Soda: To Drink Or Not To Drink...
The average American drinks 44 to 56 gallons of soda yearly, depending on the survey results one looks at. (This is a whopping 101 to 128 cups of sugar a year, just from soda!)
Open a 12 ounce can of soda and be prepared to be ingesting 10 to 12 teaspoons of sugar. Yet, despite admitting knowing about the high sugar content and that this very sugar is not good for health, 48% of Americans still admit to drinking soda every day. (Reported in a Huffington Post article about a Yale University study on obesity.) Average consumption is 2.6 glasses of soda a day. Much liquid sugar is being ingested.
Where is this soda and sugar consumption taking Americans, their waist lines or their overall health?
The average American drinks 44 to 56 gallons of soda yearly, depending on the survey results one looks at. (This is a whopping 101 to 128 cups of sugar a year, just from soda!)
Open a 12 ounce can of soda and be prepared to be ingesting 10 to 12 teaspoons of sugar. Yet, despite admitting knowing about the high sugar content and that this very sugar is not good for health, 48% of Americans still admit to drinking soda every day. (Reported in a Huffington Post article about a Yale University study on obesity.) Average consumption is 2.6 glasses of soda a day. Much liquid sugar is being ingested.
Where is this soda and sugar consumption taking Americans, their waist lines or their overall health?
Let us look at some of the impact soda, and the sugar, has in the human body.
1. Soda is empty calories. This means your body is taking in calories that have no nutritional value. Your body needs calories, dense with nutrition, to support the replication of healthy cells. Empty calories = empty cells. This is cell degeneration... this is degenerative disease happening slowly but surely to your body. Empty calories means weight gain, as well.
2. One can of soda contains at least 10 teaspoons of sugar. This causes an immediate blood sugar spike which causes an insulin spike. The physiological reaction in your body is a sweet (no pun intended) set up for diabetes and all the other diseases that diabetes invites into your life.
3. Soda contains phosphoric acid. Phosphoric acid contributes to tooth decay and osteoporosis (cellular health thing again), both of which are also exacerbated by the empty calories and sugar content. It is a triple whammy to your cellular health.
Phosphoric acid interferes with digestive activity and inhibits nutrient absorption. Not what you want to happen if you want strong, healthy, nutrient dense body cells.
4. Soda is loaded with liquid corn syrup; high fructose corn syrup. Corn syrup comes from corn, genetically modified corn. Corn syrup is harsh to your liver. Love your liver; feed it whole foods.
5. Got diet soda? You then get aspartame or another synthetic sweetener (Aspartame's name has been changed to Aminosweet. Do not be fooled!) No calories, yes, but it is a fake substance with many inherent health issues.
Artificial sweeteners: contribute to headaches and migraines, fake your body into thinking sugar is coming and this leaves you actually craving and eating more sugar and calories than you normally would, the before mentioned sugar consumption increases your risk of diabetes, and is linked to many health problems (look it up!).
6. Erodes tooth enamel contributing to decay from the outside, on the actual tooth surface. The phosphoric acid and empty calorie issues contribute to decay from the inside, de-mineralizing your teeth from inside.
7. Soda, sugar consumption, is linked to higher rates of depression. I would be happy to go into cell physiology with you and sugar's effects on the nervous system (your brain & mood health) if you want to chat.
Depression is certainly an issue in our culture. Perhaps moving away from sugary drinks would lower the numbers of anti-depressant prescriptions written daily in this country? Just a preventative health thought....
8. The base of soda is tap water and is most likely not from pure sources. You are getting a dose of chlorine and fluoride and the health issues that go along with ingesting chlorine and fluoride.
9. Soda and obesity are linked; walking through life hand in hand. I think it is about that sugar and empty calorie thing again.
10. Back to your teeth... soda consumption causes plaque to build up on your teeth. Plaque contributes to cavities (Another whammy to the teeth from the outside; the surface of your teeth.) and can lead to gum disease. All that plaque creates space for harboring bacteria...
11. Soda contributes to de-mineralization of your body / body cells. (See #6 above.) Empty calories, refined sugar in your blood stream, and phosphoric acid all contribute to minerals being pulled from bones, teeth, organs, muscles... every body cell is affected by this mineral leeching. Mineral deficiencies (as this is what de-mineralization does) cause many health problems: osteoporosis, tooth decay, bone spurs... any and every degenerative disease process is contributed to by mineral deficiencies.
