The first and fundamental question you want to ask yourself is not how, but why: when your reasons are clear, the path naturally follows.<p>I can see three strands:<p>1. For health reasons. This is IMO the weakest reason. I'm not interested (nor qualified) in starting an endless debate about the health risk/benefits of meat; but if you only want to eat healthier is best to start with the obvious: cut sugar, snacks, sodas, sweets, junk food and deep fried; eat more low-GI and greens, etc.<p>2. For Ahimsa [0]. Ahimsa is a beautiful and subtle topic, but broadly speaking it means that you try to minimize the amount of suffering caused by your actions. Buddhists (as well as Socrates) believe we constantly fail to understand that our actions have consequences. Ahimsa is about getting in touch as best as we can with these consequences, and act accordingly to our insights.<p>3. For environmental reasons, i.e. reducing your ecological footprint. This has some overlap with Ahimsa, but the reasons are practical rather than ethical and there are exceptions: in terms of sheer sustainability, battery farmed chicken might be OK (maybe, I don't know).<p>Whatever your reasons are, it's something I believe is worth thinking about.<p>[0] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahimsa" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahimsa</a>
I did it within minutes.<p>Watch the film on YouTube: "Earthlings"<p>Try to watch it in a full sitting. You probably wont be able to, but try. Then walk to a mirror and look yourself in the face, and ask if you and this world are really real, that is, do your own version of a reality check.<p>Then you will see your proverbial red pill and blue pill.<p>Dont do it because you think you might lose a few pounds and impress some stranger at a beach. Do it because you want to deeply re-examine life and this world. Make it a life path for yourself.<p>Its either a difficult and impossible path OR its a trivially easy path, it all depends on your intentions.<p>Watch the film.<p>I have been vegan for several years.<p>It took me almost 2 years to watch the film in its entirety.
I have been a vegetarian since 28th october 2012.<p>I was 16 then. I cut out the meat intake immediately. I happened to one day take a stroll in a part of the town where butcher shops were in plenty and I stood and observed the butchering process out of curiosity. Whatever I saw left me pale and horrified. I came back home and cried a lot. The shrieks and cries of the hen didn't leave my mind. And I decided from that day onwards that I wouldn't kill for my taste buds.
I am a third generation vegan & fourth generation vegetarian. It is much easier to be vegan than it was 20 years ago. Also the quality of milk and cheese replacements has significantly improved. The first time I tried almond milk (1993ish) it was a very poor experience, now it is amazing. My email is in my profile, feel free to reach out if you have any questions.
I'm always very fascinated by people's rationale and I enjoy reading these threads. Thank you for posting. My own journey took me in the opposite direction: I eat nothing but meat and other animal-derived products such as cheese and eggs (but not milk). I have made this decision after reading <i>The Fat of the Land</i> by Vilhjalmur Stefansson [1] and <i>Why We Get Fat</i> by Gary Taubes [2]. I consciously decided the most important dietary principle, for me, is to never trigger a strong insulin response. I have been zero carb (and therefore zero fiber) for about a year now.<p>I have since then thrown in intermittent fasting as well. I fast 22 hours a day, work out at the end of the day, and then go home and eat 1kg of steak/lamb. I think intermittent fasting is worth adding to any diet, vegan or otherwise.<p>[1] Book was printed in 1956, so copyright may have expired. There's PDFs online. Here's a link to Stefansson's Wikipedia entry: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilhjalmur_Stefansson" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilhjalmur_Stefansson</a><p>[2] Non-affiliate: <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Get-Fat-About/dp/0307474259" rel="nofollow">https://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Get-Fat-About/dp/0307474259</a>
I went vegetarian for a year. The girl I later married was (and is) vegetarian, and I knew I'd be doing a lot of the cooking, and wanted to see things from that side for a bit.<p>As for how, I went cold... tofurkey?
