beauty

No matter how sparse and how good your diet or how many antioxidants you take, no matter how conscientiously you deal with stress and how enthusiastically you exercise - all of which are central to ageless aging - it can be helpful periodically to spring-clean your body from within. Controlled fasts are not the only way of doing this. In fact I have come to believe that they are not even the best way. The natural-law approach to age retardation and the long tradition on which it is based also offers a number of other simple methods. Some - such as a spring-clean semi-fast or the sauna - are helpful when used every few weeks, while others, such as techniques for improving lymphatic drainage, can be used to advantage every few days or even more often. The whole purpose of spring-cleaning is to stimulate your body's eliminative capabilities so that any sluggishness in the blood and lymph circulation and any stasis in the tissues is cleared away. Then whatever toxicity may be present - heavy metals and cross-linkers for instance - can be broken down and eliminated via the skin and lungs, bladder and colon before it can cause degenerative damage and premature aging to your body.

I learned the secret of agelessness when, many years ago, I came upon a quotation from someone I much admire. Let me share it with you: “All men dream; but not equally.” he said. “Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find it was vanity: but dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible.” The quotation comes from T.E. Lawrence. I adore it. It transformed my own vision of aging. It reminded me of the imaginative power each of us has to create our unique path. It taught me that there is no need to fear growing older. Each one of us can live a rich and fulfilling life at any age. Yet too few of us make use of our powerful abilities to envision, then bring into being, what we long for. If, like me, you’d prefer to die young late in life, there are two things for you to do: First, get savvy about how to care for yourself naturally. Second, start to practice Lawrence of Arabia’s dictate. Decide to become a “dreamer of the day”. Then “act with open eyes to make it possible.” The growing understanding of natural medicine, together with reputable research into high-tech biochemistry, has made this transformation possible. Once little more than a pipe-dream, agelessness is becoming a reality. Savvy gerontologists have challenged the assumed maximum lifespans of human beings. They show us that people in the know can make intelligent use of antioxidant nutrients, electromagnetic treatments, and a myriad of other safe, natural anti-aging tools—including an organic, high-raw diet—to prevent physical degeneration and restore a healthy balance to their bodies and their lives. It is never too late to begin. Instead of prescribing dangerous drugs, this new wave of visionary scientists and practitioners show that the foods we eat exert powerful effects on control centers in the brain. These powerful loci direct metabolic processes on which your health depends—from hormonal behavior, weight and appetite, to emotional and mental states—even, believe it or not, the way we perceive the nature of reality. What few people yet know—and what I have been studying and teaching for decades—is that these control centers in the brain are also filters through which we experience profound spiritual growth. Choose to live on a diet of convenience foods, sugars, and carbohydrates, as more than 90% of people now do, and your brain’s control centers become crippled. You begin to age rapidly. Then, should you be urged to buy into relying on pharmaceutical drugs, eventually your body becomes poisoned by them. Become aware of this. Fresh foods grown on healthy soils foods and top quality nutrients do not poison the body’s crucial enzymes, nor do they block vital cell receptors, on which your health depends. Taking drugs long-term does both, bringing about not only ill-health and rapid aging, but unbalanced emotions, mental fog, and a strong sense that—in ways you cannot even articulate—you have lost trust and connections with yourself, although you may have no idea how this has happened. Changing the way you eat and care for your body can begin, within a few weeks, not only to transform your health. It can expand your consciousness and help you change your life for the better on virtually every level. Forget your chronological age. It’s a very limited indication of your biological and functional age. These are the measurements that really matter. Older people are capable of far more than society would have us believe. At any age, people can learn how to live by the principles of natural wellbeing and become highly resistant to the ravages of degeneration and chronic illness. They come to know their bodies. They face each morning in fresh anticipation about what the day can bring. They’ve learned to dismiss the negative brainwashing continually bombarding us from mainstream media, the medical profession and government directives. They know, for instance that, as George M. Mann MD says, “The diet-heart hypothesis which suggests that high intake of saturated fat and cholesterol causes heart disease has been repeatedly shown to be wrong. The public is being deceived by the greatest health scam of the century.” Those in the know refuse to allow themselves to be deceived any longer. Savvy, independent people have every right to boast of their increased longevity and high resistance to degeneration. They’ve earned it. These people seek truths and continue to uncover them. They choose to shun unnecessary drugs, to banish convenience foods, to make at least 50 to 75% of the foods they eat organic. They reject negative beliefs about growing older. They become not old, but ageless. Agelessness makes available to you a steadily maturing wisdom which is one of the greatest blessings as years go by. You become someone whose experience and awareness has not been distorted by an ill-functioning mind or waning vitality. Our sense of time expands and helps us come alive to the present moment. In a powerful, real, and positive way, this draws it towards the future. And when we are able to project ourselves into the future, that future becomes not an abstract consideration, but an experience of great rewards. The future of the planet is our future. We are responsible for it. If we wish, we can start to see ourselves as caretakers of our earth instead of tenants in a rented property. At last, the freedom from mental and physical degeneration which agelessness brings is no longer an empty dream. It is happening to many who are awakening. Who cares if, at the age of 85, you are still capable of running a marathon, or if you look 20 years older or younger than you are chronologically? Such things matter little by themselves. But high-level health, mental clarity and well-being which are the rewards of agelessness—no matter how old one is chronologically—are of urgent concern to all of us as residents of the earth. They form the foundation on which we human beings can build if we are to make use of our creative potentials. In the full use of such creativity lies the future of ourselves, our children and our planet. Have I become one of Lawrence’s “dreamers of the day”? I certainly have. It’s dreams that create the true mythologies by which we live our lives. I believe each and every one of us urgently needs solid dreams to give our lives direction—dreams which, tempered by the wisdom of age, are large enough and rich enough to carry us forward. Such dreams not only have power. They can help us bring forth exciting new realities.

