Healthy Living by Willow Creek Springs
A podcast about practices to promote healthy lives featuring experts, businesses, and clients: we gather to share our stories about success, failure, exploration, and so much more. Our subscription episodes feature some personal and vulnerable, real-life stories that are sensitive to some of the general public.
Healthy Living by Willow Creek Springs
Raw, Simple, And Powerful with Axay Shah
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What if the most straightforward question—why Axay Shaw, founder of RawFoodiest, to explore how eating for energy and minimizing harm can transform performance, clarity, and long-term wellbeing.e His story spans sixteen years of raw nutrition, marathon training, and lab results that improved with age—built not on rigid purity, but on curiosity and attention.
I share my own path through an aggressive cancer and the dietary pivot that followed: dialing down methionine-rich proteins, leaning into plants, and using fasting as a careful tool rather than an extreme challenge. We unpack how keto helped with weight yet missed the deeper problem, and how learning to listen—truly listen—to the body’s signals changed everything. From nuts and sprouts to simple strategies for B12 and digestibility, we focus on practical moves that keep energy high and stress low.
Together we challenge noisy nutrition myths: the single-nutrient obsession, the fear of lectins and antinutrients, and the claim that one trend fits every body. Okseh’s forthcoming manifesto lays out the science of energy, whole-body thinking, and step-by-step practices that make raw eating feel like freedom instead of restriction. The big takeaway is refreshingly human: question your defaults, collect your own data, and choose food that loves you back—most of the time, with room for real life.
If this conversation sparks you to rethink your plate, tap follow, share it with a friend who’s experimenting, and leave a review with the one change you’ll try this week. Your body is talking—ready to hear it?
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Well, hello, and welcome back to the Healthy Living Podcast. I'm your host, Joe Grumbine, and today we have a very special guest. His name is Okseh Shaw, and he's a plant-based health advocate and founder of Raw Foodiist. And um, we're just gonna jump into a conversation because um I have a recent diet change that we have a lot to talk about. So, Okse, welcome to the show. It's so great to have you here today.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you very much, Joe. Thank you for you know inviting me. Uh and yeah, I'm glad to be here.
SPEAKER_00:Excellent, excellent. So um, you know, it your story resonates with a lot of people, and you know, there's every kind of diet out there. There's people that say you should only eat meat, and then there's people that say you should eat a um Mediterranean diet and eat, you know, mostly vegetables and nuts and a little bit of meat and fish, and then there's people that say, you know, eat mostly vegetables and maybe a little eggs and fish, and then there's other people say, I only eat fish. And then there's people that say, I'm vegan, I won't touch anything that was ever part of an animal world, and then there's raw vegan who say, Well, that's a whole nother story. So why don't you tell us a little bit about how you came to this place that you're at, and then tell us about it.
SPEAKER_02:Let's let's turn the table now. You know, it's like instead, telling I don't tell people what to eat. I I say, okay, this is what I'm eating, right? And if you want to know, I I'm here for you. Nice. Let me ask you a question, Joe. Why are you eating any food?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I eat for a lot of reasons, but right now I eat to nourish my body.
SPEAKER_02:Correct. Let's say nourish your body for what? For energy, for um uh you know immune system.
SPEAKER_00:For for all of the above, I um recently uh overcome a very aggressive cancer. And so for the last year and a half, my life has been upside down, and my purpose and and and the way I eat has changed dramatically from before not not only for you.
