Oral Health: From Flossing to Tongue Scraping

As I’ve journeyed through health I’ve constantly come back to see just how important oral care is.

The environment in your mouth is a reflection of your internal world. Via your mouth, you get to engage directly with your skeleton (through your teeth), and in your soft tissue (through your gums).  Your mouth truly is an indicator of what’s going on inside. 

When you become aware of and attend to the care of your oral terrain, this awareness is going to extend to your internal terrain.

The first thing you will notice is that your whole mouth is alive. It is a living system including your teeth, and your teeth have circulation. They are alive. When you breathe, they breathe. So let’s move away from this concept that teeth are just dead things in our mouth that we need to brush every now and then. 

Flossing

The most foundational thing for oral mouth care is to FLOSS. I know it’s weird for me to be telling y’all to floss your teeth - but it’s really important. You actually floss out those little bits of food matter that decay and then lead to an accumulation of bad bacteria and off-gassing. 

Tongue Scraping

I get up first thing in the morning and I wanna ensure that anything that I’d been detoxifying in my sleep and that’s been coming up in that little furry layer on the back of my tongue, I scrape off and get out and away from my body. 

I’ll scrape it off and look at what I brought up. Yeah, it’s a little – ewww, gross – then I’ll wash that off and I’m on my way. 

It’s the first thing I do when I wake up in the morning and I do that again at the end of the day. 

Brushing

After flossing and tongue scraping another important thing is brushing. 

I like to use a bamboo toothbrush with charcoal on it, and a clay-based toothpaste. When I brush, I do it very gently.  I don’t go out and brush my gums real hard, more of a flicking energy and this little bit of intention just permeates, represents a softness and a gentleness you’re having on your whole body, taking the time to consciously brush, ensuring you get to all those little areas. 

Flushing

Another thing you can do after you’ve had a meal is to gargle with water, wash it through, and spit it out. This will ensure that food particles in your teeth and gums don't remain there for hours after eating - thus eliminating the environment where bacteria thrive.  We all know that bacteria cause bad breath - so gargle folks!