There are five main channels for detoxifying your body: the skin, the lungs, the kidneys, the bowels and the lymphatic system. None is less less recognized, nor more important in spring-cleaning the body, than your lymphatic system. Yet the state of its health and functioning is still almost completely ignored. Your lymphatics are not only a major route for absorbing vital nutrients from the digestive system into the tissues to keep skin healthy, youthful and glowing—they are important carriers of immune cells. These protect your body from damage and illness and help prevent degenerative aging. Lymphatics are also your body's metabolic-waste-disposal system. They take away unwanted proteins and large particles of toxic debris which cannot be removed by any other means. This includes toxins—the by-products of fatigue and of stress—dead cells, fatty globules, pathogenic bacteria, heavy metals, infectious viruses and other assorted rubbish cast off by your cells. WASTE DISPOSAL So essential are the waste-eliminating functions of the lymphatic system that without them you would die within 24 hours. Doctors working with natural methods of healing insist that a primary cause of fatigue, disease and cell degeneration, with its accompanying premature aging, is poor circulation of lymph to and from the cells and tissues of the body. The same tradition of natural medicine uses a number of effective techniques designed to stimulate lymphatic functions as a means of healing even quite serious illnesses— ranging from rheumatism or cardiovascular disease to chronic fatigue. These techniques include exercise (done for the joy of it, not as a chore), skin-brushing, special breathing techniques, and infra red saunas. All of these things improve the purity and quality of the lymph—the clear fluid which flows through the lymphatics (lymph vessels). They are little short of revolutionary in what they can do for your good looks and your good health. They have even been known to clear long-standing skin troubles such as acne, improve the look of puffy or aging skin, heighten vitality, banish muscle and joint pain, and aid in the regeneration of the body as a whole. Making use of these techniques is simple. But first you need to know a little about how the lymphatic system functions, and just how important a role its mysterious mechanisms play in promoting health and beauty. WHITE BLOOD MAGIC Your body is more than 75 per cent water. So important is water to the processes of life itself that, according to Nobel Laureate Albert Szent-Gyorgyi, “Life is water dancing to the tune of solids”. A French biologist rather poetically emphasized Szent-Gyorgyi's observation by saying: 'Man is an amphibian. Even the most beautiful woman's body is no more than an aquarium with 50 liters of lukewarm seawater in which trillions of cells live and fight for survival.' Five liters of this 'seawater' are to be found in your blood, five in digestive and other secretions, and almost all the rest is in your lymphatic fluid or lymph—sometimes called 'white blood'. Thanks to the lymph, a ceaseless interchange goes on between your body's trillions of cells and their surrounding interstitial fluids, so that food and oxygen are exchanged and waste products are eliminated from the cells—all through the medium of water. For cells and tissues to be nourished, for them to remain vital, and for your skin and muscles to remain smooth and healthy and firm, this interchange needs to occur without impedance, and the water itself needs to be relatively uncontaminated. BEAUTIFUL FLUID In your body, nutrients and oxygen are transported to the tissues and cells via the bloodstream. Arterial pressure forces the blood through tiny capillaries and out into the cells' interstitial spaces to enable the nutrients and oxygen to be exchanged for the wastes which the cells have produced. Here the water or interstitial fluid, now filled with toxic waste, is gathered by tiny lymphatic tubules and then sent back through the lymph vessels to be detoxified. These lymphatics are a highly organized and elaborate system of ducts and channels which flow all over your body. In fact, almost all the tissues of the body are equipped with lymph channels which drain excess fluid, and the wastes which it contains, from the interstitial spaces. This opalescent liquid carries the wastes and toxic products from these minute channels into larger lymphatic vessels, and on through the lymph nodes, which are located in the groin and under the arm and the neck. The lymph nodes filter the fluid to remove impurities and dead cells; they are also a place where antibodies, which fight infection or toxins, are made. After purification at the nodes, the fluid is returned to the blood. In this way, the lymphatic system works ceaselessly to clear toxicity and to reduce excess mucus and waste. GRAVITY IS YOUR FRIEND The microscopic network of these lymph channels resembles the blood capillaries, except that it is finer. And the lymph system in many ways is rather like the blood system except that, while the blood system is powered by the action of the heart muscles, the lymphatic system has no such prime mover. Instead, its nourishing, water-balancing and eliminative functions are almost entirely dependent upon gravity and the natural pressure of muscles which occurs when you move your body. These muscle contractions and body movements—together with biochemical factors, such as whether or not excessive quantities of protein are present in the fluid—keep the lymph flowing and make it possible for the lymphatics to carry out their important task of bodily cleansing. For good lymphatic functioning—to keep your body free of the buildup of wastes and toxicity—you need to move your muscles vigorously and often. That is why regular brisk exercise, such as taking long walks in comfortable shoes, is so important not only to firm your muscles and strengthen your heart and lungs, but also to encourage the steady and effective elimination of wastes from your cells and tissues.

