About cleansing, detoxing, and finding balance.

My life has been pretty good. I’m far from being an example of well-balanced person – I drink too much, study too little, am not spiritual enough, and worry about looking good, being skinny and all that shit. But I believe to be in an extremely unique moment in my life, learning to be myself, and respect myself, and take care of myself…

Jeez, is it really all about me?

Well, I have been watching a lot of people talk about eating healthy lately, finding balance in life, allowing love to come, and beauty to flourish from within. And a lot of the talk comes accompanied by cleansing, detoxing, extensive yoga practices, or deeply spiritual beliefs.

Yoga calms you down and is great work out. Good! Go and practice yoga in order to calm down and work out. But I can't understand the desire for magic. It just seems to me everyone now is looking for magic, the magic formula, the magic diet, the magic practice that will make all aspects of life work!

I hear people talking about raw food diets, copious amounts of kombucha, yoga, veganism, and the so-famous cleansing & detoxing like “one of these has got to work for me!!”

Wait a minute. I don't see how balance could be found through such radicalism.

As each person is unique as unique can be, there’s NO right way of living, NO magic super-food waiting to be discovered, NO theory that will be completely right for you and your friends!

I know that alternative medicine is incredibly attractive, and so is Buddhism, and the yoga practices, and massages, and teas, and anything that comes from the ancient and wise eastern world. But we’re not in ancient times anymore, we don’t live under the same weather, we don’t speak the same languages, or behave the same way they did, or even do now. So diving completely into any theory or belief just doesn’t seem like a wise path to balance.

Being too worried about getting ready for when true love actually comes will end up having you miss it when it walks by!! Love is not granted. Love happens. Balance is part of life, not part of a restless search for the right way of living.

And while so many of these theories on ancient medicine seem attractive but questionable to me, that’s not what makes me worry the most.

I am shocked by the popularity of practices that are far from having been proven to be successful.

Cleansing, detoxing, and also the practice of applying enemas (which is increasingly popular among young women) clean your colon so well it actually makes it unhealthy, getting rid of good bacteria needed for healthy intestine function!
The human body is capable of cleansing and maintaining itself; therefore, detoxing is absolutely dispensable. If you eat healthy, your body will let go of the toxins it doesn’t need and hold on to what’s important.

Professor Alan Boobis OBE, Toxicologist, Division of Medicine, Imperial College London, states that "The body’s own detoxification systems are remarkably sophisticated and versatile. They have to be, as the natural environment that we evolved in is hostile. It is remarkable that people are prepared to risk seriously disrupting these systems with unproven ‘detox’ diets, which could well do more harm than good.”

The very restrictive detox diets, such as water fasting, may result in nutrient deficiency. Plus, for instance, it’s widely known that protein makes muscle. So if you lack protein, your diet might only result in wasting of muscle tissue!
The same uselessness could be applied to the intake of vitamin pills. If you eat well, they are a waste of money and only get into your body so they can come out with urine. If your body is healthy, it will just get rid of the vitamins you’re taking because it won’t need them!

So, if I’m trying to make a point here, that would be: RELAX. Balance is found within balance, within respecting your taste buds, your fun times, your heart, your body. Balance is not found through radicalism and the, even-more-naïve, belief on the search for magic formulae.

It just seems that in times of so much awareness and this reaction to shit food (that's really what most of it is), we went too far and became paranoid with finding an answer, a sure path, the magic ingredient to inner peace, health, love, and happiness.

Life is many, many things weirdly grouped together. And it should be respected as so. That's why it's so beautiful!

"Deixo a vida me levar,
Vida leva eu..."


By Anita Petry