Sense of Home
This list of steps to better health comes from the handout that we received at the Raw Food Seminar. Again, I am not a health professional, just sharing what we learned at the health seminar.
1. Air - Several times a day pause outside to breathe deeply, the air outside, even in polluted cities is healthier than in most of our homes.
2. Water - Drink 1/2 ounce of liquid for each pound of body weight everyday (water or living green drinks). Drinks should be tepid, not too hot (heat kills enzymes), and not too cold (cold shocks the digestive system and hinders the production of enzymes).
3. Sleep - On the average an adult needs 8 hours sleep per day.
4. Chew Your Food - Chewing well helps break down the food for easier digestion in the stomach. In addition there are certain digestive enzymes that enter the system in the saliva. If food is chewed and swallowed too rapidly those enzymes are lacking in the digestive process.
5. Drink Wheatgrass Juice - one of the most nutritious foods on earth; 2 ounces = approximately 3 pounds of the best fresh vegetables.
6. Drink Green Drinks - One 16 ounce green drink provides more nutrition than a meal. Green drinks count in your liquid consumption.
7. Eat more organic vegetables.
8. Eat sprouts and sprouted greens.
9. Cut back on the consumption of all forms of meats, dairy products, eggs, salt, and sugar, if moving to a raw food diet.
10. Daily Exercise - this one I added, we all know how important it is to get some form of exercise daily in harmony with your abilities and mindful of any health limitations.
Enzymes
The pancreas creates all the many and varied enzymes for the body, those for digestion, healing, building, and fighting disease.
On the standard diet about 1/2 of the pancreatic production goes for digestive enzymes. During your life, half of your enzymes are used just for digestion.
There are things you can to to supplement the enzymes your body produces.
- Eat living foods which carry their own digestive enzymes.
- Take digestive enzyme supplements
- Take probiotics to restore the healthy flora in the intestinal tract. Once healthy, this bacterium actually helps by producing digestive enzymes.
Sounds like pretty sound wisdom to me!! We often forget the power of the sun!
ReplyDeleteI need to work on 3 and 4 and have never tried #5. This is a good list for better health.
ReplyDeleteTaking probiotics is really in these days. We have begun making kefir regularly and have it in our smoothies - a yummy way to keep our insides healthy.
ReplyDeleteWonderfully instructive and helpful post. How do you make your wheatgrass and green drinks?
Shyla
http://nourishingstrength.blogspot.com/
Shyla,
ReplyDeleteI haven't started making wheatgrass drinks yet. I do make a spinach blueberry smoothie (kefir, fresh spinach, fresh or frozen blueberries, touch of honey if you like), not sure if this would qualify as a "green drink" though. This list is from a handout I received at a raw foods seminar I recently attended.
-Brenda
my liquid intake is terrible this time of year. So many of these things apply even if you aren't working on a raw food diet. I think your smoothie fits in as raw food and green drink. I hope to have enough green things to make green smoothies this summer. any type of smoothie is such a nice meal replacement in the heat of the summer...refreshing and light. Thanks for continuing to share what you learned at your class. Emily
ReplyDeleteWhat are "wheatgrass juice" and "green drinks"?
ReplyDeleteFrancesca,
ReplyDeleteWheatgrass is grown from wheat seeds and cut and juiced when it is at the "green grass" stage. It is very nutritious; contains chlorophyll, vitamins, over 90 minerals, 19 amino acids and essential enzymes. The speaker at the seminar said it was the most potently healthy food. Usually only a small amount of wheatgrass is drank at a time. When I was in a juice bar in Boston they served it in shot glass size with a wedge of lemon to suck on afterward.
Green drinks are not as concentrated. They are greens such as spinach, collard greens, or kale juiced along with other vegetables such as celery or carrots. Because they are juiced the drink is smooth and because there is a large amount of greens in the juice the juice is green and they are called "green drinks". Also very nutritious.
Good question!
-Brenda