Action To Take:
1. Drink pure water that is free of chlorine and fluoride.
2. Make herbal teas using the above mentioned pure water.
3. Mix high quality fruit juice with above mentioned pure water to make a fruity flavored drink.
4. Mix that high quality fruit juice with seltzer water to create your own healthier version of a fizzy drink.
5. Drink beer! : ) If you opt for this one, do so in serious moderation. Also, find craft brewed beers from ingredients that are good for you and good fo the Earth. Avoid beer produced in the typical mass production methods.
Why I Love Yoga and Other Thoughts on Whole Food, Whole Health Healing
Why I Love Yoga…and other thoughts on local, whole foods!
And you are now thinking, what does yoga have to do with the food? My answer is quite simple. When we create mindfulness through a regular yoga practice (or any other form of body awareness exercises: Tai Chi, Qi Gong, Tae Kwon Do), we consciously make healthier choices in all areas of our lives. This means healthier food choices.
Back to yoga. Why I love yoga… because it works! It works on many levels, see my above comment around food choices. The word yoga comes from the Sanskrit word yuj and means to yoke or bind. Yoga is often interpreted as a method of discipline that brings union (yoking or binding) to body, mind, and spirit. Yoga is the study of the Self. Yoga gives us tools to improve our lives by stripping away the illusions that block us from connecting with our true self, with others, and with life itself.
Yoga is a whole food that nourishes body, mind, and soul. Food is sacred to the body; it nourishes and sustains us. Love is sacred to the mind and heart; nourishing the very part of us, our spirits, that gives to others and back to ourselves. Yoga is the breath of the soul; keeping our life force strong and our 3 parts (body, mind, soul) in harmony and union.
Getting down to the brass tack: I am an exercise enthusiast. Those who know me, know this well. As long as I am not sitting still, I am happy. The list of activities I have engaged in goes on and on and blurs together over the years and decades of my life. I love and have loved them all.
Frost, my Siamese Mutt Cat, doing her version of Downward Facing Cat Pose. She IS a natural at Yoga!Why I Love Yoga…and other thoughts on local, whole foods!
And you are now thinking, what does yoga have to do with the food? My answer is quite simple. When we create mindfulness through a regular yoga practice (or any other form of body awareness exercises: Tai Chi, Qi Gong, Tae Kwon Do), we consciously make healthier choices in all areas of our lives. This means healthier food choices.
Back to yoga. Why I love yoga… because it works! It works on many levels, see my above comment around food choices. The word yoga comes from the Sanskrit word yuj and means to yoke or bind. Yoga is often interpreted as a method of discipline that brings union (yoking or binding) to body, mind, and spirit. Yoga is the study of the Self. Yoga gives us tools to improve our lives by stripping away the illusions that block us from connecting with our true self, with others, and with life itself.
Yoga is a whole food that nourishes body, mind, and soul. Food is sacred to the body; it nourishes and sustains us. Love is sacred to the mind and heart; nourishing the very part of us, our spirits, that gives to others and back to ourselves. Yoga is the breath of the soul; keeping our life force strong and our 3 parts (body, mind, soul) in harmony and union.
Getting down to the brass tack: I am an exercise enthusiast. Those who know me, know this well. As long as I am not sitting still, I am happy. The list of activities I have engaged in goes on and on and blurs together over the years and decades of my life. I love and have loved them all.
For many years I was into serious weight training and I felt that I was very strong. When I started to do yoga, I was humbled. I could not push up into a back bend. My arms would just not do it. After a few weeks I had the back bend thing down. Years later, I now do reverse push ups. Push ups from the back bend pose! The strength I have gained is through my whole body (mind and soul!).
Over the years I realized my yoga strength ran deeper than that. My choices around food and other lifestyle habits became more conscious in a health promoting way. I paid attention to eating with awareness, chewing food well, eating only what I needed, and stopping before I was stuffed. These habits around food and food choices slipped in the back door; all part of the study of self (ha ha, yoga!). All those years of doing yoga transformed the way I interacted with myself and the world around me and I did not even perceive it happening.
