22 Ways To a Sweet Life without the Sugar

Holiday time, or anytime, the sweet tooth in all of us gets so-o-o-o-o antsy.  It craves and craves and craves, sugar.  Do we know why?  Yes.  Other important nutrients are lacking and the sweet tooth, the small voice that says "Oh go on, just one more time. It's ok", wants to stay front and center and hammers many of us until we give in.  I believe most of us can relate to this.  Well we are going to give the sweet tooth the boot!

Cane sugar has no nutritional value to you and is actually quite toxic to your body when taken in in excess over time.  An imbalance is created. It's GI is 80. Do you need to give up sweets?  No.  There are delicious ways to bake, "bake" or make many recipes that you love without using sugar or unsafe sweeteners.

The sweeteners that are not good for you are cane sugar, high fructose corn syrup, fructose corn syrup, corn syrup, Agave (it's the processing and what that breeds that makes this unsafe and toxic), and the little packets of artificial sweeteners that are everywhere.

To curb sugar and sweet cravings have a green smoothie with apple or other "sweet" fruits in the morning. Over time you will see yourself removing more of the sweeter ingredients and using more greens.  The greens, especially dark leafy greens, have so many nutrients in them that your body is satiated, satisfied and the cravings become less and less over time and then they are totally gone.  There are hundreds and hundreds of delicious smoothie recipes available, so there is no reason for you to become bored.  I myself like the variety but I also gravitate to a few favorites and one of them is definitely not sweet. You will find this probably happen to you too. 

Do start off at the pace you know you will stay with and experiment with the vegetables, greens and fruits you know and like for now and then add in new ones as you go. Please contact me if you would like some suggestions or to just talk about these simple and delicious meals to start your day in a truly easy and healthy way.

One of my favorite smoothies is a salad smoothie, no sweets. It uses cilantro and garlic in it.  Who would have thought. Yum!

Before you read the list of healthy sweeteners, do use all sweeteners in moderation as the goal here is to be and live in optimal health.  If you have a dis-ease, Diabetes for example, please work with your health care practitioner, and or a nutritionist or coach such as myself to understand and follow what works best for you. We are all different and can not follow the one size fits all approach.

Healthy Sweetners - Use raw and organic products most often, those with* are not vegan

Stevia - green leaf, not the processed white powder! is an herb. Herbs do not affect blood sugar
Xylitol - from the birch tree

Coconut Sap

Coconut Crystals
Coconut Meat
Dried Coconut

Medjool Dates
Date Crystals

Honey (local best)*
Apples
Bananas
Mangos
Carrots
Beet Sugar
Pureed berries
Black Strap Molasses
Maple Syrup
Maple Crystals
Brown Rice Syrup 

The sweeteners above that are in bold are hyper-glycemic and not recommended for diabetics. If you use them once in a while in a smoothie or a juice they must be paired with  a 1/4 amount of the sweet to at least 3/4 amount of dark leafy greens. Those sweeteners in italics are known to be safe for some diabetics.  Please note dried fruits have a much higher concentration of sugar than their natural state counter part. Click here to view a chart of various sweeteners and their GI rating by Organic Lifestyle Magazine.

Of course Love, Passions and Compassion are 3 more ways To a Sweet Life, a life that transforms you to a refreshing holistic lifestyle. 

Want to learn more? Give me a call or email  me and we will  schedule a time to talk about Refreshing Your Life Now.

Barbara

203-216-6889

RefreshYourLifeNow@gmail.com

www.RefreshYourLifeNow@blogspot.com


This post may be reprinted on your blog, website or in your e-zine with my blessing as long as you include the following:  Barbara Greenhouse shares her passions of Food, "Cooking", Cruelty-Free, and the Sharing of Unbiased Information for a healthy and informed world.  She guides her clients through their journey to live their dreams, easily and holistically, with compassion and by incorporating some delicious live raw foods.  She is currently authoring her first book, "Sacred You, The Delicious Journey"®    © copyright refreshyourlifenow, - 2011 Connecticut, USA

Is Living a Simplified Life Easy

In life we tend to want the easy way out now a days. Even the least expensive.  We don't have enough patience or time anymore for whatever the reason.  It's too inconvenient. Our priorities are out of balance.

When we take the easy way out we may actually make life more difficult by leaving out important aspects, thoughts, ideas and decisions, we rush.  We will most likely have to redo the situation, project, event, business decision for example. This is wasteful and costly in time and many times in money.

