No doubt about it….feeling your feelings is a big part of getting healthy.  Healthy in the physical and healthy in the spiritual sense.  My saying is “Just Feel It”.  When I was young I stopped eating to get attention.  When I didn’t get the attention, I overate.   Then I just got lost in a sea of eating, not eating, stuffing emotions and denying emotions.  There is a difference between stuffing and denying your emotions.  Good luck figuring that one out.  Experiencing my divorce over 15 year ago, was when I could officially say I realized I hadn’t been feeling anything.  Did I start feeling then?  No way.  There was a lot more to come before I could start feeling.  But I did realize I wasn’t feeling.

I’ve read a lot, processed a ton, and listened to all the raw foodies out there over the last 20 years.  This I can now say, that there are more and more of us out there not afraid to admit we suffer from emotional eating.   Yes, you can follow a raw lifestyle and still not be totally healed.  C’mon, guys, none of us are perfect.  It’s only when we choose to deny our feelings to ourselves and to others, does it become a problem.   This is a process.  This is peeling the layers of an onion.  There’s always another layer.

When I cleaned out my kitchen of all processed and unhealthy items of food, I went 100% raw.  Before that I had tried to fast at least once a week for about a year.  I remember very clearly the first moment I actually “felt” that I didn’t want a cookie.  It was only a week into being raw.  It wasn’t that I couldn’t have a cookie.  I didn’t WANT one.  Boy, was I mad.  What?  Not want a cookie? You love cookies, Donna.  An interesting moment that was.  My body was talking and not my head.  But my head was angry.  I vibrated for about three days with this.  I couldn’t stop shaking.  I waited.  I knew the real reason I was mad was about to come up.  Yes, I did process something.  That’s another story on relationships.  I thought at that time, “Great, I’m healed!”  I couldn’t have been more wrong.  40 years of holding in feelings and I was going to release them in three days?!?  Yeah, right.

The feelings continue.   What feeling is it though?  Is it really about food or is it about me?  Do I still eat cookies? Yes, I do.  Sometimes more than two.  But I’m listening to my inner voice a lot more.  How do I do that? Lots of breathing, lots of yoga, and some tears.  I try to let the emotion wash over me before I eat.  Not always.  I still have food issues and like an addict, I will always struggle with my food issues.  I do things to allow myself to feel love.  I hug my cat.  I write these blogs.  I take a nap.  I give in to the stress of the moment and give up.  I surrender to what is.

Stop being so hard on yourself.  We are all human.  Try being a “human being” and not a “human doing”.  As always, I wish you the best of health.  Today I wish you good thoughts and the ability to feel them.  There is change coming.  Let it wash over you!

Donna Bergonzi-Boyle

My 96 year old grandmother just passed away.  It’s very interesting to watch how we all want to avoid the “break-down” and prove to ourselves that we can get through an emotional time without the tears.  Or it could just not be the right time to cry.  Even at 96, her death was unexpected, so most of us were just trying to get through the service and everything that had to be done.  Once the adrenaline rush had dissipated, and we returned home, my daughter and I suffered through a 24 hour stomach bug.  That’s when the tears came and I was able to start to experience the grief and sadness of loss.

I rarely get sick and with the exhaustion of the week, I’m sure my defenses were quite depleted.  Eating a high raw diet and not being home is difficult to say the least.  Plus we are Italian, do I need to say more?  I ate fruit and just one meal, but that was too much combined with the emotion of the week.   After my daughter got better, it was my turn.  I don’t like being sick.  Who does?  Every muscle in my body ached.  I couldn’t walk, it hurt to move.  When I decided to finally let go and let the “bug” win, I cried.  I cried for all the times in my life when I hurt.  I cried for my grandmother.  I cried because I was in pain.  I cried because it felt good to cry and I felt better after I did.  I relaxed.

Why cry?  Simple reasons…. a response to pain or for more complex reasons.  Crying helps you become aware of emotions such as fear, anger, sadness, or grief.  Holding in tears only allows those feelings to bury themselves inside your physical body.  Eventually those feelings cause an overload of stress hormones and when levels get high, crying can release this and help you feel better.  People cry after receiving happy news too.   The feeling of powerlessness or the inability to influence what is happening can also lead to crying. 

How you cry is a factor too in relieving stress and actually feeling better.  There are the simple tears, the sobbing cry or the flat out wailing, beat on your pillow, cry.  The emotional insight to your tears could be the deciding factor on whether your tears are being beneficial to your growth, personal and spiritual.  For me, I’ve had times when the crying was just crying, and I got nothing out of it.  But when the tears came like they did when I was sick, I know they were helping me heal.  I could feel the stress I’ve held onto for so many years being let go of.  When you cry and don’t project that crying onto someone or something else, you can feel the sadness and grief on a deeper level.  We all have sorrow.  We need to release it.  Sometimes, as during my grandmother’s service, it’s just not appropriate to wail.  Tears? Absolutely. 

