Veg juicing & Emotional Detox

Cathie Jones asked about using non-organic veg for juicing. It is of course always better to use organic to avoid taking extra toxins on board. But given the choice of juicing with non-organic veg and not juicing at all, I'll go for the non-organic juice every time.

However as soon as the nettles are up, then they will be the main green ingredient in my juice. The sting goes when you juice them, and this is the ultimate FRESH, WILD, RAW, NUTRIENT RICH vegetable available to us all!

EMOTIONAL DETOX
Cathie also mentioned missing hot chocolate. She say's "it's that comforting warmth in the solar plexus, again emotional...not sure what to replace these things with. I know the best idea is to feel whatever it is and not comfort it with food".

We must be gentle with ourselves. I think of it like this. Our body is like a pool of water. When we detox the water clears and we can see all that resides at the bottom of the pool, all our emotional issues are brought into focus, and this can be uncomfortable, and sometimes too much.

The first thing to do is to quietly observe what is happening within us and most importantly to do so without judgement of any sort. The troubled sides of each of us are generally based in the emotions like fear, guilt, shame and grief and must be handled gently and with love. 

Finding a way of healing these deep issues is important. The non-judgmental observation of them can sometimes be enough, but more often than not a therapy to help us shift the energy is required. As you may know meridian tapping techniques are a personal favourite. 

Whatever you do remember to be gentle with these delicate parts of yourself. Mostly they are parts us stuck in the energy of some sort of trauma from earlier in our lives. So it is like denying that young child the hot chocolate that normally calms and placates her. Don't leave her out in the cold, be kind and loving like a mother to the child within. 

I have had some difficult emotional stuff coming up myself this past 10 days. I had a massage in the middle of last week, and body work, like detoxing pushes issues to the fore. I felt very uncomfortable for a few days, then with tapping cleared a big issue that I hadn't been able to properly access before. It was a huge relief and I was filled with an overwhelming feeling of gratitude at having the opportunity to heal something so deep and life determining. It takes some practice to be able to hold yourself in the discomfort zone and do the work without someone else's help. So don't go it alone if you are not ready!

Above all remember - never judge yourself just observe what is happening within you. If we practice self-observation in this way we slowly be surely gain more self awareness and a greater level of consciousness arises within us.

xx 

Spring cleaning and Meat..

Hi Folks

Hope you are all doing well. I've had a bit of a rough week personally but feel better today. It always makes we smile how my outward world is such a reflection of the inner. I have been spring cleaning my house, clearing out the garden shed, washing rugs and generally getting things spick and span, and my foggy headed world of the last week - where I have felt like I was only half here -  is finally lifting.

This detox when I reflex, actually started for me at the end of January - which was the last time I ate meat. I have never been vegetarian before, but never really like meat as a child and I ate more meat than I would have liked in recent years because I lived with a man who liked it. So as many of you know I am now single and I guess I'm eating more by instinct. Anyway, the thought of eating meat in the last 5 weeks has just repelled me. I can't do it. I'm not really sure why either. I have ethical issues with the way we farm animals, but it's not just that. It is what my body is telling me is right for me at the moment.

And that is what is so important and hopefully something that we can gain from the detox - learning to be in tune more with what is right for us as individuals. Learning to listen to what our body really needs for us to feel great!

Meat as a food can be important for some people - I'm not advocating vegetarianism for all. Meat can be useful as it is very grounding. But even if you feel it is an essential part of your diet, maybe you could eat less but better quality meat. Remember that we are taking on the energetics of our food as well as the physical nutrition. An animal that has had a good life and death is much healthier for us to eat than one that has not.

If I do eat meat again, which I think I probably will do occasionally, I will look to eating wild meats. Deer are culled in many places, and the venison is available if you ask at local butchers. This is the healthiest kind of meat we can hope to eat. The animals will have had a life in the wild, eating wild plant foods. The meat will be lean, clean and nutritious because there has been not interference with animal breeding to make them fat, and concentrate foods to make them fat, and antibiotics to make them fat. Then (hopefully), they will know little or nothing of their death, because a skilled marksman will have taken them down. These animals will not have had to faced much in the way of stress or fear. If you compare this to a farm animal that may not have known much freedom in it's life, it may well have been fed many concentrates (which if not certified organic will more than likely contain GM feeds), will have been fed antibiotics in the feed (unless certified organic) all of which will adversely affect the nutritional quality of the meat. Then at the end of it's life it will face the stress of long journeys to the abattoir... and then, well you know the rest. I always think about what if it was me? What if I were the animal what would I prefer? Personally I would prefer to be hunted in the wild - free to the end.

Ok, hope that hasn't caused too much indigestion...

Oxidants v antioxidants

Oxygen is the reason we breath, because oxidative (oxygen dependent) reactions are what run our bodies. So what about anti-oxidants?

Oxidative reactions could be compared to a nuclear reactor. The reaction is what creates energy, but it must be kept in check. So it is a balance between oxidation and checking and replenishment of the system by antioxidants.