Most cellulite begins with a stiffening of the septa locked into the surrounding network of connective tissue. Lymph circulation to and from this subcutaneous layer gets blocked by wastes we accumulate from a sedentary lifestyle and from eating foods which, unbeknown to most women, are anathema to their bodies. This causes the septa to become more fibrous, and to squeeze down on fat cells. It also deprives the area of oxygen and vital nutrients, preventing both fat and toxins from being cleared. Toxic build-up is not only a main cause of cellulite build-up. It is the reason that many women retain water, experience heavy leg syndrome, and find their feet and calves swelling on an airplane. One of the great gifts of the Rohsäfte-Kur which I wrote about last week is that, even when followed for only a few days, your body begins to eliminate toxic build-up that has become trapped in the connective tissues. Now, if you’re ready to banish cellulite forever, improve your health and life for the better, where do you begin?Start with this three step process—making changes in what you eat, in when you eat, and in what kind of exercise you do. It’s important to remember the following things if you want to become cellulite-free while growing healthier and leaner: Important Truths 1. Cellulite build-up is the result of hormone disregulation, toxic build-up and a sedentary lifestyle. 2. Insulin is your body’s primary regulator of fat storage and waste build up in the tissues.  When insulin levels are high—either long-term or simply after eating a meal—fat deposits accumulate and produce cellullite. When insulin levels are low, your body becomes able to release cellulite from septa-bound connective tissue, turning it into energy. 3. Grain-based and cereal-based carbohydrates are the major culprit behind cellulite as well as obesity, fatigue and chronic degenerative conditions. They negatively affect insulin secretion seriously disrupting the symphony of hormonal balance in the human body. 4. Sugars—from glucose and sucrose to high-fructose corn syrup—are monumentally harmful. To clear cellulite and remain free of it, you must eliminate sugars from your diet. It is also essential that you use no artificial sweeteners. They are dangerous contributers to body pollution and therefore to cellulite itself. Use only real stevia (see my recommendations below). 5. Because of the negative effects that grains, cereals, starchy vegetables and sugars exert on insulin, they not only lay down cellulite deposits; they lead to the development of diabetes and coronary heart disease. Grains are also major contributors to cancer, Alzheimer’s disease and other diseases of civilization, as well as early aging. 6. Cellulite and an inability to shed it are the result of an imbalance—a disequilibrium—in the hormonal regulation of fat tissue and fat metabolism. When hormonal regulation and hypothalamic balance are restored by making vital changes in how you eat, this reverses the process. Step One—Clear The Decks Start right now by getting rid of all the low-fat and high-carb foods in your kitchen. These include jams and jellies, rice cakes, popcorn, flour, grains, pasta, pretzels, low-fat salad dressings, raisins, fruit-flavored yoghurts and sugars. (You might want to hang on to a little sugar so you can offer it to visiting friends who are not yet as savvy about how dangerous it is as you are. You might also want to hold on to some brown rice, buckwheat flour or chickpea flour—things you can use to thicken a soup.) Most women find that the process of clearing their fridge and pantry is a salutary experience. It brings with it a sense that they’re starting a whole new life—as indeed they are. The most important foods you will be buying to replace them are these: A good supply of wholesome natural fats like coconut oil, extra virgin olive oil and butter—preferably from grass-fed cows. Top quality protein foods including meat, seafood, eggs and the very best micro-filtered whey you can find (see recommendations below) if you like to make smoothies. Plenty of fresh green vegetables—preferably organic— both to eat raw and to cook. The best fiber in the world comes from these vegetables. Try eating half of your vegetables raw. Some low-sugar fresh fruit such as strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries. Say No To Packaged Foods What surprises most people when they go to a supermarket in search of genuinely healthy foods is that most of the stuff they find there is not worth eating. A good general rule when choosing foods is this: Foods with a long shelf life don’t belong in your body. Processed high-carb foods often have a very long shelf life. This makes them great sales material for food manufacturers and retailers, since these packaged foods can sit on the shelves for months—sometimes even years. But 90% of them have been whipped up out of flours and sugars, junk fats and chemical additives—all of which you will want to avoid. You’ll usually find the healthiest, freshest, most natural foods around the outside edges of any supermarket. These include crunchy fresh vegetables, fresh game and meats, seafood, eggs and cheeses. Fresh, wholesome foods are perishable and therefore have to be replaced often, unlike the ready-in-a-minute, pre-made stuff that populates the inner aisles. Organic Is Your Goal Whenever possible, go organic. Not only do organic vegetables, fruits and meats taste better, the organic matter in healthy soil is nature’s factory for biological activity. Organic foods supply us with an excellent balance of minerals, trace elements and vitamins which we cannot get any other way. Organic methods of farming also help protect against distortions in mineral balance. Good mineral balance is important, since an increase in one or more minerals can alter your body’s ability to absorb as much of another mineral that it needs. Conventionally grown fruits and vegetables have been sprayed with pesticides—petrochemical-derived compounds which behave like low-dose synthetic estrogens in the body. Many fruits and veg are also treated with fungicides or wax. Each one of these chemicals the body takes in contributes to its toxic load, putting pressure on your liver, stressing the entire body and causing free radical damage. When it comes to maintaining good blood sugar and insulin balance—all of which are essential to becoming cellulite-free—you do not want these things to happen. A stressed liver has trouble managing glucose levels and controls insulin poorly. Read Labels Carefully A word of warning: Just because you buy something in a health food store or natural food emporium does not mean that it will be helpful in reversing insulin resistance, clearing cellulite, and promoting fat loss. In addition to the good fresh foods they sell, these stores are also chock-a-block with high-carb treats full of sugar. And by the way, just because a food is labeled “organic” doesn’t necessarily mean you want to eat it. Organic sugar and organic flour can upset the insulin/blood sugar apple cart just as easily as their non-organic counterparts do. Although organic treats may look great in their packages, most of them are best avoided. Read labels as carefully here as in you do in a supermarket. Make sure that foods you buy contain no hidden sugars such as honey, corn syrup, fructose or other sweeteners. Step Two: Decide When To Eat Here’s where the power of meal spacing comes in. Its power can be monumental. You can call this intermittent fasting if you like, although I prefer to look upon it more as a way of developing your own schedule for eating as well as for resting from eating. Spacing your meals is an effective way of continuing to clear away cellulite as you cleanse the whole body creating new sleek muscles, heightening vitality and eliminating food cravings permanently. The ideal strategy for taking advantage of the gifts intelligent meal spacing has to offer is simple. Eat well at a meal, then wait 4 to 6 hours before your next meal. Here’s what happens metabolically each time you eat something. During the first couple of hours after a meal, your blood sugar rises and insulin spikes. After these first two hours—from the start of hour 3 after a meal for the next two hours—both insulin and blood sugar levels drop. Finally, from