Showing posts with label cleansing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cleansing. Show all posts

Friday, February 5, 2010

Heal yourself in 15 days with the Health Ranger's living juice recipe (part five)

(NaturalNews) Continuing our 15-part article series called Heal Yourself in 15 Days, today we focus on cleansing your digestive tract and energizing your cellular energy with the help of some living foods. This is in preparation for part six in the series, which we'll get to tomorrow.

Here's the cool part about this: You don't need a juicer to do this step. All you really need is a blender and a nut milk bag (a fine mesh bag used to squeeze out the juice). Of course, a proper juicer really helps, but it's not required. Below, I'm going to give you an absolutely delicious live foods juicing recipe that I think you'll really enjoy. I'm using special ingredients in this juice that help mask the more bland tastes of the green ingredients, so even if you've tried fresh living juices in the past and didn't like them, check out what you'll read below...

Raw living foods offer one of the greatest secrets to disease reversal and lasting health, and nothing beats fresh living foods right out of the garden. So if you can grow any of your own ingredients for this when Spring comes around, definitely make an effort to do so. Otherwise, buy them at a store or farmer's market.

Here's what you'll need (always choose organic):

• 1 container of Blackberries (use all the blackberries)
• 1 bunch of Parsley (use all the parsley)
• 1 bunch of Kale (only use 2-3 large leaves in this recipe)
• 1 bag of Carrots (only use 3 large carrots for this recipe)
• 1 bunch of Celery (use 2-3 stalks for this recipe)
• 2 Pears (use both pears)

If you can't find these ingredients, substitute something close. It's crucial to have some berries in the mix, however. They are part of the recipe for making it all taste good.

After proper preparation (washing, etc.), push all these ingredients through a juicer to generate the fresh juice. If you only have a blender, then blend all these ingredients with water, then pour the juice into a nut milk bag and squeeze out the juice from that. With either method, you'll end up with a container of fresh juice.

This juice will be extremely potent, so mix this with water (add an equal amount of water to the juice). You may also wish to add some stevia if you'd like to sweeten up the taste a bit.

Health benefits of the fresh living juice

• The blackberries will mask the bitter tastes of the other ingredients with their acidity. This acidity greatly improves the overall taste of the recipe. It also improves digestion of the minerals in the vegetables (you need an acidic digestive environment to absorb minerals).

• Blackberries also have a powerful anti-cancer effect through your entire digestive tract, from your mouth and gums down through your colon.

• Parsley is a super digestive cleanser. It will help eliminate toxins while providing your body with a burst of chlorophyll that will help cleanse your blood and liver.

• Kale contains potent anti-cancer phytonutrients. It also contains healthy plant-based proteins and lots of chlorophyll.

• The carrots are used primarily as a sweetener here (they really do sweeten up the juice), and they also contain a wide assortment of beneficial nutrients, most notably beta carotene (from which carrots get their name).

• The pears are the sweeteners here. I find that pear juice tastes much better than apple juice in these raw living juices, but of course it's your choice of what's best for you. If you're diabetic or want to reduce the sugars in this recipe, reduce the numbers of pears to just one or eliminate them altogether (when I juice here in Ecuador, I don't use pears at all. I just use carrots.) Some people prefer to use oranges instead of pears. The tart taste of the oranges in some ways provides a better overall taste. Try the recipe both ways and see what you like best.

In addition to all the benefits listed above, these foods are alive with nutrients and energies. They are live foods, not dead processed foods, and they provide both the nutrients and the energies of life! It's a simple concept, really: If you want to stay alive, eat more living foods. If you want to be dead, eat more dead foods.

Your body will thank you

The point of today's living foods juice is to both introduce you to the joy of juicing (if you don't already know about it), and to prepare your digestive tract for tomorrow's action item.

How much juice should you drink? Just drink whatever amount you feel comfortable with. I recommend an 8 oz. glass of this juice at minimum, but if you only feel like drinking half that much, that's fine, too. Some people will drink as much as 64 ounces of fresh juice in a day! (Juice Feasting)

For the purposes of this 15-day experience you can still eat all your other normal food during the day. This isn't about eliminating everything else, it's about adding some fresh, living juice to your day. Ideally, you'll make this a regular part of your diet because whatever your diet consists of -- whether it's pure vegan or based on McDonald's cheeseburgers -- it will be helped by adding several ounces of fresh juice.

