Nutrition, Energy and Fatigue ~ Yuri Elkaim [Notes]
My notes from Nutrition, Energy and Fatigue ~ Yuri Elkaim
Stay away from these 3:
1.) Caffeine
2.) Sugar
3.) Wheats/Breads (Gluten)
Caffeine is the biggest energy-draining substance on the planet.
Reason: because it’s a stimulant.
Revs up our stress-hormones, adrenaline running through our veins.. followed by a crash. Wrecks your blood-sugar levels. Impacts adrenal glands in a very negative way. No merit to having caffeine in the body – if you enjoy coffee, switch to decaf.
Sugar & caffeine are almost like brother & sister.
Spikes blood-sugar. Insulin is released. Then Crash.
Re: Energy. Anything that is a quick-fix, is not a long-term solution.
Wheats & Breads – most gluten is grain (cereals, pastas, breads that are not gluten-free).. very modified these days. Raises your blood-sugar more than table-sugar does. Gluten is a protein that the body does not do well with. Even if you don’t have an intolerance, it still damages gut-lining.
Any food that is going to create some kind of “immune-response” is going to drain your energy.
Bulk of your diet should be green vegetables.
Mineral/Vitamin/Phytonutrient content.
Eating more vegetables and some fruit.
Give your body surge of alkaline minerals = help keep your ph at its ideal level.
You have to get oxygen to every cell in your body. Your red blood cells deliver oxygen throughout your body.
If you have a piece of meat, realize that it will be slightly more inflammatory and balance that out with alkaline benefits from vegetables.
Daily basis if you did nothing else – one big salad a day will change your life. Profound difference in your health and energy levels.
More plant-based foods – LOTS of vegetables
Non-sweet fruit so lower glycemic fruit like Apples, Pears, Berries = unlimited amounts
Good quality fats = avocado, olives, olive-oil, coconut oil, organic grass-fed butter
Whole premise = clean diet = real fresh foods that you find in nature, and try to get more of them in the raw state (not cooking all of your foods). Try to enjoy the raw, fresh living vitality / ethereal life-force that is present in foods that are not cooked.
You become a reflection of the people you surround yourself with. It’s built into our DNA – we do not want to stand-out from our immediate crowd otherwise we get ostracised from the ‘tribe’. Your environment is always going to trump will-power no matter how much dedication & devotion you have. You need to surround yourself with people and an environment that is going to support you.
Simple way to test adrenals
In the dark (with a mirror), shine a light in your eye. They are going to constrict. Adrenal glands in response to this light, are going to pump out an adrenalin kind-of hormone that are in this case, sent up to your eye (to constrict the muscles that constrict the pupil). If your pupil is able to stay constricted for more than 20 seconds, your adrenal glands are ok. But I don’t know anybody who has been able to do that.
Most people = they flash the light, the initial dilation of the pupil constricts, and then it starts pulsating for a few seconds, and then it dilates again. So what that’s telling us is that the adrenal glands do not have enough ‘oomph’ & vitality to maintain the constriction in the eyes.
Thyroid is really important because it regulates pretty much everything. Every single cell in our body has receptors for thyroid hormone.
If you’re cold (if you have cold hands & feet all the time, or dry, flaky hair/skin/nails),those are all indications that your thyroid might be compromised. Real simple test you can do, when you wake up – put a thermometre under your armpit, and measure your temperature. Over the course of a week for best-results. If you see that it’s consistently less than 37 or whatever degrees Celsius (I live in Canada so I don’t know what the Fahrenheit is).
Hyperthyroidism = environment = full of toxins, thyroid is very sensitive to mercury, lead, all sorts of heavy metals & chemicals and gluten. Avoid bread. The protein in gluten is very similar to the protein or the structure of your thyroid. So this is something called molecular mimickry, where your body can confuse the food protein with your tissue protein. And with repetitive exposure, it can begin to believe that your thyroid gland is gluten – an invader – “lets attack it”. And that’s how auto-immunity develops.
Low-thyroid = sometimes it is an iodine deficiency but most of the time, the condition will improve by cleaning up the diet, repairing the gut, and minimizing exposure to toxins (detoxification protocol, or being very aware of what you are being exposed to and try to minimize that).
People who have adrenal fatigue need to avoid intensive exercise until they recover.
Exercise is a catch 22. Exercise is a stressor but it’s also a very important stimulus for losing fat & revving up your energy. You want to use a smart amount of it. Exercise less = focus on quality of exercise.
You want to focus on exercise that is going to be short and intense and give our body plenty of time to recover between that.
Instead of going for an hour jog, do 5-10 minutes of “interval training” (sprint-jog-sprint-jog) to get profoundly more impactful benefits.
Metabolism is more raised.
But, long jogs = compromises & negatively effects your thyroid.
Ultra-endurance athletes / Long-term cardio = much lower levels of T3 (active thyroid hormone) and all the ‘ideal’ hormone markers are plummeting when you do lots of cardio.
Focus on short-workouts (10-30 minutes at MOST) // 3 times per week
Incorporate full-body movements using heavier weights to strengthen & stimulate muscles, which gets you to an intensity level that naturally raises your energy
Recovery = Yoga or Pilates or Meditation // anything you can do to help your body recover and bring down the level of stress is going to be massively important.
Strength-training = making an investment in your muscle. Burns calories long-term. (Turning your body into a 24/7 fat-burning machine).
Resets metabolism & hormones to a balanced level.
Source: http://futureofhealingconference.com/