

Being a vegetarian and leaning towards being a vegan is a given to me. I can't call myself a vegan since I'm not always eating vegan but I don't drink milk and I don't buy eggs for example. Rarely any cheese either but they put eggs, cheese and milk in some food I buy sometimes.

On Friday I were seeing some friends and one of the things we talked about was eating insects. If I would be ok with that, but I said that I don't know but that one don't have to eat that or meat anyway. I haven't really thought that much about insects. Just that I don't like killing them either. I always try to let insects out if they are inside. I never kill them. One summer evening I spent a little time rescuing around 20 bumble bees from dying in the starewell. I let them fly from my balcony, but unfortunately some of them were to weak to be able to fly so they fell and died... but for each bumble bee that were flying away I felt very happy to have saved someone :) That my little help had let a bumble bee live some more.

I focus a lot on the health aspects but the ehtical aspects are of course very important. I love animals and can't even stand the thought of how many animals that has to suffer all of the times for humans eating meat when we do not even need it and when it isn't even healthy... stupidity. I'm currently reading a book about how the animals suffer and I don't understand how anyone can read that book and still eat meat, but I know people who does....

But anyway trying to tell other people that they do wrong is not the right way too go. I can only share what I know and I always want to know more. Knowleadge is the shit!

I can never say that I know more then someone else but I can say that I want to know more and that I'm interested in health, science, enviroment questions etc. And all of those areas points to the direction for vegeatarians and vegans of course ;)

I watched "Vetenskapens värld" (a TV-program about science) this evening but unfortunately I layed down after a while and almost fell a sleep... But it was not because it wasn't interesting of course. My sofa is too comfortable and I didn't get to sleep that many hours last night because I stayed up way too long. Anyway this TV-program was very interesting. It was about multi-universes. I absolutely believe that there could be more universes then the one we live in. Sounds very strange but it is always better to be openminded then narrowminded and science is going in this direction so there is no reason not to believe in it. But people always find it hard to believe things they can't actually see with their eyes. People don't have to go visit animal factories so they can pretend that they don't exists... but people just put their blinders on because they like meat too much. But really? Is meat worth your own health and the suffering of so many animals and people (think of the poor people having to work with those suffering animals for example).

I could go on even deeper here but I will stop. I'm not religious and one can believe in what one wants as long as it doesn't hurt anyone, but eating meat hurts animals and people so I can never "believe" in it.

I've lost weight because I've been excersising quite much recently. I were a bit fanatic with exercising and training already before but maybe I'm just a little bit more fanatic now when I am "turfing" (www.turfgame.com). I lost 4 kg in short time and I could see on myself before I even weighted myself that I was thinner. I didn't need to be thinner, I was absolutely normal and slim before but I'm still healthy and hopefully I won't lose more weight now. Maybe I should try to build some more muscels so I gain some weight. I really should do some core training at least. (I did do a few push-ups at a party yesterday though, it was all my idea of course and the people in the same room followed along so when another friend came back into the room we were all exhausted :P I just couldn't help it. Just felt like exercising :P) But the nice thing with weighting so little and having a pretty good condition is that I feel like I'm flying when I walk around, I feel so light and I walk very fast (and this was despite that my left foot have been aching because of a blister under my foot due to walking so much but I still kept walking every day in the same shoes... I'm crazy). But I do not recommend people to be skinny, I do not want to be skinner now. Then I would be underweighted. I actually always thought I was perfect but could gain some more weight maybe and then I would get more curves :). I never wanted to lose any weight. I have been walking home from work almost every day this week (only a walk of 3 kilometers but I have been walking around a lot in town too and up on a mountain and other places as well) because my bike got a flat tire on Monday. But today I fixed my flat tire and tomorrow I'll bike even if it is minus 10 (of course I have winter tires on!). At least that is what I will try to do. If it isn't a snow storm and if I don't freeze too much I'll bike and I'm stubborn so I'll bike. (I almost concidered biked with the flat tire too but realized it would bee too annoying having to stop after 1 km or less to pump more air to the tire and risking having to walk home with my bike). I feel very frustrated if I can't bike or move in any way. I refuse to sit on a bus both to work and from work at least. (plus people can spread diseases on a bus and you don't get the fresh outdoor air if on a bus) I have to be active in some way because at my job I just sit still. And I need a massage.... A friend who has some knowleadge about massaging and who is very good at it gave me a massage yesterday and I needed that. He found several knobs around my neck and back that he tried to loosen up. I need more massage. I should really try to find a professional who could massage me and my stiff neck and back.