Pointers and shortcuts

Don't have time to make your own fresh juice? There are shortcuts, but none of them are as good as actual living fresh juice.

You can, if you wish, consume juice from a superfood powder such as EnerFood, VitaMineral Green, Boku Superfood, Delicious Greens or others. These are all reasonable alternatives to fresh juice, but by their very nature they are not as fresh as living foods would be.

Do NOT reach for a Naked Juice, or Odwalla juice and make the mistake of thinking they are fresh living juices. All of those juices are DEAD, pasteurized juices made by the big soft drink companies (Coke and Pepsi). None of them are fresh, raw and alive. They still have nutritional benefits, so I'm not saying they're worthless, but they pale in comparison to fresh, raw juices that you make at home.

You can drink this juice between meals, or during a meal, or any time you want. Just drink it quickly after making it, because fresh juice oxidizes in mere minutes. The nutritional quality of the fresh juice you make literally starts to degrade with each passing second. Ideally, start to consume it within two minutes of juicing it, and finish it in no more than five.

You may feel some "detox" side effects from this juice, especially if you currently pursue a relatively unhealthful diet. But they should be mild. After all, this is just simple juice from simple foods. These aren't drugs or extracts. They are the foods your body was meant to consume.

By the way, I'm not here to push a vegan diet or a vegetarian diet on you. Decide to eat whatever you wish to eat, for your own reasons. Just add this fresh juice to your day and see what happens for yourself. Even if you gobble down pepperoni pizza and diet soda, these fresh juices will improve your health results in a noticeable way.

In case you're curious, I drink about 16 ounces of this fresh juice each day, right from my own garden. Except I don't use the pears, and I add in fresh aloe vera gel from fresh leaves that I grow myself here in Ecuador. I grow all my own fresh berries, kale, carrots, parsley, broccoli, cucumbers and more, and these go right into my juice.

Just so you know how powerful this is, I just finished a 90-hour fast. Aside from a raw coconut food bar a friend gave me, I didn't eat any solid food for 90 hours. I did, however, drink one glass of fresh, living vegetable juice each day.

If I had been consuming a junk food diet, my energy would have collapsed within the first 24 hours. I would have been dead tired, detoxing in bed and probably suffering through it all. But because my daily diet is so clean, I was able to eat virtually nothing for nearly four days and still have the energy to write these articles, to go hiking up the mountains behind my house and generally get along with a normal day. (Yes, it got difficult on the fourth day, which is why I ended the fast at 90 hours.)

Fresh living juice is such a powerhouse of nutrition and energy that even when you eat virtually nothing for several days in a row, the juice you had before the fast keeps you alive, healthy and energetic. That's been my experience, at least.

What about the pulp?

I've added this section to the article because people are asking why they shouldn't drink the pulp and fibers of the fruits and veggies instead of juicing them.

Here's my take on it:

First off, I don't want vegetable fibers, and I don't need 'em. The fruit fibers, on the other hand, are very good for your digestive health. Fruit pectin even helps prevent cancer according to many naturopaths. So if you want more pulp in your juice, then do this:

#1) JUICE the vegetables to get pure juice while tossing out the fibers.
#2) BLEND the fruits to keep the fruit pulp. Then pour in the veggie juice and add water.

To me, this is the best "pulpy" juice. It's easy to remember, too: KEEP the fruit fiber, TOSS the vegetable fiber.

But for those who are using juice therapeutically to treat disease under the care of a naturopathic physician, for example, they will probably want no fiber at all. That's because the fiber makes it more difficult for your body to absorb the juice. So for people who are fasting, or treating cancer, or detoxing or whatever, it's often recommended that they discard all the fiber and go for the pure juice.

There's no absolute right or wrong about this. What's important is what works for you! Try it both ways and do what makes you feel healthier and happier.

Tomorrow I'll talk more about fasting. For today, enjoy your juice!