hours 4 to 6 after a meal, insulin gets so low that it almost disappears, while human growth hormone (HGH) rises directing metabolism to clear the body of more waste and metabolize fats from the body’s tissues including cellulite deposits by turning them into energy. Two Meals A Day To make the very best use of meal spacing you will need to eat only two good meals a day, made up out of the “good guy foods” listed above. Eat your fill of these health-giving foods and enjoy them. Be sure to include plenty of the good fats—coconut oil, extra virgin olive oil and butter from pasture-grazed cows—in each meal. Be sure to create your meal spacing in a way that works for your lifestyle. I eat my first meal between 11am and 12:30, depending on what I am doing. My second meal is usually about 6:30 or 7 in the evening. This means that I have a long period during the night while I sleep for my body to work its magic, both for detoxing and anabolic rebuilding. Make sure your first meal of the day is full of good quality protein. Don’t just through yourself in at the deep end when you begin your meal spacing. Ease your way into it by having a good quality snack between meals if you feel you need to for the first few days until you get used to the lengthy periods between meals. It won’t be long before you sense the beneficial changes that are taking place. After the first week or two you’re likely to find you no longer have any need for snacks, and that you are beginning to look and feel so good. Step Three: Move For Joy I love this definition of real fitness: When you’re not sitting or resting, your body is physiologically able to deal with whatever challenges it is asked to handle. Forget forever that you need to exercise to lose weight and all that nonsense. You don’t. The major reason why exercise is so important for shedding cellulite and improving health is that it heightens insulin sensitivity and quite naturally causes your body to replace belly fat and liver fat with beautiful sleek muscles. What kind of exercise is best? The kind that delights you. I would never exercise because the powers-that-be tell me I ‘should’, or out of a sense of duty, or for fear of putting on weight. To do that would not only imprison my body, it would kill my spirit. It would be like taking a thoroughbred and binding it so that it can’t get out of the starting gate. Experiment and discover what physical activities you love doing, then do them for the sheer pleasure of it. You could swim or jog or dance just because it feels good and makes your body sing. Try rebounding on a mini-trampoline—something that is particularly good for improving lymphatic drainage and clearing cellulite. Swimming can be great because it feels so sensuous. But don’t make yourself swim laps in some driven way. Instead, move deliciously through the water. Play as a child would. Notice the bliss your body feels. If you have no idea what kind of movement you enjoy, start with a simple walk each day, while paying attention to how your body moves with each step you take. Once you discover just how vast your body’s potential for joy is, and begin to delight in movement, your experience of exercise can change forever. Far from being something you once did because you’re told you should (how I hate that word), exercise can become one of the most enjoyable experiences in your life. American enthusiast, the late George Sheehan, whose legacy continues to inspire people about the true nature of exercise, describes this experience well: “Exercise that is not play accentuates rather than closes the split between body and spirit. Exercise that is drudgery, labor, something done only for the final result is a waste of time.” I couldn’t agree more. 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I am a sucker for beauty. I always have been. It dazzles me, whether in the form of a man, a woman, a sunrise, or tiny shoots poking their heads through encrusted mud after a devastating flood. One way or another I have spent more than forty years of my life working with beauty, writing about it, researching for product formulations and helping create skincare ranges in the beauty industry. Superficial? Nothing but an indulgence? Nonsense. Like truth, beauty can be one of life’s greatest joys. Keats knew what he was on about in the final lines of his Ode To A Grecian Urn: "'beauty is truth, truth beauty,' – that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know" For years I had a recurring dream: I am walking through a wood and come upon a tree so magnificent I cannot bear to look upon it. I never understood what the dream was telling me. Then one day I got it. True beauty—the dazzling uniqueness of a tree or a wonderful piece of music or a woman, be she 18 or 80—in some way annihilates us. It takes us beyond what we feel comfortable with to what physicists call zero point, a realm of no thoughts, no opinions, just a sense that we are at that moment in the presence of something wondrous. THE ZEN OF BEAUTY To me there is nothing more beautiful than the unique nature of a human being, that “seed power” within each of us which carries the genetic potentials of what we can become. Each man or woman boasts her own brand of seed power—a unique collection of physical characteristics, passions, needs, quirks and agendas. Like a stalk of bamboo in a Zen painting, the seed power of a human being is absolutely unique, yet carries with it a magnificent sense of the universal. The more freely and fully a person’s seed power gets expressed in how they speak, think, look and live, the more beautiful they become. This is what I call deep beauty. Real beauty is above all authentic. That is, it is carried on the energy that comes from living your own truth instead of buying into somebody else’s rules. The mythologist Joseph Campbell used to say that the best way to live your life is to “follow your bliss.” I think he’s right. When you live this way your eyes shine, your body grows stronger and your skin glows, no matter what your age. In this lies the truth of what they call “inner beauty.” ICING ON THE CAKE But what about “outer beauty?” I also love the trappings and trimmings, the glory and glamour of lotions and potions, sparkling eyeshadows and shimmering lip-glosses. Since I was a teenager my dressing table has been littered with colors and brushes, hair clips, bottles and sprays. They were my playthings for adornment and exaggeration. Like the ribbons nineteenth century women wove into their hair and bodices… mmm… sheer delight. I had a beautiful mother whose name was Violet. She looked like a cross between a golden-haired fairy godmother and a Hitchcock blonde. Always impeccably dressed, my mother could walk through a barnyard in a white suit and emerge without a speck. Not me. I am a walking advertisement for what I ate for lunch, since most of it ends up down my shirt. COOL BEAUTY Violet was a cool beauty. She never shared her clothes with me, her jewelry, or her cosmetics. Even to walk through her dressing room and touch them was a crime punishable by banishment. But she did share some important advice: First she taught me that beautiful skin matters. To maintain it, she insisted, you need just the right amount of sunlight—half an hour early or late in the day—no more ever. She was adamant I needed to eat natural foods and to supplement my diet with some judiciously chosen vitamins and minerals as well. “Stay away from sugar and breads and pizzas,” she insisted. “Never go to bed without cleaning your face first, and always nourish your skin with something active, be it fresh papaya or an absurdly expensive but irresistible French night cream. That will help repair damage that takes place in the daytime.” At first I balked at the idea. Then, in my mid-twenties, I decided she was right. I began to make a little time each day to look after myself. It was then I discovered that the time a woman spends at her dressing table (this can be as simple an affair as a cardboard box covered with cloth at which you sit on a cushion) far from being a narcissistic self-indulgence can become a time of silence, solitude, and renewal. I believe this right to this day. It can be a time every bit as full of peace, simple pleasure and quietude as meditation. It can also be a lot of fun.