Simple is a step by step system to get to something new or for a change - the intended results you seek.  Is this always easy? To be honest, no. We probably need to think more than we want, make uncomfortable decisions we'd rather not, or go back to a place we've "covered up" (pushed away).  Examples of this are not making healthy snacks or lunch and grabbing fat and sugar laden unhealthy fast foods, not listening to your body even when it is screaming at you that it is out of balance and needs you to slow down, pumping your body with coffee/caffeine to re-energize, not bringing unpleasant situations to closure. This discomfort usually holds the solutions to where we want to go with our lives, it is the bridge to get there. I am the safety net in your process. 

So while it may be simple to follow the steps it may not be easy.   This is how you move from your place of struggle and pain to your place of ease, authenticity, and pleasure. The system we create for you is your journey to living your dreams within YOUR new lifestyle.  Will it need tweaking now and again, possibly.  You can always have new passions as you mature and grow and as you raise your level of consciousness.

Give me a call or email me and we will  schedule a time to talk about Refreshing Your Life Now.

Barbara

203-216-6889

RefreshYourLifeNow@gmail.com

www.RefreshYourLifeNow@blogspot.com


This post may be reprinted on your blog, website or in your e-zine with my blessing as long as you include the following:  Barbara Greenhouse shares her passions of Food, "Cooking", Cruelty-Free, and the Sharing of Unbiased Information for a healthy and informed world.  She guides her clients through their journey to live their dreams, easily and holistically, with compassion and with delicious live raw foods.  She is currently authoring her first book, "Sacred You, The Delicious Journey"®    © copyright refreshyourlifenow, - 2011 Connecticut, USA

Is Your Body a Sacred Temple?

Realizing that my body is a Sacred Body Temple created a major shift in my life.  It allowed making the changes I wanted come to life.  I was able to refresh my life.  Can it for you? Absolutely. 

So what does it all mean?  Simply that every cell and every fiber of your body and mind are Sacred, connected to, and filled with the Life Force energy and the creative energy.   This requires the healthiest, smartest practices for your body as a whole and for your thoughts as well.  You have a deep connection to the divine, on all levels. This is holistic living, the interconnections of body, thoughts, the Divine and the world you live in.

Each system in your body does miraculous processes for you every moment of the day.  Every group of cells in the process, every cell in the group, down to the components of each cell hum 24-7 to keep you healthy, functioning and full of energy to carry out all that you do, consciously or unconsciously, all day and night.   Pretend for a moment that you are a car, a car built to run on High Test fuel, not sand, not water and not Regular. Your cells have many components and the KEY is to keep them nourished with what they require, not necessarily what you want to feed them to live a vibrant, joyful, balanced life.  Your bodies and cells are like the car example above. You and I were created to run on High Test.

Compassion is a very important aspect along with your Sacred Body Temple to refresh your life into a holistic lifestyle, one aligned with your core beliefs, your deepest yearnings, your dreams. You can read my article on Compassion here.  In essence, it is to run optimally physically and consciously for you to feel and look your best, to be able to live in alignment with all that is deeply important to you while being connected to the divine, the spark of creation of all.  It allows you to live a healthy life, live YOUR deepest dreams not your parents, not your best friends, not your spouses, the list can go on. Yours!

My formula to Refresh Your Life is simple, all encompassing, and takes some work. But the results!

            

I am your support, your net, I will keep you accountable, and you will stay on track.  You see, aligning to your Sacred within, being Compassionate with yourself and your thoughts keeps you naturally committed.  You will be deeply committed to You. 


Success = Sacred > Compassion > Commitment> Transformation ® TM


If you are as excited about this as I am, give me a call or email me and we will  schedule a time to talk about Refreshing Your Life Now. 




Barbara

203-216-6889

RefreshYourLifeNow@gmail.com

www.RefreshYourLifeNow@blogspot.com


This post may be reprinted on your blog, website or in your e-zine with my blessing as long as you include the following:  Barbara Greenhouse shares her passions of Food, "Cooking", Cruelty-Free, and the Sharing of Unbiased Information for a healthy and informed world.  She guides her clients through their journey to live their dreams, easily and holistically, with compassion and with delicious live raw foods.  She is currently authoring her first book, "Sacred You, The Delicious Journey"®    © copyright refreshyourlifenow, - 2011 Connecticut, USA

Compassion a Word with Depth and What It Can Do For You

We could speak about the depths of Compassion for hours if not days.  It is that important.

