By David Wolfe
What is detoxification? And why cleanse? Toxins exist all around us, in particular in the more than 70,000 chemicals that have been added to the environment since the 1940s. We tried the idea that “it’s a better world with chemistry,” but chemicals have only made us feel worse. Now we need to go to a new idea, which is really a step back to what our bodies know and understand: living nutrition.
Every day the liver tries to clean out the toxins you’re exposed to … in the food you eat, the water you drink, the air you breathe. But it can only do so much work. And without help from the right nutrients, its job is even harder. So what does the liver do? It sequesters toxins that it can’t eliminate.
What does that mean? It means that your body will create fat just to store the extra toxins that it can’t get rid of. When you put the living nutrition in, you can draw the toxins out.
Here’s are 3 steps you can take to start yourself on the detox journey:
1. Add in green vegetables: Raw and organic is the rule when it comes to using vegetables to help detox your body. When you’re green on the inside, you’re clean on the inside. The chlorophyll in green vegetables, especially leafy veggies like kale and spinach, acts like a deodorizer in your body. Think about the baking soda you put in the fridge to draw in odors. Chlorophyll does something similar in the body, binding to toxins and pulling them through your system. An added bonus: the fiber in vegetables combs through your digestive tract, pushing out toxins that have built up along the way.
2. Try Juicing: This doesn’t mean you have to go days without food or drink wheat grass all day! Start slowly – just take a day and drink nothing but juice. Try a lemonade juice in the morning and simple juices throughout the day, like celery and cucumber. You are getting the alkalizing nutrients in along with excellent hydration to flush your kidneys and move out the toxins. Next time, maybe you’ll try two days or more as you reset your body with a flood of nutrients and liquids.
3. Get moving: Your lymphatic system is like the sewage system of the body. But it doesn’t have a pump to circulate the fluid the way the heart / vascular system does. The best exercise for the lymphatic system, as studied by NASA, is rebounding. Contraction—like in rebounding, or the impact of jumping, running, and brisk walking (especially kickboxing)—pushes the lymphatic fluid, flushing it through kidneys and getting the toxins moved out of your body.
Keep in mind one key to success: Add In. You don’t have to make crazy changes overnight. Start small and keep in simple. As you add in more vegetables or get your rebound on, you’ll be making changes that will help your body detox.