HorseSense

I used to love mushrooms until I thought about the fact that they are just fungus. Umm no thanks! lol

There is no substitute for hanging leg raises! I found that out after investing in one of those contraptions you hang in your doorway. I was kinda skeptical of its quality and usefulness at first but after doing my first pull up and handing leg raises routines there is no looking back!

I have never heard of anyone gaining weight from eating fruits. In fact if you youtube 80/10/10 and visit 30bananasaday.com you'll see it is quite the opposite. I was eating a lot of pasta a while back and going a little bit overboard, and gained a little fat from that, but nothing to make me panic. I replaced the pasta calories with fruit calories and lost the weight again. Works like clockwork. But that's just my body. Your results may vary IDK.

Great progress! Looking good just be patient keep doing what you're doing that part where you get to showing the abs is the toughest for most of us.

Your body is not as strong on a meat-based diet as on a plant-based. That is my own observation, not a scientific finding with documentation. But the reason I say that is animal protein is acidic whereas plant based proteins are alkalizing. Your body prefers the latter, but cancer loves the former. Also, you have to keep in mind that what you are probably comparing the average bodybuilder to is the average person who doesn't exercise. The average person who doesn't exercise is a great example of being disease ridden.

I think if that's your tastes than go with it. It is your body not anyone else's and it knows what it wants. Your combinations sound nutritionally great (the lentils are powerhouses) if that's what you like for taste. Though I'm no expert. I would just make sure I'm getting B12 somewhere.

Thanks guys for the comments. I'll have better pictures up eventually of course. Phyto - I have been building muscle just fine with minimal protein supplementation (a scoop of pea protein/some grains), definitely nowhere near the 1g per lb body weight rule. In fact I've never lived up to that rule even when I was a meat eater. I believe I'll keep on just fine with natural protein intake without supplementation. I think the key to maintaining/building muscle mass is making sure your body has enough calories so there are no cannibalizing hormones going rampant. This is VERY easy to do with fruits. Throughout the summer (literally up the road from me) there will be available local strawberries, peaches, watermelons, tomatoes, and my aunt grows so many blueberries every year she has to give them away by the multiple lbs to keep up with it all! She gives me a bunch of them and so much my freezer gets full so I have some during winter too!! I do not plan on giving up my soy milk/cereal yet though so I won't be completely raw. I may change my mind on that. But both are fortified with lots of B12 and D and I've been comfortable with that. I can always just take a vitamin though. So we shall see down the road.

I was on soy milk as an infant as I was allergic to cow's milk. It wasn't as easy to find back then (very early 70s) so sometimes it had to be hunted down. Anyone who says it can't be equal to cow's milk didn't see me as a baby. I was FAT and HEAVY and VERY healthy. After soy milk my mom introduced me to fruit based baby food. I guess this explains A LOT! LOL

LOL well because the mirror doesn't do jack to show my "curves" as well as like looking from the ground up. I don't know why. Cameras hate me and I don't look anything like myself in a pic or video. Thus those angles. And thanks I didn't think I'd ever see such definition in my muscles but going vegan made that possible, while still building muscle. What is going to be very interesting is I'm now going into a mostly raw fruitarian diet without any supplementation during the summer. I hope my muscle building progresses as usual, because I have a theory that it will!!

Having done a lot more research I have to say I'm going back to bananas. In my part of USA there are a lot of fresh local fruits available now and for quite a few more months and I've just added bananas to the list. Looks like I will be starting up the raw fruitarian diet again. Very excited about it!! One thing that I love about fruit is the "mood enhancing" that was mentioned. That has to be what explains just that when I eat fresh fruits and drink fresh fruit juices. It is a very "light" feeling and everything is "bright" and fatigue and depression are nonexistent. Some people may think I'm bananas (sorry I had to) when I say that but I'm very sensitive to what I put in my mouth so it should make sense to those who are the same.

This is my transformation from a few months ago (last year sometime) to 4/17/12. Sorry if the angle isn't great but that's the only pic I have of me in that shape last year. I was never planning to do this up until I just up and DID IT one day and didn't look back. I'm 5'9" and pic on the left I was 191 with a 38.5" waist and on right I was (and still am) 165 w/31.5" waist. I know you probably can't tell that I lost that much, but I also had a lot of fat (or fluid??) in my chest, arms, and legs and you can see my abs coming out on the right, something I thought I'd never see since my twenties!!! LOL I am NOW getting back up to where I was with the arms, chest, legs, etc but it is ALL MUSCLE and it feels fantastic to be able to see it in the mirror in contrast to my more natural waist line!! What is really exciting is now that summer has hit I can up my fruit (grown locally) up BIG TIME which always works to my advantage!!! Here's to the future!! http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/keyofdavid88/compare.jpg

Adding any kind of "food" to mine only made it worse. I finally just added a scoop (I do 2 now) and 2 tsp of Splenda. Not unpleasant and I do it 2-3 times per day. To supplement the pea proteins I eat pasta and rice dishes and on treat days, some kind of vegan bread, usually unleavened.