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: The National - Sea of Love

Before you start reading I just want to warn the sensitive readers that this is about illness and hospitals but I will not go into much details, so now you know. I'm very sensitive for that kind of stuff as well and could almost faint by the thought of it but I'm strong and very stubborn so I'll always manage when it comes to handle my own illness.

( If you don't want to know what happened you can skip this part but there is no blood or anything like that involved, mostly just my own thoughts. )

Since I had my knee surgery I had no serious pain or illeness so it's been a while. I guess that the good thing that comes out with such experiences is that you learn to appreciate your life more. That you learn that not every one are as lucky as you are. And that there is always someone having it worse then you have it and that I'm lucky to live in a country with one of the best health cares in the world. And most of all that when you least expect it something could happen to you that will change everything. Nothing one should think about but just remember enjoying and tresuring all the wonderful moments in life.

You learn that your health is most important, not if you miss a party or miss work or whatever. That it is most important that you and your loved ones feel well. This is what I value the most but should be the thing valued the most for every living beeing. Money is just a means in this world, it is nothing to long for being rich because there will always come a time when money is worth nothing. I never heard of anyone on their deathbed regretting that they didn't earn more money in life, what people regret is not caring enough for their loved ones. If one are fortunate in life I hope that one can learn to appriciate it. It is good to get those reminders sometimes.

Current Mood: thankful
Current Music: The Veils - The Leavers Dance

Now there is evidence for what I already knew! Eating meat will make you die earlier! So now that is proven! yet another argument for me keep being vegetarian, not that I ever doubted that it was a good descion :P

Well from what I've seen and from what i know and from my common sense I already knew all this. But apperently they had done a study about it with 120 000 people involved over a time of 30 years and it proved that the ones eating meat would shorten their lifes. Also the risk of getting cancer is 13% bigger if you eat meat and if you eat sausages and that kind of really bad meat then it is as high as 20%. Don't want to scare people... but it is worth thinking of.

And if you still want to eat meat, well you can eat 0,5 kilo/ week. But as it is today Swedish people eat 1,3 kilo/ week so they need to reduce their meat-eating. I'm eating 0 kilos meat so no risk for me :)

And they also said that it is no danger to eat fish and birds. So yes one can eat chicken, but I don't because of ethical reasons... chickens suffer too much and the food-chickens lifes sucks so I'm not surporting that. But fishes I'm more ok with. Well mostly because it is healthy and I already knew that but also because I feel that the fishes don't have to suffer as much as the other animals. Sure they get killed and eaten too but at least it they lve in the ocean or a big lake they have plenty of space to move and as long as the water is not poisoned they should be living pretty well. Now there could be risks with eating fishes too and there are bad things with eating fish as well and I don't eat much fish nowadays. But I can do it. It is ok by me. But I'm not ok with eating other animals.

People eat meat mainly because they like the taste of meat... it is kinda like candy for people. It tastes good and they love it and I can understand that. When I ate meat I liked the taste of it too... especially bacon and salt pork. I would say that those were my favorites. But I always knew that the salted pork were not healthy so I didn't eat it often.

I think it is idiotic not to think of ones health... well people can do what they do... people do all kinds of things to shorten their lives... but if I can avoid it I rather. do that. Why be stupid?

So I don't smoke, I don't eat meat, I almost never drink alcohol anymore, I don't drink coffee (oh yes, I'm sure that isn't healthy either and I read articles about it), I train as much as I can and I try to drink a lot of water. I rarely have eat candy so I have only had one dental cavity in my life but could had been zero as well. I think maybe I got it because I'm not that careful when I brush my teeth. I could probably number a lot of more healthy things that I do.

