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What is the Best Water?

More Water = Less Efficient Filtering?

I got an interesting e-mail a while back: I thought you might find this interesting, Tonya. In the Ladies Home Journal (Christie Brinkley on the cover, July 2009, page 141), a study is quoted … 'in fact, there’s evidence your body is less efficient at filtering out toxins when your water intake is higher.’ That, Tonya, is what you say in your books!!!

Gosh, I love being confirmed—whether by science or the Ladies Home Journal. I grew up in the former Soviet Union. In our area the water was bad. No one ever encouraged us to drink water. In fact, I don’t ever remember drinking a plain full glass of water. We always had to boil it first and then use it in a tea, or soup, or some other cooked creation.

Lots of Water But Dry Skin

These days we are inculcated from every direction: Drink lots of water. It sure looks like even while we are drinking plain water in large quantities as never before in history, yet dry skin is almost epidemic. Something obviously is amiss. Drinking water for hydration does seem logical—after all, our body is mostly water. Why then do I hear, almost daily: “I drink lots of water, but my skin is still dry”?  To paraphrase Goethe: the truth never lies on the surface.

I’m often asked what type of water I recommend for drinking and what type of filtration system one should use. Should it be spring water, distilled water? Or maybe still alkaline water, or ionized water? Or even better, silver water? When I am asked this question, I honestly say: I don’t know, nor do I think it will become a topic of my research in the future.

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I Don't Drink Water

Why? I’m in a unique position: I no longer drink water, in the conventional sense. So it’s a subject of almost no direct concern for me. After 14 years following a 100 percent raw food lifestyle, I have no need for free water. Dry skin was a problem for me in my 30s, now in my 50s it is no longer an issue. Am I dehydrated? Quite the opposite. People always want to know the secret of my youthful skin.

Biologically Active Water

Fresh squeezed juices and foods with high water content, including young coconuts, contain what’s known as biologically active water. This is what I consume exclusively, and the only kind I recommend wholeheartedly. This is water which still retains all of its original ‘information’ and structure. It has not been altered in any way, and your body recognizes and uses it perfectly. Moreover, this water will have exactly the right alkaline content needed.

After my hot yoga class, I simply eat half a watermelon, cantaloupe or honey dew melon or drink the ‘milk’ from a fresh coconut. Add my vegetable juice and some fruits or a green smoothie during the day, and I’m never thirsty. Nor dehydrated.

Get Your Water from Fruit and Veggie Sources

I now get all the water I need directly from the hydrating juices and whole raw foods. I think this is my secret. But a caution … This is not something I recommend for everyone at beginning stages of their raw food transition and are still detoxing. It is what I call an ‘advanced practice’ in the raw food lifestyle.  Be sure to read my Quantum Eating and get the full story. Remember a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

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While transitioning and still going through cleansing, you must drink plenty of water. If you reach a point, as I eventually did, where you no longer consume cooked or dehydrated food, basically any food that has had the biologically active water removed, then you can receive all you need from "waterful" raw foods and vegetable juices in your diet.

I encourage you to focus on getting most of your hydration needs met by consuming the water found in fruits, vegetables and their juices. Beyond that, you’ll need to educate yourself and obtain all the information you can on the types of water filters and purification methods available and decide how each might fit your particular needs and goals.