SPEAKER_02:Let's say I'm asking this question to everybody. Sure, you are eating, right? And if you are eating, a lot of people say for energy, for immune system, to to grow, to survive, uh, we are hungry. There are so many answers. Right. Basic answer boils down to one thing, and that's you need energy. Sure, food is a source of energy, and then then we can say, you know, a lot of things that, yeah, okay, we we we are we are getting nutrients out of it, we we get some system to for uh you know, immune system, some you know, and uh for growth, uh for for better sleep, for better this or that, you know. That's I agree, but bottom line is energy, right? So then you have to think which food is good for energy. Now, any food which you think is good for energy and it really is good, it's helping you, Joe. You should eat that food. But if it is hurting you, you should not eat that food. There you go. I like that. It's that simple, right? Common sense, yeah. Yeah, you don't have to have a PhD or you don't have to have a medical degree. So, what my two cent, my understanding is we are all eating food for energy. Okay, when we eat the food for energy, and something you know is like which we eat in a smaller quantity, but still it gives you better energy, that's the you know, better food, right? Gives you optimum output with minimum input, right? So in my research, in uh the sciences and everything, I have not found a single person still telling me that hey, what you are doing is wrong. Even doctors, they say okay, what you are doing is right, it's a hard, but it is right, it is the right thing to do. So, what I I found out using raw food, what Mother Nature created for us, and that is something which is if we eat, there is a lot of benefits, no harm, no side effect, uh no no problem at uh you know old age. That's what I think. I'm only 66 now. Okay, but let's say if if I can and I'm doing this for last 16 plus years. Okay. I started at age 50. Okay, and I I uh uh your question was how I started. I had no medical problem, I didn't have any issue, health problem, or anything. I was not obese. Still, I started out of curiosity to find out. It was experiment.
SPEAKER_00:So, what was your diet like before you switched over to what you're doing now?
SPEAKER_02:I was on on a plant-based food, I was vegetarian, but I was eating cooked food. Okay, so I was eating cooked food, but it was like I was eating like a pig. Okay, whatever you know. I see, you know, it is the quantity was a large, mindless eating, eating without any reason, uh, eating because uh it's just in front of me, eating because I like it, eating because I'm in a party, or somebody offered me those kinds of eating I used to do before. Okay. Now I become so much aware that you know I don't have to eat because it's in front of me. I have to eat only when I'm hungry. And my body sensors now become so sensitive, so good, it tells me very precisely when I'm hungry, when I'm thirsty, when what I need to eat, what I don't need to eat. And uh it it refined my sensors in such a level that now uh it is uh very easy for me. For earlier, it was like a lot of people have difficulty. I didn't have that much difficulty, but it was like I screwed it up for 50 years.
SPEAKER_00:Right?
SPEAKER_02:So pre you you you spent your whole life as vegetarian or so basically, yes, my whole life was vegetarian, but I ate uh uh meat like in uh four years of my college days. Okay, in my college days, it's like uh with the friends, and you know, I ate meat. Okay, that out of uh uh you know, it's like because in in our culture, eating meat is a taboo, you cannot eat meat.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_02:Now, especially as as a as in college, you know, you want to break the rule.
SPEAKER_00:There you go. Yeah, exactly. You're rebelling against everything, right?
SPEAKER_02:So I I ate in four years everything, you know, chicken, meat, everything, fish. Okay, but uh those four years I just without any you know issue, and I gave up. Nobody told me to give up, nobody asked me to do it, but I felt uh I didn't felt that good while those four years, and then I said, you know, why to eat you know, why to continue? So I gave up. I quit, and since that day till today, I never touch again.
SPEAKER_00:Got it. Okay, interesting. So most of your life you've I mean the vast majority of your life you've been vegetarian. Correct. Okay, and you've been generally pretty healthy. Very healthy.
SPEAKER_02:I just right now, before uh you know, come talking to you. I had a call from my hospital that hey, uh your annual checkup is now due. Uh, doctor wants to see you. Uh, we will run all those blood tests and everything. I'm ready because I'm going to run my marathon, eight marathons on coming March after, you know. So every time before running marathon, I go and have a physical checkup. So doctor have all the records, and that record is helping me that I am uh doing this uh you know 16 years, but that 21-year-old record, everything I'm publishing to the public, you know, is like okay, here what I was before, and here I am now, after 16 years, my record in instead going down is is improving.
SPEAKER_00:So the difference really between your diet of before as a vegetarian and now today is that you just don't cook your food now. Correct. And and that's that is the primary difference. So you eat more or less the same things?