A detox can work miracles after a spate of too much work and too little sleep, after the over-indulgences of Christmas, in spring when all life is renewing itself, before you hit the beach in summer, or whenever you need a lift. Detoxification is just a long word for clearing out your system. A process which stimulates your body’s natural ability to get rid of the toxic waste products that build up in your cells, tissues and organs over months and years of living on the Western fare of convenience foods and polluted air. You can spend hundreds of hours and thousands of pounds on lotions, potions and treatments to improve the look of your skin, to firm your flesh and to renew your body. But none of these things is likely to bring you the same benefits as simple, natural methods for periodic internal spring-cleaning. You might think of spring cleaning in terms of carting out boxes of junk from the attic. In a way, an internal spring clean does the same thing. The human body is magnificently designed to cleanse itself automatically without ever giving thought to the process. The trouble is that the kind of food and drink most people in the West put into their bodies, the tendency we have to lead stressful but sedentary lives, and the increasing number of pollutants to which we are exposed through the air we breathe and the water we drink, have created a situation in which often far more toxins are taken into the body, and far more metabolic wastes produced in it, than we can effectively get rid of. In other words, your body is continually having to cope with more poisons than it can eliminate in the normal day-to-day course of events. Instead they are stored in the tissues where they lower vitality, encourage the development of degenerative diseases and early aging and rob the system of nutrients necessary to keep your whole body looking its best. garbage gathering Dr Dwight McKee, Medical Director of the International Health Institute in America, put it rather bluntly when he said: "anybody who has lived the mainstream American lifestyle for ten or more years has 70 trillion garbage cans for cells." McKee believes, as do a growing number of physicians, that the cells of anyone living in the West are literally chock full of metabolic and environmental wastes gathered over a lifetime. To live at a high level of health and vitality, not to mention being able to make the most of your potential for good looks and prolonged youth, we need to get rid of them. Beautiful skin, a firm and healthy body, and a clear mind are all dependent on your system being able to efficiently and effectively get rid of bodily wastes and toxins before they have a chance to do any damage. This principle forms the foundation of the long European tradition of natural medicine. Remove some of the burden of what is creating excess toxicity in your system by laying aside coffee, alcohol, and over-processed foods complete with chemical additives for a time, and you’re halfway there. Add to that a very simple and temporary regime designed to trigger rapid detoxification and quite naturally you trigger your body’s own mechanisms for clearing out the junk in the attic. good looks from within So what do you get out of it? Giving your body the chance to clear out the rubbish it has been carrying around, sometimes for years, will encourage weight loss if there is weight to be shed, will start you on the road to getting rid of cellulite, will improve the look and texture of your skin, minimize lines on your face, improve overall muscle tone, and increase your sense of vitality and well-being. It cleanses the digestive system, restores a good acid/alkaline balance to the body and generally stimulates the proper functioning of organs and tissues. In short, it puts you through the kind of transformation which leaves you sparkling with vitality. Regimes like this keep world-famous health-spas making money hand over foot as they take in worn, tired, stressed people and transform them using healthy foods and natural treatments into more energetic, younger looking, better functioning versions of themselves. Yet you, too, can get that health-spa lift by doing a simple detox in a weekend at home for – believe it or not – the price of a few pounds of apples. Following such a regime two or three times a year can be enormously helpful in transforming the way you look and feel, reducing excess weight, increasing your energy, and generally getting you back on track. It is particularly useful when you have been under a lot of stress, when you have overindulged, or to get you looking and feeling your best before exposing your body on holiday. Detoxification can bring you a new sense of vitality and regenerate all your systems for maximum good looks and energy. The theory is simple. Stop putting into your body as much as possible those foods which encourage the production of toxic wastes which clog the system. Take two days – a weekend - to relax, spoil yourself, and get your natural elimination processes going with an apple fast. Follow with a few days of taking in lots of delicious living foods to really put you on top form. It’s a cheap, effective program which fits perfectly into a normal working week.  Too good to be true?  Check out Apple Magic and find out for yourself. To Find Out more About The Apple Detox Click Here

Moving your body preserves youth and creates high-level vitality, as well as good feelings about who you are. Did you know, for example, that regular exercise is the best treatment yet devised for depression? Little wonder, since throughout evolution our bodies have been built to move. It is only in the last century that we have become sedentary ‘lounge-lizards', making ourselves vulnerable to the numerous ailments—from osteoporosis to coronary heart disease—in which lack of physical exercise is a major risk factor. Exercise can do as much good for your mind as it can your body. You might be surprised to find how simple and blissful the right kind of exercise can be. GET INTO BLISS We are told all the time, by everyone, that we should force ourselves to exercise whether we like it or not. Personally, I love exercise. But only because doing it brings me joy. I firmly believe you should never exercise out of a sense of duty, or for fear of putting on weight if you don’t. Find out what you love doing, and do it just for fun. You could swim or jog or dance for the pleasure of it Or rebound on a mini-trampoline—something that is particularly good for internal spring-cleaning. Swimming is great because it is so sensuous. But don’t make yourself swim laps. Instead, move sensuously through the water and notice the bliss your body can feel as you do. If you don’t know what exercise you enjoy, then start with a brisk walk. TAKE A WALK Brisk daily walks can be a lot of fun—but they can also be a major factor in disease-prevention, as they help keep your body clean from the inside out. They increase vitality and improve your mental state. How far? How fast? That depends on how fit you are already. Start slowly if you are not used to exercise, and then gradually—over several weeks—work up your pace to four miles an hour; that means you will be walking a mile in about 15 minutes. Walk with a sense that you are just going to allow your body to move and to experience the pleasure of being alive. Walking brings our awareness into our bodies, along with the magnificent spirit that is the essence of who you are, so you and your body feel like one. If you have young children, take them with you in a pushchair or pram. Older children can benefit as much from the exercise as you do. If the weather is bad, make sure you are all equipped with waterproofs or warm clothing. Or, if you prefer, get up early before anyone else is awake and go out by yourself (this is my favorite time for exercising). If you go out to work, carry your work-shoes with you and wear a comfortable pair of trainers. Take the bus or train to within a mile or so of your workplace and walk from