While it’s great to focus on hitting the gym every day and keeping your body fat levels in a safe range, one must not forget to really look at the root of your overall well-being. That is, the state of your tissues and cells.
The fact of the matter is that each day we are faced with toxic substances. These impact us from the environment in which we live in, as well as for many of us, the foods and beverages we choose to put inside our body.
Over time, these toxins can build and before not too long, they can be having a real impact on our day to day functioning.
This is why putting a few detoxification principles into action is so important. By doing these on a regular basis, you can help ensure that every cell in your body is functioning optimally.
Start Each Day With Lemon Water
One of the best things that you can do for yourself to help detoxify your system is to start each day off with a tall glass of lemon water. This achieves two things.
First, it helps keep you hydrated. As most of us live in a chronic state of dehydration on a day to day basis, anything you can do to get yourself hydrated will always be a good thing.
Second, the addition of lemon will serve to detoxify your system, while also helping to improve your pH balance. If you are on a high protein diet, as most of us are, there’s a good chance that you are a bit more acidic than you should be.
Lemon, while acidic outside of the body, actually becomes very alkaline when inside the body, thus it’s a great way to restore your natural pH balance. This will help you function much better overall.
Consume Healthy Probiotics
Next, also focus on consuming some healthy probiotics in your diet. These are the healthy bacteria that reside in your gut that everyone needs to be taking in on a regular basis.
They’re responsible for keeping your immune system strong (since 80% of your immune system is based in your gut) as well as ensuring proper digestion and breakdown of the foods you eat.
Most people aren’t getting enough probiotics into their diet and as a result, harmful bacteria begin to take over in the gut, outnumbering the good bacteria. The end result is a system that is out of balance and an immune system that’s weakened as well.
You can take in probiotics through foods such as yogurt (be sure it contains live cultured bacteria), sauerkraut, kimchi, miso, and pickles. Alternatively, you can also supplement with a quality probiotic supplement as well.
Get Deep Tissue Massages
If the relief you get from a good massage after a hard workout session is not enough to get you in, consider the fact that deep tissue massages can help to boost detoxification.
Deep tissue massages will help move lymph through the body, which is basically a white substance made primarily of white blood cells who’s role it is to clear out invading bacteria and toxic substances.
By getting a deep tissue massage, you’ll help promote the greater clearance of toxic material out of the body, promoting optimal functioning.
Drink Green Tea
By now you may have heard of the metabolic and fat burning benefits that green tea has to offer, but do you know that it can also help you enhance natural detoxification as well?
Green tea is a powerful source of antioxidants in the body and on top of that, doesn’t contain quite as much caffeine as coffee does. If you’re drinking multiple cups of coffee per day, making your caffeine intake quite high, this could be wearing your body down and making it less capable of dealing with day to day stressors.
As a result, your toxin and stress load may begin to increase. Green tea is a perfect alternative as it’ll still provide a slight dose of caffeine to get you energized, without you overdoing it.
This allows you to save your caffeine intake for when you really need it, such as with taking a pre-workout prior to hitting the gym.
Harness The Power Of Superfoods
When it comes to getting your body in the healthiest state possible and promoting longevity, you must not overlook nutrition. Eating quality foods on a day to day basis will go a long way towards helping fend off disease and keeping you feeling your best.
There are certain foods in the diet that really go that extra mile, delivering you so much nutrition they are deemed superfoods. These choices will help fight toxic build-up, nourish the body, and help fend off oxidative damage as well.
Some of the top superfoods to be getting in regularly include berries, kale (all leafy greens), salmon, coconut oil, and flaxseeds.
Use A Sauna
The next great way to help get toxins out of your system is to simply sweat them out in a sauna. Saunas are great for the relaxation benefits they provide, but in addition to that, they’ll also help you eliminate toxins through the pores of your skin.
Then, when you come out and re-hydrate the body, preferably with pure filtered water, you’ll be ‘washing’ your body clean in a sense.
Sauna’s also do an excellent job at increasing blood flow throughout the body due to the fact they cause vasodilation, which can then improve the delivery of oxygen and nutrients to the body tissues. This makes them an excellent way to recover following your workout sessions.
Meditate
In addition to detoxifying your body, you must not forget your mind. Meditation has been studied extensively and the benefits it has to offer cannot be stated enough.
Meditation can help to ease stress, improve cognitive processing, improve your attitude/outlook, combat depression, boost heart health, and enhance insulin sensitivity.
Think of meditation as a giant detox for your mind. Just 10-15 minutes a few times per week can offer you all of the above noted benefits.
Cut Out Alcohol
Finally, don’t forget to cut out any substances that you are directly putting into your body that increase your toxic load – namely, alcohol. While having the occasional alcoholic beverage may not pose too much of a problem, if you are drinking with any sort of regularity, this is exposing you to toxins.
Alcohol is considered toxic to the body, which is why all other metabolic processes (such a burning fat or building muscle) will come to a stop when alcohol enters your system. Only once the alcohol has been oxidized off will those resume.
The more you can cut alcohol out of the picture, the better.
So keep these detoxification strategies in mind. If you apply them all to your own lifestyle, you can expect to not only lead a healthier and longer life, but remarkably improve how you feel on a day to day basis.
References:
Paul-Labrador, Maura, et al. "Effects of a randomized controlled trial of transcendental meditation on components of the metabolic syndrome in subjects with coronary heart disease." Archives of internal Medicine 166.11 (2006): 1218-1224.
Marchand, William R. "Mindfulness-based stress reduction, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, and Zen meditation for depression, anxiety, pain, and psychological distress." Journal of Psychiatric Practice® 18.4 (2012): 233-252.
