How to Quit Drinking Coffee
April 18th, 2010 by Casey
Growing up, I was disgusted that my parents both drank black coffee every morning. I’d try it and it’d burn my mouth. The taste was so nasty that I’d have to brush my teeth after just to get the taste out!
Fast-forward into my college years… Somewhere between exams and partying, I developed a taste for that brown water. It could have been a girlfriend who worked at the coffee shop where I studied who gave me free drinks, or maybe it was the prestige of drinking an espresso after dinner. Whatever the reason, I was hooked.
Over the course of the next 3 years, I was a coffee fanatic! Starbucks, home brewed, McDonalds, double shots of espresso, triple shots of espresso in coffee with heavy cream. It didn’t stop there. Monster Energy Drinks were a favorite of mine when I had to work, then class, then party at night.
Ever hear of a Monster BFC?
I’d do 2 pounds of sugary caffeine loaded energy soda in the morning for breakfast, then coke with my Jack Daniels at night.
I was a caffeine monster! I couldn’t help myself.
It was this crazy cycle of not having enough energy, and always drinking more coffee or having another Monster (hey, 2 for $5 was a steal!). I remember waking up for class and being so exhausted, so I’d reach in the fridge and grab a Monster from my recently purchased case.
Once I decided to take accountability for my life, I looked into caffeine. Did I really need all that caffeine to stay awake, or was it some sort of cycle that kept me tired and gave me a false sense of energy? Was I just caught up in something that I wasn’t aware of?
Yes. I was addicted.
The next suitable thing to do was to slowly start weaning myself off caffeine. I began to limit my coffee intake to 1 cup a day, slowly dropped out the energy drinks. It took me about a month to be fully caffeine free. It was tough, but well worth it.
That’s something you should do tomorrow. Start focusing on your caffeine intake and start to reduce it. We’re talking about giving you REAL, LASTING energy – not some fake alternative. In the next few days, we’ll look into natural ways to give you the energy that the caffeine was pretending to be.
Trust me, you’ll be a lot happier with the change!
Stay Awake!
P.S. Green tea, chocolate and sodas all have caffeine. You’ll want to monitor your intake of those in your journal and see how you feel without them.
Read more...
Fast-forward into my college years… Somewhere between exams and partying, I developed a taste for that brown water. It could have been a girlfriend who worked at the coffee shop where I studied who gave me free drinks, or maybe it was the prestige of drinking an espresso after dinner. Whatever the reason, I was hooked.
Over the course of the next 3 years, I was a coffee fanatic! Starbucks, home brewed, McDonalds, double shots of espresso, triple shots of espresso in coffee with heavy cream. It didn’t stop there. Monster Energy Drinks were a favorite of mine when I had to work, then class, then party at night.
Ever hear of a Monster BFC?I’d do 2 pounds of sugary caffeine loaded energy soda in the morning for breakfast, then coke with my Jack Daniels at night.
I was a caffeine monster! I couldn’t help myself.
It was this crazy cycle of not having enough energy, and always drinking more coffee or having another Monster (hey, 2 for $5 was a steal!). I remember waking up for class and being so exhausted, so I’d reach in the fridge and grab a Monster from my recently purchased case.
Once I decided to take accountability for my life, I looked into caffeine. Did I really need all that caffeine to stay awake, or was it some sort of cycle that kept me tired and gave me a false sense of energy? Was I just caught up in something that I wasn’t aware of?
Yes. I was addicted.
The next suitable thing to do was to slowly start weaning myself off caffeine. I began to limit my coffee intake to 1 cup a day, slowly dropped out the energy drinks. It took me about a month to be fully caffeine free. It was tough, but well worth it.
That’s something you should do tomorrow. Start focusing on your caffeine intake and start to reduce it. We’re talking about giving you REAL, LASTING energy – not some fake alternative. In the next few days, we’ll look into natural ways to give you the energy that the caffeine was pretending to be.
Trust me, you’ll be a lot happier with the change!
Stay Awake!
P.S. Green tea, chocolate and sodas all have caffeine. You’ll want to monitor your intake of those in your journal and see how you feel without them.
Read more...
Raw Food and Prostate Cancer
April 18th, 2010 by Casey
When I returned home from college, I was struck at the knees with some terrible news. First, my father was diagnosed with prostate cancer. He’s in his 60’s, but I never thought my dad could get cancer! He’s the man that I look up to most. HOW COULD THAT HAPPEN? The entire family got tense. Things got weird.
As we were all dealing with Dad and the treatment options, my mom got some of the same kind of news – she had cancer too. Lucky for her, it wasn’t a vital organ, but it was in her nose. A weird place for it to be, but still — NOT COOL.
As I tried to look up treatments, I began to think of WHY this could happen. Why did both of my parents succumb to cancer? Neither of them smoke, they’re not obese, they don’t work with any dangerous chemicals…
Then I zoomed out and noticed a lot of people in my life were also experiencing cancer. I remember a kid I went to high school with who had testicular cancer at 16, a recent friend with brain cancer … the list keeps going.
What was going on?
