Spring is here!  It is time to get rid of all that winter sluggishness (not to mention holiday pounds) and burst forth with a new vitality.  When you are making plans to Spring Clean your home, don’t forget to do a little spring cleaning inside your body!  Detoxes are a great way to de-clutter your insides and while you certainly can go all out if you have the time and inclination, just a little detox can go a long way.  

Candida Cleanse
A Candida Cleanse is one of the best detox programs around.  It takes three weeks and you’ll probably feel a bit deprived, but nothing is better when it comes to cleaning out your system and resetting your entire metabolic thermostat.  If you find yourself with a list of reduced well-being symptoms – lack of energy, low libido, digestion problems, sleep issues, and such, you will likely find a whole new you waiting on the other side of a Candida Cleanse.   I’ve done this cleanse three times in my life and while it takes some sacrifice, the result has always been worth it.

The cleanse is pretty simple really – just avoid eating anything that Candida can eat.  In other words you starve the little buggers to death.  In simple terms, you avoid sugar in all forms (including fruits), gluten (including wheat, barley and rye), yeast, condiments, dairy, left over foods, processed foods and mushrooms.  I know it doesn’t sound like there is much left to eat, but trust me there is.  An internet search for Candida Cleanse Recipes will give you plenty of ideas.  Don’t get too wrapped up in the blah, blah, blah on the internet though.  There are several supplements on the market promising a better, faster Candida Cleanse, but the fact is if you just stick to the diet restrictions the Candida die.  Period, end of story; and end of Candida overgrowth issues.

Elimination Diet
The  Candida Cleanse is rather like an engine overhaul.  If you’d like something closer to routine maintenance, try an elimination diet like the one Dr. Alejandro Junger calls The Clean Program.  Dr. Junger’s program was a little pricey for me and I wanted something shorter so I opted for Gwyneth Paltrow’s version on her newsletter Goop.   The plan was pretty easy to follow and you are consuming something every few hours so I never felt deprived.  You can find the diet and all the recipes here.  Instead of using both a whey powder and ProGreens in the shakes, I used Ultimate Meal, my favorite nutrition-in-a-can product .  I ended up addicted to the coconut milk mango shake and the ginger carrot dressing!  The plan does take a little bit of food prep time but it only cost about $50 for the week and it made a world of difference.  In just seven days I felt lighter, slept better, panted less in Amy’s classes, and even lost five pounds. 

Daily Detox Choices
If life is just too crazy right now to change your whole eating regimen, try smaller changes.  Eliminate refined sugars, fried foods, soda, and candy; increase fish, wheat products and vegetables and reduce animal products, milk and fruits.  Drink tea instead of coffee or better yet just water.   If you change just two unhealthy choices a day to healthy ones, drink a glass of lemon water at rising, eat half a grapefruit before lunch and dinner, drink one glass of natural unsweetened cranberry juice through the day, and chamomile tea at night, you will sleep better, cleanse your liver, speed up your digestion and you may even drop a pound or two. Just a little change can start the momentum that leads to big results and a better feeling you. 

You can find many other good detox ideas on the internet, just be careful to double check your research and be wary of sites trying to sell you anything.  You don’t need to add something to take something away.  If you go for a full out detox, remember to take it a bit easy on yourself – get good regular sleep, drink LOTS of water, and back off in yoga a little.  Sometimes stepping back to the krama before the one you usually do and focusing on the finer points of the posture rather than pushing for the next level will actually slingshot your yoga practice forward even though it feels like you’re moving backward. 

Sometimes we just don’t have the time, inclination or will power to eat as healthy as we’d like.  But changing what you put into the body isn’t the only way to detox – you can change what you do as well.  Check out these relatively easy detoxifying actions you can take anytime, or better yet all the time!

Sweat It Out!  If you can’t make it to yoga class, try a hot sauna, a quick run, a few flights of stairs, or twenty minutes on a cardio machine.  Forget the med-spas, the best facial you can give yourself is sweating every day!