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Heal yourself in 15 days by transforming your blood (part four)

(NaturalNews) This article continues part four of the 15-part article series called Heal Yourself in 15 Days. In part three, we explored how you are what you absorb, not merely what you eat (http://www.naturalnews.com/028067_s...). Today, in part four, we take a closer look at how to transform your health by changing your blood.

Your blood is a useful focal point for exploring your health. Whatever health outcome you are experiencing today, it is largely a result of what's in your blood.

Think about it: Your blood bathes your cells in nutrients 24 hours a day. Blood not only brings vital nutrients to your cells; it also carries away metabolic waste products. It is the superhighway of nutrition and detoxification that reaches into (virtually) every organ and cell in your entire body.

It stands to reason, therefore, that altering your health outcome depends largely upon altering the composition of your blood. If you want to make someone really healthy for a short time, for example, you can give them blood from a healthy person. Research has already documented that when you take blood from people whose bodies prevent cancer and then inject that blood into people who are suffering from cancer, the anti-cancer benefits of the blood are immediately reflected in the cancer patient (through tumor shrinkage, for example). There is such a thing as anti-cancer blood. And if you eat an anti-cancer diet, you're making anti-cancer blood every single day.

I eat a very strong anti-cancer diet. Most vegans do, too. They could theoretically help heal cancer patients by simply giving them some of their blood. The anti-cancer effects would be immediate and powerful. The FDA, not surprisingly, prohibits you from selling your own blood as "medicine," so don't think you can make money by eating a healthy diet and then selling your blood for $1,000 / pint (although it might very well be worth that much in a truly free market).

The other limitation with this idea is that the benefits from receiving donated blood are short-lived. If the blood recipient does not alter his or her lifestyle in some meaningful way, the anti-cancer properties of the "healthy" blood will, within just a few days, be erased and overpowered by the blood that person is manufacturing on their own.

And this leads me to the important question: How is your blood made?

How your body makes your blood

A typical human red blood cell only survives about 4-5 months. Your body is constantly producing new blood and releasing it into the bloodstream to do important work -- the work of carrying nutrients, hormones, water, chemical messages and even information throughout your body.

Blood is primarily made of three things: Red blood cells (oxygen carriers), white blood cells (immune function) and blood plasma (a liquid solution that carries everything else).

When more red blood cells are needed, your body (with its infinite healing wisdom) automatically generates new ones. Naturally, it must create those red blood cells using the materials that are available: Materials that are circulating in your blood at the time.

Got that? So the blood cells you make TODAY, which circulate throughout your body for the next four months, are made out of the materials being carried in your blood right now.

So what's in your blood right now?

Your blood is largely comprised of the things you ate, drank and absorbed over the last several months.

So if you ate a McDonald's cheeseburger today and chased it with a large Coke, the blood cells your body generates today are going to be made, in part, of materials from that cheeseburger and Coke. If you think about where cheeseburgers really come from -- with all the cruelly slaughtered, hormone-injected animals, the ammonia-injected beef parts, the refined white flour in the bun, the processed cheese "food" substances, and so on, it's not exactly the kind of thing you probably want coursing through your veins for the next few months.

If, on the other hand, you spent the last several days consuming fresh living juices, superfoods and clean, energized water, then guess what your new blood is going to be made of? It will be super blood that's energized with the elements and vibes of all the good stuff you've been consuming!

Bad blood leads to bad health results. It leads to angry, moody mental function and chronic disease. But good blood results in happy, healthy outcomes. Good blood improves your sleep, your sex, your moods and cognitive function. Good blood keeps your body free from cancer, youthful, energized and actively healing itself at multiple levels.

Once you understand all this, it only seems natural to work consciously towards creating good blood every single day.

Amazing facts about your red blood cells

• A whopping one-quarter of the human cells in your body are red blood cells. But most cells in your body are actually non-human cells (bacteria).

• A red blood cell circulates around your body in about 20 seconds. The same red blood cell makes tens of thousands of trips around your body, transporting oxygen to cells, before it is recycled by your own immune system.

• Red blood cells in humans are molecularly quite similar to chlorophyll cells in plants.

• Your red blood cells are made partially of cholesterol. Although the drug industry has tried to label cholesterol a villain, in truth you couldn't survive without it!