I grew up on a farm in Northern California, so there really wasn't the option for a "faceless" meat. I decided when I was 15 that I wanted to try to be vegetarian, I quit cold turkey and have been vegetarian or vegan ever since. I'm 40 now.<p>My advice:<p>- Learn to cook. You'll want to eat unprocessed foods that come from good sources. Don't worry about how much protein you're getting. There is no need to supplement with protein shakes or fake meats. Amino acids are plentiful in all whole foods except fruits. Nuts, peas, beans and whole grains are all rich with protein. If you're eating whole foods you shouldn't really have to worry about it.<p>For example, why buy isolated whey protein when you could purchase ricotta (made from whey) or pea protein when you can have split pea soup. The whole food will be more nutritious and hell of lot cheaper to make. On that note, purchase an electric pressure cooker, an immersion blender and some basic cooking utensils if you don't already have them.<p>- Learn how to ferment foods. A lot of grains, legumes and vegetables have mild amounts of phytotoxins that are removed during the fermentation process. Sourdough breads, yoghurt, kefir, kimchee, sauerkraut, etc. are all great sources of vitamins, minerals and umami flavors that are not in the "fresh" sources.<p>- If you decide to be ovo-lacto vegetarian, find a good local farm for eggs or dairy (local for milk, not so necessarily local for cheese). You'll be saving a lot by not buying meat, so make sure you're purchasing ethically raised chicken eggs. Eggs are great foodstuff. Chickens are also easy to raise yourself if you want to feel closer to your food.<p>- Don't evangelize. Over the years your reasons will change. Answer peoples questions when they ask (and they will), but don't push YOUR personal decision on others.<p>- Have fun with it!
Vegetarian - just stopped eating meat one day to see if I could keep it up.<p>(The reason being that I had already been thinking for a while how gross it actually was to eat animal corpses, and that I'd also rather be alive than dead, so others shouldn't suffer that fate just because I had to satisfy my taste buds)<p>That was the easiest part - the social aspect of it is a lot more complicated than that, mostly because I had to explain to people why I made the decision, over and over again. And obviously the braindead comments about not getting enough protein etc.<p>Some things I did not even know initially, like how many products contain gelatine (which is made out of animal bones and skin), but nowadays it's rather easy to avoid such products.<p>Going Vegan is the next goal, probably when I move into my own place, and I already tried going Vegan, but always ran into a wall because I am not the person doing groceries in this household.
I transitioned gradually. Limited when/where I ate meat (eg veg at home, meat still at work/lunch). Also limited what I ate (eg no mammals).<p>Transitioning slowly really set me up for success. Doing so allowed me to adjust my habits. Took longer for my tastes to change.<p>I thoroughly enjoy my diet now. It doesn't feel like a burden and I don't feel like I have to compromise on enjoying food.<p>One thing that is really easy is just eating less meat. By just cutting down, you don't have to change/think about your diet. Just eat less meat, more everything else. Cutting it out entirely takes a bit more work (still totally doable).
I was a strict vegetarian for 20 years but recently went back to eating meat primarily to increase the diversity of protein in my diet.<p>If you're planning to go veg, my suggestions would be<p><pre><code> 1. Go all-in straight away.
2. Stick to it all the time. It's easier on others if they just know that you won't eat meat rather than guessing
3. Prepare a canned answer to the "Why" question. You'll get asked this every time you share a meal.
4. Don't preach it, just do it
5. Don't equate vegetarian/vegan with healthy. Any diet can be healthy or unhealthy.</code></pre>
I was a vegetarian (abruptly) for a couple of years. Eventually I started to feel sort of icky, not properly nourished, though this is probably the fault of my specific dietary habits and not vegetarianism in general.<p>Since then I've stuck to a low-meat diet; I mostly eat vegetarian, and when I eat meat I try to eat low on the food chain. I'd say I eat fish and chicken about once a week each, and pork or beef maybe once a month. I also cook with chicken broth pretty often.
Im mostly vegan when eating out since Im unsure of meat used. And I like to cook hence it turns out when you cook meat dishes at home its a real bargain.
