How To Choose A Raw Guru

There's no question that a raw diet can do wonders, and there seems no end to the raw gurus that claim they can lead you down the path to a new, healthier life.

The problems is, many of them preach what amounts to pseudo-scientific-sounding babel clearly divorced from reality, and prey off those who they take in with their fallacies. These people usually don't stick with a raw diet after they've been burned a few times, which is why the raw food movement is hemorrhaging new recruits rather than growing.

When gurus spout diet information that doesn't work, they're creating misinformation and driving people away from their shot at health, which is something that should be abhorred.

Without naming names or blaming anyone, I'd like to lay out some criteria you can use for judging raw gurus objectively. My hope is that if we can get enough people thinking about what they're hearing, we can start laughing more of these parasitic raw gurus off the stage.

Finding A Raw Guru: Trying To Have It Both Ways

The first sign of a raw guru gone bad is when they try to have it both ways, and in effect create a logical fallacy by attacking the essence of their own message.

Raw, fresh, whole, plant foods are healthiest, right? It's not a statement that I've heard any raw guru argue with, and there's enough scientific literature on the subject to make challenging it rather hard.

Even mainstream doctors will tell you everyone should eat more raw fruits and vegetables, even if they would balk at the idea of going raw themselves.

We know that plants- fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds- pack a nutritional wallop like nothing else. No food has more vitamins than fruit or more minerals than vegetables.

Plant food provides every nutritional component for health we can possibly need. It's clear eating a large variety of them is a good thing, but equally clear that there is no one superior or necessary food, only categories of superior and necessary food.

The questionable raw guru realizes he needs to sell the idea that raw food is superior because he wants his followers to realize some level of health gain, but he also needs them on a hook, so he gives the message with a caveat.

Yes, he'll tell them, raw foods are superior, but they are also flawed. But lucky for you, I've got what you need to make everything right.

At this point the learner is instructed that while whole, fresh plant foods are indeed just dandy, the copious use of supplement pills, herbal extracts, salts, dried or otherwise processed foods from obscure locations, or something stimulating and not at all raw like chocolate is in fact the key to achieving and maintaining health.

When push comes to shove, fruits and vegetables get the short end of the stick. If anyone questions this too much, some of those pseudo-scientific sounding answers are trotted out, such as the absurd idea that hybrid fruits are harmful, as if whatever is being peddled in its place is any less of a hybrid.

Fruit is restricted to an occasional dalliance, fat is trumpeted, and the stimulants are needed so that people come down from those stimulants and then need more to feel good. The questionable raw guru can never let you feel good all the time, because then you wouldn't need him.

Finding A Raw Guru: Is Your Health Chained To Your Wallet?

There's nothing wrong with making a living, especially when your business is helping people get a new lease on life. Nor is there any problem with having competing views of what is ideal.

Raw Guru Pill Money

What's wrong is holding true health just out of the reach of its seekers, and only distributing drops of it for regular doses of cash.

If any raw guru is teaching health on the instalment plan, or attempting to bestow special properties on some obscure item for financial gain, there's a pretty good chance you should write them off.
How does this work?

If a teacher promises they can give you the information to achieve a maintainable and healthy raw food diet through a book, audio recording, class, or another one-hit sale, it seems pretty reasonable. After all, they've accumulated knowledge, and are spending their time to teach others what they know. Why shouldn't they be paid?

On the other hand, more parasitic raw gurus infer that it is in fact they that hold the key to health. They sell the best supplements. They hawk the best olive oil.

Beware A Raw Guru Bearing Chocolate

They can supply the most rare cultivar of goji berry. You need to keep buying if you want to stay healthy, because fruits and veggies won't cut it. They're downright harmful, even. So open up the wallet and buy some pills and some "super"foods.

Finding A Raw Guru: Dabblers Aren't Good Leaders

It's not at all uncommon to find raw gurus, who, upon being pressed, admit they're not 100 percent raw. They sneak cooked meals here and there, and field all kinds of reasons as to why they do this.
Raw Food Guru Fruit

If a particular raw diet isn't good enough to keep its own advocate satisfied, you can bet there's something wrong with it. Either the raw food diet is the best or it isn't. There's not a lot of room for waffling.

Finding A Raw Guru: Continuity In The Message

I'm sometimes shocked when I go to the book store and pick up two books written by the same raw guru. One, written earlier, will preach one message while a later one will suggest something significantly different.

How can you trust a someone who said five or 10 years ago they'd found the way, and then apparently changed their mind and started pontificating for something new and better? How do you know they've really found their way this time, and won't change their minds in another five years when some new slick marketing opportunity emerges or they finally realize that their high fat processed diet isn't working?

Finding A Raw Guru: Empowering The Pill, Not The Body

Only the body can heal itself; our food only provides the raw materials. At best, foods are easy to digest like fruits and vegetables and provide a complete panoply of nutrients that won't tax your digestive resources or force you to pump out toxins. At worst, they harm you and layer your arteries with fat.

The idea that there are super foods capable of healing your body is a frequently-touted idea brought out by pill sellers, but it's false. The body is responsible for building itself up and repairs damage. Food is just fuel. Always take the best fuel, but know that it's just making the engine go, but not moving the car itself.

Finding A Raw Guru: Not Because It Resonates

Don't follow your gut. Follow your brain and your body instead.

Too often I get emailed by people picking their a guru because the person resonated with them at some level. Often, what this means is they liked what he said, or, in other words, what he said didn't disturb their equanimity in the slightest.

This is the same mentality that gets most people into bad health situations in the first place. When an American comes down with heart disease, his doctors more or less tells him what he wants to hear: you don't have to change your diet much - just start popping these pills.

Despite the fact that low fat diets have a proven history of reversing heart disease, they're almost never mentioned, because who wants to hear that they need to do something radically different?

Most health seekers wouldn't mind having health while eating cake too, and parasitic gurus are eager to sell it to them - but only the highest quality raw cake, of course. A perfect diet would be one where you could eat whatever you please without consequence, but such a diet does not exist. There are consequences to everything, and if you want health, you must eat healthfully.

Finding A Raw Guru: When the Message Strains Credulity, You Need To Be Able To Think

It doesn't hurt to learn a bit about nutrition yourself.

This makes it much easier to question fallacious statements like "fruit demineralizes the body."

If someone asks you where you get your protein, it's not a bad idea to have an answer up your sleeve. A college-level textbook on nutrition is probably a good place to start.

Your body is also a good judge. If you can't shed the weight you want despite following their diet to a tee for six months, or you're feeling sluggish and unathletic, that should tell you something right there.

Think independently and evaluate.

Finding A Raw Guru: Following Up

At the end of the day, you're the one that has to be able to judge the teacher. Do they radiate health and honesty? Do you find yourself comparing them to a used car salesman?

The best option in this and all matters is to think. Does the message really make sense? Why does he say that? Ask questions and find out. Press him. You might just find there's a lot of bluster hiding a real lack of knowledge. Inspiration from those that have blazed a path is excellent, but don't let their marketing blind you.

Regardless of which raw guru you're listening to, read how you should feel on a healthy raw food diet.

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