When when we are detoxing there are more toxins moving through the system that can create run away oxidation reactions - free radicals - that are like fire crackers whizzing around damaging everything in their path. So we need some damage limitation strategies for that. 

So how do we keep the furness burning nicely without damping the fire, while keep damage limitation  from free radicals at a minimum. 

Firstly keeping oxidative therapy and antioxidant therapy separate. For examples sake, the use of Ozone and Hydrogen Peroxide as alternative cancer treatments - oxidative therapies, would not want to be done at the same time as antioxidant protocols.

For us, the best oxidative therapy is exercise. This is a great way to increase oxygen supply to the body. But it will kick up some crap, so there will be more free radicals running around the system after exercise. So this is the time (not before) to get some antioxidants into your system. A veggie juice is an excellent way to recover from exercise.

The other way to avoid damping the fire whilst keeping free radicals in check, is using whole food state antioxidants. These will not create an imbalance the system. So here I have list some of the most powerful antioxidants (or as it would be better termed anti-free radicals) that are my favourites.

Green vegetable juices - love this stuff!

Raw vegetable foods - watercress is a good one.

Whole fruits, especially berries - amazing!

Raw cacao

Sumac

Olive leaf extract - love this stuff too!

The sweet things in life

Hi folks

A couple of people have asked about whether fruit is ok. The answer is whole fruit YES. Absolutely, it will help detox deep into your body.

It is however a good idea to avoid fruit juice because having taken away the fibre you are left with a big hit of sugar that your liver will deal with by turning it into fat.

Talking of sweet things. Raw Cacao is a powerful antioxidant and delicious in a milk shake with almond or rice milk and a banana. - the lazy version of this recipe is a couple of blogs below..

Jo Dawson has taken this idea and turned it into something even better. Here is her recipe, I'm look forward to trying it!

Hi Georgie,

I've been making this as a detox smoothie, and it's gorgeous, adapted from your chocolate banana smoothie just slightly.

Soak 1.25 cups of almonds and, separately, soak four dried figs, all over 

night.

Make almond milk in the morning with the rinsed almonds and the water from the figs. Eat two of the figs.

For the smoothie:

1 or 1.5 bananas

2 of the figs

2 teaspoons of raw cacao

1 teaspoon maca

glass of almond milk

Blend with a hand blender. The smoothie will have fig seeds in, which makes it deliciously crunchy. It is chocolately, really sweet, without the cocoa powder, and with figs.

Hope you like it :-)

Jo x

DETOX 2013

Hi Folks

The next detox is scheduled!... and I've decided to do it a little differently this year. From personal experience of doing this for a couple of years now, I think it should start a little earlier. So this equinox it will start February 25th and end on the Equinox - March 20th with a celebration of the shift in energy, that you will be completely ready for!

Also if you are in Cumbria, I am running an Art of Detoxing workshop at the Medicine Garden on February 23, 10-12am with a cost of just £12. For more information or to book a place, either email me at gpwh@yahoo.com or call me on 07971 631699.

Love and Light
Georgie

Chocolate superfood

Hi Folks

Happy Equinox!! Hope you have enjoyed the detox and feel good and ready for the season ahead!

Here is a recipe for you to get you well nourished in the months ahead. A chocolate banana milk shake! Chocolate is a fantastic superfood, it is the best source of magnesium of all foods. And if you use raw cacao powder then you are getting a massive hit of anti-oxidants too!

Serves 1

1 banana

1 glass rice, almond or oat milk

1 heaped teaspoon of cocoa powder or raw cacao powder

1 level teaspoon maca powder (optional)

1 pinch of chilli (optional)

Blend it all up and enjoy this yummy superfood drink. The maca powder is a root from Peru and is good for helping hormonal balance and gives you energy, as does the caffeine in the chocolate, so beware drinking it at night if you are sensitive to caffeine. 

Big hugs to all

xx

Home and juicing

Finally back in cold Cumbria!

It's been raining a lot while we've been in sunny Cornwall - my tomatoes are a bit of a wash out but one thing I do seem to be able to grow like a weed is lettuce. I have loads of Endive lettuce, which is quite bitter - not something I want to put a lot of in a salad, but it is great for juicing.

This is my favourite juicing recipe at the moment that serves 2

4 celery sticks
1/4 of a cucumber
2 small apples
handful of bitter lettuce
1 slice of lime
chunk of ginger

What I love almost more than the taste of this cleansing, alkalizing, enzyme and chlorophyll packed drink is it's colour! It is a gorgeous pale iridescent green!

If you don't have a juicer it is a really worthwhile investment. A fresh vegetable juice is the best pick me up mid afternoon that you will ever have. It keeps you cleanse and full of vitality.

Remember juice mainly vegetables, using a little apple to sweeten. Otherwise keep your fruits for eating or making smoothies. That way you don't overload your system with fructose, which in excess gets processed a bit like alcohol. It's difficult for your liver to handle.

