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This article is written for Evolving Wellness by Nathalie Lussier of RawFoodsWitch.com
If you’re reading this, you’re probably familiar with the old medical model. You know the one where doctors treat symptoms and prescribe drugs to cover up the true problem?
Well, the old model is broken
Luckily there’s a massive shift going on, because people are waking up to the fact that this medical model doesn’t work.
*Photograph 1 provided by Shutr
People aren’t just mechanical devices with parts needing to be replaced. People are complex, and everything is interconnected – when one organ is weak it causes a chain reaction.
So when you get a headache or a cold, it’s not time to cover up those signals from your body.
It’s time to figure out what caused that headache in the first place. And ask yourself why your immune system is being suppressed.
Time for a holistic approach
Even though the current medical model isn’t working, we’ve got options. I would call it the new model, but the truth is that the holistic approach to wellness is much older than our current medical model is.
The concept is simple. You treat the whole person, and you bring the body back into balance.
It’s a lot easier to keep someone healthy when their body is balanced, rather than adding in new drugs that keep pushing the body further off balance.
With a holistic view of health, you must consider the whole person: from the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual too. You can break each of these down further, looking at a person’s diet, exercise, stress levels, and interpersonal relationships.
So how do you start?
Alright, so it seems totally logical to start using a holistic approach to health. But how do you start when you’re so used to the current medical model and taking drugs.
The solution: the gateway drug to healthy eating, my dear friend the green smoothie.
If there’s one thing you can control in your lifestyle, it’s your eating habits. If you have a hard time controlling yourself around food cravings, then that’s another issue altogether.
The one simplest and most effective change I’ve seen people make that resulted in a domino effect of health has been to start drinking a green smoothie every morning.
Some of my clients started out drinking a green smoothie, saw that they were losing weight, started exercising, and now are well on their way to a truly healthy lifestyle.
No more depending on drugs or putting themselves out of balance.
Blend your first green smoothie
Here’s what you’ll need to make your first delicious green smoothie:
- 2 bananas
- 1 handful sliced or frozen mango
- 1 handful blueberries
- 1 bunch spinach (gradually add it in)
- Water to blend
Place all the ingredients in a high speed blender and watch this turn into a really tasty drink.
If you’re making a green drink for the first time go easy on the spinach and add a bit more every day until you can stomach the full amount.
This might sound gross to you, but trust me if you add the greens in gradually you’ll be enjoying these green smoothies and getting the nutrients and fiber you need to improve your overall health!
About the Author
Nathalie Lussier is known as The Raw Foods Witch because she uses her magick to spook away your raw food fears, and cure your cravings. Get her free ecourse and watch your energy soar! You can also follow her on twitter @NathLussier.
9 Comments to “You Don’t Need Drugs Once You’ve Tried the Gateway Drug to Healthy Eating”
Coincidentally, this is one of my main goals for 2010, eat more healthy/raw. I have seen this recipe while reading one of your newsletters in the past and always wanted to ask you two things. (1) Blueberries are not readily available were I live. What should I replace it with? (2) Is it okay to drink this every morning or should you replace the ingredients with others from time to time? Experimenting, I suppose?
Anyway, I look forward to Cure Cravings Forever!!!!!
Hi Bart! Great questions!
1) Definitely feel free to replace with any other fruits you can get your hands on. Or buy frozen blueberries/other berries.
2) I recommend you switch up the greens as much as possible: kale, swiss chard, collards, romaine lettuce, parsley, etc. And the fruit as well, but the greens are super important to switching. ;)
Yay I’m excited to have you in the program too! :D
Accepting new diets or new ways of eating envigorates the soul and liberates one from an habitual lifestyle. Lets keep on mixing it up, like your blended smoothie recipe, never to be reliant upon one form of energy ever again.
May each day bring new recipes into our lives.
Hi Bern!
I love the idea of always bringing in new recipes. Way to keep things fresh, and a truly wonderful idea. :)
Nathalie
Hi Nathalie
Thank you for sharing your knowledge here!
You provided some great tips where natural health is concerned and as most of the readers here know, I am a huge proponent of a return to a more holistic view of health and the human body, in fact including a holistic view of all of life!
And as a green smoothie drinker myself, I can honestly vouch for the many, many benefits that come with this type of lifestyle. Anything from starting the day with servings of fruits and vegetables, to proper elimination, to feeling more energized, and so much more… – they are an amazing way to go.
My personal, most common recipe is:
- 1-2 bananas
- 1/4 of fresh pineapple
- 4-6 large kale or collards green leaves
- ground flax seeds
- water
Mmmmmm! Just love starting my days with this and of course alternating fruits depending on the season.
Thank you again :)
Hi Nathalie,
Green smoothies always look weird to me, but I love spinich, kale, and collard greens, so I may as well give it a go.
I’ll try making a green smoothie this week. I have all the ingredients, now it’s time to blend them together. I’m going veggie this month, so this would be a great dinner.
I’ve been thinking about incorporating a morning smoothie into my daily eating routine a lot lately. I do like this recipe that Nathalie offered up. However, my concern is eating spinach everyday. I’ve recently learned that spinach is high in oxalic acid, which can deplete calcium from your bones and teeth if you eat it everyday. Will this smoothie work just as well with other types of greens? Or should I be looking for a new recipe?
@ JENNIFER – Thanks for your comment. Regarding your question about the spinach and oxalic acid. You are right about not wanting to eat spinach everyday. In terms of the bones, it basically blocks the absorption of minerals like calcium and iron. So it is not so much that it depletes it, as it blocks its absorption and then when your body needs it, it will take it from the stores in your bones. It also binds with any available free calcium to make an insoluble salt which can precipitate problems. However, this would normally only happen under extreme cases where someone literally eats spinach everyday for a few years.
The key as Nathalie said, is to alternate the greens – the recipe she offers is just one of many possible examples. If you take for example spinach, collards, kale, romaine lettuce, and bok choy, each weekday you have a smoothies with a different type of green. This is in fact the key to any healthy diet – balance and variety.
Here is some more info to help:
HIGH OXALIC ACID CONTENT:
Vegetables that are very high in oxalic acid and that we should not eat on a regular basis: amaranth, beet leaves, parsley, purslane, spinach, chard.
LOW OXALIC ACID CONTENT:
Dandelion greens, most fruits, kale, watercress, escarole, mustard greens, turnip greens, kale, broccoli, tomatoes, asparagus, cabbage, and most greens not mentioned.
Hope this helps. Your questions and comments are always welcome.
So true, treat the person and not the condition. I’m so glad that more and more people are waking up to that. I love green smoothies, and you definitely don’t need berries if you can’t get them. I often use apples, pears and I quite like adding a bit of raw ginger or a slice of lemon.