Hey everybody! I've been thinking a lot about healthy living and healthy eating. And the great thing is I've not just thinking about it , I've been doing something about it. And to add more good news to already good news (now there's a new expression), it's been so easy and I've been able to lose weight without being tortured! I was telling someone last week, it should be wrong for eating right and losing weight to be this easy, when I know others are tying so hard and feeling so bad in the process!

So what's my secret??? I'll tell you! My experiment with eating right and trying to not have food cravings began with my drawing upon my knowledge of nutrition.

The foundational basis for healthy eating is that the food must have nutritional content. I know this sounds so elemetary, but follow where I'm going. Most everybody knows about the most basic components of a truly nutritious food, being one that has vitamins and minerals, amino acids and throw some essectial fatty acids in for good measure. However there is something missing here. It's what's missing that makes  all the difference!

So without further adieu, here is where peoples' diets fail, and they won't tell you at Weight Watchers or Jenny Craig. They are missing ENZYMES! What ? EZYMES! I know you are just beside yourself with questions. I would be!

One of the principles of natural medicine is that you are what you DIGEST. Just becasue you eat a food and don't get a stomache ache doesn't mean you digested it properly.

What do enzymes do? The way it was explained to me is that they are like the spark plugs that make your car's engine start. You can have the most exspensive car with the biggest engine, but if you don't have the spark plugs to fire up those sparks , the engine won't work.

At the store I used to work at, we had a training class by a company that ONLY manufactures enzymes. I was amazed at what I learned . I'm not sure if scientist even know how many enzymes and types of enzymes the human body has.

One of the biggest trends in the supplement industry is with enzymes. Enzyme defficiencies can cause a host of food allergies, as well as inflammation. Inflammation doesn't just occur in the joints of those suffering with arthritis. It can occur in any part of the body and where it is present, there will be a name of a disease given to it. For example, when inflammation is present in the muscles, it is called fibromyalgia.

I think you can see how important those tiny little enzymes are!

So, how do we get enzymes? You can purchase digestive enzymes, but anything man made doesn't have the added benefit of the nutrition that goes along with it. Plus, there are new scientific discoveries made all the time of something great and wonderful that is in our food! Man has yet to exhaust them all!

So, back to weight loss. This is what works for me, and how I discovered it.

I was first introduced to the benefits of enzymes by some people I knew who juiced. The reasoning behind juicing is to not only get a concentrated source of nutrition your body could easily digest, but also to get the ENZYMES! I was astounded at the energy and the natural high that juicing gives!

So, I decided what was missing in my diet could be enzymes and the way to get them naturally is to eat more unprocessed (raw) foods. What I did was to try to eat my meals with as much raw foods as possible, thus getting the nutrition that these foods give and the additional benefit of greater absorption of the foods due to the enzymes.

For example: for breakfast, I would start by drinking water with freshly  squeezed lemon in it. If you take large gulps and not small sips, your body will not make enough enzymes to digest the foods. Then I would eat an apple with peanut butter. Usually two apples. The fiber from the apple will also help to fill you up.

In between meals, I am constantly drinking water with lemon. The lemon has one of the most complex nutritional profiles of anything I've ever seen.

For lunch , I would eat a sandwich with some kind of salad and if I feel like I am really hungry I will eat several bowls of salad (watch the salad dressing and don't pile it on!) or eat some kind of raw food like several stalks of celery or carrot sticks. My strategy is to concentrate on trying to eat about 50 -75 percent of what I am eating as raw. It's not as hard as it seems.

For snacks, I do nuts, fruit, celery , any kind of raw foods. I also like to take alfalfa tablets at the end of each meal, because they have so many minerals and trace minerals that balance the blood sugar.

Dinner is a repeat of this regimen. Eat as much raw food as possible and then  eat protein. I don't eat a lot of carbohydrates such as breads, because to be honest, I am not craving them and I'm getting carbohydrates from the fruits and vegetables (mostly fruits.)

As I have made it my goal to eat as much raw food as possible, and to drink the water with lemon (providing lots of nutrition and ENZYMES) in between, I haven't to battle with food cravings and blood sugar spikes.

I have been treating my body like a car that needs the proper fuel. And my body is repsonding by giving me more energy and better performance!

I can now wake up in the morning and feel good, even if I haven't gotten as much sleep as I really need and not feel exhausted.

The most energy your body must expend to do any work is in digesting food! The easiest foods there are to digest, which require the least amount of processing are raw foods!

Well, I hope this blurb on enzymes will help you understand some principles of nutrition that you can use to work for you!

And just remember you can do ALL things through Christ who gives strength to YOU!

If I can do this, anyone can. I used to have a sweet tooth the size of the Grand Canyon!

What I have discovered with myself and with others I have observed, is that when there is something missing in your diet, you will be out of balance and have food cravings.

Farmers and veterinarians call this cribbing or pica, when an animal does this. Have you ever heard of a horse chewing on rubber tires or eating the paint off of wood? OR how about when pregnant women want to eat dirt? Strange , but true! Most of the time, it's minerals or trace which are missing!

God bless you !

I'm praying for you~

Elaine