RAW JOURNEYS is run by Erini Loucaides with passion. She offers raw food recipes and advice on the raw food lifestyle in collaboration with nutritionist, Barbara Karafoka of Conscious Living. Erini also organises raw food exhibitions, potlucks and workshops.  Below is the story of their raw journey so far.

We also love to hear from others on the raw journey, so please tell us yours by emailing us at: info@rawjourneys.com and we will put it here! 

WHY JOURNEY?

As you move along this constantly unfolding path, there is no destination (even when you think you’re going backwards, you’re not!). What is important is  doing your best whatever that may be at that point in time for you.

Just  Flow.  

 Erini’s Journey;

Erini Loucaides is a raw foodist and private school teacher with a degree in English Literature. For the past decade she has been co-running the school's Ecology Club, focussing on both inner and outer ecology. This has involved visits to health and environmental centres, and many organic farms, including the Alternative Technology Centre in Wales as well as  attending many ecological conferences, even as far as Nepal. Erini has also attended and followed lectures by David Wolfe, Peter Ragnar and been advised by raw food authors, Karen Knowler and Gina Panayi. Of course her main love is concocting delicious raw recipes and feeding the unsuspecting

It all happens step by step, so quietly in fact, that you don’t realize it and it’s not until you reflect much later, that you are able to understand where life was guiding you all along.  

I was born  23rd January 1975 and thought that turning vegetarian at age 15 was healthy but a few years later, after reading the Diamond’s ‘Fit For Life’, I realised  that there were good and bad vegetarians.I was bad! By this time I had finished my degree in English Literature from London University and had begun teaching at a private school where a colleague and I set up the school’s Ecology Club. Over the decade that followed, we promoted care for the environment in its many forms and highlighted the essential fact that just as there was outer ecology, there was also inner: the food we eat and its impact on us. This led to many trips including one up in the Machairas mountains around 2003. There, Dr Maria Georgiou and her husband provided some valuable insights into proper eating habits. Impressed, I returned there again, alone, and out of everything Dr Maria said to me over that weekend, one big truth resounded within me.

     ‘Always make sure you eat something living with each meal’

 I had read Ann Wigmore’s ‘Be Your Own Doctor’, but after that day, I saw food very differently. Of course I was still unaware one could have  a 80-100% raw lifestyle, but  I’d look at the grilled vegetables, then at the large salad and wonder, ‘If that salad is living, then what is the cooked stuff?’  Quite dead of course! At this point, I increased my intake of greens, made juices and was probably 50% raw – but the other 50% also comprised of ahem…certain nasties.

And so it was that a few years after that I attended a detox talk where my life was truly about to swivel. I thought it would be like any other such lecture and in some ways it was with the exception that I came out more inspired than usual. At the end of the talk, Siri Shabd Singh recommended a book, ‘Detox  Your World’ which I bought soon after  and within days, the world of the raw lifestyle made its fullest impact upon me.  Life would never be the same.

I had a three month honeymoon period where I was pretty much 80-90% raw and I was overwhelmed at the changes. The weight fell off, my mind grew clear and the world was one gorgeous adventure!   However, I guess you can’t kick 30 years of bad habits in three months and the drastic change did catch up with me. Eating raw is just as much an emotional, mental and spiritual change as it is a physical one. I had to start with basic steps all over again, ones that had to be learned well before moving to the next level.

Now I feel that I have tuned into the rhythm of my raw dance. Although I am not always sure what is around the corner, I know one thing:  raw is always there to catch and pirouette me!  And is it perhaps your time to dance?   

Barbara’s Journey….

Barbara Karafokas is  a raw foodist with a Masters in holistic nutrition. She has attended and followed seminars and lectures by well known raw foodists, Gabriel Cousens, Peter Ragnar and motivational speaker, Anthony Robbins. She has offered  nutritional and holistic advice to hundreds of people over the past few years. In Barbara’s own words her vision is to “educate our community and to help us all realize that we need to all start living our lives consciously and to evaluate our behaviour with regard to how we may enhance or disrupt the natural balance of all things.’

How did it all begin ? I was born 30th September 1972, but the little wake up call was when a friend of mine gave me the Diamond's book "Fit for Life", about 12 years ago. Then the mega huge, earth quaking, shake up wake up call occurred back in 1999 when I went to an Anthony Robbins seminar in Geneva. It opened a door which led to an awakening period in my life which has not ended. I started reading and reading and realized that every time I bought a book it was on nutrition and spirituality (about a book a week).

That eventually led to me obtaining a degree in Holistic Nutrition MSc, from Clayton College of Natural Health. About five years ago I came across the Essene Gospel of Peace by Edmond Bordeaux Szekely, which was my first introduction to eating raw.

