The man who introduced me to MonaVie is somebody I had known for about 15 years. He is a dialysis patient who had a kidney transplant, and he told me he was getting great results with this new anti-oxidant acai berry fruit drink called MonaVie. So I gave it a try.

About 15 years prior when I was fairly new at studying clinical nutrition and promoting supplements, I tried to introduce different nutritional products to this same person as well as others in our church, but they responded to me like I was an alien from another planet. People just weren't into nutritional supplementation like they are today.

So when he called me up all excited about MonaVie, I had to see what finally hooked him into becoming such an advocate for nutrition so many years later. I bought a few bottles of MonaVie for myself as well as some close family members, and we enjoyed the taste very much. It seemed to make us feel good too. I noticed a reduction in joint pain, increased energy and what I believed to be an increase in mental clarity.

At my friend’s suggestion I became a distributor with the company. He told me about how much money people were making, how he was on his way to doing the same, and that he wanted me to make money with him. It all sounded so good! But the main thing that gave me great pause was the price.

A 1 oz. serving of MonaVie Active at the entry level wholesale price (including taxes, shipping & handling) was about $2.00 each, and two or more servings per day are recommended. The bottle (which looks like a wine bottle) only holds about 24-25 fl. oz., which translates to a scant 12 day supply for one person.

I'm not suggesting for people to avoid this product, but simply that you know what you're getting yourself into. Personally, I believe that somebody's trying to get rich quick! To me, MonaVie’s prices are outrageous, ridiculous and out of reach for lower income people who need it the most.

Yet, even though I was offended at the price, I still struggled momentarily with the idea of not selling it, because I really liked the stuff and I was impressed with the professionalism of the company’s product packaging and marketing strategy.

I’m the type of person who believes in getting what you pay for, so I personally have no problem paying a high price for a high quality item. As I quandered about the whole thing, I also thought, "Maybe what I'm feeling is real and the product is really that good."

To overcome this dilemma I had to do the best I could to determine if the results I experienced were due to the placebo effect of EXPECTING good results due to the company’s claims and the emotion-filled testimonies of MonaVie customers.

I also realized that if a person doesn't normally take nutritional supplements or is taking a break from supplements to avoid a plateau effect (like I was at the time), any good supplement will make one feel real good in the beginning.

I needed to know for myself if I could experience the same good results I got from MonaVie by taking OTHER nutritional supplements, and/or by ramping up my exercise regimen, improving my diet & sleep habits, praying & meditating more, etc. Bottom Line: I wanted to know if I could feel just as good or better without spending all that money!

And as far as making money was concerned, I also had to deal with the struggle of introducing and selling what I believed to be an extremely expensive product to my friends and family in the midst of a bad economy. Just because I believed in paying a high price for a high quality product, that didn’t mean my potential customers would feel the same way.

Like many other products in times past, I could’ve sold the heck out of MonaVie if I really wanted to, but I opted out. There’s a million different legal and morally upright ways to become prosperous out here. Therefore, I don’t need to violate my conscious just to make money.

I concluded that even though MonaVie is a good product, I didn't want to gouge people. And in my opinion, the company’s multilevel marketing strategy preys on people’s ignorance (not knowing any better) and laziness (not making the effort to find out). I’ll elaborate on this further.

But first I must say that I am so happy and grateful that I put the brakes on consuming and selling MonaVie products. The results of the research that I conducted on MonaVie and my layman's studies of clinical nutrition saved me, because otherwise I most assuredly would have fallen into a devastating trap.

Just like my old friend got me all hyped up into trying MonaVie despite the high price, I could've done the same with some of my own friends and associates as well, and their friends and associates, and so on, and so on. This company’s success is based upon on that very multi-level marketing premise. MonaVie's motto: "Drink It. Feel it. Share it."

I quickly discovered in addition to improving the personal habits mentioned above (i.e. sleep, diet, meditation & exercise) I could get the SAME good results and more than I got with MonaVie by taking other supplements that cost a whole lot less, and which gave me a much bigger umbrella of health benefits.

One of MonaVie’s claims is that the Açai berry has an unprecedentedly high ORAC (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) value. The ORAC value is a rating of a particular nutrient's anti-oxidant capacity to neutralize free radicals in our bodies.

My research of the ORAC scale showed the Açai berry to have a value of 161,400 units per 100 grams, which indeed is very high – among the highest of all known fruits.

