The silly season has passed and now its time to pull in the reigns and sort out your inner systems right? All those toxins from the yummy food, alcoholic drinks and chemically treated food has left you feeling flat and out of sorts. Yep, its time to do something about it! But what foods are going to be the best ones to help? Maybe no food at all; just juice and water for three days? Lets not get too extreme!

I wanted to share a few tips on some simple lifestyle modifications to optimise your body’s own detoxification processes, no supplementation or starvation needed!

Firstly, there are 4 primary ways our body will eliminate “waste”. These are urination through the kidneys, perspiration through the skin, defecation by the bowels and expiration through the lungs. Follow these simple but effective lifestyle habits to stimulate all these systems to work effectively. Every. Single. Day.

1. Upon waking in the morning drink 1 Litre of water (add a pinch of pink salt for better effect).

So simple. Why? During the night we will lose a small amount of body weight by breathing out water vapour in our breath, about 1 Litre. As a way to conserve water lose, our kidneys will limit excretion by reabsorbing water. We can simply reverse this by replacing the water that is lost and stimulating the urination process. A pinch of salt can help absorption of water across cell membranes to aid with hydration.

2. Perform some light fasted cardio in the morning

Right after drinking your water and before eating anything, go out and perform some light cardio, think jogging, brisk walking or cycling. This is where the magic happens!

Performing light exercise like this will aid your digestive system in its peristaltic movements and has the added bonus of helping pass stools or to be more technical; defecation.

While you are exercising, it’s likely your metabolism will start to increase to meet energy demands. This is associated with an increase in body temperature, which must be controlled. Our body does this by shunting blood to the skin and allowing our sweat glands to open.

Also while you are exercising, your body will be producing co2, which needs to be expelled. An increase in co2 will stimulate a faster and deeper rate of breathing which is the forth way in which we rid our body of waste, through expiration.

Within one hour of waking you have stimulated all four detoxification systems as set yourself up for a great day ahead. Clear out the bowels, get sweaty, take a nice long pee and get a little puffed! Do this on the reg for a far greater detoxification effect.