Common Mistakes that Occur on Raw Foods - by Victoria Boutenko (www.RawFamily.com)

1. Many raw fooders do not eat enough greens. Solution: Regularly consume energy soup or green smoothies to guarantee the proper amount of greens.

2. Many raw fooders do not consume enough fiber, soluble and insoluble. Solution: Drink more smoothies or energy soups instead of juices.

3. People on a raw food diet often consume too many fats. When they try to imitate cooked dishes they substitute starches with nuts. Solution: Use nut pulp left over from making nut mylks, use more seeds and less nuts, and use more fruit and vegetable pulp from juices in your mixtures, to minimize the consumption of nuts.

4. Raw fooders commonly try to become too perfect too fast. They don't give their bodies a chance to adjust to such a radical dietary change. Solution: Gradually adjust and purify your own individual diet to help you ease into the healthiest diet for you.

5. When people change their diets they usually decide the other components that make up health are no longer important, such as sunbathing, exercising, proper rest, fresh air, etc. Solution: Practice a well-rounded healthy lifestyle.

6. People on the raw foods diet often over-indulge in some particular foods and neglect the variety of other fruits and vegetables. Solution: Eat foods in reasonable quantities.

7. The biggest mistake raw fooders make is that they listen to the raw food authorities and don't trust the invaluable messages their own bodies communicate. Solution: Keep a diary of your daily food consumption and how it affects your well-being.

To add #8: Dietary Variety - perhaps just an emphasis of #6 - At Creative Health we often found that after a year on Raw Living Foods many people we experiencing imbalances because they had settled into a routine of only 6 or 7 foods they were eating. Dietary variety is very important! Try everything in the veggie aisle. Experiment with the unfamiliar in the fruit aisle. Try different grains and seeds. Even if you just toss a bit of this and that into the blender, you'll still gain the benefits that each food gives us.