But it didn’t take one long to see on that same scale www.oracvalues.com that a common household spice like cinnamon has an ORAC value of 267,536 units per 100 grams. A few quick clicks by way of a word search on the computer goes a very long way. As far as price is concerned, ground cinnamon is a lot cheaper than the Açai berry, and it has many comparable health benefits.

What impresses me the most about cinnamon is that it is a potent antifungal. Doug Kauffman's show "Know The Cause" www.knowthecause.com reported: due to a clinical study, cinnamon is just as potent as the prescription antifungal drug Diflucan (Flucanazole).

Getting back to MonaVie, their blend includes 19 different fruits including the Açai berry, so there is a synergistic effect with that product. For people who like a quick convenient swig of fruit juice that is sold in high-end containers, and they don’t mind the price – that product might be fine.

But for me personally, I want certain synergistic effects to come from a wider variety of nutritional products, and not just in the form of fruit juice because fructose is NOT recommended in any antifungal diets that I am aware of.

I like my omega fatty acids to come from a certain brand of fish oil, my beta glucan to come from a certain company, my mega-vitamin C & liquid multi-vitamins from other companies, my antifungal and anti-oxidant supplements from another, my probiotics from another, and so on, and so on.

I am particularly interested in antifungal diets because as written about here on HubPages (over 950 references), fungus has been linked to a vast multitude of human ailments and diseases. Lliterally from head to toe (scalp dandruff to toe nail fungus), the fungus link includes cancer, diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, obesity, arteriorscerosis, and the list goes on.

If people don’t perform their own due diligence by researching different natural supplements or even check out some decent antifungal pharmaceutical drugs; if we don't explore the multitude of options available to us in order to see what works best for us individually, then we become the targets of certain greedy health care professions and nutrition companies out there that are only in it for the money.

Even though health care and nutrition companies are generally in business to make a profit, some are much more compassionate towards the consumer's pocket book than others. These are the ones who are sympathetic during hard economic times. For some, it’s not all about the money.

The good companies place a stronger emphasis on building up our immune systems and addressing the little known causes of our illnesses. They implement prevention strategies, and are more content to make smaller profits initially in order to get the good stuff into our bodies, thus building long term customer loyalty rather than trying to get the big chunk of change up front.

I can only speak for myself in this regard. Before my 'friend' first called me about MonaVie, I hadn’t heard from him for a very long time - that is until he wanted to sign me up under him as a distributor. And once I decided not to sell it, unfortunately I haven't heard from him since.

I came to the conclusion that if I sold MonaVie against my better instincts, I knew I would be held accountable for taking unfair advantage of people monetarily, and I would be jeopardizing my personal relationships in the process. Sure, my pockets would have gotten fatter, but I believe my soul would’ve withered – and it just wasn’t worth it.

I am not writing all this to say that MonaVie is such a terrible company or that the people who sell their products are bad people. Not at all. It's just that we all have our own convictions we must live by.

I'm simply saying that in my opinion and based on my experience, there are many better options available at much more affordable prices. So I encourage people to explore their many options, because what we don't know can really hurt us.

For example, when I discovered the healing properties of olives that The Bible talks about, and after I looked up the olive's many health benefits in a Google word search; once I learned that the extract of olive leaves and even the juice of an olive (it's oil) are antimicrobial (antiviral, antibacterial, anti-parasitic and antifungal), I started filling my MonaVie shot glass with olive oil! Indeed, the olive is one of the world's best natural antibiotics.

By the way, olive oil tastes much better than the cod liver oil some of us had to take growing up. We may have hated taking that stuff, but it kept us healthy!

In conclusion, when I first became a hubber, I just knew I would be right at home here as a writer. I was thrilled to see so many articles pertaining to healthcare, natural remedies and nutrition right here in HubPages.

It is my hope that more and more people around the world realize that with all their high IQ’s and advanced degrees, doctors don’t have all the answers or the last word when it comes to our personal health. Each of us can and should take the time out to learn all we can about the multitude of available healthcare and nutrition options that we have.

Whatever we want to know, we can get the answers that we need in order to save our money, our time and our lives!

Quite literally, we have so much life-saving information available at our fingertips (via the internet, media news stories, scientific and clinical nutrition reports, medical journals, etc.) that in this generation, if we get taken advantage of and suffer needlessly, it's more than likely due to our own willful ignorance. Let's be 'In The Know'!

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