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Archive for the ‘Naturopathy’ Category

“Prevention is better than cure” and less trublesome too. A person falls sick when his defences are down in other world when his vital force is at a low ebb it is the vital which keeps you alive being a bulwark against disease and delay. The vital force is the store house of your physician strength, your vigour, your ebullience and your verve. Its ebb and flow determines the state headache malfunctioning bowels are all indications of diminished vital force. Maintaining it can ward of disease. For that a person has to follow some simple rules with regard to sleep fresh air sun light & clean habits.

Sleep

The best source of your vital force is sleep. Sleep not only gives you ease from labour, but also replemises the source of energy. The expenditure of energy during sleep is minimal but how for a sleeping man will recover what he has lost during waking house will depend on his way of life.

Sleep in itself is a medicine and that is why even the traditional physician will tell you not to wake a patient merely for administering the prescribed does. Infants sleep for 20 out of 24 hours But as they grow they can do with less sleep. A healthy adute can do with 8 hours of sleep. The old agage “early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy wealthy and wise” still holds good because one hour’s sleep before midnight relaxes you more than tow hours of slumber after midnight can.

Relax completely when you compose yourself for sleep. Worry and the grave are twain sisters so leave your worries for your waking hours.

SUNLIGHT

After sleep sunlight is the element which helps restore your vital force. Just as a plant will whither away without sunlight a human being deprived of it will be pale wan sickly. It gives the green colour to the plants and adds the red to your blood. Fruits and vegetables absorb sunlight to the body. One should not overdress so that sunlight can replenish your vital force. Even though people in the cold climates take to sun-bathing for cosmetic reasons it is a must for revitalizing the human body.

AIR

A man may survive without food for weeks without water for days he cannot survive the lack of air for more than a few seconds. The ozone in the air helps the lungs to cleanse our blood of carbon dioxide. One must keep the living room and the bed room well ventilated so that fresh air comes into contact with the body all the time.

The pores of the skin need it as much as do the lungs clothes must be loose so that the pores are not starved of take exercise giving air, breathe deeply and take exercise regularly which force the lungs to take in more air to replenish the blood. In hale deeply a few times before meals and also before sleep go to the outdoors as often as you can.

WATER

The cheapest and the best cleansing agent-water is the third vital necessity for your life and health. Ensure that it is clean and free from contamination. Drink it early in the morning before going to bed one hour before meals and tow or three hours after. The best you a heavenly feeling of freshness activating as it does your blood circulation. The gets cold that is why you feel warm a few minutes after a cold plunge. A hot bath dulls the circulation which explains why you feel lethargic after it. A vigorous rubbing of the skin with a rough towel after a cold bath will open your pores. A rubbing of the skin with your palm will drive away most of the skin disorders.

FOOD

The best food is the one which is taken in the from in which nature provides it. The greater the culinary effort the more palatable the food no doubt but lesser is its nutritive value. A greater part of the diet should comprise fruits and vegetables cooked to the minimum. Cereals should be germinated before eating. The cardinal point to remember is that the longer a food remains in contact with heat the lesser is its nutritive value.

MENTAL MAKE-UP

Mental make-up and health are intimately connected. Anger, frustration, envy, jealousy, and violent reactions are as harmful as worry. When a man is angry there is too much adrenaline released into his blood stream-hence the higher blood pressure, a quickened pulse dry mouth and a purple face. Anger harm you.

Keep happy and smiling auto suggestion and self hypnosis are based on the theory that thinking can lead to a better state of health. Do not give in to despair when you fall sick. Many critically ill persons have died when they gave up the fight or lost hope a solid resolve to Stay alive has pulled many from the bring of the grave.

WAY OF LIFE

Your way of life leaves its imprint on your health over indulgence in anything would reduce your vital force a clean life free from addiction of any kind fresh air, exercise and a placid temperament will help you stay healthy. Tensions must be avoided as they erode the vital force. One must not join the rat race for money and success in disregard of the golden rules of health. You must also be regular in your habits sleep and exercise and an occasional fast will help you live longer free from common ailments, which afflict humans.

