Cleansing versus dieting – what’s the difference?
There are so many different diets out there, from the cabbage soup diet, the grapefruit diet, the Special K diet, the low fat diet, the low carb diet (aka. Paleo diet), to weird crash diets which eventually leave a person sick and gaining most of the weight back afterwards. This yo-yo dieting eventually leads to a shame and lack of respect for our bodies, and can even lead to eating disorders like bulimia or anorexia.
Dieting
If you are frustrated by all of those fad diets, you aren’t the only one. The problem with dieting, or what I like to call, yo-yo dieting (since the individual almost always gains back weight after the fact, and eventually leads them into trying out a different diet), is that people usually can’t seem to keep off the weight once they are done said diet. This results in an un-breakable lose-gain-lose cycle, leaving the individual frustrated by the weight-loss world.
When you are constantly shifting between different fad diets, you aren’t truly getting to the root of the problem. Sure, following the latest fad diet will cause you to lose a large amount of weight quickly, however, what you may not know is that fat and water storage are actually your body’s way of protecting you from poisonous toxins! This is often the reason why people just can’t seem to keep the weight off for good, once they have finished their diet of the week.
Our immune system doesn’t allow the removal of excess fat and water if there are high levels of toxins stored in these tissues. Toxins actually bioaccumulate in the fatty tissues of animals, making it difficult or near impossible to metabolize or excrete without proper cleansing and detoxing.
When someone finishes their diet, their body remains in a state of stress, and although they may look thinner, their body is still highly concentrated with toxins and other impurities, which leads to rebound weight gain as a natural protective mechanism – in other words, our body goes into emergency fat production to protect the body from these impurities.
Many diets are also devoid of essential fatty acids, and essential vitamins and minerals. The body cannot release fat is there is a lack of these elements. In addition, when the diet is complete, lean muscle tissue will not be replaced by lean muscle tissue (when we diet, we often lose muscle mass). This muscle mass will be replaced by body fat – another reason why you see people who yo-yo diet, getting larger and larger each time.
Diets are not successful for long term weight loss because they aren’t targeted to cleanse the body of toxic impurities. Instead, focusing on a healthy cleanse or detox program will get your body on the right track!
Cleansing
If you crave real weight loss, cleansing is the way to go! As stated previously, your body stores environmental toxins and metals in your fat cells. This is the only area that can be truly detoxed in order to help release toxins from your system. Burning fat stored in your fat cells will cause the fat cells to shrink and thus, fat-soluble toxins can be effectively removed from your system.
Cleansing and detoxing at a cellular levels helps relieve toxins and pollutants from their “home” in our fat cells, and they can be naturally released from the body. When cleansing, the nutrients that our body requires are delivered to our cells as well as our major detox organs, the liver, kidneys and intestinal system. These detox organs, when cleansing, are given the opportunity to naturally remove these toxins from the body.
Every day we are bombarded with hundreds of different toxins, whether it be from the foods we eat, the chemicals we clean our houses with, the products we put on our skin, or the environment we surround ourselves in. As a protective mechanism, our body stores these toxins and pollutants in our cells, particularly our fat cells.
When you cleanse, these toxins and pollutants are removed from the body at a cellular level, and so the body no longer needs to hold onto excess fat and fluids (these normally stick around in the body to help dilute the concentration of toxicity in the body) – thus, in the end, you lose excess weight, and there is no rebound. You are left with better overall health, less fat and more muscle.
By cleansing, the body is no longer in a protective state, because it doesn’t have to compensate for the build-up of impurities (since they have been effectively released through detox). Our bodies no longer need the fatty thick protective shield, and we become thinner as a result.
What kind of cleanse is best?
What helped me, and many others succeed at long-term weight loss was adopting a long-term whole-foods plant-based diet.
When I went raw vegan, I was literally infusing my cells with all of the minerals, vitamins and essential fatty acids it craved while releasing and getting rid of toxic waste matter that had accumulated as a result of eating poorly. Not only did I find my healthy weight, but I gained energy and eliminated my consistent fatigue and bowel problems.
Consuming a high raw vegan diet, focusing on unlimited fruit and vegetable calories will never leave you feeling hungry, irritable or depressed. In fact, knowing that you can eat whatever plant foods you want, when you want, has been one of the most liberating feelings I have ever experienced!
There is also the spiritual aspect of changing the way you eat and feeling an overall sense of peace that you may have not felt before.
Sources:
http://www.healingnaturallybybee.com/articles/toxin11.php
http://www.canadianliving.com/health/nutrition/the_problem_with_yo_yo_dieting.php
http://www.mytripleh.com.au/isogenix/cleanes-v-diet/