God is an all compassionate God.  When you are compassionate you feel it deeply towards yourself and others. It is an emotion where on the one hand you are "judgmental" because you see an issue, yours or someone elses and on the other hand you are moved to act divinely once the issue is seen.

We are taught so many things in life directly from those we know and love, friends, society and through assimilation.  We learn how to be judgemental unconsciously early on in life.   When you understand and live with Compassion you are liberated from being judgemental, you are more loving to yourself and others, those most often judged by society and to animals. In other words, it is non-violence towards your body and within your mind.

How does this relate to Refresh Your Life Now?  When you treat yourself with Compassion you are not cruel to yourself, you do not live in fear, you do not sabotage yourself, you do not criticize yourself, and you do not judge yourself.  You simply acknowledge "what is" and lovingly let it go.  You substitute your "what is" with your yearnings, your hearts desires, with love.  You know that you deserve what ever the new "what is", is.  There is no regret, you feel great about it! The results happen in steps or fairly quickly depending on the what your "what is", is.

Some of you may have more than one area in your lives where Compassion would be a

beneficial practice.  Examples might be image issues due to your weight, disfigurement, acne; beating yourself up for not realizing or doing something, you know the swirling thoughts in your head:  Why do I do this constantly, why don't I do that? Why do I procrastinate all the time, I get nothing done, I'm worthless. What's wrong with me, why can't I ...support my family,...keep weight off..., heal? and on and on.

When you think about it and when you are aligned with your deepest yearnings you become less stressed, and less negative.  You also become more positive, more excited, more joyful, more energized (I like to say jazzed) more loving and more happy.  Your thoughts and actions are in balance, your mood is cheerful.  I believe we all want that.

If you are as excited about this as I am, give me a call or email me and we will  schedule a time to talk about Refreshing Your Life Now.




Barbara

203-216-6889

RefreshYourLifeNow@gmail.com

www.RefreshYourLifeNow@blogspot.com


This post may be reprinted on your blog, website or in your e-zine with my blessing as long as you include the following:  Barbara Greenhouse shares her passions of Food, "Cooking", Cruelty-Free, and the Sharing of Unbiased Information for a healthy and informed world.  She guides her clients through their journey to live their dreams, easily and holistically, with compassion and with delicious live raw foods.  She is currently authoring her first book, "Sacred You, The Delicious Journey"®    © copyright refreshyourlifenow, - 2011 Connecticut, USA

To Die-t or Not To Die-t, is This Your Question?

My take is, one should not be deprived or feel deprived if one is to be happy.  While mulling over one problem that looms large in many, many lives, perhaps even yours, is this thing called a die-t. Notice how the word die is in it. How positive is that!

I love playing with words and word games.  Within die-t are four, four letter words that simplify the process of transition associated with weight loss, but where the benefits are much greater and transformation into a new lifestyle occurs.

Die-t = deprivation, lack; the ultimate setup to failure

Tied  = tied into or hooked in, to deprivation and failure

Edit  = change, make the decision to modify and change

Tide  = breakaway, changing the tide to transform, go from the ebb, the old ways, to flow the

             new  ways, your dream, goal, alignment to your core beliefs and hearts desires - your

             life plan

Lifestyle = your life plan, you connect with how you want to live - for the reasons and ideals

             important to you, to your passions, no one else, only to you.  This is simple, all

             encompassing, and takes some work. But the results!

            

I am here to teach you how to do this, sharing the keys to achieve success for whichever OMG you wake up to every morning where you want to pull the covers back up and over your head. 

So before you go, head on down to the comments section below this post and tell me what swirls are going round and round in your head keeping you up all night.
  

Give me a call to start you on your journey to a vibrant, happy life. We will schedule a time to talk about Refreshing Your Life Now.





Barbara

203-216-6889

RefreshYourLifeNow@gmail.com

www.RefreshYourLifeNow@blogspot.com


This post may be reprinted on your blog, website or in your e-zine with my blessing as long as you include the following:  Barbara Greenhouse shares her passions of Food, "Cooking", Cruelty-Free, and the Sharing of Unbiased Information for a healthy and informed world.  She guides her clients through their journey to live their dreams, easily and holistically, with compassion and with delicious live raw foods.  She is currently authoring her first book, "Sacred You, The Delicious Journey"®    © copyright refreshyourlifenow, - 2011 Connecticut, USA