When you have been advised to live on fruit juices or juices or soups of vegetables, you should take about 250 milliliters of fruit juice or clear soup or juice of vegetables three to four times in a day. The best juices are those of oranges, pineapple, rose apple, raspberry and tomatoes. If the juice is too thick, mix it with plain water in the proportion of 1:3/4th. Juice of gourd, tomatoes and carrot can be taken in its natural form.

If you do not have a juicer, grate the fruits or vegetables and squeeze them and filter the juice. Other vegetables have to be half a kilogram and should be boils in 250 millimeters of water and the juice drunk. When you are living on fruit, take them thrice daily. But take one kind of fruit at one meal. For example you can take tomatoes for breakfast, orange at lunch and apples for your dinner. If you can take the same fruit at all meal times, it would be still better.

The total intake of fruits in the day should not be more than one to one and a half kilograms. When a diet of fruit and milk is indicated, take 250 to 350 millimeters of milk with the fruits. If your appetite improves, as it should, the quantity of the milk can be increased to half a liter at one time. Unboiled milk should be taken in the morning and even during lunchtime milk boils in the morning can be ingested. Sip the milk as you munch the fruit. It will be more beneficial than gating the fruit and drinking the milk.

Even when you are on a diet of fruit juices, do not forget to drink one to two liters of water in the day. If your bowls do not move automatically during the fruit & milk diet, take recourse to an enema. But the bowels must be evacuated properly and no morbid humors or substances should be allowed to accumulate in the body. Water and food-

Intake of water: -

One must drink one to one and a half liters of water in 24 hours. The best time for taking water is the first thing in the morning, one hour before meals and two hours after. If you must drink water during the meals, see that the quantity does not exceed 200 to 250 millimeters if you have taken water one hour before the meal, you will not feel the need to take it during eating. But still, water may be take during the meal according to need and inclination.

Time of meal :-

The interval between two meals should be five hours or more. The last meal of the day must be eaten two to three hours before you get into bed. Break fast between seven to eight in the morning lunch between twelve nouns and one the afternoon and twelve dine between six and seven in the evening.

Whole meal bread: -

The best wheat flour is when you have cleaned and dried wheat and ground it through a hand mill. Do not pass the flour through a sieve so that the bran is not separated. Bran is the substance, which provides roughage needed to avoid constipation and it also contains the necessary vitamins. The dough should be kneaded two to three hours before it is used for Chappatis (whole meal bread).

The Chappatis (whole meal bread) should be thick but it needs patient to cook it property. A thin Chappatis is of course the best since most people are likely to count the number of Chappatis they take without regard to their size or thickness. Do not eat the Chappatis with the vegetables since you may not chew it properly. Eat them separately or alternative mouthfuls of Chappatis and vegetables.

PORRIDGE: -

Good quality, properly cleaned wheat should be used for being ground into porridge. Each wheat grain should be broken into eight to ten pieces. Separated and the porridge should be toasted over a hot plate lightly till it turns brown. It should then be cooked like rice. Its consistency should not be too thick or too thin. It should be cooked over a slow fire till it is properly done. It should not be mixed with salt or milk even though people are in the habit of adding these substances to porridge. The best sweetening agent for the porridge would be raisins added to it while it is being boiled.

RICE: -

Unmilled rice is the best. The necessary vitamins, which are found in this cereal, are lost in the process of milling and polishing. The paddy should be treated at home with the help of a large pestle, which only separates the husk and leaves other elements in fact.

Add only enough water to cook the rice. If too much water were added it would have to be either dried up by heat or passed through a sieve destroying its starch and also some other elements.

VEGETABLE: -

Vegetable, which can be eaten with their rind on, should be eaten unpeeled. If the outer covering is hard scrap it with a sharp knife. Wash the vegetables before cutting them into smaller pieces. Add a little Ghee or sesame Coconut or ground nut-oil and add a few Cummins seeds and let the vegetable cook over a slow fire. Most of the vegetable contains natural moisture and water does not have added to them for cooking. The most that you can do is to cover them with a lid and put a little water over it so that some moisture is added to the pan in which the vegetable is cooking. Try to see that the natural moisture of the vegetable is not burnt by excessive heat since many vital elements are thus lost.