Take the time today or tomorrow, or this weekend, to cry.  I know when I’m in need of a good cry.  I watch a sad movie, or a love story.  That works!  Then I take the time to “feel” my tears.  To allow those tears to come from the depths of my pain.  Then I go even deeper into the sadness, the grief.  It’s all the same.  Sometimes the length of my crying is very short.  It doesn’t matter how long, as long as you are getting “in touch” with the emotions.

Donna Bergonzi-Boyle

It’s that time of year again when everyone talks about resolutions.  I was never a believer in these.  Every night I make a resolution for the next day.  Every morning I reaffirm that intention.  The power of intention.  If you think it, if you believe it….it will become reality.

Here are some ideas for you this morning(or afternoon or evening), it’s never too late to set an intention.  Before you start your exercise routine for the day, whether you take the stairs instead of the elevator or you work out at a gym, set an intention.  What do you want to get out of your routine?  How will you feel if you get what you want?  Think about this for a minute.  Let’s say your intention is to get up each morning and stretch for at least 10 minutes tomorrow.  If you do this, how will you feel after?  That is your intention.  Before I begin my yoga class, I set an intention.  How do I want to be with myself during this class?  How do I want to feel at the end of this class? How do I want to receive the rest of the day?

There is one big problem with setting resolutions as I see it.  The guilt if I don’t achieve what I set out to do.  Guilt is not a healthy thing.  I’m pretty sure all of you know this.  “Guilt may reduce the ability of the immune system to fight off illness.” Internal and external forces will cause “dis-ease” in the body.  If I think negatively about my food intake, about my exercise or lack of exercise, it will affect my physical body.  I find I can judge myself before I even eat something.  I guess that’s good….in a way.  Now I can use that inner voice of judgment and turn it around.

Before starting to write this blog, I wanted something else to eat.  I knew I wasn’t hungry, I knew my body didn’t want anything else, but still my mind was running away with this idea that I needed food, any food.  I talked to myself.  Asked myself questions about what I would feel like if I did eat something?  I knew it wouldn’t feel good.  My stomach would hurt, either now or during the night.  The intention I set this morning was to feel good all day and night.  That intention made it much easier to listen to my body tonight, instead of my head.  And yes, I’m still talking to myself tonight.  There’s a lot going on in my head tonight.  I’m trying not to judge myself.  Tonight I will set another intention for tomorrow. It may be the same as today, to just feel good.  Yes, I could fail at this tonight, but tomorrow is a new day.

It’s certainly easier to go for fast food, already cut up, already washed items while you’re grocery shopping or looking for that quick lunch idea……BUT…. is that really the healthier choice?

Let’s start with baby carrots.  In whole carrots, most of the nutrition is contained in or just below the skin.  In order to make baby carrots, this healthy portion is removed.   Then the carrots are washed in chlorinated water and some are even dipped in a stronger chlorine solution to keep their looks once in your local store.  If you believe labels,  “baby carrots” are carrots harvested while the vegetables are still small.  “Baby Cut Carrots” are made by the process explained above.  Which would you rather on your table?  Personally, I’ll take organic whole carrots when I can get them.  These you don’t have to wash.  If they aren’t organic, wash and peel your carrots.  Then you can eat or juice them.

Carrots are a great source of antioxidant compounds, and the richest vegetable source of pro-vitamin A carotenes.  Antioxidant compounds help to protect against cardiovascular disease and cancer and beta-carotene helps to protect good vision, especially night vision that affects most of us over the age of…ahem…..40.  Carrots should be stored in a plastic or “green bag“, or wrapped in a paper towel to reduce the amount of condensation.  When storing in green bags, only store one type fruit or veggie per bag.  If the carrots you buy have their tops attached, cut these before storing, as they will pull moisture from the carrot itself causing it to wilt prematurely.

What else can you do with those fresh, whole, organic carrots?  Breakfast anyone?  Dip anyone?  Did you just call me a dip, madam?

CARROT DRINKS

Try these combinations in your juicer tomorrow morning.

Carrot and apple

Carrot, apple and celery

Carrot all by itself

CARROT AVOCADO DRESSING

1/2 avocado                                 1/2 cup celery juice

1 clove garlic                                1/4 cup water, if needed

cayenne to taste                          1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice

1 cup carrot juice                        1/4 cup chopped scallion

Combine all ingredients except the scallion in your blender.  Stir in the scallion and season to taste.  This could be used as a dressing for your salad or a dip for your fresh veggies.

How about frozen wheatgrass?  That’s convenient, right?  Ah, but not as healthy and nutritious as the real thing.  Most of the wheatgrass grown for frozen juice or dried wheatgrass powders is grown outside on acres of land.  It is also usually second cut wheatgrass too.  To get optimum benefit from wheatgrass, you want baby grass, first cut grass.  There is a lot to say about frozen vs. fresh that I just don’t have the space for here.  Make your own choice.  You can grow your own wheatgrass. You don’t have to settle for the easy way out.

Next time you’re at the grocery store, don’t take the easy way out.  Get involved with your food.  It matters.  It’s healthier.  Take the time.

Donna Bergonzi-Boyle