Happy New Year! I hope your year is off to a great start.
I’m a few months behind on posting about my monthly physical wellness challenges. But this one in particular seems like a good one to kickstart the new year.
My 18-month journey to better physical health continued with another challenge in October. I’m working on monthly challenges to create healthy habits that will lead to a healthy lifestyle **
In October, my focus was on doing a cleanse to reset my metabolism.
I have to say that I’m very skeptical of cleanses in general. I mean, doesn’t the body do that naturally on its own anyway? But, I was so led and so I did, and will admit – it’s probably a good habit to practice once or twice a year.
The cleanse that I did was inspired by a book called “The Hot Belly Diet” by Dr. Kshirsagar. I came across it while searching for a Kitchari recipe for the fasting challenge in August. The book teaches Ayurvedic principles and how most illnesses can be traced back to improper digestion. It contains a 30-day plan to “reset the metabolism, lose weight, and restore the body’s natural balance to heal itself”.
The plan involves an optional gut cleanse using food grade castor oil or fasting on the first day. Then, this is followed by a simplified eating plan, featuring kitchari for lunch and dinner, on the remaining days.
In addition to both of these, I also drank a milk thistle tea to support my liver. This was unintentional on my part. I set out to the store to buy Dandelion Root tea which I drink regularly; it’s great for digestion. But the only one I could find was a Milk Thistle tea that has dandelion in it.
Milk Thistle is said to be an antioxidant that protects and decreases inflammation of the liver. And the liver’s health is essential because it’s the body’s main filtration system. It convert toxins into waste, cleanses the blood, and metabolizes nutrients into important proteins needed by the body.
And the results…
I didn’t follow the book’s plan exactly. It was an unexpectedly busy month so I had only one week, later on in the month, to devote to this.
I did the castor oil cleanse as instructed on day one. It took much longer to take effect and the result wasn’t as intense as warned in the book. I’m not sure what that says about its efficacy or the state of my health. Maybe I didn’t do it correctly. Or maybe my metabolism is much slower than I realize. Or maybe this part of the cleanse was completely unnecessary for my body. The other part of the cleanse – eating a simplified meal plan featuring kitchari – went well for the rest of that week.
Overall, I’m not sure how this helped to improve my health; it’s difficult to measure. I don’t feel any different. But, as I’ve said before, I’m walking in faith on this entire health journey so I trust that there is some benefit of which I’m not aware.
Do you have plans to improve your health or wellness this year? Trust Him to lead you in it.
** For more on this Physical Wellness journey and other challenges, click here>>