SPEAKER_02:No, because vegetarian food, people think it is healthy, but it is not. Right. A lot of it is not, right? I agree. So people I I tell is like I never had that awareness about food before. When you when I started it, is it's like I started doing research. I started digging into it and trying to find out what is good, what is not, and why. So then I found out that you know, after just starting it, that cooked food is is uh killing all the enzymes. Not all, almost 60-70 percent enzymes are dead, and nutrients are depleting, you know, it's it's now so for what you are eating, you're eating just for calorie. So uh I instead I I I see this way that you know um eating raw food gives you optimum energy, uh, minimum or no harm. Um it makes your organ uh every organ, not only one, not only that uh your your liver is good, or not only that you know your heart is good, but uh everything, the whole whole body, holistically, you know, right from the the brain to the toe, everything works so well. And uh that is that is more important. Thing is, if you don't see this our body as a whole, one body, that then itself is creating the problem. And and uh here industry is oh okay, you know, eat omega-3 for this, eat uh B12 for that, uh take more protein, take this. So, but they are not seeing that the whole thing in in uh large scale. Because everything you eat, maybe there is some benefit, but there is a lot of problem. Eating uh you know mindlessly and eating too much protein is also creating a lot of problems. But then you okay, yeah, because uh advertisement says the protein is good, you just keep eating it.
SPEAKER_00:Well, that's actually a big part of my big diet change. I I learned that um cancer has a uh huge appetite for methionine, which is an amino acid found in every protein. And without it, cancer cannot um metabolize or replicate the way it wants to. And so my diet is very low protein, and it's a little difficult because I'm very active and I I you know try to keep my muscle mass where you know in a healthy way, but I defeated this cancer. I had a giant tumor sticking out of my neck um less than a year ago, and uh no surgery, no radiation, and um you can't even tell. And the doctors are all blown away, but um I'm I I eat basically a vegan diet now, and um I break a little bit once in a while, you know. I I enjoy meat and eggs, and and I think eggs are a really good source of nutrients, and so now and again I have a little bit, but it's very seldom in and very small amount. Um, but that would be one of my questions is as a as a raw vegan or vegetarian, you're you're not consuming legumes because you gotta cook them.
SPEAKER_02:No, I'm not doing it, but people can do it. Uh let's say sprouted uh mung beans or any other thing is okay. Or let's say if somebody wants to do it, they can soak it in a water and then they blend it. Oh, okay. All right. That is that is also possible. And if let's if somebody wants to eat uh with a little boiled or you know, steam, is is I I I tell people, make your own rule. Sure. So don't don't follow anybody, including me. Right. Because you know your body, you this is your body. Your if once you start listening to your body, your body is going to tell you what to eat and what not to eat. And so uh uh basically this raw food is is not to cure any disease. This is actually raw food is preventive. Our body is so so intelligent that if once you have any issue, it heals itself or protect you from so, but we are not listening that, and that is the causing all the problem, right? Whether it has a cancer or diabetes or blood pressure or any any other issue, heart problem. But once you start listening to your body, your body will tell you stop, stop, don't eat this, this is no good. This is but that is the issue that that that the whole reason I'm telling it. This is not good the you know like a cure or any for cure for any disease.
SPEAKER_00:Sure. Yeah, yeah, it's a lifestyle. I mean it's it's it's about um it's it's a way to live, not not a specific purpose to do a thing. Um and again, these are questions that I have because I I have become very aware of my body as well, and you know, um in in going through these changes, I first I lost 55 pounds uh uh initially with a keto-type diet. And so I was eating a lot of protein, and at the same time, this tumor was growing, and I didn't I didn't understand. So I wasn't eating any fruit, I wasn't eating any carbohydrates, I wasn't, you know, I was just eating a lot of protein and vegetables mostly. But I lost the weight and got real healthy, but at the same time, the problem that I had wasn't going away. And um through the course of all this, I began to really get a feel, you know, for when I needed something or when you know, listening to your body. It's it happens when you're paying attention to what you're doing, I think. And uh fasting was a big part of my my regimen as well. What do you think about that? It's good.