Positive things I noticed around food: not needing to fill my plate to the brim or returning to the potluck table for another round of food, being satisfied with enough, passing on the desserts as sweet foods no longer dominated my taste buds, feeling abundance and satisfaction with light meals, and reveling in the flavors / colors / textures / and gift that each meal brings.
When we stop the constant chatter inside our heads and still our minds through mindfulness activities (yoga and other body awareness exercises), we tend to make choices that are in alignment with what is best for our health without feeling deprived. This is because we have learned to live in the present moment and are aligned in body, mind, and spirit. That is the awareness that Yoga brings to our being.
A cluttered "chattery" mind and a body that is not aligned in mind, body, and spirit tends to make decisions based upon impulse and cravings without regard to what is best for long term health.
When we quiet our minds, we use our emotions to our advantage. When our minds are busy, our emotions use us.
Change is defined as the process of becoming different, substituting one thing for another, biological metamorphosis, personal development especially if seen as personally "life-changing". Consciousness is awareness of one's own existence and behaviors, inwardly attentive and mindful. Conscious change involves will and deliberateness, altering self in an intentionally conceived manner.
When we discover that something we are doing in our lives no longer serves our higher purpose as a human, conscious change is how we evolve. When we discover that the lifestyle and food choices we have made, consciously or not, are not reflections of our higher selves, we move to make change. We realize our bodies are not vibrating at our highest level of health and we seek out ways to change this: to heal current symptoms and weight issues and prevent lifelong degenerative diseases from interfering with our vibrant quality of life.
Remember that life is always for us! Life force energy is always moving towards the positive, health and healing. It is humans who tend to go against the grain of nature and turn this flow of energy against ourselves. If you allow yourself to be in this flow, positive things will just happen.
Yoga, or any body awareness type exercise, aligns our bodies, our minds and our spirits so we make life giving choices. Yoga helps us to become normalized in our eating, to reach a pattern of habits that are normal and healthy for us. Yoga (or any body awareness exercise) help us to walk into the Potsdam Food Coop, Nature's Storehouse, our local farm stands or supermarkets, and we can make choices that feed and nourish every cell of our being. We walk out with life giving, whole foods to nourish ourselves and our families.
Update 3/2/2020: over the 8 years since I originally wrote this article, I have learned much info about how science has proven “how” Yoga works. Here is one article that is simple and to the point on Vagus Nerve Toning and Health. The words, in the image below, exemplify how toning the Vagus Nerve improves our wellbeing.
Simply put into words by Donna Farhi, world renowned Yoga Teacher: (image compliments of Trillium Center for Yoga & Health, Potsdam, NY)
A book to inspire you to create conscious living in your life.
This means you no longer make choices based upon emotional triggers. You instead make choices based upon inner wisdom and peacefulness.
Namaste
PS
Update 7/31/2019 I created and teach my Sacred Circle Yoga Mentorship because I see what a daily Yoga practice does for one’s health. This Whole Food / Functional Medicine Health Coaching Mentorship encourages you to add Yoga (any kind of poses and deep breathing habits) to your daily Lifestyle Medicine to retrain your body-mind-spirit to a place of peaceful calm. When we walk the Earth in peace & calm… we are capable of making the best decisions for our purpose on this planet. See the Donna Farhi image above.
Update 4/23/2018 Happy Earth Day! This post has been used and published in several newsletters and journals in the 5 years since I wrote it. My wish is that the gift of Yoga, mindfulness, reaches out to help many heal emotional issues around food, food choices, and eating habits. I have since created The School of Self Healing home study courses on weight loss, sugar addiction, and whole food eating that embody the mindful / yoga habits to support your feeling whole and happy in the healing choices you make. Much Love to All.
More Why I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Yoga Blog Posts, Yup, click on the "blue" back there. Enjoy reading as much as I enjoy sharing my Love of Yoga.
Update on 4/29/16 Great quotes from the book "The Little Red Book Of YOGA WISDOM" Thank you Shelby of Five Elements Living Retreat Center for always keeping my heart and soul open to inspiration.
Yoga is the martial art of the soul and the opponent is the strongest you have ever faced: Your Ego. - Unknown
Spiritual practices help us move from identifying with the ego to identifying with the soul. -Ram Dass
Yoga exists in the world because everything is linked (connected). -Desikashar