But if anything would kill me I think it is the computer :P I'm very weak for computers and it is dangerous to sit still for several hours a day like I do so that is the worst thing I'm doing to myself.
Well in my job I have to sit in front of a computer... so I try to remember to take breaks but I'm very stiff and my neck sometimes hurt and I even felt some mouse arm tendencies lately.

Anyway, I think that people are afraid to become vegetarians because they don't know how to eat but it is really simple. You can eat just like before but just exclude the meat and replace it with something else. Many dishes you can still do as well. Like panncakes :) And there are lots of good vegetarian food and food you might not had tried if you only ate meat. I didn't have much fantasy when I ate meat. Now I have gotten forced to discover other things and it is really interesting... but lately I have gotten a bit stuck in doing the same kind of dishes over and over again just like when I ate meat... but we all have our favorites.

Today I had tofu with paprika, onion, zuccini, soy cream, soy and rice. A really nice dish.

Actually last time I were on after work with my job the vegan was the most happy with his food. He got a sweet corn soup and it really looked delisious but a little bit little food for me I think. I had aubergine with beans and cheese and it was really good as well and so said the other vegetarian who had the same dish as me but all of the meat-easters complained about their dishes :P I wonder if they would had liked the vegetarian dishes better or if they just had too high expectations... maybe both.

I feel that if something makes you feel good for a short time and bad for a long time then it is bad... and that's the case with fast food that we all know is bad for your health.

They I rather wat something that tastes good but also makes you feel good for a long time. It may not give you the kick of eating something really sweet and unhealthy but in the long run it makes you feel good. Same thing with training... you might not find it that fun when you start training but after a while you see how much more you are able to do and you understand that in the long run it is something really good.

I rather look at things in the long run and look at the whole picture then to find the kicks in small things that if you do them reguarly they are bad for you. It doesn't mean I don't enjoy life because life is more then unhealthy eating. It is also experience fun moments and things that has nothing to do with what you eat. The things we will look back on and feel happy about is not what food we ate a certain day but how fun we had with people we like :)

I saw a science program about wind-power stations on TV this evening. It started out positive with a positive man who showed his wind-power stations and who were really proud of them and how those could maintain all of the electricity that they needed and they could have a good consciense because they were using 100% green electricity. Me like very much! The man seemed very sane and nice and I really liked him. I want more people like him! Would be wonderful to be able to live on 100% green electricity!

Then after that they showed people who were negative against wind-power stations. Some old people that said that the wind-powers were noisy... umm.. ok? Well one couldn't hear anything on TV of course :P And they ahd experts on noise who said that those shouldn't be that nosy. But maybe they weren't that well tested. It was only one single wind-poer station that they complained about and it was not that close to their home. I would had been very happy to have a wind-power station that close to me and I mean traffic is noisy too and probably much noiser :P Anyhow I think that they didn't understand the good with wind-power and maybe afraid of new things because they are old. I don't know. But it sounded pretty silly to watch them complain about the noise.
But that wasn't the worst part. The worst was even yet an old lady who claimed that all wind-power stations must be removed because they destroyed the beautiful anture :P hahaha... omg... does she even know how much nature there is here... he are so little people in a huge country... we have room for a lot more wind-powers and who cares if they are in the nature? well obviously her but not me and then I'm grown up in the countryside basicly and I only feel happiness if I feel a wind-power station. It is much more disturbing to see electricity generators in the nature... and I've seen a lot of those and it makes me scared because they are so dangerious... so much electricity there... a wind-power station isn't as dangerous... of course there is electricity there too but it isn't as close to you as those electricity generating stations.I don't knwo that much about that.. but if people are ok with them then surely they should be ok with a little wind-power station :P

Then what was just so ridicilous so I couldn't do anything but laugh out loud was when that old woman claimed that the climatecrise was is a hoax, hahahaha... what is she? Have she been buried for the last decades?? of course it is not a hoax. Does she think that climate scientist would make up such a thing just to ear money?? Is she totaly out of her mind? Well the sad thing is that she is not the only stupid person on this earth who believes so. When watching her I felt like: Can someone please remove that stupid thing from the TV I can't see her anymore.. can't take this stupidness anymore!