SPEAKER_02:Fasting is good because it's uh you know, whatever we ate other day, and there is excess, everything, you know, excess, it it's it's it's clear as up. So it's like you're you're cleaning your house let's say once a week. You're you're doing your laundry once a week is good. That that is how you know if you keep rest to your body, it it cleans up. It's it's and nothing wrong. I do fasting even on the raw food. My food is very little, but every Wednesday I don't eat any any fruits and vegetables, I eat only nuts. Okay, and that's my way of doing that.
SPEAKER_00:That would tell me. Um, I I my a couple questions that I would have is a lot of times vegetarians uh run into some problems with some basic nutrient deficiencies like protein. But if you're eating nuts, you generally can get the protein you need. Um, yeah. What about like B12? That's another is a big issue for vegetarian.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, uh, I don't have that issue. Uh, reason is I'm eating a lot of uh yeast flex. Okay. Traditional yeast flex and also uh the kombucha homemade and all those gives a little bit of uh B12. Okay, and I'm asking my doctor, actually. In fact, uh I asked this time, you know, uh let's uh have a checkup on uh B12 also. Yeah, so uh they're going to run that. Uh but it if it's B12, it's uh if anybody is healthy, then they don't have issue of B B12 because it helps you for immune your immune system, right? So yeah, uh, but still I I don't want to take it anything for granted. Uh I want to check it out, I want to have the number, and so that I can give that number to the public.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely, absolutely. So, yeah, those are just you know, as as I've been making lifestyle changes, you know, I'm gonna be living this lifestyle for the rest of my life now because I I know what it does and what it doesn't do, and and you know, once you deal with cancer, you you always deal with it, even if it's gone, it's still you have the likelihood of it wanting to come back, so we don't want to give it a chance to come back, so I'm not giving it that. But I I struggle with it a little bit because I I enjoy fish a lot, and so you know, for me, I I say, well, most of the time I live this way, and once in a while I break down and have a have a meal that I really enjoy this way, and then that's it. And then I fast afterward for uh three days and and get reset my body and go back to it.
SPEAKER_02:I I tell people this is not restriction, right? This is a freedom. Actually, this you don't have to punish yourself. This is this is something which you have to enjoy it, you have to cherish it. Uh, this is you one's supposed to do it before they fall sick. This is one supposed to do it when they are, you know, at the point where they can make decisions. Okay, I want to change it now. I want to change it not because uh I want to uh run in Olympic, but I want to change it to to make sure that I I want I don't want any issue in my old age, I don't want uh to be dependent. Uh I want to see that um I function very well. Uh I don't have to go for surgery and fall sick and stay home and take medication and all the pain and suffering. So basic thing is if you don't want pain and suffering. Um you have to have kind of little awareness and consciousness that hey, okay, what where I should go. So if people are have no no regards for their life, their body, and they keep smoking and they keep drinking, they keep doing drugs, or whatever they're doing, it is their choice, is their life, is their body, they are the boss for their life. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:And they have to pay for it. Right. And what I've what I've discovered in this journey that I've been on is everything seems to have a double-edged sword. And everything has good and it also maybe has a problem, you know, and and so like like with fasting, people go too far with it. And you know, they think, well, if three days is good, well, I'm gonna go two weeks. And it's like, well, that's ridiculous. It doesn't work that way. Or people will say, Well, you know, I don't eat that anymore, or I only eat that, or whatever it is, you know, and they go to extremes. And there may be benefits or short-term benefits, but it always seems like there's everything seems to have a positive and a negative to it. And in my the research, I do a lot of research right now because I've, you know, am I own advocate to you know keep myself healthy and and I I plan to live a long time, so I'm I'm I'm trying to make my body to where it's ready, ready to do that, wants to do that. And in in in studying different dietary practices, you hear a lot of different things. Like I have a friend who is a carnivore and he swears by it. I say, well, that's interesting, but over long term, I don't think that that's gonna be a good solution. I think it might give you short-term benefits if you're working out real hard and doing all the things that make that work. But I just don't see in the long term that that's gonna be a good idea, but maybe it will, maybe for you it will. But the same thing goes through with you know all these different practices. So the only thing I've heard negative about raw vegan, as opposed to just vegetarian or vegan, is that um a lot of the vegetables that we eat, um, it's a lot of work for the body to break it down. And if you cook it a little bit, it it it makes it to where your body gets the most out of it and doesn't have to work so hard for it.