Salt turmeric Cummins seed may be added as seasoning. The less salt you take the better it is if you feel like taking Ghee add it after the vegetable has been cooking and not before.

SALADS: -

A salad is prepared out of raw vegetables. All vegetables, which can be eaten raw, can form part of the salad. For example, you can eat cucumber, carrot, radish, onions, tomatoes, spinach, green coriander and cabbage for salad. Take any three of these vegetables and cut them into small pieces. Season them with salt if you must, but the best would be to eat them as they are. The normal amount of salad per head (adult) should not be more than 250 grams. You can add a little curd also to the salad if you like. A salad can be made out of fruits also. The best time to take the salad is before the meal.

WALKING DEEP BREATHING AND SLEEP: -

During a walk you must move briskly. Your back should be straight and the arms moving. The normal speed of walking should be about four miles per hour. Take a different route for a walk every day as that would be more enjoyable instead of taking the same route every day. Five to six miles walk in the morning and two to three miles in the evening is the best. Those who are starting to take a walk should not overstrain themselves but increase the distance gradually.

DEEP BREATHING: -

Deep breaths should be taken during a walk. In halation should become a natural rhythm with you in halation and exhalation should both be done slowly.

SLEEP: -

Sleep should be sufficient to give a sense of relief from exhaustion but do not over sleep nor laze about in bed when you are not sleeping. The ideal time for sleep is from nine o’clock in the night to five in the morning. Those who feel sleep all the time returns to normal sleeping hours after some days during summer a siesta for an hour or so will refresh you. If you cannot sleep relax for an hour after lunch.

Diet are a subject of the greatest importance in all system of medicine but in naturopathy it are of over significance because most of the treatment consists in cleansing the system through diet. The basic principle of dietetics is that the body has to be ped like an engine, which needs fuel. Food is the fuel for body but just as there various types of engines diseal for the trucks. Aft for the planes and petrol for your scooter the human body and its needs also need special types of food according to its conditions. If you are a robust individual without any constitutional disorders you may take any type of food condition special diets have to be taken.

Naturopathy believes that the correct approach the eating’s that a person should “eat to live” and not “live to eat” eating should be a necessary function as breathing is but most people regard it as a means of gratifying their desire for the nice things life. By tradition “nice” things are supposed to be those which give pleasure and satisfy your taste buds but most nature has a different code.

You would see that most things, which has a bitter taste, are good for health bitter gourd is one such example. Recent researcher have shown that the vegetable plays a vital role in activating the pancreas the malfunctioning of which leads to diabetes the fruit of the neem tree is a great purifier of blood inspite of its bitter taste. Another curious fact is that in most vegetable and fruits the rind (commonly thought to be unnecessary and hence remove) contains all the vitamins and the mineral salt so necessary for the maintenance of health. A misunderstanding of the vital ignore the facts state above foods are refined to such an extent that their value is lost even if they become more pleasing to the taste buds and the eyes.

In the process of preparing food we tend to loss many of the vitamins. An example is boiling of vegetable most of which tend to use their value if over boiled the polishing of rice and the refining of sugar are other examples where the preference for a nicer look leads to destruction of their essential value as foods.

As is known to everybody there are certain trace elements in our body, which are required to keep us in good health. Any lowering of their small amounts in the system will give rise to many disorders for example the destruction of iron in the blood will give rise to Anemia and weakness should deficiency leads to many disorders. Thanks to the pioneering work of the masters of nature cure we know that the artificial foods found in so much abundance in the food stores are in a great measure responsible for many of the disorders that inflict themselves on their users.

