Viewing entries tagged
cleanse
By now, you may have realized that I am a bit obsessed with beets. All sort, all colors of beets. This is a super tasty and pretty warm beet salad that hits the spots and supports your liver all those detoxification phases to help you to feel your best.
The betaine found in beets encourages your liver to rid the body of toxins.
Make up a batch ahead of time and munch on this tasty side dish or meal (if you add the nuts and seeds for some protein) all week long.
The beautiful color of this elixir comes from turmeric, the potent Indian spice that reduces inflammation, enhances vitality and cognition and supplies your body with potent antioxidants.
Spritzer it up with some sparkling water and a few other fun ingredients and voila, you have the perfect spring mocktail.
Have fun with this one. Enjoy as is (mocktail style) or use as a mixer for your spring festivities…
The cycles of the seasons harmonize us with the rhythms of nature, reminding us that we are nature. Within these, nature goes through everything on the spectrum – from full bloom to death and decay.
The more we feel into the elemental cycles around us, present for all life forms on the planet, the more we can ride the waves and rhythms in ourselves. This knowing is embedded in our true nature, our cellular DNA and our innate animal wisdom.
Spring synergy is intuitive when we listen. Often, in our bustling culture and our busy day-to-day lives we tend to miss these intuitive cues in and around ourselves, but it is never too late to return to the most natural part of our existence. Following the innate rhythms of the seasons informs our body’s wisdom, our emotional intelligence, and our manifestation of our health and vitality in the world around us.
According to Traditional Chinese and Ayurvedic medicine, each season comes with a unique energetic quality, nourishment, dominant organ,emotion and action. Synchronizing with each season’s expression is like medicine for the body, mind and soul.
Let’s take a stroll through the earthly cycle dedicated to SPRING and begin to understand and how spring reflects around us and within us.
Spring is the most healing, creative, and vital season of the year.
As we emerge from the winter months, we often feel the urge to cleanse our lives, our bodies, and our beings for an energized renewal.
Blooming into spring’s brilliance is a synergy of some important aspects of life. During spring, ruled by the wood element, our energy and vitality heighten, we wake up from winter’s rest to energize our life force, creativity, and zeal. We clear and cleanse the sacred spaces of our bodies, minds and homes to find a fresh rebirth for ourselves to gain a renewed momentum.
Spring is the time to renew the pleasures that our physical bodies are designed to feel. Transforming from the quieter more inward season of winter into spring, we may feel a little tired, a little sluggish, and even a little resistant to turning towards the bright new energy of this season. When senses wake up with the beauty of nature blooming all around us, we heighten the pleasure in our bodies and hearts. Spring is abounding with passion, excitement, inspiration and love.
As the leafy bitter greens sprout and emerge in our gardens, and the dandelions fill our yards, try finding some ways to cleanse your body and mind with some of spring’s treasures.
At this time of year, we are designed to eat lighter and leafier greens, – spring’s medicinal liver cleansing foods (such as dandelions) that are in full abundance. The flavor of spring is bitter, which in turn supports the liver in cleansing and strengthening. Walking through the farmers’ market I love to gather bright green baby arugula, an array of sprouts for my spring salads and colorful tulips to beautify my home and office.
o Eating lighter and more bitter foods
o Growing your own fresh salad spring garden
o Sprouting seeds such as alfalfa, broccoli, or sunflower in your kitchen with a sprouting jar.
o Roasting radishes, asparagus, artichokes and spring onions to support your liver and uplift your spirit.
o Brewing up some dandelion or nettles’ tea to cleanse your body and support any spring allergies or hay fever.
After a long winter’s rest, a time most of us eat heavier foods and perform less physical activity, our bodies often become more sedentary and our livers more stagnant. The dominant organ of spring is the liver, housing the emotions of anger and resistance.
As we begin to attune to spring, we naturally support the liver in cleansing, and releasing the anger and resistance that winter has accumulated. Once our energy begins to flow more freely, and our bodies and minds become clear and free, we are most often left with the inspiration of hope and renewal for what is ahead. The blooming flowers and new greenery inspire a renewed attitude and passion.
One of the most effective ways to energize our lives in the spring is through daily movement. Practices such as yoga, hiking, and dance can help to awaken the spring within us. Enliven your spirit and uplift your moxie with some inspired movement of your own.
I love to take late afternoon walks in the beautiful spring air, sauntering along the creek path near my house where I can behold the array of flowers and trees blooming. Remembering to feel good in our bodies through movement we can savor the sensuality of spring. Enjoying our bodies and the heightened senses that come with spring is one of the most potent ways to elevate our sensuality and pleasure.
What I am going to share with you today comes from what I have personally learned about my energy and vitality through my own experimentation and deep inquiry. I will also share what has impacted my daily rhythm, my food choices, my sleep patterns, my libido, my cravings and even my internal dialog and self-talk.
I have learned what works for me. I have learned what is sustainable for me in the world today. I have learned about health, combined with a deep priority for pleasure, that doesn't feel restrictive or depriving. I have learned to be fluid, feminine and intuitive as things are always changing and I have learned that we each have our own unique recipe for feeling our best.
I have put the past 15+ years of my work into discovering this for myself and today I want to share a couple of these specific nuggets with you – my favorite ones for spring.
The truths toxicity are real, important and impactful, while also being be daunting, fearful, and overwhelming. Don't worry, I have some answers for you....
These truths have supported me greatly in my own journey with health and high energy living and I want the same to be available for you.
1. Toxicity is one of the primary blocks to your metabolism working at it's best. A high toxic load will literally slow down your cellular metabolism of energy. You will feel more sluggish, lethargic, tired, and depleted.
2. Toxicity can literally impede, inhibit or block the efficient functioning of our cells, tissues, organs, systems and biochemical processes. This could lead to the slow onset of degenerative disease that gets harder and harder to reverse over time. Toxicity makes the body's natural ability to heal and find equilibrium more and more compromised.
3. Toxicity creates and/or exacerbates inflammation in our bodies. Many of us in the world today are struggling with inflammation in relationship to various health issues. Inflammation is a big problem, and the root of most health issues. Inflammation is only made worse with some of our daily exposures to toxicity.
4. When our toxic load is high, accumulated or frequent, it prevents us from burning and releasing fat. All those attempts you may have made were not futile on your part, you were not at a plateau, or doing things 'wrong'. Your body just cannot lose weight effectively with toxicity in the way.
We all are exposed to high amounts of toxicity in the world today – its unavoidable. Toxicity is prevalent in our food, our water and our air. While we can surely minimize our exposure with clean, healthy living, the reality is toxicity needs a bit more assertion than that for us to feel our best.
I've been busily working on some solutions for you and I have put together some very useful, practical and work-able practices for you to explore .
What do you seek to shed this spring to “lighten” up and access your inner freedom, energy and brilliance?
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