SPEAKER_02:You and me, we we are we we we think, we do research. Right, right, we just don't take anybody's words, right? Right, right. Exactly. A lot of things, a lot of things is so bogus. Right, agree. I mean, it's like all right, and and it it it travels a lot from one end of the world to another, and it goes in two minutes. It's like because it's bogus, it is because it's fake. Yeah, now tell me is if it is that bad, if let's say the raw food is bad, how I survived for 16 years, right? I agree, and that's not only survived, uh how I I reverse my my liver, yeah. My my cholesterol is good, my everything is is is good, you know. So how it it didn't affect me, right, and uh it is affects only on on the some bogus internet uh you know article, right?
SPEAKER_00:Right. So the bottom line is the question would be like there's a lot of different body types, a lot of different body chemistry propensities or genetic mutations and all different kinds of things where some people have sensitivities to things, some people thrive in different environments. You know, there's a lot of differences. I would just as the devil's advocate say, well, you know, maybe some people are better suited to that and other people aren't. I don't know the answer.
SPEAKER_02:I I'm I'm it is I I don't think that also is possible there is a because of the culture, because of the climate, because left said you are living in some multitude, you know, you have different uh environment there, and somebody's so that that is true, but basically, we all have a same body structure, right? Your blood level is uh 7.4 on pH level, and my also 7.4 pH level. Doesn't matter whether you are living in Nebraska or you are living in Australia, right? Right. What it is it then now we have to think that if if our basic constitution of the body is the same, how in the world where we have so much difference in the food and stuff? So that is that is uh because of the the culture, because our our grandparents and their grandparents uh started eating whatever they are eating, and we are we continued without questioning.
SPEAKER_00:What do you think about um, you know, again in my research, some things came up about, you know, even plant-based diet with things like lectins and and um the the compounds that plants have in them that protect the plant and maybe irritate the human.
SPEAKER_02:Again, again, all this thing, lactin and everything is is is scientific thing that one person is saying is good, another saying is not good. It's uh okay, you eat peanuts and you get lactin, and so you don't eat and I I tell this, and this is you as I said, I don't have a medical background. Sure, neither do I I'm not a doctor, I don't have you know any medical study. Yeah, I see this. Okay, any animal, any animal you see in the outside in the world, they know what to eat. Right. We as a human is the only species is so confused, agreed, agreed. And why is confused because bombardment of the false reports are created by some you know the the the field where they are working, okay. And I'm not against anybody, they all have to make money. Agree, so they have to do this, but as a you as a consumer, you and me, we don't have to give up our freedom for their pleasure, right? They want to make money, okay. You make it, but don't take my my health, give it let me, you know, keep my health with me, and you take everything else, it's fine. So I I I don't buy that, and this lacting and all this thing is is uh you know, if it is luxe, I have lactose intolerance. So I'm I I quit milk long back, yeah. Long before even I started doing uh the raw food. Okay, dairy is gone, and I I am glad that I I did it because dairy is such a nasty thing, it's so bad. Yeah, and dairy industries worldwide is so big, right? They are going to come behind me when I say dairy is bad, they say you are bad, right? Right, of course, of course. So, and I I know that it is going to happen. We as a as a human, we have to think rational. I I I'm not saying okay, you do what this or you don't do this. I am all I'm saying think rational, open your mind, question everything. If it is not good, don't eat. If somebody says it's good, don't just take it for granted. Uh research it, do your research. As you are doing your research, I I'm I'm I really I'm glad that you know somebody's at least doing that.
SPEAKER_00:But everybody is not like you. Agreed, agreed. Very few people are like me. Well, tell me about your um in nature we trust. I I I see that you uh you published this, and tell me a little bit about what that's about.
