With increasing exposure to dangerous and destructive toxins in our food supply, the air we breathe, and the consumer goods we purchase, it is not surprising that detoxification, cleansing plans and diets have become all the rage in 21st century America. Environmental toxins play havoc with our body's circulatory and digestive systems and impair our ability to lose weight. With proper education and research, however, each of us can create a personalized, detoxification plan that can facilitate healthy, weight loss and improved, overall health. The following five cleansing steps will help your body detoxify and leave you leaner, more energetic and resistant to disease:
1.) Choose the Right Foods
1.) Choose the Right Foods
- This primary step is pretty self-intuitive, since its advocation has likely been drilled into each of us as early as childhood. It is imperative that any detoxification plan begins with a significant foundation built on vegetables, fruits, and herbs that complement each other and insure efficient biochemical breakdown and metabolism among a myriad channels. Coupling fruit and vegetable intake with lean protein sources and quality fats will optimize detoxification in your body and permit your liver to convert any free toxins or radicals in your body to metabolic waste. With the proliferation of high-quality organic products at grocery stores such as Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, and Sprouts, there is a surfeit of organic plant foods and superior animal protein sources available to the discriminating customer.
- During any cleansing program for your body, it is important to combine your healthier choice of food intake with complementary non-food improvements in your daily lifestyle. This lifestyle evolution begins with getting 7-8 hours of sleep per night. Deficiency in sleep is one of the culprits in antagonizing the body's immune system and inhibiting metabolic function and dissolution of dangerous toxins in our gut and digestive tract. Another vital step to improve your immune system is to manage and control your stress levels. Spiked stress levels dramatically elevate the production and lifespan of contaminants within your body and put you at increased risks for cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, stroke, and even weight gain.
- Heightened toxicity in the body often leads to recurring inflammation, which impairs the liver's ability to absorb and metabolize toxic byproducts. When your body is inflamed, the heavier toxic load in turn leads to the degradation of fat loss and retention of fat byproducts in your adipose tissue. People with inflammation and elevated toxic loads in the body often complain of sluggishness and bloat that compromises energy levels and work rate. To counteract the threat of inflammation, begin a diet that is rich is omega fatty acids such as salmon and plant foods like flaxseed, hemp seeds, walnuts, and kidney beans. The DHA and EPA types of omega-3 fatty acids found in these food sources play an essential role in reducing cholesterol in the body, lowering cardiovascular risk, and eliminating destructive toxins in the body.
- Another essential step to detoxify the body is a dedicated weekly plan of exercise that sweats out the toxins through the largest organ of the human body: your skin. High intensity exercises such as interval training, spinning, pilates, running, or hot yoga all serve as efficient conduits for toxic secretion and further enable the body to develop greater, fat-burning lean muscle mass. Any metabolic overload from dangerous levels of toxins in the body can be mitigated (if not outright eliminated) by "firing up" your body's metabolic rate through exercise. Once you discover a consistent workout schedule that suits your passions, stick to it and make it an indelible part of your daily lifestyle. In combination with an improved diet, a dedicated workout regimen dramatically improves your prospects of a successful self-cleanse.
- Chiropractic medicine traditionally is known for its salutary effect on people who suffer from a malady of medical issues that may include back pain, headaches, and arthritis. Recently, it has been discovered that chiropractic work can also serve as a catalyst for detoxification of the human body. This serendipitous byproduct is due to the fact that whenever the vertebrae of your spine is re-aligned into their proper position doing chiropractic work, the resulting signal to the central nervous system initiates a message to the body to eliminate any dangerous toxins. Thus, whenever a patient returns from a chiropractor appointment complaining of nausea, it is no reason to be alarmed. Rather, this nausea is the necessary fallout from the toxins in your body being released and flooding your circulatory system, giving that temporary, "sick" sensation. However, once these unhealthy toxins are excreted by your normal exit pathways, you will often feel much stronger and vivacious than ever before.