Quality drinking water is probably the most important but underrated factor for good health. With our bodies being estimated to be up to 75% water, it doesn’t take a lot of critical thinking to understand that the quality of water we put inside our body is going to have a dramatic effect on our health.
Unfortunately, most people still are not getting it right and are consuming inferior (and toxic) water that could easily be rectified with a little knowledge and a hook up to the best proven sources.
Here are some reviews of the most common water sources, so you can make a better decision about your hydration.
Tap water
If you have been paying attention to any alternative health websites, you already know that tap water is the worst source of “approved” waters known to man. Riddled with chemicals like fluoride, chlorine, and VOC’s (volatile organic compounds), tap water has probably been the most dangerous and widespread experiment of all time.
Fluoride has been shown to increase cavities and bone fractures, create behavioural problems, and weaken the brain and thyroid. Chlorine has been tagged with an observed rise in allergies. VOC’s have leeched into the public water supply through industrial farming practices, which adds another layer of poisoning to tap water.
Bottom line, regardless of what you have been told by your municipality, its best to steer clear of using tap water for drinking.
Bottled water
Bottled water seems to have been the upgrade from tap water, but the irony now is that companies like Pepsi are now admitting that bottled water is nothing more than tap water! To add another punch in the gut, consider that the plastic containers of these water bottles leech xenoestrogens into the water, creating another dangerous layer of toxicity that ruins hormone function.
In a simple pH test, this author found that a popular source of bottled water measured at 5.7 on the pH scale. In comparison, most clean filtered water will be above 7, and a pure spring water can be as high as 8.5. Keep in mind that 1 point on a pH scale is a exponential difference.
If you ever have to choose bottled water, look for glass containers (which will signal to you the manufacturer cares about the container and the planet).
Distilled Water
Distilled water is another “healthier version” of drinking water, and it is with respect to its absence of chemicals. However, it can also be classed as “dead” water due to the removal of trace minerals which also makes it slightly more acidic.
If choosing distilled, make sure to eat a largely produce filled diet that contains these nutrients, or add a pinch of pink sea salt to add some of the minerals back in.
Reverse Osmosis Water
Sometimes referred to as the “white flour” of water, reverse osmosis (RO) water is great for cleaning, but not so much for drinking. Like distilled, it is a “dead” water that lowers its natural alkalinity and removes trace minerals. So if you do choose RO water, add that pink sea salt in again to remineralize it.
Alkaline water
In recent years alkaline water systems were considered the holy grail of water systems. Although they do have their benefits for certain periods of time and with a certain segment of the population, you need to keep in mind that the pH of them is unnaturally high.
So even though they do deliver exceptional active hydrogen and abundant colloidal mineral content, their use long term has a little asterisk beside it due to pH levels that often exceed 10, and can be as high as 12 or 13. This should not be considered healthy long term even if the majority of the population is highly acidic, as it will slowly weaken your stomach acid, one of your primary defences to unfriendly pathogens.
In comparison, the benchmark for water pH is between 7.5 and 8.5.
Spring water
When properly sourced, this is the purest and most hydrating water one can get their hands on. Not only is it “alive”, but it is full of minerals and oxygen. Spring water is the gold standard of water (provided by nature, of course), and if it is available to you (not in bottles, but at stations or a real spring), you should make it a priority to secure it for your water needs.
To find out if you have a source close to you, visit Find A Spring.
Filtered water
A very popular way to improve water quality, water filters have come a long way to filtering out various contaminants from the public water system, without removal of other important trace minerals. However, many brands on the market are for “show” only and are terrible at actually removing common toxins found in water supplies.
Fortunately, Natural News has done independent testing on water filters and has separated the best from the rest. For more details on this filtered water report, and more details on all of these sources of water, visit Guide to Drinking Water.
Sources of this article include:
http://healingthebody.ca/guide-to-drinking-water/
http://www.trueactivist.com/pepsi-admits-that-its-aquafina-bottled-water-is-just-tap-water-coca-colas-dasani-is-next/
About the author:
Derek Henry took a deadly health challenge that conventional medicine couldn’t solve and self-directed a one-in-a-million health journey that found him happier and healthier than he had been in his entire life. As a result of this rewarding journey, he created Healing the Body and became a well revered holistic health coach who now spends his time writing, coaching, and educating thousands of people each month who want to enjoy similar results.
His Wellness Transformation E-Guide and THRIVE Online Health Program are two essential resources for anyone who wishes to have the intelligence and answers to become truly well.
You can find his experience derived and heavily researched articles at his website Healing the Body and his one of a kind holistic health program, THRIVE, here.
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