Here‘s an interview w/ Matt Stone of 180 Degree Health on Natural Maven about his take on juicing.

I think it’s interesting that he advocates against drinking yucky green stuff or a lot of vegetable juice, especially if you find it yucky, and adding a bit of salt to 1/2 diluted juice (homemade Gatorade, anyone?).

He also recommends against juice fasts. You can read the details.

I now drink juice instead of the giant glass of water I used to have first thing in the morning. I have had a really hard time relaxing about the juice, and doing some of the other things I need to in order to raise my metabolism, in part because of my deeply ingrained fear of sugar and salt. When I was a kid, we used to have a kelp shaker on the table instead of salt and/or pepper. The first dozen years or so of my life included pretty minimal processed sugar intake – I still remember the gross smell of molasses and honey mixed in with the fake maple syrup on our pancakes, and turning down sweets at school (we were well-trained!). I always wondered why the cookies sourced from outside our house were crunchy and white, while ours were always like brown, cake hockey pucks.

And just like when I was a kid, we’ve still got lots of health gurus out there telling us to avoid the demon sugar, and all the old medical beliefs still circulating about salt consumption and blood pressure. I can’t remember a time when my grandmother wasn’t avoiding salt on doctor’s orders to reduce her hypertension (or so they thought – doesn’t seem like it worked well, or at all).

So far, the results of Matt’s suggestions are good and my metabolism seems better. I’m warmer, calmer, happier, and – I am even voluntarily turning down sugar and wanting to dilute my juice now. I seem repelled by stimulants lately, as well – my years-long, dark chocolate addiction seems to have disappeared. Tried to eat a square of dark chocolate and could barely gag it down. No desire for coffee, or caffeine, either. It seems the body might be trusted, after all!

Now if I could just get myself to bed on time…