I started to read more about the average American diet – because that’s who these people were, Average Americans. It was here that I found something very interesting…
I realized that our bodies are amazing machines. We can feed them a diet based mostly on corn syrup and refined sugar and somehow, they grow beautiful nails, hair and bones. Think about that! What other machine can turn something so lacking into something so incredible?
Did you know that 1/3 of the American Diet is junk food and soda? Refined sugars by the tablespoon slip into soft drinks and are consumed daily by millions of people. Diet sodas have artificial sweeteners that are VERY questionable.
It had to be the diet. My parents got cancer, I believe, because of their diet. Meat, potatoes and a little side salad with buttermilk ranch was a staple in my home. It covered all the levels that had been drilled into our heads, based on the Food Pyramid. But… the proportions were all wrong!
I remember reading that green, leafy vegetables had every mineral and vitamin we need to live. EVERYTHING in one source! I was eating lettuce in the salad, but only a tiny amount, and that was AFTER I had eaten my steak, if I had room in my belly.
After I took accountability for my health, I started to integrate more vegetables into my diet. Holy WOW did it change the way I felt. My digestion improved with all the extra fiber, my blood sugar was not fluctuating as drastically, and I wasn’t as hungry as I used to be.
I was harnessing the energy of natural greens – not cooked, steamed, or fried. The natural way they grow in the world. For flavor, I add a little balsamic vinegar or I juice them all in a handy electric juicer. The way my body responds is phenomenal, and changed my life in a HUGE way.
Tomorrow, I want you to have a big, fat salad for dinner. Don’t add cheese or croutons or anything besides fresh fruit and veggies. Stay away from anything canned – you don’ want it pasteurized (flash cooked) because it destroys all the enzymes. But that’s another story…
Be a Green Giant!
P.S. – Try to eat organic greens. I usually pick up a “tub” of them for $3-4 and it lasts me 3 days. Those are BIG organic salads. And don’t go for the discounted ones – if you get a big tub (2 pounds, I think they’ll go bad before you finish them. I pay the $1 premium to make sure they are fresh and full of love and goodness!Read more...
As we were all dealing with Dad and the treatment options, my mom got some of the same kind of news – she had cancer too. Lucky for her, it wasn’t a vital organ, but it was in her nose. A weird place for it to be, but still — NOT COOL.
As I tried to look up treatments, I began to think of WHY this could happen. Why did both of my parents succumb to cancer? Neither of them smoke, they’re not obese, they don’t work with any dangerous chemicals…
Then I zoomed out and noticed a lot of people in my life were also experiencing cancer. I remember a kid I went to high school with who had testicular cancer at 16, a recent friend with brain cancer … the list keeps going.
What was going on?
I started to read more about the average American diet – because that’s who these people were, Average Americans. It was here that I found something very interesting…
I realized that our bodies are amazing machines. We can feed them a diet based mostly on corn syrup and refined sugar and somehow, they grow beautiful nails, hair and bones. Think about that! What other machine can turn something so lacking into something so incredible?
Did you know that 1/3 of the American Diet is junk food and soda? Refined sugars by the tablespoon slip into soft drinks and are consumed daily by millions of people. Diet sodas have artificial sweeteners that are VERY questionable.
It had to be the diet. My parents got cancer, I believe, because of their diet. Meat, potatoes and a little side salad with buttermilk ranch was a staple in my home. It covered all the levels that had been drilled into our heads, based on the Food Pyramid. But… the proportions were all wrong!
I remember reading that green, leafy vegetables had every mineral and vitamin we need to live. EVERYTHING in one source! I was eating lettuce in the salad, but only a tiny amount, and that was AFTER I had eaten my steak, if I had room in my belly.
After I took accountability for my health, I started to integrate more vegetables into my diet. Holy WOW did it change the way I felt. My digestion improved with all the extra fiber, my blood sugar was not fluctuating as drastically, and I wasn’t as hungry as I used to be.
I was harnessing the energy of natural greens – not cooked, steamed, or fried. The natural way they grow in the world. For flavor, I add a little balsamic vinegar or I juice them all in a handy electric juicer. The way my body responds is phenomenal, and changed my life in a HUGE way.
Tomorrow, I want you to have a big, fat salad for dinner. Don’t add cheese or croutons or anything besides fresh fruit and veggies. Stay away from anything canned – you don’ want it pasteurized (flash cooked) because it destroys all the enzymes. But that’s another story…
Be a Green Giant!
P.S. – Try to eat organic greens. I usually pick up a “tub” of them for $3-4 and it lasts me 3 days. Those are BIG organic salads. And don’t go for the discounted ones – if you get a big tub (2 pounds, I think they’ll go bad before you finish them. I pay the $1 premium to make sure they are fresh and full of love and goodness!Read more... The Truth about Water
April 17th, 2010 by Casey
What if I told you that you had the World’s Best Drug available to you, on tap? This is better than anything you can buy in a pill, or get addicted to. It’s the basic building block of your body – Water.It seems so crazy to me that I used to live in such a dehydrated state. The coffee, soda, and poor processed foods all lacked water, or were bound up with diuretics that excreted all of the water in my body. I could drink 60+ ounces of soda a day and still be dehydrated!