I mean think... use your brain... how hard can it be? And so what if it was a hoax what would it do you? Oh so you are a little annoyed that there is a wind-power station there... yeah? but it won't kill ya! Yeah, but you can get killed if they aren't there... if you rather use nuclear power...

Sometimes I wonder what is wrong with some people... whouldn't the most important thing be to care about each other? Toc are about life and health? Oh no seems like the only thing that matters to them is money... "sigh"... and in some cases I don't even understand why they work against the unavoidable development... I guess it is a fear of change... but I hate to tell you I told you so... but you will all have to adapt yourself... and humans had done that all of the time... that's just how it is... so I'm sorry to tell you that you that if you are against green electricity or eating less meat... well it is going to be much more of that stuff in the future! :D Whoopee!

Current Mood: hopeful
Current Music: Manic Street Preachers - If you tolerate this your children will be next

I got a cold so I stayed home from work today. Sleeped for so long that I felt really tired then finally got up again and ate lunch and watched TV. Then to my happiness I came across something really interesting on TV. An interview with a psyciatrist that has written a book about the mindfulness of the brain. Mindfulness means something like staying aware of (paying close attention) your responsibilities. It is easy to procastinate things when they don't seem fun to do. Like when I was studying it was funnier to do everything else but study... and now when I want to read a book everything else seems more tempting then reading a book... I'm also very lazy when it comes to cleaning up and doing the dishes. Of course I do it, but not as much as I should. I do it because I have to not because I want to. But actually once you have started to do the dishes, cleaning or read that book it feels very good and you are being mindful and doing what you wanted to do.
They even said that we can slow down the aging with mindfulness and I think it could be true. Well at least it is a known fact that if you are training your brain the risk of getting Alzheimers decreases. The brain is like a muscel, it also needs training and it needs tasks to solve and it needs to focus on things and be there in the moment. I really felt focused when watching that TV-program for example because it was so interesting and I prefer to see documentaries were I can learn new things. It is fun to learn, but I want to have fun when learning and learning by TV is more fun then by reading books even if I do manage to read sometimes.

Another interesting thing about mindfulness is that it is good for your mental health. Depressions and other mental diseases are getting more and more common. We know pretty much about curing our physical body but not about how to cure our minds. We need to learn how our brains works and there is a lot to learn since the brain is so complicated... in fact the most complicated system on the planet or maybe even in the whole universe...

Some things being said in the TV-program I already knew since I'm interested in psychology and has studied it a little and also read some books on my own. For example one really easy thing: That we can choose to focus on good or bad feelings and by doing so we decide ourself if we feel happy or sad. Of course sad things happens and we can't always be happy. But for trivial things it is much easier and better to focus on when you get compliments, when people are being nice and focus on people you really like and who makes you happy. Because if you only thought of bad things or people you don't like of course that wouldn't be fun. So I'm always trying to think positive and also to think positive of myself. I can feel sorry for myself when things are going bad for me but it is just to accept how things are and trying to do something about it intead of not accepting it and not going something about it. I also try to learn from my experiences. But some things that keeps happeneing to me over and over again I don't understand why they do so I need to be better at choosing things that are good for me.

Very interesting subject anyway. I think I might buy the book :) (The book is in Swedish "Mindfulness i hjärnan" but one can always try googleing "Mindfulness" or "Mindfulness in the brain" to find out more.)

Current Mood: sick

Before I became a vegetarian I remember walking in a store and thinking: What the heck, why am I eating sausages and meatballs? It is animals and I love animals. It just felt so wrong and so weird that it was a norm for people to eat meat :/ I just couldn't understand it. I grew up in a pretty "normal" standard family with ordinary traditions and we ate meat like most people do. I didn't know any vegetarian until I went in high school when one of my classmates were a vegetarian but her reasons was not because of animal rights although I think it could be because she was a really smart girl and a cool girl who went her own way. Her reason was just that she didn't like meat.
Then when I went to college one of my classmates were also a vegetarian. He however was it because of ethical reasons. He thought it was wrong to kill animals and eat them and I thought that it was very good of him to be a vegetarian for those reasons and stand up for himself and not caring what other people thought of him. I liked that he was a vegetarian. I have always liked vegetrains. Well vegetarians are just as any other people but it is a great quality to be one and something that definately makes a person a little more likable in my eyes and especially if they are so because of ethical or environmental reasons.
( Read more... )