A large number of disease ascribed to the various organisms by the traditional practitioners of medicine are in fact due to deficiency of vital elements in the food that people take. They try to make up the deficiency (if all they are able to establish the nexus between the deficiency and the disease) by administration of those substances prepared in the laboratories but another sad fact which they are unable to confront is that elements found in nature are more easily digested by the human body that the ersatz substances passing off as vitamins or mineral medicine that the body needs a continuous supply of mineral salt and vitamins which are found in many nature an unspoiled foods. They not only make up the deficiency but also cleanse and purify the body ridding it of toxins that give rise to various diseases.

A possible explanation for the state of affairs is the preoccupation of modern medicine with the laboratory. Unless the technician is able to put his litmus paper in a substance or look at it through his micros cope he refuses to believe its existence or efficialy. Even where tests prove the effective role that some drugs or fruits play in the healing of certain diseases the shadow of disbelieve does not leave and then efforts are made to prepare the substances and minerals found in natural foods synthetically in the laboratory. It has been proved times without number that the synthetics vitamins are not easily digested by the system as those which are contained in some fruits and vegetable through the pseudo scientists insist on using them.

The medical professions the traditionalists have not yet properly assessed the role of the mineral salt which vital to the functioning of the body. These substances are available in the quantities needed by the body in fresh fruits and vegetable the cardinal role-played by these substances is that of purifying the body an ejecting the toxins collected there. Too much of refining of foods in the processing and canning of foodstuffs destroys the essential vitamins and minerals. Even the addition of synthetic vitamins and minerals does not help. Another fallacy which modern medicine suffers from is the measuring of food value in term’s calories. Energy is something fundamental to the organism and can be enhanced because of the ability foodstuffs taken. If the foodstuffs lack the essential elements, which should be present in them, the vital force of the body is not enhanced.

On the other hand it eight be reduced because of lack of essential elements if the feeding habits are not in tune with nature. A system burdened with unnatural foods loses its capacity to fight disease it may become a victim of toxins fight which show themselves in the from of various diseases. That is healing by fasting his patients and when fasting is followed by fruits and vegetable in their nature from recovery must ensure. An all fruit diet is the lack of which makes the body susceptible to disorders of various kinds. An all fruit diet cleanses the system of all toxins and aids recovery. An enema is recommended during the period of fasting so that the bowels are kept clean. (They are not likely to move on their own since the solid food is prohibited). In some cases a restricted diet consisting of fruits & salad is recommended. That introduces variety in ones diet and then salads and vegetable eaten as salad are not mere adjuncts to ones food as is commonly believed but are the mainstay of health as they supply calcium, potassium, sodium, iron, Silicon, and other trace elements so essential for a healthy body.

Milk is a complete food and one can live on it without in anyway imparing ones health. But it must not be boiled and should be taken fresh. It is recommended after the all fruit diet has been taken for some days. After a protracted fast an all milk diet is usually recommended. An all milk diet should however be taken under expert guidance. In this the total intake of milk is increased to six quarts a day. In India’s ancient system of medicine it was known as “dugdha ralpa” and was recommended in certain conditions. Pernicious anaemia, diabetes, arthritis, neurasthenia and many other diseases have been cured by milk therapy followed by a long fast. By means of fasts the all fruit diet the restricted diet (fruits and salad s) the fruit and milk diet the full milk diet and various naturopathy puts his patients on the road to recovery after which a balanced diet is recommended. The main point to be noted is that 75% of the diet of a patient should consist of alkaline the toxins of the act as cleansing agents for the toxins of the body. Meat is considered by most naturopathy as an unnatural food because of the dange of its putrefaction in its intestines. If it has to be taken it should be of freshly killed animals. In most cases of illness meat should be totally avoided.

Refined foodstuffs like sugar & white bread polished rice boiled potatoes etc. are acid forming and should be avoided as far as possible. Brown sugar whole meal bread unpolished rice and potatoes with their feel intact are recommended as they are less acid forming for proteins the naturopathy depends on eggs cheese milk and nuts saturated fats like ghee are an abomination for him. Coconut oil and other unsaturated fats like sesame are recommended.