SPEAKER_02:So, Joe, no matter how much I talk, I cannot finish my my message in half hour or one hour or even ten hours. Right, right. What I did, I put everything, my whole idea in this book. Okay. And I I tell his book is a manifesto. Right. Okay, this is a raw food manifesto. It tells you how our body works for energy, how we can harness it, how it can help us, and uh what is the science behind it. I'm going to put my all record in there. So, you know, it is not just uh just a fluffy uh talk. Uh it is uh you know substance there, uh endorsed uh and also uh checked by other doctors. Uh even the forward is written by MD doctor. Nice. So yeah, and it is uh I'm not just because I don't have a medical degree. I have to see that people don't get any wrong message. Absolutely. But still, I'm saying that this is not the cure, this is prevention, right? That's the whole book. You know, this is book. If somebody read this book and uh they change their life in 30 days, they are going to bless me.
SPEAKER_00:I of course, I love that. Well, tell me about raw foodist. What is that about? So that's the raw food.
SPEAKER_02:I wanted raw foodist. Okay. But uh that that that the domain was gone. Ah, okay. I put e in between because e for education. Got it. So raw foodist is the e for education, and you know, uh, well, uh now a lot of people know what is raw foodist. All right, and this is a website, it is a website, so you know, R-A-W F O O D I S T dot com.
SPEAKER_00:Excellent. Well, we're we're this has been a great conversation, and like you say, there's never enough time. And and before you coalesce your thoughts, I do want to invite you to come back. I I have a lot of guests that come on and and regularly come and share their thoughts. And it seems like you've got a lot to say about things that I think are really important. So I'd like to invite you to come back sometime when when you see fit, and um, we can continue this conversation for sure.
SPEAKER_02:Definitely, Joe. Yeah, I I will come back. Let's say, you know, once uh my book is out in March, I'm going to send you the link. Perfect. Then you read it and uh you open it and we can discuss the book. If that's how you can ask me questions, you criticize this.
SPEAKER_00:What absolutely, yeah. I mean, I I'm always asking questions because I'm trying to learn the truth.
SPEAKER_02:Sure, and I'm also uh learning the truth. I'm I'm behind I'm my pursuit is for the truth, and that's my my whole goal is.
SPEAKER_00:I love it, I love it. Well, if you if you could uh create or or wrap up your your ideas into one central thought for the audience, um, to leave them with what would you think that would be?
SPEAKER_02:The most important thing, listen to your body and and start questioning, don't accept anything, you know, start questioning whatever you are doing, why you are doing, and you if you get the you know satisfactory answer, then only you do continue, otherwise you stop.
SPEAKER_00:That's good advice, good advice. And of course, how does somebody get a hold of you if they wanna if they want to get a hold of your uh your manifesto or or ask you questions or however, how they how do they reach you?
SPEAKER_02:So on my website, rawfooties.com, everything is there. Anybody wants to send me email, that's uh guru G-U-R-U at rawfoodies.com. They can send me email, but uh there is a lot of direct connection from the raw foodies website itself. Uh, you can put my link on on the at the bottom of your video. I will, absolutely. Right, yeah. And so people can connect with me. I'm going from there. There is a link for my book, and everything is there. So, yeah, that that is important.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I'll say I uh it's been a great conversation. You just kind of popped up out of nowhere, and I says, Wow, that's great. And usually these things take weeks or months to schedule, and boom, you're right on in. So I was great. Um, I I I I like what you're doing. Um, I like your message, and I certainly would love to continue the conversation when your book comes out. Um, want to thank you for being here.
SPEAKER_02:Thank you, Joe. Thank you for inviting, and I wish you all the best for your health. Okay, keep uh doing what you're doing, do research and eat the right food. You can call me anytime. We can have a personal conversation for your health. I can help you out from for that. Fantastic.
SPEAKER_00:Excellent. All right. Well, this has been another episode of the Healthy Living Podcast. I'm your host, Joe Grombine, and I want to thank all the listeners for making this show possible. And we will see you next time.