That's what Sheryl Crow is calling this recipe in her "If It Makes You Healthy" cookbook. I thought it was worth a share. Serves: 6-8 1 tbsp canola oil 1 large yellow onion, diced 1 tbsp. chopped garlic 1 pound ground soy burger alternative 2 tsp. cumin 1 1/2 tbsp. chili powder 1/2 tsp. smoke paprika, optional 1/2 tsp. dried red chili flakes One 12-oz. can light beer, at room temperature 1 1/2 tsp. low sodium soy sauce Two 14-15 oz. cans chili hot beans with can juices, preferably organic Two 14-15 oz. cans fire-roasted diced tomatoes, preferably organic 2 bay leaves 2 tsp. dried oregano Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper Fat-free saltines or cornbread for serving (optional) Hot pepper sauce for serving (optional) In large pot, HEAT the oil over medium heat and when hot, saute the onion and garlic for 3 to 4 minutes. ADD ground soy and cook 1 to 2 minutes, stirring with a wooden spoon. Add cumin, chili powder, paprika and chili flakes and continue to cook, stirring until the spices are slightly toasted and fragrant, 1 to 2 minutes. Using a wooden spoon to prevent sticking, STIR in half of the beer and soy sauce. Add the rest of the beer and sir to mix. ADD the chili hot beans, pinto beans, tomatoes and 1 cup of water and mix well. Add bay leaves and oregano and stir. Bring the chili to a low boil over medium-high heat and COOK for 10 to 15 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes or so until the stew is well blended. REDUCE the heat to low and simmer gently until cooked through, 30 to 40 minutes, until the flavors blend. Stir the chili occasionally during cooking. Adjust the heat up or down to maintain a simmer. SERVE hot with crumbled saltines or cornbread and some extra hot sauce, if desired. Looks good to me!! Found this in Country Weekly. Gonna try it myself!

I think its more to do with your outlook. People are brought up to believe they are a part of the "predator" world, when that actually is not the case for most. But we can become what we are brainwashed to believe we are. I have experienced less lustful thinking as well and less anxiety because of it. I see things more "in line" with what my TRUE nature is, instead of something misdirected and not true to self.

Kid is wise beyond his years!

Yea mine only tortures me with the smell of Starbucks when you first walk in.

+1 I was a little afraid to go back to anything "starchy" like pasta or rice after losing so much weight after eating mostly legumes and fruit but I have been incorporating more and more this into my diet again to compliment the pea protein I'm taking now and I have to say I'm still gaining muscle (which I'm now focusing on instead of "just" losing fat) and I'm STILL losing around my waist. I was 191 when I joined this forum. When I got down to 175 I didn't think I'd get lower and started the muscle bulking again. While gaining muscle mass I continued to lose around my waist down to 170 and maintained that for a little while. Recently incorporating grains back into my diet has resulted in another 2 lbs off the scale to 168 lbs and more OFF of my waist! For me, it was milk products. I'll never got back to anything from an animal.

Yea and it SEEMED at first glance to be a "cold" move on Target's part, but really it is just a place of business. It is a system of buy and sell, not somewhere I should feel harassed. People want to harp on stores not letting bell ringers stand in your way upon entering? Where is the concern that my sister called almost every church in our area and NO ONE was giving to the recent victims of the tornadoes that ravaged the midwest? No bad mouthing of churches in the media so far... We found ONE church giving, so we drove out of our ways to go there and donate what we could. Giving without being manipulated into it is much more satisfying, too. And yea Baby Herc that was such a fantastically worded post! I may have to quote that for future...statements. David

+1 for Target

If it ain't broke don't fix it!

No offense taken. Was in NYC which is beyond by far anything Cali calls "competitive" and I thank God everyday SC is not So Cal.

Wow that was very helpful! Unlike our good friend HorseSense comment, I find this helpful. Sorry. Its just that I was in your shoes once and all it took was classifieds to get me started. That was it. Maybe I just had good luck. Best of luck to you! Hope things go your way!!

Advertise. Craigslist. You're welcome.

Here it is folks! From the horses' mouth! They're heeeerrrrreeee!

Got it!! All I did was add a tsp of Splenda. Its great now! I guess any protein powder would be nasty without flavoring so it should have been a no brainer. I'm also in transition from Splenda to Stevia but that's a slow process. (had to add that for the hardcore vegans, lol) Since its not totally nasty with flavor added to it I'm thinking I can probably just add it to a dish (like a pasta recipe) after it has been cooked but still hot. That way I'm assured of no denaturing.