It may be easy to glance over quickly, but at the top of this website is a line that states, “The Map To Unleashing Your Personal Energy & Living Your Dreams”. While many of these posts deal directly with your health and personal energy, my question is where is that energy being focused and directed? If you could wake up with twice or even ten times as much energy, clarity and drive, than ever before…how would you use that energy?

I feel that I can strongly say “watching more tv” didn’t enter the picture for most of you. Why? Because that’s not your drive. When you reach a level where you’ve got a reliable, steady stream of energy all day, every day, you eventually turn to yourself and pose a question: “What’s my purpose? Is there something better I could be doing with my time?”. The thing is, most of us only find this focus and direction after getting to a place of abundant personal energy. Anyone in an energy crisis will tell you that they’d much rather just get by; it’s honestly hard to reach for goals and ambitions that stretch you when you feel like there’s nothing left to stretch. I’ve been there and I made a decision to leave that path because it wasn’t taking me where I needed to go…and that’s what brings us to this discussion.

So how is your energy being focused and directed in your life? The reason I called this post “The Passion Of A Life On Fire” is because of the relationship of living your passion, your mission, your life purpose and living a “life on fire”. When you’ve got a strong, fueled intention (it could be to teach children in a way no one else can, it could be to plant 5,000 fruit trees in your lifetime, etc) the intention takes on a life of its own. There’s an ancient saying, “Jing follows Chi, and Chi follows Yi”. What this means is that action and results in this world flow from the energy before them, and that energy is created through intention. The other way around, this shows that the power of our intention determines the energy of that intention, and correspondingly the action and results that flow forth into the world. It all starts with your intention, which may be just a short-term goal at this point!

Have you ever written down a task, chore or even a goal that you wanted to accomplish but felt it completely sap your energy? Maybe you wrote down “clean house and organize files”…and put it off indefinitely. The real reason for this is that your intention isn’t resonating with that deeper part of you. What if instead of writing “clean house and organize files”, you just charged your intention a little more and turned it into the goal “create the most inspiring, beautiful environment for my family”? Which one, running through your head over and over, would drive you to take action? Which would leave you feeling more fulfillfed? Which would give you a greater sense of purpose and direction? Our intention certainly directs our perspective, and our perspective is so intricately tied to how we feel. When we feel like part of something bigger than ourselves, something worthwhile, that can be all it takes to light that fire.

To truly live a life on fire that lets you jump out of bed every morning, follow your intention. Don’t intend to just “get by” if you’ve slipped back into default; intend to live your purpose, your passion, your mission, and intend to do it like no one else can. Here’s another secret: the passion of a life on fire can’t be put out. Ask Gandhi. Ask Martin Luther King. Ask anyone who truly lived life to the fullest and pushed the boundaries of human potential.

On that note, I wish all of you the passion of a life on fire. Whether you’re actively pursuing them or not, what are your passions? Do you have any personal mission? Post them below and get others talking!

Unleash Your Vitality,

John Brackett

P.S. => The New E-Book Is Here!

As a raw foodist myself, I’ve spent hundreds of hours (if not more) researching the arena of raw foods, health, energy, peak performance and other related topics. I’ve seen the research for raw foods, and I’ve heard the counterarguments against going raw. After looking at all of this evidence with an open mind, I’m more convinced than ever that eating 100% raw foods is by far the most sensible path to radiant health.

I’ll be honest with you: it’s tough to accept ideas that completely shatter a current paradigm. This is a cooked food world everywhere you turn…but that doesn’t mean it’s natural or even healthy. Humans are the only creatures on Earth that cook their food. Think about it. All animals in nature eat their wild, natural diet of raw foods. These animals also live to their natural old age, free of the countless diseases on the rise more and more. Yet feed all these animals the same exact foods – cooked – and they develop the degenerative diseases seen everywhere today. There have been countless studies on all different types of animals, and the difference between the same food raw and cooked is the difference between vibrant health and chronic disease, genetic mutations, and complications galore.

It’s certainly not our fault for eating cooked foods! They’ve spread rapidly across the globe since fire was first used to cook thousands of years ago. The reason for this has nothing to do with health if you really dive into the research. When proteins, fats or carbohydrates are heated above a certain temperature, the structure of the food itself changes. My favorite line about this comes from Susan Schenck in The Live Food Factor: “When you were in chemistry lab at school, you no doubt learned that heating things changed their chemical structures. Why would heating food be immune to this chemical process?” The generally accepted cut-off point for heating most foods is 118 degrees Fahrenheit. It’s interesting to think about temperatures in nature, where most hot days reach up into the 80s or 90s. Certain regions can even hit 100-110, but that’s about the upper limit. This corresponds remarkably well to the point where foods change structurally.

An example? The act of heating protein creates cross-links that make around 50% of the protein unusable by the body. When you cook a big slab of meat, you likely go from about 100% protein to 50% protein digestibility on average, depending on the temperature and duration of heating. This literally means that raw foodists need only half the protein intake of people who cook every form of protein they encounter.

But to get back to why the cooked food culture has spread, the heating actually causes thousands of chemicals to be released, many of which our bodies are simply not designed to handle. Many of these chemicals also inhibit our natural functioning by destroying the delicate chemical balances throughout our body. Cooked foods are addicting, comforting, and warm. How many times have you reached for your favorite cooked food when you’ve had a stressful day? An emotional challenge? When you’re exhausted? They’re comforting and addicting, which is why it’s such a hard habit to break. Many raw foodists know firsthand that breaking the habit can be more challenging than any drug addiction – and that it can take years to accomplish.

This is a tough topic to write about because it really feels like an attack on your habits. If you found yourself becoming defensive over your foods, consider why that may be. Have your foods become tied up in your emotions rather than a shining path to radiant health? These are the hard questions, but if you’re willing to ask them then you’re actively breaking up the patterns and habits that may be holding you back. Let me know if this post inspired some heavy thinking and opened some doors for you, or just feel free to ask questions below and I’ll give you my honest opinion.

Unleash Your Vitality,

John Brackett