Spring Cleaning
May/June 2021
Spring Cleaning
by Alexandra Johnson, MD
Many clients are coming to our clinic right now looking for relief from fatigue, digestive problems, anxiety, and other lingering health conditions that they haven’t been able to resolve. Sometimes, even when we do many things to support our health, it seems like more is needed to help the body come back into balance.
When we don’t feel well, of course we want to make the symptoms go away as quickly as possible. But the things we do may actually tax an already overburdened body. Everything we take in needs to be digested, metabolized, and finally eliminated. This is so, not only for foods but also for the sensory impressions we receive and the things we experience throughout the day.
Many health-related practices have components with potential to help us become more balanced and healthy. But for real health, we need to relate to symptoms and illness as an opportunity to find greater harmony between our body, mind, and feelings. To find the right approach, and to choose the right thing to do and when, we need to actually be in touch with our body. This is where body-mind connection becomes of vital importance.
In this issue, we will look at ways to support our digestion and metabolism when body, mind, and feelings are overloaded. We have a Self-Breema exercise, essential support from Breema Center classes, and a one-day fast protocol—perfect for Spring cleaning!
When We Look with Conscious Energy, We Take a New Impression
Bring the hands palm-to-palm in front of the body at heart level.
Rub the palms together rapidly, generating heat in your palms, and keeping your shoulders and arms relaxed.
Close your eyes and place the slightly cupped palms over the eyes so that they snugly contact the cheekbones, eye sockets, and bridge of the nose, shutting out all light. The hands are relaxed, and the fingers mold to the contours of the forehead.
Hold like this for three full breaths.
Brush the hands up the forehead, over the crown of the head, down the back of the neck, and off below the chin.
Repeat the rubbing, palming, and brushing two more times.
The third and final time, continue brushing down the front of the body until the hands come to rest on the thighs (if sitting) or at your sides (if standing).
Slowly open the eyes, allowing them to remain unfocused for several seconds.
This exercise may be done standing, sitting on the floor, or sitting in a chair. Once you know how to do it, keep your eyes closed throughout the exercise.
1-Day Juice Fast Program
Fasting helps detoxify the lymphatic system, the entire digestive and intestinal tract, and the joint fluids. This program involves a “preparation” day, the fast itself, and a “follow-up” day. This program provides a real rest for the digestive system, which in itself is invaluable. It will also put your body in a more advantageous position in terms of healing both musculoskeletal and physiological problems.
Day 1
Do eat:
Fruits
Salads
Steamed vegetables
Don’t eat:
Meat/Fish/Poultry
Dairy products
Nuts
Beans
Refined foods
Processed foods
Day 2
Upon waking, dissolve 1-3 tablespoons of Epsom salts in ¾ cup very hot water. This supports in evacuating the bowels—you can vary the amount based on the sensitivity of your GI system. Then squeeze in a bit of fresh lemon juice. Drink this (holding your nose actually helps), and follow immediately with a glass of your fasting juice.
During the day, eat no solid food, but drink at least eight 8oz glasses of juice. You can drink more—as much as you’d like. We recommend any one of the following (depending on the seasonal availability):
Carrot juice
Raw (unpasteurized) apple juice
Watermelon juice
Juice may be diluted up to 1:1 with either spring or distilled water.
Day 3
Continue to drink lots of juice throughout the day. You should also eat some of the type of fruit or vegetable you are using for juice. You can return to eating fruits, salads, and steamed vegetables. Try to include some sauerkraut and/or miso, as your intestines will be especially receptive to the helpful bacterial flora they contain.
Maximum benefit is derived from this short fasting program by continuing to drink juice and by eating these clean, simple foods. The longer you remain with these foods, and the more slowly you return to complex protein, processed, and refined foods, the better.
This program can be repeated on a monthly basis. For those who have never tried fasting before, it is wise to first consult a health practitioner.
Denise Berezonsky, Breema Practitioner and Instructor
Spring is here, and with it the urge to be more active and renew our energy after a tough year and the indoor days of winter.
I spent last year, like many, with more time at the computer and much less movement. When I received my first Breema bodywork session after a few months without it, my body relaxed and let go in a deep and satisfying way. Breema offers a strong invitation to drop all concerns and allow myself to be fully supported in the atmosphere of a Breema session. When a Breema practitioner leans their body’s weight into my body, I feel stiffness and rigidity melt, and the supported postures used to stretch the body create openness in joints that felt stuck before. When my body receives the support it really needs, my mind relaxes too, and I experience openheartedness that may have been missing or hidden behind all those preoccupations of life. I feel more available to the support of everything around me.
Many health traditions look at the Spring season as a time for cleansing the body, releasing whatever has accumulated that no longer serves us, and opening ourselves up for the fresh flow of vital energy. We may not notice it as it’s happening, but constant busyness in the mind uses up a lot of the energy we need to live our life, and prevents us from meeting it harmoniously. Breema bodywork is ideal support for this process because it not only helps release accumulated tension in the body, it also gives the mind and feelings a chance to let go of the preoccupations and reactions that can create that tension in the first place.
This Spring, give yourself the gift of Breema!
Denise Berezonsky has been offering Breema bodywork at the Breema Clinic for 30 years. She brings a wide range of Breema bodywork sequences to her practice, using them according to the need of each individual client. Her approach is also informed by her many years as a student of Pilates, Restorative Exercise(TM), and other movement modalities where she gained knowledge of the body’s structural relationships via experience with her own body. She is co-author of Self-Breema: Exercises for Harmonious Life, Associate Director and Practitioner at the Breema Clinic, and a Staff Instructor at the Breema Center.
Bread and Water
It happened that a poor man was going to have an important guest to his house for dinner. He usually ate very simply, grinding his own flour, making bread, and fetching water from the nearby stream for tea. But he thought maybe he should get something better to serve his special guest.
He went to town thinking, “I’ll get some yoghurt for my guest.” He went to the man who sold yoghurt and asked, “Do you have a special yoghurt?”
“Oh yes,” said the yoghurt man. “My yoghurt is as rich as butter.” The simple man said, “Thank you very much,” and left, thinking that if the yoghurt man was comparing his yoghurt to butter, butter must be more special than yoghurt.
So he went to the woman who sold butter and asked, “Do you have butter that is very special?” The butter seller told him, “Oh, yes, my friend, my butter is so wonderful, it’s as smooth as olive oil.” When the man heard that, he said, “Thank you very much,” and left in search of the man who sold olive oil.
When he found the olive oil seller, he asked him, “Do you have olive oil that’s very special?”
“That I do,” replied the olive oil man. “My olive oil is as pure as good spring water.” When the simple man heard that, he said, “Thank you very much,” and went home to prepare for his guest, very pleased to already have the most special things.
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