This is something I did for a girl community in FB. Copying here for my future reference... And maybe yours too.... O:-)
With the holidays at its peak, it would be a good time start with a week of detox program. This is primarily a fruit & vegetable diet. If not anything, this routine will help us flush out all that excess oil from the beef roast & pork curry. This can be considered as an experiment to reset your system.
This is a toned down version of detox programs any leading holistic healing center would have.
Luke warm water/Black tea/Green tea + lemon/honey/cinnamon 30-40 mins choice of workout Breakfast - smoothiesPre Lunch snacks - Fruits/Cucumber+Carrot Lunch - Veggies/saladsEvening snacks - Fruits (Mango/Water melon/Musambi)Dinner - Soups Optional 30-40mins workout Triphala - 1 tsp with luke warm water
The simplest way to get toxins out of our system is - sweating it out. Including some basic exercise routine will take care of this. Sinus can be cleared with the help of steam. Those who are comfortable with Neti kriya(also called Nasyam), can try that too. Cleansing of the stomach & intestines are done with the help of Thriphala churnam. There are other ayurvedic medicines too. You may choose based on your comfort.
Early to bed, early to rise
Generally all holistic healing system encourage us to start the day early. Planning ahead helps in finishing your day early & go to bed early.
Things to Avoid
Fermented items - Try to avoid all varieties of fermented items during this period - idly, dosa, appam, bread, curd, aerated drinks, etc.
Artificial sweeteners - Big NO to white sugar. You may substitute with natural sugar sources like honey or jaggery.
Some Breakfast option
Smoothies are the best to swallow down. You can bring in variety in taste by trying different permutations & combinations of fresh fruits. Some of the things (not all in one go) that goes into my breakfast smoothies will be -
Smoothies
flax seeds
dried nuts
sunflower seeds or any such you can place your hand on
oats
dried dates or any such fruits you like
chilled/frozen banana
other fruits optional
avocado
honey/jaggery
milk/lemon/tender coconut water (any one)
for flavor change try almond milk, coconut milk (may add coconut as is while grinding)
Oats with fresh fruits
Some Lunch options
(i) salad option - peanuts, carrot, tomato, capsicum
garnish with lime & corriander leaves
(ii) Steamed veggies - carrot, cauliflower, mushrooms, capsicum, beans, anything of your choice ( 3-4 types of veggies would suffice)
May toss in roast garlic or ginger for flavor
(iii) Fruit bowl - try with salt & pepper
(iv) salted oats with sprouts thoran (roast the coconut mixture in hot tawa without oil, no need of kaduku vara either)
Still hungry? Have butter milk/sugar cane juice
What about Evening snacks?
You may have something depending on your activity level later in the evening. If you are planning for a heavy workout, even ethapazham would be okay. If you are not planning to workout, keep it light.
Dinner?
Here again, slice & dice whatever suits you & pressure cook for 2 whistles. if you are lazy like me, you may skip the blender process & gobble up as is. Adding ginger & pepper would bring in interesting flavors.
Kudambuli
Soak kudambuli in water & drink that water. It helps in weight reduction. Note - you are not preparing fish curry. You are consuming the water as is, so tone it down a bit. (This is something I learned while talking to an ayurvedic doc for this article).
Detox Water
I stick with lime, ginger, mint combo
Triphala
End the day with triphala churnam. This will take care of cleansing of your stomach & the intestines.
This is how I consume triphala. I find this easy to swallow.
Mix 1tsp of triphala in one-gulpable-portion of luke warm water. The trick is to get the right amount of water. It should go down your throat in one-single-gulp! If you forget about the portion in the first try, don't worry, you will remember it the next time ;-) If you haven't ever had thriphala, you will understand this when you take it O:-)
Beginner Yoga videos
Here are some links to basic yoga stretches. Will keep your body supple & flexible. You may repeat the same routine.
If you are already practicing Kapalbatti, this is a wonderful cleaning practice. Let the strokes be at your pace, but make sure that you practice continuously for a min at your pace. 1 min & n strokes/breaths make it 1 round. Perform 5 such rounds. Give sufficient pause between each rounds.
Nadi shodhana is also good. Name itself has shodhana in it ;-) Here again, repeat 5 times.
Is this even possible?
I will list my personal experience here. I am someone who has grown up eating non-veg. Even now, I cannot think of completely letting go of non-veg. Though the portions have come down, a complete letting go... I couldn't think of it.
One thing that helped me was, chanting this to myself - 'Okkay... Its only this one meal that I am going veg." Small packets instead of the big package. This has worked even when I had to prepare beef at home. While preparing, I had told myself, I am going to have beef for lunch. But at lunch time, I was like... Okkay... I will eat veggies now & have beef later.
Another thing is, you have to keep tricking your body. Never ever should you leave the stomach empty for long periods. It should be fed at regular intervals so that it doesn't feel hungry, uncontrollably hungry. My weak moment is when I get back home from office. I am a savage. I rampage the kitchen & gobble up a lot of junk. When I sensed this, I started having butter milk/sugar cane juice/kappalandi muttai just before leaving the office. When I started doing that, I was in control when I reach home.
The longest I have stuck with fruits & vegetables was 7 weeks. During that time, my body had toned down a lot. I had lost kgs & inches. And the icing on the cake??? No pimples during that time of the month.... Aaah!
PS.
This is a write up. End of story. Do not read between the line, especially with me as the center character.
Once upon a time... Exactly 20yrs back... They did it all for me while I was drifting through the process.