For the past ten years I have been devoted to spreading the knowledge of a healthy vegetarian lifestyle, including simple holistic living and care of the environment.

As a Holistic Nutritionist my vision is to educate our community and to help us all realize that we must all start living our lives consciously and to evaluate our behaviours with regard to how we may enhance or disrupt the natural balance of all things. From the exhaust gases to cars and industrial pollutants, the chlorofluorocarbons destroying the planet’s ozone layer, exposing us to harmful radiation. The unrestricted urban sprawl is wantonly eliminating our green space, natural habitats for animals and the herbicides and pesticides are poisoning our soil and consequently, our food. Greed and waste are the characteristics of a population that has lost touch with itself and its soul…

Eating raw is the most natural way to cultivate qualities of joy, inner peace, health and happiness in ourselves and in turn these are spread to our love for mother earth and all her creatures. It is walking the Divine path of  love.

I invite you to join us on this journey and live life by opening your heart, body, mind and soul to RAWSOMENESS !

Constantina’s Journey

One of seven children, I was born in a small village called Southwick near

Brighton in England . My father ran his own Fish & Chip shop, where I often helped out serving the fatty fried food but never wanting to eat it. Instead my mum often took us to ‘Infinity’ Health food store in Brighton to get molasses and honey flapjacks. I wasn’t to know then that my passion for health foods would develop later in life.

I can remember as a teenager feeling uncomfortable after eating certain types of food such as milk chocolate and bread. I would hate the sluggish feelings and then the mood swings that came along. I don’t think at that point I understood the direct connection with the foods I was eating and the way I was feeling. I was sixteen years old when I moved away from eating red meat and it took no effort at all, feeling most natural. For the following ten years I continued to eat bread, dairy products, chicken, fish and all fruits and vegetables. In the meantime I moved to Cyprus with my family where I found my love for watermelon and many other delicious fruits available on the island.

It wasn’t until 1999 that I came upon the book ‘Fit for Life’ by Marilyn and Harvey Diamond, that I began a lifelong interest and passion for diet and health. Gradually my eating patterns began to change as I followed the food combining diet and my intake of fruit and salads increased. I continued eating small amounts of chicken and fish to please others more than myself as I had a history of low iron and low energy levels and still believed the protein myth. However, even though my iron and energy were low, I noticed a positive change in my digestive process, discovering that I was able to digest food much easier if I combined correctly. I eventually stopped eating chicken and fish. Then, making the change to rice milk and cutting out dairy products, also had a positive impact and my own children had very little, if any, colds once dairy was omitted from our diets. Bread and all wheat products were taken, bringing great benefit to my physical and emotional being.

It was not until 2006 that I learned that my diet could move up to a whole new level.

I will always remember the day my good friend Erini told me all about the Raw Food lifestyle, and even as she was speaking to me, I felt that I was discovering a great truth: A feeling of remembering and knowing that this was it, at last, the natural way of eating that I had been searching for.

From then on I embarked on a personal journey of self – discovery, exploring the raw food lifestyle and making many connections with the foods I was eating and how I was feeling. I have learned to listen to my body and feed myself with the vitamins and minerals that my body has been starved of for many years. My exploration of Superfoods, namely Cacao, Maca and Spirilina have helped me immensely.

My low energy levels and iron deficiency that I had suffered from for many years have improved dramatically and my PMT and mood swings have found a balance.

Maintaining clear communication with my body’s needs has led me to nourish my body in a way that brings more self love and self honouring.

I have also developed a closer connection with nature through my exploration of herbs and plants. This has led me to a deeper awakening and appreciation for the beauty and abundance of our planet. Ultimately, it is a reconnecting of oneness with mother earth.

Along with all this, I have found a deep connection with the raw food lifestyle and my spiritual journey. Throughout my studies in Feng Shui and Shamanic Healing, I have observed that my diet is crucial to my mental and energetic performances.

I have realised that there is one main fundamental connection between Feng Shui, Raw Food lifestyle and personal Shamanic energy healing, and that is to clear our blockages; be it clutter in our homes, toxins in our body and heavy energy in our energy fields. To bring balance and find inner peace with our pure connection to the planet and all that is.

I see that we have many allies at our assistance while we journey on this beautiful planet. To name a few, Feng Shui, Astrology, Raw food Superfoods and Energy medicine. It is our responsibility to become our full potential and to use all of the tools that are available to us. All it takes is a willingness to learn and be open to the magic of all that is.

I have been inspired by all of my teachers, Lillian Too, Alberto Villoldo and David Wolfe and am filled with gratitude for being able to journey with others who are also willing to step into the truth.