Yes. Went from omnivore to vegan overnight, stayed that way for two years, and then went vegetarian three years ago. No meat since Jan. 3rd 2012.<p>When my wife and I took the plunge I had been eating lots of meat at lunches...mostly in sandwich form and we had been unintentionally transitioning from all meat to chicken and fish to mostly just fish at home for dinners...wife's preference for fish over other meat drove that.<p>Then we watched the documentary "Forks Over Knives" and, regardless of the scientific accuracy of the film, said "Why don't we try going vegan for a month and see what happens".<p>So after a New Years trip to see family in LA where we are a ton of meat we drove home and then...never ate meat again. After the first month "test" we asked each other if we should try it again for another month, agreed to do it, and then never asked again.<p>Over the holiday break in 2014 we ended up eating a bunch of eggs and decided we really wanted eggs and cheese, so we ditched the veganism and went vegetarian. We probably eat 80% of our dinners as vegan still, unintentionally, but we don't feel bad about eating cheese anymore.<p>One quick tip if you try to be vegan...be flexible if your not doing it from a moral standpoint. If I ordered a sandwich and they accidentally put mayo on it, I just ate it anyway. If a coworker brought cookies or cake, I ate it. I didn't ditch my shoes or belt. True vegans would probably be appalled, but life is so much easier if you go with the flow. Try to stick to it, but don't fuss or worry about the occasional lapse.<p>Hell, I know plenty of vegetarians that are 99.9% vegetarian but occassionally grab a slice of pepperoni pizza or slice of bacon or whatever. There aren't any rules...it's a personal decision. Do what makes you happy.
I just flipped the switch one fine day in 2011 - to go vegetarian, it was at the back of my mind via various sources, I wont go into that. However mentally for me it was lack of exercise and meat just made me lethargic and I felt vegetarianism will help.<p>So I turned vegetarian and started exercise (tennis, walks) and I started feeling the benefits.<p>Hindsight (20/20) of course, I think it was just exercise that was needed. I think we are what we eat but we are polished if we exercise.<p>Last year I tried just eggs a bit (for me vegetarian = no meat/fish/eggs, definition I guess allows eggs) but did not like the taste, after 6 years of vegetarianism.<p>I woud overall say, listen to your body, eat what you like, but don't forget to burn those fats irrespective of if you eat meat or not.
Vegan for about 6 years. I cut out red meat for health reasons for a few years. I then decided to become vegetarian, which proved fairly simple. I "slowly" cut dairy from my diet over the course of a few months and immediately became vegan once I realized that dairy made me feel sick.<p>Do you usually cook for yourself? Do you live in a rural town with few vegan options? If the answer to either of those is "yes", I'd give yourself a couple months to learn how to eat meat- and dairy-free. Otherwise I'd say just go for it. Especially in a big city it is easy enough to find vegan substitutes (e.g. mock meats) in a pinch that you should have no trouble supporting a rapid transition.<p>Don't forget to take B12 supplements.
I slowly transitioned over several years. I first stopped eating pork, then started doing a meatless day once per week, then twice per week.<p>There were a lot of factors involved in moving over fully, but the precipitating event was joining a farm share for the summer. I got a huge box of vegetables every week and it just didn't make sense to keep buying meat on top of that.<p>I had serious (and strange!) meat cravings about 6 weeks in, but those stopped after a week. I tried a few meat dishes after the summer ended but they didn't taste good to me any more. And I noticed after a couple of months that I felt physically better than I could ever remember. So it was easy to not go back.
I did go vegetarian (been vegetarian for ~15 yrs now).<p>Back during the birdflu scare (2008-09), my parents decided to stop eating meat (chicken - which was the only meat I used to eat). I was ~12-13 yrs old.<p>Overtime, I wanted to switch back but for some reason or another (saw some videos on Youtube about how chickens are treated and killed didn't sit right with me), never did.<p>We cut meat immediately. While I didn't miss a lot it, I did eat a lot of soy in the interim period (ofc a few friends of mine who tried didn't succeed).<p>Just as an FYI: Don't watch those videos if you like stuff like leather for example...I love the feeling of leather seats, but I'm looking for synthetic leather in my next car.