I've also got to know one of my brothers friends better and he is a vegan. He wanted me to watch a movie about veganism but I had to stop watching after 15 minutes because then then guy in the movie were about to show a clip about how it looks inside a slaughterhouse :(( I try to avoid watching such things as much as possible. I don't need to watch it to know how terrible the animals are treated and in how much pain they are and how afraid they are etc. I don't need to watch it, it is just torture even thinking about that it happens so why torturing myself with watching it? But well the vegan speaking in the movie is really good and if you dare you could watch all of the movie here.

At first I was thinking to post that movie here but since I couldn't finish watching it I am not posting it directly here. I may skip the part from that clip and try to watch what he says afterwards because it was really inpiring to listen to.

But instead I found lots of other clips about celeberies on a vegan diet. One was acctually Bill Clinton! :) Another one is Ellen DeGeneres who also is it for just the right reasons. Bill Clinton seemed to be it mostly for health reasons. But all reasons are good I think and I care a lot about the environment as well and that is also a very good reason. So one could say that my reasons for being a vegetarian are:

1. Ethical (I love animals and I do not tolerate that humans treats them bad)
2. The environment (It is known that the meatindustry consumes a lot of C02 and that it takes a lot of reasources and energy)
3. Health (I do not want another kidney stone attack and if not eating meat will decrease that risk I do well without it. It is also known that red meat is not especially heathy.)

So I have three big reasons but all of them is a good enough reason in themselves. Some people have it as reason not to eat it because they don't like the taste but most people like the taste and so do I but for me it isn't worth the little pleasure I get for it when I gain so much more pleasure in knowing I do something good for the animals, the planet and myself.

So here is the clip with Ellen DeGeneras and there are lots of other of famous vegan people explaining why they are vegans. Go you wonderful people! :D

Just wanted to write this down yet again because it is so very important and one do feel happier when one does something good for others, including animals :)

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: Patti Smith - People Have The Power

I've been interested in healthy food for a while now. Only being a vegetarian makes me feel healthier but there is lots of more things one can think of.

I found an interesting blog about raw food. (It is written in English! Yay! Someone thought of the rest of the world outside Sweden! :D Or maybe it is not a Swede who wrote it :P)

There they also had a simple recepie for how to make icecream from a banana which I will try today. I got one banana from a co-worker on Thursday. At first i didn't want it because it didn't look like it was ecological and I only eat ecological banans... but I figured she would throw it away otherwise so I decided to take it anyway. I thought that maybe i could do something else with it then eating it directly so now I think making an icecream of it seems like a good idea, although I had rather used an ecological banana for it... it will have to do... I won't die if I eat a banana that is not ecological :P

I have become a real food snob :P

I feel myself not being satisfied when other people are shopping and I always think of what is the most healthiest... and I feel like a boring person pointing out that I don't eat candies (and certainly not the unhealthy stuff with pig parts in them). If I buy chips for myself I even buy the ecological ones... the few times i buy chips... the few times I'm not healthy I buy Ben & Jerrys... but didn't find it in the store last time I went shopping so today I'm having homemade banana-icecream.

In the interesting raw food blog I also found an interesting article about coffee. I don't drink coffee and it is mainly because of health reasons. Why on earth drink something that is not good for anything accept making you dependent on it?? Not my melody. Never read an article about it to understand it but here is one and well I was always right about it. Totally useless with coffee :P

I drink red or green tea instead... which isn't by the way real tea... it is healthier then tea and especially the red tea. Black tea isn't healthy but I drink it to be social sometimes just like i drink alcohol to be social sometimes. But I would never smoke to be social. I've tasted coffee, I've tryed smoking and I know I can live without it. I would never damage my health to be social.

I like reading about healthy foods and I want to know the truth about the food. Well most of it is just using your brain... could this really be healthy? Like with the coffee.

