April Newsletter
7 Lifestyle Tweaks to Thrive this Spring and Help Detoxify
One of the best ways to stay healthy is to live in balance with the seasons. Balance, in this context, means mindfully crafting your diet and certain aspects of your lifestyle based on what season it is.
An easy way to think about this is with fruits and vegetables: we are lucky these days to have grocery stores stocked all year with fruits and vegetables from every corner of the globe at all times of year. Chinese medical thought prescribes realigning our diets with what would be available to us in the region where we live and at each time of year. In this way, we’re aligning ourselves with the rhythms of the earth. Not only that, but eating fresh, local fruits and vegetables probably means they’re going to be better tasting fruits and vegetables in the first place, because they’re fresh off the vine and ripened close by. Living in balance with the seasons helps to keep us healthy and free of disease. Check out the dirty dozen list of produce that is necessary to buy organic "Dirty Dozen Food Guide".
In spring, Chinese medicine says we should be attentive to our liver. Springtime is all about new life, life-giving processes, renewal and cleansing. The liver provides essential support to our lungs, heart and circulation system – in other words, all the life-giving systems in our bodies. The liver also stores and distributes nourishment to the whole body. It also filters toxins from the blood and breaks them down for elimination.
When the liver is functioning properly, there is functionality throughout the whole body, and we feel a physical and emotional freedom and expansiveness that allow us to take on the essence of springtime.
7 ways to tweak your lifestyle this spring in order to support your liver:
1. Rise and shine. Make it a habit to wake up earlier in the spring than you were during winter. Notice if getting up earlier allows you to have more energy during the day.
2. Exercise more. Try to incorporate more movement into your daily life during the spring. Especially during spring, exercise is a great way to battle depression and anxiety that can creep in due to a liver imbalance.
3. Add sour foods to your diet. The flavor connected to the liver is sour. Adding lemon to your water is a simple way to do this that will help your digestive and emotional health.
4. Keep breathing…deep belly breaths. Be intentional about developing or maintaining habits that help you to de-stress during spring. Springtime can feel like a burst of energy compared to winter, but it is important to make space each for downtime and not get too busy too fast.
5. Green is the color of spring in Chinese Medicine. During these months, fresh greens are abundant. It is highly recommended that we incorporate more fresh greens into our daily diets. Greens have been shown to be very beneficial for helping the liver detoxify the blood. Dandelion greens, in particular, are a good source for detoxification, which ultimately strengthens the liver and gallbladder meridians.
6. Avoid excessive stimulants during the spring months. Things like caffeine are considered expansive and energizing, which can be somewhat helpful during the cold winter months. But during the spring, excess energy can actually be harmful to the body. It can create headaches, insomnia, anger and more.
7. Incorporate detoxification therapies once a week into your regimen. Some effective options are Acupuncture, Electro Lymphatic Drainage, AmpCoil Biofeedback/Bioresonance PEMF therapy and FarInfrared Sauna.
For more helpful tips and to make an appointment call Carolina Holistic Health at (864) 516-6868