I am slowly getting there. After watching the film cowspiracy my wife and I decided to slowly transition, mainly environmental reasons but also because of the way animals are treated. We eat meat maybe once/twice a week coming down from twice daily, and when we do eat meat we try and source the best from small farmers. Transitioning away from meat has been relatively easy, where I personally fall short is dairy. There just isn't a good substitute for cheese and I find the smell and taste of soya milk awful. Hopefully new products will come along...
Went Vegan about 8 months ago. Cut of meat and dairy products immediately. Feeling great. Been loosing weight - some people might want that, not me, skinny as it is. I was always a bad eater, so I guess removing meat and dairy came natural to me. What I can suggest is stop thinking of food as tasty. I'll eat dirt if it gives me the right vitamins and proteins, don't care how food tastes as long as it gives my body what it needs.
No because meat is delicious. Giving it up is effort and not going to stop any of the negative actions that occur from the global eating of meat anyway.
I went to an Earth day event in the late 90s, which had lectures on the environmental impact of beef and really good vegan pizza, vegetarian ever since -- Vegan for 7 years of that; but got tired of being that guy. I was already vegetarian at home at the time, so I just stopped ordering meat when I was out to eat.
Yes, for 10 years (between 8 and 18).<p>I love animals and care for their welfare (and still do), but reflecting back as an adult, the reason did it was because I wanted to control over some aspect of my life, and I consider my own vegetarianism (and my young cousins 'low fat high carb veganism') as eating disorders.
I was vegetarian for a while back after college.<p>Now, I just try to eat healthy. I tried the book Vegan before 6, which I thought was a nice way to move into that lifestyle.<p>I also am working on a side project to help me find vegetarian / vegan dishes at restaurants in a location. I still want that healthy option when I am eating out.
Check out the documentary "Forks Over Knives" for great information about the health benefits of a vegan (whole food plant based) diet. The title makes reference to how much better it is to prevent (and even treat) many chronic health conditions with the fork rather than the surgeons knife.
No - but I won't be having kids, and no procreating vegetarian will have a lower footprint than me, so I think there are other ways at having the desired impact without being confined to dietary habits.
I've been on a very slow path to veganism for years.<p>I gave up beef a few years after college for green reasons, as managing my personal carbon footprint as best as possible made sense to me. Because of this I would (and still do) make exceptions if I knew the source of the beef was local/sustainable. I found that after a while of abstaining from beef I lost an appetite for it and can't really digest anymore and I have very little interest in beef.<p>I started to eliminate eggs and dairy for allergy/IBS reasons. I've found that the less of both I eat, the better I feel in general, but I know that everyone's mileage varies. For me, eggs turned out to be a bigger culprit than I imagined in some of my worst food issues. Of the two, I'm more likely to cheat with dairy than eggs these days.<p>I live a few blocks from a major industrial pork slaughterhouse. I can live in ignorance most of the year, but there are a few points in the year where the output at the facility gets its heaviest (the big one being the holiday months of late October through mid January), or they do something illegal/wrong, and their smell ekes over to my part of the neighborhood. Walking into a BBQ place in my neighborhood to meet friends one day during the holiday period, I had the nausea inducing moment of realizing how much the smells inside and out were deeply entwined and more similar than their difference (which at that point seemed merely hints of charcoal versus hints of feces). From there I realized I couldn't criticize the facility in my neighborhood and continue to eat pork, and definitely could not stomach the thought of pork that day.<p>I find it interesting that without pork, chicken lost most of its interest. I still eat seafood somewhat regularly, but that's about the last of it for me.<p>I'm not very strict, still, and see it as my job, not a restaurant server's to manage it. If I order something that isn't quite right, that's my mistake, and mostly I eat it and enjoy it anyway. The green reasons on the one side are full of intentional exceptions for local/sustainable food. On the other side the allergy issues and growing inability to digest certain meats comfortably are "spell slot management" issues. I know there are consequences and I try to be careful and know my limits, but those are, for the most part, my own problems to deal with.<p>I took to heart the "Vegan Club" idea that you don't talk about being vegetarian/vegan unless asked a direct question. I like it to be more of a private concern. I find small joys in those moments when someone I've had lunch with for several days in a row gets that surprised realization I've only really ordered vegetarian/vegan and finally thinks to ask.