Brush, Brush, Brush Your Skin – Did you know that skin is the largest organ in the body?  The more effective it is at releasing toxins, the less work your kidneys and liver have to do and the better you feel.   Dry brushing just a few minutes opens pores, stimulates lymph nodes, releases toxins and exfoliates the skin.  Choose a natural fiber brush, preferably with a long handle, and always move towards your heart.  Starting with the feet, brush in circles up the legs to the buttocks.  Do the same from your hands to shoulders, followed by your back.  Finish at the stomach and heart, being sure to brush counter clockwise on your stomach.  Follow with your regular shower or, for some extra vitality, do a little hydrotherapy – alternating cold and hot water three times for thirty seconds each, ending with cold water. 

Sleep Spa – You pamper your skin, your body, your face, even your nails, what about your subconscious?  Studies show that during sleep we reconcile our subconscious patterning with our conscious experience.  Ever felt like you’ve learned something in your head but you can’t put it into practice?  Lack of good sleep may be part of the reason why.   So give yourself a Sleep Spa.  Promise yourself for one week you are going to bed at a certain time and getting up exactly eight hours later.  You may be able to get by on six, but that doesn’t mean it is what your body truly needs.  To prevent problems falling asleep, create a “wind-down” ritual.  Put away your work and turn off everything that has a screen one hour before bed time.  Instead of watching TV or writing emails, pamper yourself a bit. Take a warm bath, enjoy a mini-pedicure, or just a hand rub with your favorite lotion.  Drink some chamomile or valerian root tea.  Read or meditate or listen to smoothing music until it is time to go to sleep.   After a week, see how great you feel and make an appointment with yourself for your very own Sleep Spa at least once a season, if not every week of your life!

The Only Constant Is Change – We all know the saying, yet the fact is we tend to be very dogged about not letting change into our life. Change helps sleeping aspects of us awaken and we become inspired. Haven’t you ever noticed on vacation how much more vibrant life seems? It’s not necessarily the place, or even the lack of responsibilities, it’s that we see everything through new eyes. The world becomes a fascinating place again, filled with wonder and possibility.  Bring that into your everyday life by trying something new – take a long walk in a park you’ve never been to, try that dance class you’ve wanted to take forever, or pretend you’re a tourist for a day in your own town. If you want to feel different, DO something different!

Give Away – Your time, your clutter, your love.  Whether you write a letter to a friend, take boxes from that spring-cleaned garage to charity, or volunteer at the hospital, time we give in service to others is given back to us tenfold in our sense of self and purpose. 

Go Within – Give yourself the gift of silence and clean out the cluttered spaces in your mind. Resolve to give yourself just ten minutes a day – a fraction of what you likely give to everyone else. Turn on some ambient noise if you find it difficult to quiet your mind.  Lose yourself in the rhythm of a drum or the sound of flowing water. If you find yourself thinking, just lead your mind back to silence with a soft, loving call like a mother calling a small child who has strayed too far from the playground.  Imagery can help too – a waterfall, field of flowers, the ocean or a mountain view. Find nature’s grandeur in the confines of your own mind. You can only see outside what exists inside. Revel in your own vastness.

Let Go – Do you have a certain pose you just pray the teacher will end NOW! Frog or pigeon or splits, for example? I find in these postures that my body is having an internal debate. There is a wise, quiet voice coaxing gently “just let go, you’ll be okay” while some other voice is screaming “NO! I’m going to injure something any second.  Please let me OUT!”  It is paradoxical, but true - the hardest thing we ever do in life is just let go. Set your spirit flying by finding physical ways to let go.  Gallop a horse, take a repelling class, try trust exercises with a (trusted) friend, or go to a playground and just swing upside down.  Let yourself feel that sensation of letting go and being okay – it is an amazing feeling and one we don’t give ourselves nearly often enough. 

Spring Forth – The whole city is waking up from its winter nap.  Get out and relish it!  Smell the flowers, eat outdoors, plant a garden, delight in the longer days and find gratefulness for this season of birth and restoration.