A Surf Juice Cleanse that taught me all I need to know about holistic nutrition and what started me on my HOLISTIC path…
My HOLISTIC health journey truly began when I went to Maui, Hawaii, at the age of 35. I was thinking I was going on a week-long surf retreat, when in turns out it was a juice, detox, and life-change retreat. What I learned about food, meditation, rest, juicing, detoxing, supplements and colonics changed my life forever.
Not that I was a junk food addict, but I was overweight, and I still drank Diet Coke, and ate the standard diet, with no knowledge of food pairing, dangers of asparatame, candida, or that eating organic was important for starters. I also remember having the most awful stomach pains and cramps (IBS), although I had no idea what that was then.
All that changed after that retreat. I came back leaner, thinner, and so much clearer in my thinking. Since then I never drank a Diet Coke or eaten at Taco Bell or MacDonald’s ever since. However I did continue to eat gluten, since I did not have any drastic visible reactions i.e. celiac or such. But that was coming to an end…
Gluten?
Fast forward a few years and I began getting irregular periods, waking up at 2 am for months AND developing a cyst on my ovary. The OB/GYN then asked me: how is your thyroid? So I began looking for homeopathic and naturopaths to help find the solution. The answer came in the form of changing what I eat and removing gluten. I have gluten sensitivity, and am not a celiac. Gluten places stress on the adrenals, which affect your endocrine (hormonal) systems- see this link if you don’t take my word for it….www.womensbesthealth.com.. So I stopped with the gluten and my cycles are back to normal.
Teaching Yoga
During that time frame, in 2013 I decided to pursue my training as a certified yoga instructor while sitting at a desk job that paid well, and I was grateful, but not my life’s calling. I had been dabbling in yoga for years, and remember my mom teaching yoga back in Africa, from a book to the other expat ladies…Long story short I got certified, and then in 2016 I started on my 300 hr yoga teacher training with Shiva Rea. This is when I was exposed to Ayurveda and its’ magic. This included observing the seasons, the rhythms of the day, and the seasons: like foods to eat in the winter vs the summer and not to eat huge dinners after sunset, and to get to bed by 10pm as that is when your body begins the hormone cycles and other things to recover…and our own constitution: what is our own body signature: that is based on your personality, body type and traits. This changed how I viewed my daily schedule, my sleep hygiene, my work out schedule, and what I eating, during what time of year.
Ayurveda
So for example, before I knew of Ayurveda, I attempted a 21 day raw cleanse in the middle of winter. Not only did I not know anything about preparing raw foods, I had no idea that due to my constitution, and time of year, eating cold, uncooked foods would place my body and mood in a catatonic state. I had to stop the cleanse after 3 days. All I wanted to do was sleep and shiver. No way I can eat cold salads and juices during the middle of winter. I did not know that what my body craved was warm, soupy, cooked foods. I know this now through Ayurveda, and intuitively it makes sense- meaning now I eat more of what feels good from an inner knowing, rather than reading about a diet fad and blindly adopting it without asking my body what it truly needs. I now eat with kindness and a deeper sense of what the food feels like, tastes like, and delivers for my specific body type.
Food and your MIND
Furthermore after working with an Ayurvedic Practitioner, I understood the effects of food not only on our BODY, but our MIND. Kind of like that documentary about the guy who just ate McDonald’s for a month: he not only gained weight (25 lbs) but also got depressed and lethargic. So it was not only his body that was affected but his mind, his energy levels, his mood and outlook on life. If we eat a lot of “dead food” we feel lethargic. Also if we eat food with a million ingredients and preservatives, in tends to make our mind congested, busy and anxious; rather than opting for a simpler more holistic meal, like some veggies and rice, rather than raw oyster, followed by a steak and fries, and ended with a huge ice cream Sonday…OMG!
Energy and being an EMPATH
So since my early childhood I have been absorbing energy, to an extent where a lady who had a “bad eye” as we call it, would come to our house, and I would always end up getting sick or having a fever when she left. She was envious of my mom and I…and my Dad’s love…we did not know this, but we did believe in the “evil eye”…fast forward to the current books about empaths, and I felt like I struck gold, meaning I totally identify with the things that happen for empaths; like dislike of crowds or airports, or “picking up” someone’s energy even if they say or do nothing in particular.
So my consciousness about myself, my health and my well being has greatly changed in the last 10 years. I am more in tune with myself, my needs, and my health not only on a physical level- but also at the mind, emotional and soul levels.