there. AGE PREVENTION The latest research into age-retardation shows clearly that it is not a pill, magic potion or some glamorous and expensive youth treatment which best reverses the long and depressing list of changes that have come to be associated with aging, but simple exercise. How much regular aerobic activity you get determines the level of something called your ‘V02max’. This is the scientific term for 'maximum oxygen consumption’—the most critical measurement of your body's heart and lung performance. This measurement is something which declines steadily in most people after the age of 30—at a rate of about 1 per cent per year—simply because, unlike our primitive ancestors who remained physically active all through their lives, we lead a largely sedentary existence. As a result, we appear to age quite rapidly—we experience a decline in cardiovascular and lung fitness, we lose muscle and bone tissue, our skin wrinkles and thins, and we experience a progressive stiffening of the joints. These age-related changes appear to occur at just the rate at which our V02max declines. The good news is this: a decline in V02max is by no means inevitable. When a person of 35, 55, or even 75 moves their body regularly, this can restore V02max levels to that of someone many years younger. As this happens, energy increases and parameters such as cardiovascular fitness, heart-rate, cholesterol, and blood-lipids return to more youthful measures. Skin looks younger, high blood-pressure lowers, joints regain flexibility. Meanwhile, loss of minerals from the bones is halted, muscle-mass increases, and fat is lost; even your intelligence improves. LASTING VITALITY Physiologist J. L. Hodgson carried out a series of studies at Pennsylvania State University which showed that when an inactive 70-year-old starts a program of moderate activity he can expect, in effect, to improve his oxygen-transporting ability (V02max) by some 15 years. If then he goes on to achieve an athlete's level of conditioning, he can potentially regain 40 years of V02max and experience many of the physical and physiological effects of rejuvenation in the process. AGE REVERSAL So exceptional is the ability of regular exercise to reverse aging changes that Dr Walter Bortz, one of America’s leading scientific experts on aging, wrote in the Journal of the American Medical Association that 'It seems extremely unlikely that any future drug or physician-oriented technique will approach such a benefit'. Bortz had begun studying the relationship between age-related changes and inactivity through having his own leg in a cast for six weeks. When the cast was removed the 'withered, stiff and painful leg' looked like it belonged on someone 40 years older. He found that, by almost every physiological parameter known, a lack of exercise produced bodily changes paralleling those associated with aging. Regular sustained physical activity can go a long way towards preventing and even reversing them. BLESSINGS OF MOVEMENT Herbert de Vries of the Andrus Gerontology Centre at the University of Southern California showed in a study involving more than 200 people that men and women of 60 or 70 can become as fit and energetic as people 30 years younger. 'Regular exercise quite literally turned back the clock for our volunteers,' said de Vries. And, when questioned about what they considered the greatest benefit of their regular exercise programs, his subjects most often answered “greater energy”. The fitter you are, the more energy you have. SKIN GLOWS Regular exercise—the kind you get if you do 30-45 minutes of walking, swimming, dancing, rebounding or what you love most, at least three times a week—suffuses your skin with blood, enhances lymphatic functioning, increases the ability of your body to carry oxygen and nutrients to the skin's cells, and removes waste products from them. Exercise physiologist James White at University of California, San Diego, carried out an interesting study to find out just how effective exercise might be at retarding—even maybe reversing—the effects of aging on skin. Working with older women, he compared two groups: One group on a program of rebounding using mini-trampolines, and one group of sedentary women. He discovered that the exercisers looked younger, had better skin, coloring, and fewer wrinkles than non-exercisers. White was surprised to discover that exercise even reduces bags under the eyes. With all these amazing benefits, why wouldn’t you want to get into the joy of movement today…?

Some of the simplest techniques for supporting your body’s elimination processes also happen to feel wonderful and can bring delicious relaxation in their wake. Your body is working hard to get rid of all that stored waste, so treat it gently and give it some attention. Your mind will benefit too. Your two day apple fast is a not to be passed-up opportunity for some bodily indulgence of the first order. Skin brushing is now frequently recommended by health practitioners and has a long history for health and healing in the annals of European natural treatments. It is a particularly helpful technique to use during a detox, and can do wonders for your skin used daily afterwards. Skin brushing acts both superficially to draw out wastes from the skin, and deeply by boosting lymphatic drainage (more of this later) and helping to break down congestion in areas where the lymph flow has become sluggish and toxins have collected. It improves the look of skin, helps eliminate cellulite, and tones the whole body. It is an extraordinarily gentle yet powerful technique, and it feels wonderful. Using a natural bristle brush, preferably one with vegetable bristles and a long handle (available from pharmacies, natural beauty shops and health-food stores), go over the surface of your body once with long sweeping motions. Brush across the tips of your shoulders and upper back, then down over the neck and shoulders and down the arms and over the hands – always working in a downwards direction and covering the surface of the skin once. Now brush down over the trunk and tummy and down the back until you’ve covered every inch of your upper body. Then, beginning at the feet, brush upwards in the same long sweeping motions up the legs, front and back, and up over the buttocks. Do this slowly and enjoy the feeling of having the skin of your whole body gently exfoliated. Always brush your skin with a dry brush and never brush your face. How much pressure you put behind the brush should depend on how strong your skin is, your age, and how much stimulation it is used to. Go easy to begin with. Your skin will soon become fitter and then you will be able to work far more vigorously. But you should never go too hard too quickly or you risk being counter productive and will miss out on the benefits of steadily increasing skin firmness and fitness. Skin brushing encourages better circulation, brings energy into ‘deadened’ areas of flesh, smooths and softens skin, and encourages better lymphatic drainage. You are also sloughing off dead skin cells with the brush, so encouraging new cells to come to the surface and make the skin of your whole body glow. detox test Being your body’s largest organ and one of the most important for elimination (almost a third of your body’s wastes can be eliminated through the skin), skin that is brushed regularly yields up the most amazing quantity of rubbish. You can check for yourself just how dramatic is the skin’s elimination of wastes by performing a practical experiment with the help of a flannel. Every day before your bath or shower, brush your skin all over for three to five minutes. Then take a damp flannel and rub it all over your freshly brushed body. Hang the flannel up and repeat the process with the same flannel the next day. After a few days, the smell of the flannel will be quite revolting thanks to the quantity of waste products that have come directly through the skin’s surface. Just think how much better off you are without them.

