cleanse

Spring Time ~ Kapha Season

In Ayurveda, the latter half of winter and spring are considered the Kapha season. It’s not the calendar year that defines the Kapha season, but the qualities of the atmosphere, the seasonal changes that take place in the world around us.

During this time, the weather is generally cool, damp, and muddy, with heavy fog or mist in some areas. These environmental factors influence the human system by increasing the same qualities in our minds and bodies. The damp, cold, dullness and heavy qualities manifest as accumulated toxins, clogging energetic channels and lowering our immunity. Maybe even having a foggy mind and grogginess in the morning. This time of year people are more susceptible to imbalances and this leads to seasonal allergies, colds, fatigue, and digestive sensitivities.

The good news is that there are many simple and natural ways to cleanse and take care of the system to stay balanced during this time of year. According to Ayurveda, the best way to counter the Kapha-aggravating effects of springtime is by following a Kapha-reducing diet and lifestyle.

Choose Light and Nourishing Foods

During the fall and winter, heavy foods help ground and nourish us, but during the spring these kinds of foods will overburden the system. Spring still is a cool season so we want to eat warm, light vegetables and soups, leafy greens, and warming spices like cinnamon, mustard seed, and chili.

Rise Early and Don’t Nap

Try rising at or before sunrise to beat the Kapha time of day. Sleep intrinsically possesses the Kapha Dosha, so when we sleep into the Kapha time of the morning, our Kapha levels automatically be higher from sunrise till about 10 am. This makes getting up and going more difficult – not just physically out of bed, but for all the body’s systems.

Amp Up Your Exercise

Regular exercise is key in maintaining balance during the spring season. As the weather begins to warm up it’s tempting to spend more time outside, but even if your daily routine doesn’t change you should try to get moving. A light jog, dancing, pilates, or a brisk walk are great exercises for springtime, anything that gets your heart rate pumping will help starve off the heaviness and stagnancy of the season.

Stay Hydrated

Drink plenty of warm liquids, water, tea, golden sun milk. By the time you feel thirsty you are already in the early stages of dehydration, sip warm water throughout the day and stay on top of your body’s hydration needs, you will perform better, sleep more soundly and your body will feel more energized.

Perform a Spring Cleanse

Ayurveda believes in the principle of cleansing not just the body but the mind and spirit as well. The transition of the season to spring signals “cleansing time” in Ayurveda. Not only is a cleanse beneficial for eliminating excess Kapha, the season’s elements actually support the cleansing process. An Ayurvedic cleanse includes a combination of dietary guidelines, herbal formulation, and supplements to enhance digestion and support toxin removal, therapeutic purgation, and rejuvenation techniques.

You can perform an at-home cleanse or schedule a consultation with Michelle for a more comprehensive cleanse.

Enjoy this season of renewal!

With Love,

Michelle

Cleansing has to be experienced to be believed. Its amazing how either a mono diet of kitchari or a juice fast can help with energy, weight loss, detoxification, better sleep, prevent disease and actually create more connection in our lives. When you feel great, you naturally strengthen your own sense of inner peace and openness, this in turn will deepen the intimacy and connection within.

1. You get rid of omnipresent toxins

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but the truth is that you are constantly surrounded by toxins and pollutants. There is pollution in the air that we breathe, in the products we use to clean our homes and bodies, in the food that we consume, and even in our homes. You can definitely work on reducing your exposure to toxins but you can not really escape them (even your own body produces metabolic toxins). Hence why a seasonal detox/ cleanse is an excellent way to help your body get rid of some of these absorbed toxins.

2. You give your digestive system a much-needed break

Most cleanses and detoxes are based on avoiding junk foods and allergens. This helps balance blood sugar, reduce cravings and you also feel the benefits in your digestive tract. Problems such as gas, bloating, acid reflux, constipation, and irritation can all be reduced (if not completely eliminated) via a cleanse. Indeed, during a detox, there is less of a burden on your digestive system and you allow your body to get busy with other important biochemical processes, such as detoxification and rejuvenation.

3. You get more energy & a better sleep

Nutrition and most particularly the kinds of foods that you choose to eat will greatly influence your energy levels throughout the day and sleep at night. The heavier you eat and the more sugary foods you consume, the more likely you are to experience severe mid-afternoon crashes and/or poor sleep. That’s because these kinds of foods are very taxing on your digestive system and require a lot of “work” to be processed by your body.

Removing sugar-loaded foods and most common food allergens (i.e. gluten, dairy, soy, and sugar) from your diet for a period of time can go a long way in terms of giving you more energy and definitely better sleep. Test it out.

4. You experience a new sense of clarity

For many people, food and emotions go hand in hand. We eat when we want to celebrate, when we are depressed, bored, scared, … Emotional eating is a real issue and one great way to break through it is to try a cleanse. Through the removal of your favourite “comfort” foods, you learn to make healthier eating choices and you find new ways to cope with your emotions (e.g. daily movement, a new hobby, or socializing).

Moreover, the kinds of foods that we crave when we are emotional (sugary, salty, and usually fatty too) are known to make our minds foggy and unclear. Once you go through a cleanse, you start to see things in a different light – the fog lifts up and you get a new sense of clarity. How refreshing is that?!

5. You access a new level of creativity

When you go through a cleanse, you are forced out of your comfort zone. It can be annoying and uncomfortable at first but then when you push through, you reach a new level of creativity. You start thinking of different ways to prepare your foods. And you inevitably try new recipes – better yet you may even create your own! Creativity will not just stop in the kitchen, it will also expand to other areas of your life. Again, give it a try and see for yourself.

