What type of example are we setting for our children by blaming our being overweight on our genes?

Scenario: A wife eats an entire pint of Ben & Jerry's Phish Food ice cream and blames her husband for purchasing it because he should know that she has a weakness for this type of ice cream.

Question: Who is at fault for the wife eating an entire pint of ice cream and showing no restraint?

Scenario: An adult mother blames her genes for the reason she's overweight. Her parents are overweight so she's destined to be overweight.

Question: Who is at fault for her weight problem?

True, some of us have genes that could make us more prone to retain fat, but it's the WAY we eat that makes us overweight and we have control over the WAY we eat!

The Pima Indian tribe was always fit; that is, until they started eating the Standard American Diet and adopting the Standard American Sedentary Lifestyle. Now the tribe is experiencing epidemic obesity and diabetes. It's the WAY they ate by adopting poor eating habits, combined with their inactivity, that caused their weight problem.

What type of role models are we setting for our children if we do not take responsibility for our actions? Do we realize what message we're sending to our children when we blame our being overweight on our parents and our genes?

We would love to support you on your road to

Finding the Diet that is Best for Your Body Type: Being Honest with Yourself

I saw a friend Saturday morning at yoga who experienced a highly traumatic event five years ago. Through this period, she's read countless self-help books and embarked on an intensive spiritual path to understand how this could have happened and to alleviate the pain. On the surface, she was always upbeat, but I suspected that there must be going on inside.

When I saw her Saturday morning, I detected a more melancholy mood that I had never witnessed in her. I asked her what she had planned for the summer and she said, "Nothing. No fancy vacations. I'm not making any plans. I'm taking this period to regroup."

As I practiced yoga, it struck me all the paths we take to escape the pain, instead of confront it, the way my friend is. Some of us escape in harmful ways through alcohol, drugs and, of course, food. Others of us take a seemingly more "healthy" path and turn to sports and reading countless self-help books.

There comes a time, though, that if we really want to deal with the pain and alleviate it, we have to do what my friend is doing and just sit with it and figure it out for ourselves.

I remember when I was going through my own painful time and a friend said to me that if I really want to feel my best, I had to eat only raw foods. So, I tried it for a year. Now a raw food diet may be great for some body types, but not mine. I was too thin and my stomach was terribly distended. People in the raw food world told me that I wasn't food combining properly; yet, no matter what I did, nothing alleviated the discomfort, until I started adding healthy cooked foods back into my diet.

This was a very important experience for me because it taught me that I had to find the diet that worked best for my body-type. Remember, one person's food is another person's poison.

This is precisely what the JOOS Cleanse will help you do: put you on a path to discover what diet plan is best for your body so that you feel healthier and more vibrant.

We would love to support you on your road to a healthier lifestyle.

Are you hydrating yourself properly this summer?

Many beverages are NOT hydrating, including soda, coffee, tea, milk, pasteurized juices and alcoholic beverages.

In the heat, we need an extra boost, which is why we turn to drinks with electrolytes. but many of the sports drinks that contain these electrolytes, including many sports drinks, also contain sugars and high fructose corn syrup.

The best solution I've found so far is to add a small amount of Himalayan pink crystal salt to pure water.

I'd love to hear your suggestions about hydrating!

Change Your Brain, Change Your Life...and perhaps eat healthier while you're at it!

Here is a very powerful exercise that I am borrowing from Daniel Amen, MD, author of Change your Brain, Change Your Life.

On one sheet of paper, write down your vision of how you would like to see your relationships with your spouse/partner, your children, your business colleagues, your community and, or course, with food.

At the bottom of that paper, write the question "Is my behavior consistent with my vision?"

Each day, read the vision you wrote and ask yourself if you are behaving in a way that you are reaching your vision.

Sometimes we need tools to help us change our behavior so that we can realize our vision. For example, we may seek the help of a psychologist or a nutritionist. We may go to yoga or church or synagogue to pray.

Here is obviously where the JOOS Cleanse can help you: It can put you on a path to sustainable, healthy eating habits.

We would love to support you on your road to a healthier

What are those cancer causing foods and why are you eating them?

I am in the midst of reading a fascinating and highly informative book called Anti-Cancer by David Servan-Schreiber, MD, PhD. Even if you don't have cancer, I highly recommend it. I will be quoting studies from it over the next couple of weeks because this book is filled with ground breaking material how we can prevent and cure cancer through our diet.

Dr. Servan-Schreiber states that "certain foods in our diet can act as fertizers for tumors, and others, to the contrary, harbor precious anticancer molecules. As recent discoveries show, those go far beyond the usual cvitamins, minerals and antioxidants."

The food cancer promoters unsurprisingly include high glycemic index foods (i.e. sugar, white flour, etc.), hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oils, sunflour, soy and corn oil, conventional dairy products, fried foods, chips and fried appetizers, nonorganic red meat and eggs, poultry skin and skins of nonorganic fruits and vegetables (since pesticides cling to their skin).

These are the foods that we urge you to eliminate during the JOOS Cleanse. The cleanse acts to kick start sustainable healthy eating habits. As a result, you should feel more energetic, strenghten your immune system and get rid of excess weight.

No JOOS Delivery on Monday, July 5th in observance of the Independence Day Holiday

Just a friendly reminder that we will not be delivering on Monday July 5, 2010 in observance of the Independence Day Holiday.

Deliveries to H.Y.P. Studio in Needham and BodyScapes in Lexington will be T,W,F for this week only.

We will resume regular deliveries on Tuesday, July 6th. Orders may be placed at orders@drinkjoos.com. For questions or comments please contact us at info@drinkjoos.com or call 617-942-JOOS (5667).

Have a safe and enjoyable holiday weekend.

To Your Health!