Beautiful skin vibrates with energy. All twenty-one square feet of it. Skin is not only your largest organ. It is a multi-dimensional interactive system of information, molecules, energy, cells, and genetic messages determined by the health of your body. In fact our skin is completely dependent on the body’s living matrix for its radiance. Learn to feed it well and your living matrix will function at a high level of order. Your skin becomes regenerated and rejuvenated no matter what’s your age. Who ever said it’s not possible to turn back time? THE BIG THREE There are three little-known nutraceuticals to turn to when your skin needs extra help. They represent a magnum force against aging, wrinkles and skin problems. They form the core of a wide-based anti-aging, anti-inflammatory antioxidant army, working to protect the integrity of the living matrix. The big three work wonderfully together. They also work well when taken with the more common antioxidants from alpha-lipoic acid, grape seed extract and Co-enzyme Q10 to vitamin C and zinc. TAKE SULFUR Sulfur is the third largest elemental component of your body. The hottest item in offices of savvy plastic surgeons these days is a unique form of sulfur known as MSM—methyl-sulfonyl-methane. At the top of the list for extra support, MSM is a superb free radical scavenger. It neutralizes free radical molecules that damage skin. Found in every tissue of your body, MSM concentrations diminish with age. So they need to be supported by the right kind of diet and supplements after the age of 25. MSM is also found in rainwater, the sea, and all living organisms. It exists in especially high concentrations in raw vegetables, fruits, and sea foods. Even the cocoa plant from which chocolate is made is a good source. But, unless your diet is composed primarily of raw foods, it is highly unlikely that you are getting enough MSM for optimal health and beautiful skin. The crème de la crème source of sulfur for the human body, MSM slows the loss of collagen, stabilizes connective tissues, and helps clear toxic buildup both on a cellular level and in the body as a whole. MSM is light years ahead of other forms of sulfur. It is completely safe as well as highly effective. Even people who are “allergic” to sulfur-drugs and sulfite-based food additives thrive on it. GREAT NAILS AND HAIR Sulfur is the most beautifying of all the elements. Even the curliness of hair depends on it. It regulates the sodium/potassium balance, bringing in nutrients and oxygen to cells and neutralizing wastes. Every time your body clears destructive chemicals, it uses sulfur to do this. MSM provides elasticity and healing repair to skin tissues. It can even alter cross linkages, smoothing out scars. It is not only useful as an internal supplement essential for beauty. As a prime free radical scavenger, this form of physiological sulfur also helps rid the body of allergies. It even helps protect the lining of the digestive tract from parasites and pathogens. This is most important for skin, since when leaky gut or dysbiosis occurs in the digestive tract, our skin suffers. If you have a tendency to acne, you can break out. If your skin tends to be dry, this can make it drier and give the face a colorless, lifeless look. Sulfur is also essential for strong cartilage, for bones, and to build keratin—the fibrous protein out of which your hair and nails are made—as well as for virtually every function of the skin. With extra MSM, your nails grow faster and stronger. Your hair gets thicker and shinier. A good dose of MSM is 2000 milligrams (2 grams) for each 60 kilos of weight a day. Start with 500 mg per 60 kilos of weight and work up. Use together with half that amount of vitamin C (so if you take 2 grams of MSM take 1 gram of vitamin C). POWER FOR LONGEVITY The second master nutraceutical for skin is carnosine. Carnosine is not to be confused with the amino acid L-carnitine which transports fatty acids into the mitochondria of cells so they can be turned into ATP. Carnosine is a dipeptide—a two-part protein—made out of the amino acids beta-alanine and L-histidine. Like MSM, it is a natural metabolite in your body as well as a powerful antioxidant. It occurs in particularly high concentration in long-lived cells like nerves and muscles. Carnosine levels also decline as our bodies age. In muscles, its concentration falls by more than 60 percent between the age of 10 and 70. Carnosine both rejuvenates old cells and extends the functional life of skin’s building blocks—DNA—as well as its lipids and proteins. As such, it is identified as an “agent of longevity”. This amazing dipeptide also clears toxicity. When chromosomes are exposed to high levels of oxygen, carnosine is the only antioxidant known to protect them from oxidative damage. It rejuvenates connective tissue and speeds wound healing. Carnosine may eventually prove to be an important key to dissolving AGEs and destructive cross-linking of collagen after it has occurred, but it is too soon to tell for sure. THE CARNOSINE PARADOX Carnosine addresses the great paradox of life—the fact that the elements which support life—glucose, lipids, oxygen proteins and trace elements—also destroy it. This nutraceutical binds toxic metals so your body is able to eliminate them safely. Carnosine both supports life and protects from its destruction. It guards cells and protein tissues from oxidation damage. It prevents glycosylation—the process that produces AGEs to build up leading to collagen cross-linking, wrinkles and sags. Research studies in Australia confirm that carnosine increases the longevity of fibroblasts—the skin cells responsible for producing collagen. It also extends the Hayflick limit—the maximum number of times a cell can divide before dying—by a remarkable 20 percent. Because of its ability to repair protein tissue, Russians use carnosine, with great success, in a special form called N-alpha acetylcarnosine—or NAC—in eye drops to eradicate cataracts. It improves your overall skin condition and is able to treat tough leathery skin as well as help prevent