After I began to listen to my body and see what it was telling me, I noticed that water was seriously lacking in my life. The foods I ate robbed me, and I wasn’t working hard enough to put that water back in.
The biggest thing I did to increase my hydration and digestion was to increase not only my raw water intake every single day (about .5oz per pound of body weight a day) but also to increase the amount of water-rich foods I eat. Switching from a cooked animal to a ripe tomato on my salad made a huge difference in the way I felt.
Here’s something I want you to do tomorrow morning:
When you wake up, drink a full glass of water. I do it out of a glass jar, about a half liter every morning. I do this before I brush my teeth or use the bathroom – it’s the first thing I do. Why? Because it’s the time that my body is the most dehydrated in the day. I haven’t drank any water since the night before! To double your success, drink the same half liter before bed. After a few days of doing this, I wasn’t being woken up to use the bathroom, but instead my body put the new water to work.
I wake up now more hydrated than I used to, and I take care of my body the moment I rise. Do this simple step and you too will start feeling much healthier!Read more...
Dystonia and Raw Foods
April 17th, 2010 by Casey
I was taking a few of these everyday.
Not a huge issue, but my parents wanted me to see a doctor to learn more. So, we researched the best doctors in the state, and I ended up at the University of Michigan pediatric unit for neurological disorders.
After a battery of tests, which included walking down a hall and visualizing whatever made me have these spasms, they diagnosed me with Dystonia. The diagnosis came with a bottle of Tegretol, and was supposed to cure my problems once and for all.
I did what any good kid would do – I took the drugs on time, 2x a day, and waited for the results to show. After weeks, I realized I was irritable and not functioning as my true self. It was at that point that I threw every last pill away and focused on what the real issue was – Stress.
Stress controlled me in a few social situations, and created a lot of negative emotions in my body. I began to look deeper and found exercises for controlling my breath and releasing stress that way. What a huge thing to run across!
It took me only a few short days to totally rid myself of that mystery disease and finally have control over how I feel. I do this simple exercise whenever I’m stressed out and need a break… you should try it right now!
Simply inhale through your nose for a count of 4, then hold for 4 seconds, and then exhale through your mouth for a count of 8. The long exhale helps to clear out the lungs, and the inhale should be done to push out your stomach – like you’re really sucking the air in deep.
I do this exercise daily, often if I’m in a situation where there is a lot of tension or stress. I can quickly do this and it changes my entire mind. Focusing on my breath makes me become aware of my body, how it operates, how I really feel, and if there is anything out of balance. Understanding you breath is the first step to gaining control over your health.
Read more...
Exercising & Hitting the Wall
April 17th, 2010 by Casey
The bike I was riding
I bike often, and it’s my preferred method of working out – partly for the fun of going so far, but also because it’s great exercise.
Now, when I first started biking, I wasn’t eating too healthy. I would still pig out on pizza and beer at night then throw on my spandex and go for a morning ride. It wasn’t until a very scary morning did that all start to change rapidly…
It was just like every other morning… 7am I was suiting up for my ride. I grabbed 2 bottles of water and set out to see where I could go. I was planning about 40 miles that morning, but wasn’t sure if it’d be longer. The morning was beautiful, and I was in a great mood. I set out on my own and found some very cool things on the ride. I usually stop and chat with people, or watch the sun rise if it’s early enough.
This day was similar to all the rest… until I reached the half-way point. I changed the plans to go somewhere I’d never been before, and ended up in the middle of no-where. As I was approaching my mile-mark, I started getting a headache. The next 2 miles, I felt like I was drunk. My body wasn’t responding to me, and I was about to fall off my bike.
So, I sloppily popped my shoes out of the pedals and jumped off. The second I got on the ground, I fell over. I closed my eyes, wondering what had happened. The spins kicked in and I was sick to my stomach. It was the worst feeling I had ever felt!
Fast-forward 10 minutes and I was in front of a gas station. I had walked my bike to the town I was near and popped in. I felt like I was out of energy and by brain was screaming for calories. The only thing I could do was to purchase a few conventional oranges and green bananas and chow down. I was hoping that the sugar would give me the spike to beat my headache and help me feel normal again.
After about 20 minutes of fighting this feeling, I started to feel better. I regained control of my body and decided to take the ride home easy.
Once I got home, I looked into what happened. Essentially, I had burned all of my calories available in my body and it was starving for more. Cyclists call this “hitting the wall” or “bonking”. Either way, it was a terrible thing to have happen!
The reason I’m telling you this is because I lacked one important and critical skill when going for those long bike rides. I hadn’t practiced listening to my body and trying to understand what it really needs. I could have been on a dirt road on the out-skirts of town and bonked… then what? I would have been in big trouble!
Now, when I’m out on rides, I stay in tune with how I’m feeling. If I feel poor before I head out, I pinpoint the reason and I deal with it then. This has given me a huge edge in every aspect of my life, and I am a much stronger person for it.
I challenge you to start listening to your body NOW, before it starts SCREAMING at you when something terrible happens.
I wonder if this same idea would have saved my parents from getting cancer in the first place …Read more...