If you want to buy a juicer but are not sure what to buy, the 2 top feature to look for is one that is masticating rather than centrifugal. This preserves the nutrients better and gets the most out of the food you are juicing. But then a centrifugal one is better than nothing! Secondly get one that is easy to clean! This is really important otherwise you will be put off using it.

I have an Oscar Vitalmax 900 which is awesome and yes easy to clean. A quick look through Amazon turned up the Samson 6 in 1 Juicer GB 9002, which looks a carbon copy of the Oscar, but a good deal cheaper.

Bye for now!
xx

Blood sugar - Fats connection

Hello!

Hope you are all doing well and enjoying your detox.

One comment that has come back is how removing alcohol has really helped balance blood sugar.

This is because alcohol (and caffiene) stimulate our adrenal system to release the hormones that stimulate the liver to release glucose. So for anyone with blood sugar problems cutting out alcohol and caffiene as well as sugar - while you get things under contro - is really vital.

It is also important to add in one key nutrients - fats. Most of us don't have enough of the right fats in the diet and too many of the wrong fats. So maknig sure you are getting omegas 3 and 6 from hemp and flax oils and oily fish. Eating healthy saturated fats from animal sources and using extra virgin olive oil and coconut oil. Then cutting out all cheap seed or vegetable oils and avoiding fried and baked foods that are cooked in them. As these are poisonous!!

I saw an advert ourside a fish and chip shop in Cornwall that said - all cooking done in vegetable oil. Like that was a plus! NO! This is a health disaster - if you heat up vegateble oils to these high temperatures they become highly poisonous.

Anyway, if we are not getting enough of a nice variety of hard fats and liquid oils then our bodies will be deficient. But our bodies know that sugar is the food most readily turned into fat, so it will send us off craving sugar, int he absence of a healthy amount of fat in the diet.

This is so key if you are trying to loose weight but battle sugar cravings.

Need to pee?

Morning all

Well the detox down here in Cornwall is fabulous on the stress and emotional level and completely out of the window and the food front, but hey I'm on holiday. I tried the juicer, once. That was a bit rubbish. I will have to do some more research on that front because I know some of the hand winding juicers are pretty good and very affordable.

There is something I wanted to talk about, which is pertinant to women and men. And that is the need for frequent urination... I know this is a more common problem than gets talked about, but for the vast majority of people it is so simple to remedy!!

This is all about pH and the fact that our modern diets put our bodies into a state of being too acidic. This is central to many health problems today, and is precisely the cause of the need for frequent urination, urinary tract infections and loss of urinary control.

When our bodies get too acidic then so does our urine, and our bladder does not like to hold onto acidic urine because it provides the environment suitable for bacterial infection. So the stimulus to pee gets stronger, and if your muscle form isn't great, that can get problematic with the potential loss of control!

This is so easy to remedy by simply tipping the balance of what we eat from too much acid forming food to slightly more alkalizing food. This about foods like protein that break down to acids like uric acid v foods that breakdown to minerals which are vegetable based.

Main acid forming foods: Meat, dairy, sugar, wheat and alcohol

Main alkalizing foods: Any leafy or green vegetables, salads and seaweeds.

This is a delicate balance that is easy to get right by simply upping our intact of vegetables, salads and seaweeds to about half of what we eat. Personal speaking I manage to do this at home, but because I'm on holiday it's a little harder. And yes I do need to pee more frequently! This is an odd because I normally I have the bladder of a horse!

This bladder issue can be a really useful indicator of our pH balance. We know that if we are getting it right not only is life easier, because we don’t need to know where the next toilet is, but also we are guarding against conditions such as osteoporosis which are caused by long term excess acidity, that results in our bodies borrowing minerals from our bones to maintain the essential pH balance in blood.

Thanks lovely people! xx

Emotional Detox

Hey Folks

Sorry for the radio silence. It appears Cornwall is in a different era to the rest of the world and getting on the internet is akin to what it was 15 years ago! Difficult. But hey the sun has been shining, and I even swam in the very cold sea today! Now theres a good bit of detoxing. There is nothing like the feeling of getting washed by the ocean to make you feel good.

I would like to talk a little about emotional detoxing. I have recently got into the Abraham teaching 'The Power of Emotions' from Ester and Jerry Hicks and am just loving it! One of the things they talk about is when we feel in discord with life, or when things are difficult, that the only feeling that we should be reaching for is relief.... Relief in whatever form. So if someone has upset us, and we feel relief in anger, then reach for anger, but then from anger reach again for relief maybe in the form of dissapointment. But then again from dissapointment reach for the emotion that will bring you relief until you find the emotion the lets you let go.

We exhaust ourselves by fighting battles in our heads, sometimes to the point of making ourselves unwell. But if we can just stop ourselves in our tracks of internal emotional ranting and reach for relief, we can speed our way to releasing ourselves from our own minds and get back into the natural flow of life - a far less exausting place to be!

You know what I love about writing to this stuff? Most of the time I'm talking to myself!! Ha ha, in the hope that I will listen...

Hope you are enjoying doing something wonderful for you!!

Much love, Georgie