Just juice for 60 days | Kabir Kumar | TEDxFremont

After embarking on a juice fast, it took Kabir Kumar 60 days to make juicing a way of life. What followed was not only a physical change, but a lifestyle transformation.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx

On June 25, 2011,

this was me.

I don't know if you can tell,
but there're 13 people in that photograph.

I'm not talking
about 13 people in the back.

I'm talking about 13 people in the front.

That's my wife. That's my son.

And that's me.

And there're about ten bowling balls
in that photo that shouldn't be there,

but they were there.

And in 2011, I heard a fact
that changed my life.

What I heard was that if you are obese,

the likelihood of your child
being obese increases by 50%.

Let me say that again.

If you are obese,

the likelihood of your child
being obese increases by 50%.

Now, I knew something had to change.

Every New Year's, I made resolutions.

I don't know about you,

but my New Year's resolution,
for as long as I could remember, was:

this is the year
that I'm going to lose weight,

get to the gym,

eat right,

and be the very best person that I can be.

And every single year, it was the same
New Year's resolution again.

And I couldn't figure out why it was
that I would make the same resolution,

and I would break it.

But this year, I knew
that something had to change.

I knew that this year,
it could not be the same.

Because it wasn't just
about me and my decision,

it was about how my decision was having
a negative impact on my son's life.

I knew why I needed to change,

but I didn't know
how I could make that change.

And then it happened.

I saw a documentary called
Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead,

and I found my "how."

It was a story about an ordinary
man named Joe Cross,

who decided that he would change his life
by going on a 60-day juice fast,

and he would lose weight.

And as I watched Joe struggle,

day in and day out,

with his weight loss and his journey,

I began to sympathize, and even better,
I began to empathize

because I knew what he was going through.

I struggled with my weight my entire life.

And I knew in my head
that I should be able to do this,

I should be able to figure this out.

And I have to do it.

It's no longer an option.
I need to make this happen.

So I decided that I was going to do
a seven-day juice fast.

And this is not all seven-day's;
this is one-day's worth of juice.

So I started.
I started my juice fast.

I knew that my journey had begun.

And I started with day one.

And on day one, I felt great.

I had so much energy.
I was full of adrenaline.

I was calling up people I knew

and being like, "I'm doing a juice fast.
This is amazing. You should do it."

Many of them
hung up the phone on me.

And day one passed.

And on day two, I started
to get a little cranky.

My wife is somewhere here.
She can tell you all about that.

It was not good.

And day three and then day four.

When day four rolled around,
I was curled up bed, sleeping,

and I wanted nothing to do more than quit.

I was done. I had enough.

I couldn't do this. This was so hard.

And what was I thinking?
Who drinks juice? Only juice?

I mean, this is crazy, right?
What am I doing?

So day four rolled around,
but I knew I had to push through.

And I knew that if I could just get
to day seven, something would change

because everything told me that something
would change for the better.

And then it happened. I hit day seven.

And I had this moment of clarity.

(Laughter)

I like to call it my moment of clarity.

My doctor, who's here, he called it,
I believe, "processing ketones."

But whatever it is you want to call it,
I knew that my life was changed,

and I knew that everything
was different from that point on.

I was changing my life
through habits, big and small.

And see, once I got to seven days,
it wasn't so hard.

I was then able to get to 14.
And from 14, I got to 30.

And from 30, I got to 45.
And from 45, I got to 60.

And from 60, I got to 63 days
of an all-juice fast.

And it changed my life.

Now, you might be wondering.

Let me tell you something first.

What does 63 days
of a juice fast look like?

So this is what it looked like.

And in 63 days, I juiced over 500 pounds
of vegetables and fruits.

And I drank 189 glasses
of juice, and just juice.

And it didn't all look
as delicious as this right here.

(Laughter)

But I'll tell you this.

In the 15 months that followed,

I knew that I was now making
the right choices

and taking the right decisions.

And each day, it became easier.

I moved it from being,
what I like to call, a nurtured habit

to a natural habit.

I didn't have to think about it any more.

It just became automatic.
It just became automatic.

And in 15 months, I lost
and kept off nearly 100 pounds.

I started going to the gym regularly.
I still go three times a week.

For me, that's a big deal.
I don't go to the gym.

It just the place
I drive by on the way to work.

(Laughter)

I began to exercise regularly.

I began to incorporate
good habits into my life.

My body started to auto-correct,

started waking up
earlier in the morning.

I started implementing
positive habits in my life.

And I knew that things had now changed.
There was a momental shift in my life.

And I'm telling you
I'm not that different than you.

I struggled with this my entire life.

So I was on auto-pilot.

And I'm not going to lie to you -

I had lapses.

It was not smooth sailing and easy.

In those 15 months,

there were so many times
that I fell off the track.

But what got me back on were three things.

One: I was personally accountable
to myself, and to nobody else.

It's very important.

Number two: I understood
that I had a greater responsibility

to myself, my family, and those around me.

And number three: I wanted to give my son
better odds, odds that I didn't have.

So I'm not here to tell you how this ends.

I'm here to tell you how it began for me

and how my life was changed positively
by implementing small and large habits

throughout my life

and in over 15 months
being able to sustain that.

But I will say this.

I now own the responsibility
for my health.

And I now own those decisions every day
that make my life better.

And I'll ask you one thing.

I'll tell you that you don't have
to wait a single minute

to start making positive
decisions in your life,

to improve it, and improve
the life of your family around you.

And remember, it is not about the juice.

It is about the journey

and the influence that I had on my son.

I'll show you a quick video.

(Video) Woman (offscreen):
And what are you doing, Madah?

Madah: I'm juicing.

Woman (offscreen): What kind
of juice are you making?

Madah: I'm making tomato juice.

Kabir Kumar: And now
you're going to make ...

carrot juice.

(Juicer whirring loudly)

Drop it in. Drop it in.

Thank you.

(Applause)