That "wise" people are drinking coffee doesn't make it right to drink it. That "wise" people eat meat doesn't make it right to eat it. Well it is about what you feel is right for you and you are what you eat. Doesn't mean one can't eat good food because the healthy food is most often much tastier then the unhealthy food and it makes you feel good afterwards too :)

I'm eating various kinds of natural nuts every week to have something to fill my stomache with and to not be hungry before i go to the gym. I always buy walnuts for example. Guess what? Walnuts is according to science the most healthy nut you can eat! I read it here. (In Swedish unfortunately.) Not only does it prevent you from getting sick it also contains enough proteins for a vegetarian like myself to get enough proteins! :D Perfect!

I do eat lenses and beans too... but well walnuts al least once a week it will be.

Here is a dish I once cooked... should do it again sometimes... it is just sliced potato and different vegetables and mushroom that you put in the oven... supereasy and very tasty!

I have been thinking for a long time to have a food blog for healthy foods. Only vegetarian food of course and as ecological as it can possibly be and as free from E-numbers and other chemical substances as it can be.

Of course to be living healthy one need to think of exercising as well. I have been very good at it... even though I have been limited because of my knee... there is always something one can do. I will go out and take a walk in the beautiful weather in a moment.

Current Mood: good
Current Music: Goldfrapp - Strict Machine

Some days are good and some days are bad... I used to think that my life was like a roller-coaster... one day good things happened and then the next day bad things then good things etc... (but mostly a pretty non-scary roller-coaster... but a few times it is scary too...) like if I had a good day I would get a bad day and then a good day...

After rain comes sunshine etc... but I hope I won't have a bad day tomorrow just because I had a good day today.

I remember those times when I felt bored at work and time went so slowly... but I'm not like that... that's not me... I got affected by other people... it affected my negatively... I don't like people who complains about things... and I rather see the good things and focus on that. Luckily now I feel there are positive influences in the air :) Today I had things to do all of the time but not so that I felt stressed and I had different kind of things to do and I really felt I accomplished things and managed to do the tasks I had thought of doing and at the same time time just flew away and before I knew about it I had to leave work to go to see my physiotherapist! :) Days like that when everything just runs smoothly and people say nice things to you and you have nice people around you and have fun and are productive, that's good days :) And also when something unexpected happens that makes you feel good :) Even my physiotherapist said that I was doing well! :) (even though I have been really lazy and had not had the time to exercise at all since the last time... and I didn't tell her :P) But on the other hand I always have lots of more energy when I haven't been exercising in a while... even after I have been sick I feel I have more energy when I exercise... (because at least then I have rested...)

But I feel a little weak... I feel I should go to the gym more often... but it is not that tempting anymore... but I gotta do something... I don't like to feel weak :P Even if I guess I'm not that much weaker it feels like that... I hate that... I kinda like having some muscles... :P Now if I flex my biceps they aren't that big at all... not that they ever have been big... but I think they looked a bit bigger before...

And I've also been really bad at running... haven't run since Vår Ruset... really really bad... I always take the bike thought... but I should run too... But today I applied for yet another race for women... "Iform-loppet" or something like that... It is in September so I've got plenty of time to train for that one and that time I hope I can do better then I did at Vår Ruset.... then I hope I will not feel any pain anywhere and will be able to run the whole time... I hate when I had to walk... I didn't walk much... but I did... damn it... (but I didn't have much time to train for that race and I know that if I just run every week I will be able to run the whole race without problem in a few weeks.)

Now it is time to go to bed!

Current Mood: good
Current Music: Tindersticks - Let's pretend

I went to the liquor store (Systembolaget) today to buy some alcohol because I'm going to a birthday party tomorrow. Then as usual when I'm shopping I look at the ingrediets before buying anything and as I thought all the ciders (which by the way aren't real ciders they are sodas with alcohol) and mixed drinks were full of E-numbers, flavourings and other additional unknown substances that the producers add to the products so that their fake products will look like and taste like if they were real... but much cheaper to add shitty things that can be bad for your health then producing something real that is good for your health...