I strongly suggest you cleanse at least twice this year. It could be a 7 day juice cleanse, a 5 day kitchari cleanse, a week without dairy & gluten, or even something as simple as 21 days without sugar. There are many combinations out there. Once you have done your research and have been advised by a health care practitioner or nutritionist, I am positive that you, too, will be convinced that doing a cleanse is good for you.

Blessings!

Michelle

Cleansing

Living with intention is powerful medicine, cleansing is one of those things that help us to be clear about those intentions. Weather this is cleansing with the changing of the seasons or aligning your daily rhythms with the cycles of the moon. Cleansing is a way to reconnect with your roots and the ancient wisdom of self healing through food, breath and conscious movement.

There are many reasons to cleanse. Here are a few:

1) Rest the stomach. For the tens of millions of people who are on acid-suppressing drugs — and for older folks who often don’t produce enough stomach acid — making the stomach work less to extract nutrients can be a huge benefit. Juices require less of the stomach’s digestive processing (churning, acid and pepsin). Remember to gently chew the juices to add oral enzymes to further ease digestion.

2) Rest and repair the gut. Toxic foods (including saturated fats, refined carbs, foods with additives, pesticides and allergenic foods), taking medications (such as antibiotics or antacids), and even stress can impair the intestine’s functioning. There can easily be an imbalance in the gut microbiome (flora and fauna balance) as well as actual breaks in the intestinal barrier (“leaky gut”) — allowing substances into our bodies that should not get a free pass. Consuming a phytonutrient-dense rainbow plant-based juice diet allows food to be assimilated quickly through the intestine — consuming less energy, while the toxin-free, nutrient-dense food helps to repair the gut itself.

3) Rest the liver. The liver is our main detoxifying organ. Every molecule of food that is absorbed through the intestinal wall (fiber is not absorbed) moves into the liver for detoxification and preparation before being allowed to enter the rest of the body. Problem is, there are too many toxins for most of our livers to handle — with many passing unchecked into the general circulation to wreak havoc in distant cells. An organic juice cleanse rests the liver’s overload.

4) Reduce your appetite. Juicing doesn’t really shrink the stomach — although it feels like it does. Juicing eliminates the habit of comfort eating, and makes you feel satiated with less food than usual. This provides a big psychological boost to help get over the hurdle of changing habits.

5) Ease food decision-making. Juicing focuses on consuming fresh whole food produce every few hours — and reduces the enslavement of thinking constantly about what the next meal is going to be. Not only do we feel sated, but realize we are no longer slaves to our addictions with (often very harmful) foods.

6) Eliminate harmful foods. The juice cleanse eliminates dairy, wheat, gluten and fermented foods from the diet (as well as coffee and alcohol). In my experience, this can help define what foods are causing our body problems.

7) Floods our body with super nutrition. Being on an all-produce diet gives us not only the vitamins and minerals but the all-important phytonutrients that are powerhouses for the clean-up and healing process. Juices are by nature raw foods — and retain nutrients that would be destroyed by cooking, including some B vitamins and especially (digestive and anti-inflammatory) enzymes.

9) Lose weight. As you are feeling better and having more energy, you also naturally lose weight. Some of this is water bloat, but also some is fat. A juice cleanse is a great way to jump start a diet. It not only helps control appetite and cravings, but is naturally lower in calories, while supplying the body with probably more concentrated beneficial energizing and healing nutrients than it has seen before.

9) Improve energy. After the first day’s adjustment period (mostly missing crunching, and any coffee/alcohol cessation symptoms), most people begin to feel much more energy and clarity (by consuming only fresh juices) than you ever did with frequent caffeine drinks.

10) Rehydrate the body. Drinking sufficient fluids – half your body weight in ounces of water – makes the body function more efficiently, increases energy (often successfully removing the afternoon blahs/brain fog), and helps insure proper elimination of toxins.

11) Reduce physical problems. You begin to feel generally better, not just with your energy, but with many chronic symptoms such as headaches, rashes, general aches, congested sinuses and chest, and bloating/cramping/gas. Too much of the time our body is fighting off the things we do to it (especially with food — but also with lack of sleep, inactivity and stress). Take a break, rest the body (and mind) and flood it with nutrients.

12) Allow maximum detoxification. To optimally support all phases of the body’s natural detox process, you need a very broad range of plant-supplied nutrients like anti-oxidants and anti-inflammatories. By providing the body with super-nutrient dense foods juicing allows the body to have more of the resources it needs to support the phases of detoxification, and even to begin to help remove the cumulative toxins stored in the body.

13) Heal our cells. Switching to an organic plant-based diet allows cells to work optimally to re-establish efficient internal messaging and manufacturing processes, allowing the mitochondria to create energy without having to fight off a plethora of free radicals and inflammation, and reducing some of the impediments to proper DNA functioning.

A foundation for self care and nourishment is what we feed our physical bodies. Since what we eat literally makes up the cells in our bodies it stands to reason that eating well makes up our entire experience of life. Our skin, nails, red blood cells, liver, bones, and heart all renew over different periods of time. Some processes take longer than others but isn’t this mind blowing? The human body is literally changing before our eyes and you can see why giving them healing foods is so important.

How do you nourish your body??

Blessings,

Michelle