Gwyneth Paltrow - The Clean Plate: Eat, Reset, Heal

L ife is messy. Its supposed to be. Everyone I know, myself included, is juggling too many things. But we also dont want to be told to slow down or to give something up. If anything, I hear from friends, already with full plates, about other projects theyre looking to take on: the next school event theyve signed on to work, boards theyve recently joined, causes they want to champion, or new relationships theyre investing time in. In the background of all this productivity and duty and excitement, I hear a common refrain thats all too relatable. Its typically pushed to the side, downplayed, or simply drowned out: I dont feel great.

Theres so much thats outside our control, but how do we begin to claim some autonomy over our own health and well-being? What levers can we pull that can make a difference in how we feel? And how do we do this without sacrificing, without saying no to the things we want to say yes to, without pulling back at the office or at home or anywhere else?

Everyones toolbox for optimal wellness looks different. For me, the most powerful reset button is food. I dont know any magic bullets, but eating clean comes close. (Although I have to say that good sleep is high up on the list for me, too.) Theres a marked difference, for the better, in how I feel, and to a lesser degree how I look, when Im eating at least fairly clean.

When I say clean, a lot of people picture me living off foods like kale, oat milk, kelp powder, wheatgrassand who knows what other foods that I would never actually eat. I also typically do a cleanse only once a year, which is not about punishing my body for enjoying things like burgers and whiskey the rest of the year. Eating clean as a baseline, or full-on, for a set period of time isnt a moral choice, and it shouldnt have to feel like an act of deprivation.

Of course, I see why it looks that way. At the core of almost every cleanse Ive tried thats workedin at least giving me more energyis cutting out a specified set of ingredients from your diet for a set amount of time. The ingredients excluded on most cleanses are processed foods and sugars, gluten, dairy, red meat, soy, peanuts, nightshades, alcohol, and caffeine. In general, these foods are more likely to be associated with sensitivities, inflammatory reactions, and ) has called them toxic triggers, which, he explains, can compromise the integrity of the gut lining and health of the intestinal flora. You may have heard the functional medicine phrase leaky guta condition in which the gut lining is perforatedwhich is thought to be connected to a host of health issues. Dr. Junger has explained to me that the gut is the most complex system in the bodyit processes food, absorbs nutrients, eliminates toxins, helps to regulate mood, and is home to about 70 percent of our immune system and a nervous system larger than the one inside our skulls.

It makes sense: When the gut is off, the body isnt running optimally. And when people eliminate or at least limit their toxic triggers, the results can be dramatic and all-encompassingsome notice improvements in their skin complexion, others less bloat, and some a more level mood, for starters. But maybe the most rewarding effect of switching to a cleaner diet is the ability to better tune into what your body likes and what it prefers to do without. If you dont know if youre sensitive to cheese or nightshades like eggplants, removing basic inflammatory triggers for an extended period of time (twenty-one days seems to be a threshold) gives you a cleaner slate to find out. After, assuming you have the time and patience to reintroduce food groups one at a time, you can see how each ingredient affects you or not. (I also recommend getting tested for food sensitivities and allergies if its a concern.)

Admittedly, part of the reason eating clean is associated with deprivation is that, once you remove things like mozzarella and pasta, the food offerings on the table have not traditionally been all that exciting. This was partly the impetus behind my cookbook Its All Good