( The mysterious substances in our food that the food producers don't want us to know about... )

( Blogging about food maybe? )

( If it wasn't for that I'm ok with alcohol I would probably fulfill all the requirements for being a straight edge... )

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: Bloc party - I still remember

I'm trying to live a green life. I'm doing what I can, but I could probably do a lot more if I just took more time to learn more about what I can do. Tips are very welcome!

The things I'm doing right now is:

* Not eating meat (if you want to know more about why it is good for the environment you can read here)
* Not driving (I have a driving license since I was 18 but I don't need a car and if I did I would only buy an electric car)
* Recycling as much as I can (I recycle plastics, news papers, glass, paper boxes, food etc...)
* Using only renewable electricity and try to remember to switch of lamps and TV when I leave the room.
* Buying as much ecological food as possible (more and more ecological food are available in stores and the more we buy it the more of the ecological food will be available!)
* And voting green of course!

Actually a lot of the things I'm doing is good for more things then the environment. Eating other things then meat is healthier and taking the bike is good training and also good for your health :) Buying ecological food is also better for your health. The food also tastes better! And it saves a lot of money to not have a car and of course it saves money to use less electricity too! :) And actually for me it goes faster to take the bike to work then taking the tram and the bus! :) I don't really feel that I have given up on anything. It is the opposite. I have gotten healthier, stronger and happier :) I haven't been sick once since I stopped eating meat for about 1,5 years ago.

It is too bad that the world leaders aren't willing to do more for the planet but everyone can do things on their own and it is us who votes for these leaders and I will only vote for people who really wants to do something for the climate and do their best to save our planet! :) Then I think that we could find solutions for how to make the planet as environment friendly as possible. There has always been changes in the society and this one has to be done or else we will kill ourselves pretty soon...

I may be naive but I rather be naive, optimistic and have dreams, then be cynical and give up before even trying. Living green is a lifestyle, not something you try for one year. One can start gradually to implement more and more green thinking. It feels like I have been doing it without even thinking about it... maybe it all started with my kidney stone attack 2 years ago... (it made me think more about what I eat) but probably much earlier since I always voted green. And the more things I can do the happier I get :) For Christmas I'm giving my dad a book about "100 ways to save the planet". I would had loved to have that book myself but I think it would be a great gift and I think my dad is too dependent on his car... he doesn't have to be... he could take the bike instead. I know that everyone may not feel ready to "give up" on some things... like I don't feel ready to give up on my clothes shopping behavior... but everything you feel you could do without you could probably do well without. Like I had thought for many years that maybe I should be a vegetarian... the only thing stopping me was myself and now I'm really proud of myself for being one :) But of course I could blame it on my kidney stone :P It was a bit cowardly of me but I didn't want to explain for people who didn't want to understand. It is all about ourselves and the way we think... I'm still thinking about what to do about my shopping behavior because I do love shopping... But at least I'm not throwing away any of my clothes... I'm thinking about how I could reuse them, but I realize I've got so many of them that I should probably donate clothes because I read that only 2% of clothes that are thrown away are unwearable. It would make me happy if someone would like to have my old clothes too... but several clothes has many memories connected to them... but if I can't use them I better give them to someone who could... that will be the next project I think :)

I'm also bad at remembering to switch of lamps at home because I have a big apartment and I move around a lot when I'm at home, going from the kitchen, to the bathroom, to the bedroom, the hallway, the livingroom.... but I try to only use the light in the room I'm currently using.... and now when it is dark and cold outside it could be cozy to use some living candles too and it won't waste any electricity!

I'm thinking about starting a geen blog because I care a lot about the nature and animals and I care about humans too and if I could inspire just one person it would be enough to make me happy :)

Here are some inspiring sites I found today:
http://www.care2.com/greenliving/
http://planetgreen.discovery.com/
http://www.livinggreen.se/ Swedish site with many tips about how to live a greener life
http://www.ekostil.se/ Swedish site about a woman who has decided to live an ecological life for one year (I think she should try to keep living the same way for the rest of her life though but she seem to have understood what it is all about.)