many age signs on the face. Used as an oral nutraceutical, the recommended dose is 50 to 200mg of carnosine a day taken on an empty stomach. In the case of carnosine, more is most certainly not better. Doses above this amount can actually be less effective. BEAUTY’S GOLDEN THREAD The last place you might expect to find a golden thread in the tapestry of living skin is in a special form of vitamin B3—nicotinamide or niacinamide. This form behaves quite differently than the well-known nicotinic acid which causes hot flushes when swallowed. As far back as 1968, Nobel Laureate Linus Pauling published research reporting success in the treatment of psychiatric patients using moderate doses of niacinamide together with ascorbic acid. Nicotinamide has long been used both topically and orally for its anti-inflammatory abilities. It has a stunning ability to reverse many aspects of skin aging when used internally and even externally when used as a component of skincare products: As a precursor to electron carrier substances in living cells—NAD and NADP—nicotinamide enhances energy production within the living matrix. It takes part in many metabolic pathways including turning glucose into ATP making fatty acids important for skin beauty, and metabolizing proteins. It increases collagen synthesis by stimulating the activity of fibroblast cells, prolonging their life, and protecting them from senescence. It decreases skin inflammation by inhibiting the release of histidine, triggering the production of anti-inflammatory mediators. It enhances the synthesis of lipids important for good cell walls and overall skin health and beauty. It diminishes wrinkling. It repairs DNA when skin has been exposed to too much UV light, electromagnetic frequencies or chemical pollution. It helps fade age spots and helps prevent the formation of new ones. It plays a central role in blocking genetic messages that result in skin cell aging. BANISHING FREE RADICALS If, in addition to the three master nutraceuticals—MSM, nicotinamide and carnosine—you might want to use one more nutraceutical with first-rate antioxidant properties. You can’t do better than thiotic acid—also known as alpha-lipoic acid—ALA. The “universal antioxidant”, this sulfur-based, vitamin-like substance is an important cofactor in the production of cellular energy. When it is not in sufficient supply, muscle mass shrinks and skin’s energy is reduced. ALA protects DNA and mitochondrial membranes, inhibits inflammation and remodels collagen. Thiotic acid is used as a drug in Germany because of its ability to enhance sugar metabolism. A unique free radical scavenger, thiotic acid is both fat- and water-soluble. This means it travels easily across cell membranes to quench free radicals, both inside and out. A very small molecule, ALA works together with other antioxidants to recycle them. When vitamin E quenches lipid peroxidation, a new free radical is formed. Thiotic acid reduces that new radical, turning it back into Vitamin E so it is ready to fight the battle for yet another day. It does the same with vitamin C. The usual internal dose of ALA is 100 mg taken twice a day with meals. ALA is an excellent nutraceutical. I use it when I am traveling or am under a lot of pressure from work. It’s great stuff. But it doesn’t hold a candle to the magnum force the “big three”—MSM, nicotinamide and carnosine—have to offer when used together. If you are going to explore the power of nutraceuticals for skin, I suggest you begin with this combination, then work your way down the list, adding ALA and others if you feel you need them. And what is so wonderful is this: Making use of the Big Three can not only transform the look and feel of your skin. Thanks to the power of the body’s living matrix, they can regenerate and rejuvenate body, mind and emotions as well. Now Foods, MSM, 1000 mg MSM (Methylsulphonylmethane) is a natural form of organic sulfur found in all living organisms. This natural compound, researched since 1979, provides the chemical links needed to form and maintain numerous different types of tissues found in the human body, including connective tissue such as articular cartilage. While MSM is a natural component of almost all fresh fruits, vegetables, seafood and meat, food-processing methods reduce sulfur levels, making supplementation more important than ever. NOW MSM is tested to meet a minimum 99.7% purity level. Order MSM from iherb Paradise Herbs, L-Carnosine L-Carnosine is a proton buffering neuropeptide consisting of alanine and histidine (beta-alanyl-L-histidine). It is normally found in the brain, innervated tissues, the lens of the eye and skeletal muscle tissue. Current scientific research suggests that L-Carnosine has the ability to protect cells against oxidative stress that can cause premature aging and cellular damage. L-Carnosine has heavy metal, free radical and active sugar molecule scavenging activity (helps prevent glycation of proteins). Order L-Carnosine from iherb Thorne Research, Niacinamide The B vitamin niacinamide, also known as nicotinamide, is one form of vitamin B3. It acts as an antioxidant, inhibiting free radical formation, and has been shown to promote pancreatic beta-cell regeneration. Niacinamide has been found to stimulate GABA (an inhibitory neurotransmitter) receptors without binding to the receptor sites, thus creating a sedative-like effect. High amounts of niacinamide have been documented as being beneficial in protecting joint cartilage cells. Niacinamide has also been used in support of several dermatological conditions. Order Niacinamide from iherb Doctor's Best, Best Alpha Lipoic Acid Alpha lipoic acid (ALA) is a fatty acid that functions like a vitamin, although it is not classified as a vitamin. As a coenzyme, ALA plays an important role in the metabolism of glucose that produces energy in cells. ALA also has antioxidant properties and thus is important for controlling free radicals. Because it is soluble in both water and fat, ALA is sometimes referred to as the "universal antioxidant." Order Alpha Lipoic Acid from iherb