The Start Of My Journey
Healthiest Juice Recipes started as a by-product of my passion for health and juicing.
8 years ago, I was 92kg, had high cholesterol, high blood pressure and was unhappy with how I looked and felt.
I thought that I was healthy at the time; I didn’t drink alcohol often, didn’t eat out much and exercised twice a week. You could say that I had an average diet, following the Standard Australian Diet. I was definitely doing more for my health than my friends were at the time.
So why was I suffering so much? Maybe I was in the same position as my friends, it’s just that I knew what my condition was, where as they may have not known theirs.
The first thing that I will stress here is to go and get a general medical check-up. You never know what the results will bring back, and it is always better to know what’s going on in your body so that you can do something about it.
My guess though, is that you are already health conscious if you are taking the time to read this. So, I will move on.
There was a point in time that I made the conscious decision to take control of my health. I don’t know what brought it on, but I made the decision and I never turned back.
I started spending hours researching, reading, visiting specialists and experimenting. I learnt so much that I didn’t really know where to start. As I’m sure you are aware, there is so much different research going around, all providing good reasoning, and all conflicting with each other.
So, who do you believe? What do you do? I decided that I just had to start somewhere, even if it was wrong for my body, at least I would know what not to do.
Going Green
I knew that I had to increase my green vegetable intake and reduce my red meat intake. I started with that and noticed a massive difference in my energy levels. I lost a fair amount of weight just making that one change and my cholesterol and blood pressure were also improving.
What I struggled with was finding the time to buy, wash, prepare, cook and eat all those vegetables. I’ll be honest, it is much easier to slap a piece of steak on the pan and put some potatoes in the oven than it is to prepare a salad. I loved the way I was starting to look and feel, but the time and effort that I had to put in was turning me off a little.
So, I started to search more into what I could do. That’s when I came across juicing. Just imagine, most of the nutrients that your body needs all in a simple drink!
Juicing Helped Me Turn My Life Around
I loved the idea of juicing straight away and started buying cold pressed juices from a local shop. This freed up a lot my time, which I loved, but it was also costing me a lot of money. Buying cups of juice from a shop is convenient, but it is not a cheap task.
Eventually, I bought a juicer and started juicing at home, which was much more cost effective for me.
I go to my local farmers markets once a week. When I get home, I wash half of the vegetables that I buy, make juice for the next 3 days, and then do the same thing 3 days later. The whole process of washing and juicing takes me about 1 hour, and it means that I don’t need to worry about getting enough of the good stuff throughout the week.
You Are What You Eat
Your health is determined mainly by what you are eating and drinking. Yes, environment, lifestyle and genetics also plays a role, but food is the main factor. Switching to a plant based diet, or predominately plant based is probably the best thing that you can do to improve your health.
I did it and saw results within a couple of weeks. I use juicing as a vehicle to get a lot more of that plant based goodness into my body without a lot of the effort of cooking and eating large portions.
That means that I still watch what I eat, staying away from preservatives, processed foods and animal products as much as I can. Everything that you eat plays a role in your body function. If you want to learn more about it, then I suggest you read The China Study as a start.
The truth is that once you start cutting these foods out of your diet, you don’t really want them any more. Although, I do enjoy the occasional cheese board with a glass of wine. I suppose the point is that I make conscious decisions about what I eat. I choose what goes into my body, rather than eating out of habit. Juicing really helped me get to that point by providing my body with all of the nutrients that I needed to feel satisfied and energetic.
Juicing changed my life. I am now healthy, full of energy and loving life!
Please take the time to read through my blog. I have put together a range of juicing recipes and information to get you started.
It can be a little daunting to get going, but just start! You will be thanking yourself in the years to come for taking those first few steps now.
Happy Juicing!