I decided to start counting how long I swim just so I know and can see if I'm improving from time to time. I swam for one hour today and I swam exactly 80 lenghts in a 25 meter long swimming pool. At least I think it was 80 lenghts, sometimes I got a bit unsure if I was counting right. I swimmed in a quite normal pace I thought. I could had gone much faster, but not much slower. I don't like swimming slowly and I had to pass a lot of swimmers. There were few people who swam faster then me. Probably only one guy who swum too fast thinking of the surrounding people... got some splashes on me there... But it is mostly annoying that the people stops you up. I could had managed to swim longer if it had been fewer people there so I could had swum faster. But at the same time you have something to look at while you swim. There are all kinds of people there, from young girls to old men and women. But fortunately most people seem to be around my age. Otherwise I guess I would had been standing still in the swimming pool.... But I still think that people seems so unserious about their swimming. Not that they have to be, it is up to them... but you are supposed to go there to swim... it ain't called excersise swimming for nothing... There are always guys there who doesn't seem serious at all with their swimming... they play around, try to dive or just stands and talk and when they swim properly they are so slow that they are mostly in the way... I almost frontal crashed with a guy today because he dived right in my direction and I didn't notice and then he popped up right in front of me.... could had gone bad but luckely I had time to swim aside. His friend laughed at him for diving in the oposite direction of the swimmers... well his friend were right, he shouldn't had done that... but oh well. I wasn't surprised. It was fun swimming anyway.

( I guess I'm in pretty good shape :) )

Current Mood: content
Current Music: Mesh - Friends like these

I decided today to be a sponsor for polar bears, so I signed up for it. I think it is horrible what the climate changes is doing and that the polar bears are dying :( The least I can do is sponsoring with some money. Money that I could had spent on something worthless, but now is spent on something that is really worth something.

I really want to do more if I can. I should see if I can do more to help because I really want to help our climate situation. One person doesn't pollute much but I don't want to be someone who does and I want to be someone who helps out and make a difference. So I'm glad that I take my bike to work every day even if there is snow outside, raining or is minus degrees and I won't get a car until they pollute nothing. Cars costs a lot of money anyway and I rather spend this money on doing something for the climate instead of ruining it.

I don't want to cause the polar bears to die or any other animal.

The only animal I eat at the moment is fish. But a lot of this has to do with that I think of the environment too. Because it wastes a lot of energy to produce meat and it pollutes a lot to transport the meat. And I hate that animals are produced just to be eaten or used by humans. And I do fine without meat. I don't miss it at all. The food I love the most is vegetarian food. And it doesn't hurt that I got a kidney stone that teached me to drink more water and eat less meat. I don't think I ate a lot of meat before but I have been thinking for several years that being a vegetarian is something I could do. Hopefully I won't get any more kidney stones because nowadays I changed my diet, but my health was just a bonus in this... and my health is also just a bonus when it comes to my biking...

Well, now I'm both a sponsor for starving children and polar bears. I could probably sponsor a lot of things... but I'm not rich and I hope I will be able to help out in other ways then only give money and think of how I live my life. At least I think I have picked two very good causes to give money to :)

My mood goes up and down. But right now it is up! I'm so good! :) I have been training today and it is so wonderful to see that I'm getting stronger! :) Today I lifted 5 kg in each hand 12 * 2 times. First time I only dared to lift 3 kg. Second time I managed 4 kg and was so proad. Tried 5 kg because it felt so light with 4... next time maybe 6 kg? 10 kg isn't much but my arms are really weak :P I also noticed it is easier and easier to go home by bike. I'm not as exhausted as I was in the beginning! When it gets too cold to go by bike to work I'll start swimming! Starting to train was a very good decision! :) Makes you feel you have a lot of energy and it is very rewarding both for your mind and body! :)

Current Music: The killers - Mr Brightside (Jaques Lu Cont)

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iresi

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the life of iresi

Entries tagged with health

Gotta think positive in a dark world

More coconut oil...

Coconut Oil

The beautiful truth

Organic life

There is hope for the future

So much to learn

We should all be vegans.

Superhealth

Nothing else is important

Hate to tell you I told you so :P

Mindfulness

Vegan thoughts

Healthy food

Today was a good day :)

Alcohol - the only thing that separates me from being a Straight Edge?

Living a green life

Today I have been swimming 2 km

I'm a polar bear sponsor

Feeling good! :)