Check out this amazing real-time animation of a red blood cell in a human body:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:E...

Cleaning your blood

Having good blood means keeping it clean! Your blood is cleaned primarily by your kidneys and liver, but some additional "cleaning" functions are also accomplished by your lungs (through respiration) and even through your skin.

Ask anyone on a dialysis machine and they'll tell you what a huge difference it makes to keep your blood clean. Your kidneys normally do this for you, but in many people, kidney function is impaired and kidney cells don't work as well as they should to remove waste products from the blood. (Drinking sodas can impair kidney function, by the way...)

Hence the thinking behind an occasional kidney cleanse or liver cleanse. Keeping these organs functioning smoothly and efficiently helps keep your blood clean, and that translates into improved health for both body and mind. The two best cleansing product lines I know of are offered by Ed Group's Global Healing Center (www.GlobalHealingCenter.com) and Baseline Nutritionals (www.BaselineNutritionals.com).

How to create good blood

You are your own blood bank. You manufacture and distribute all your own blood. Given that your life depends on your own blood, doesn't it make sense to manufacture the healthiest, most life-giving blood possible?

In fact, you can! You have conscious control over the qualities of the blood you manufacture. Because your blood is made of what you eat, drink, breathe and absorb, you can alter the composition of your blood by consciously choosing healthier things to eat, drink, breathe and absorb.

Here are some of the most powerful pointers for making healthy blood:

Healthy blood needs healthy fats

You must consume healthy fats in order to create healthy red blood cells. This means consuming healthful omega-3 fatty acids. From the world of plants, healthful fats come from coconuts, avocados, flaxseed, Chia seeds and other similar sources. From the animal world, the best source for omega-3 fatty acids is, in my opinion, the green-lipped mussels oils in Moxxor, which come from a pristine marine environment. To learn more about Moxxor, check out Jonathan Landsman's Moxxor page at: http://moxxbiz.com/clients/getVideo...

There are other quality sources, too, including fish oil supplements from companies like Nordic Naturals or Carlson Labs. Some people take krill oil to get their omega-3s, and companies like Living Fuel (www.LivingFuel.com) offer high-end fish oil supplements. This isn't a complete list of good sources for omega-3s. Do your research and use what works best for you. The more healthful omega-3 fatty acids you take, the healthier your blood will be (to a point, of course).

Consuming damaging fats will harm the health of your blood. Damaging fats include trans-fatty acids and fried fats (such as those used in fried foods).

Making healthy blood also requires the right minerals. Red blood cells themselves need iron, but you'll want all the trace minerals, too, so they can be delivered by your blood to your cells. When you lack sufficient quantities of minerals like calcium, magnesium, zinc and selenium, biological functions start to go awry.

Healthy blood also needs plenty of water, of course. Water is the primary fluid of your blood plasma -- it's a solvent that can dissolve and transport all sorts of crucial building blocks for health including water-soluble vitamins like Vitamin C. Without adequate water, your blood turns to sludge blood -- sticky, gooey blood that your heart can't easily pump through your circulatory system. The forceful pumping required to push this blood through your system is frequently diagnosed as high blood pressure.

Human blood also needs many other elements, all of which can be found in a plant-based diet (including the proteins needed for blood).

You can make what modern science can't

When thinking about the health-enhancing qualities of your blood, remember this astonishing fact:

Modern science cannot make human blood. But YOU can.

Sure, they can try to make artificial blood. But clinical trials have shown that artificial blood doesn't work very well. It carries only a fraction of the oxygen of real blood, and it's no long-term replacement. YOU can manufacture blood that's more technologically advanced than anything ever invented by modern medicine. The only question you need to ask yourself is: What kind of blood will I make today? (And tomorrow...)

Will you manufacture blood out of trans fats, Gatorade, pharmaceuticals and junk food proteins? Or will you make your blood out of living fruits and vegetables, healthful omega-3s and positive energies from Mother Nature?

It's your choice, each and every day. You can have good blood or bad blood, and the health results you get will directly reflect the quality of your blood.

Want to transform your health? Transform your blood and your health results will automatically follow.