So Much Happier Blog
So Much Togetherness
“There is no such thing as fun for the whole family.”
If you are in one of the many places in the world that are self-isolating right now, then you have been experiencing multiple challenges. One of those is a LOT more time with family and pets who may be used to having a lot more space and alone time. I came across an article on how to keep the peace with you loved ones, and I thought I’d share it for your health and enjoyment!
You can find that here. In addition, know that anytime we undergo big changes to our routines and have to turn on a dime as we have recently, it’s very normal to feel confused, overwhelmed, frustrated, afraid, annoyed, and to be tempted to lash out at others. That doesn’t tend to go well, though, so I suggest you plan to do extra work on yourself and your inner life right now. Taking a little of the time you normally spend on commuting, doing errands, attending social engagements, etc. to do calming activities like taking a bath, writing in a journal, reading a good book, or Tapping can be a huge help in managing all the rapid change you’ve been enduring. Life will begin to pick up again at some point, but for now, don’t try to pretend this isn’t hard.
Some Research on Positive Results of Tapping
“If you ask what is the single most important key to longevity, I would have to say it is avoiding worry, stress and tension. And if you didn’t ask me, I’d still have to say it.”
This week, I know many of us are dealing with changes to our everyday routines due to public health imperatives, so I’ll keep it short and sweet. At times like this when we’re under all kinds of stress due to global events and distressing local realities, we really need to be managing our inner lives in order to stay healthy (in addition to following the guidance of public health experts, of course). In case you still haven’t gotten up and running with Tapping, below are some links that show evidence of how much it can help our bodies to adapt positively in a variety of situations. If you know someone else who is on the fence about it because it seems strange at first glance, you might want to pass along these links to them. Even if you do Tap regularly, you still might want to check out some of this information, as it’s always interesting to see how others are succeeding with Tapping. Now’s the time for all of us to be using these amazing, free techniques to keep ourselves in the game.
EFT International's Research Page
EFT Universe Science and Research Page
The Tapping Solution's Research Page
I hope you find these links helpful, and I wish you peace and health as we all navigate these strange times in which we find ourselves. Have a safe and sane week!
A Simple Way Toward All the Good Stuff
“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.”
If you’re reading this, it’s at least partly because you like finding ways to make your life better, happier, and more inspiring through methods that only require a reasonable, doable amount of effort. Am I right? In this spirit, this week, I wanted to pass on a link to an article about something that is simple, yet so powerful in helping you to feel better about your life almost instantly.
There’s a lot more research happening these days on the powers of our behavior, including the internal behaviors of our thoughts and emotions. In this article, we get a short summary on some of the scientific findings about the power of making compassion an intentional part of our lives. Sometimes a simple outlook shift can change everything for the better, and prioritizing compassion is one of the most lauded shifts we can make. Compassion is referred to throughout human history across time, place, and culture as one of the most important components of a life well lived. If you want to increase your satisfaction, your relationships, your overall happiness, not to mention your contribution to making the world a better place, this is a shortcut that you can implement anytime for free just by how you think, and it opens the door to the creation of supportive action and habits.
A few thoughts from me:
Practicing compassion requires us to become aware of and care about another’s experience. This takes us out of ourselves and gives us a break from worrying about our own issues.
Humans are naturally social, and wired to help others. Problems arise when we over-give, so keeping an eye on balance is important, but when we’re in balance, sharing and giving feel great.
When we give in a way that answers what another truly needs, everyone’s happiness is amplified. Keying into what someone else needs may require putting aside our own opinions and preferences. If this is hard for you, Tapping can help you find your calm, centered place. From there, you will be more easily able to hear clearly and let the other person express themselves without jumping in with your own preconceptions. As mentioned above, prioritizing someone else’s needs may be a challenge, but it can also be a relief.
Listening is highly educational. You just might find that when you put a bit more attention on listening, you’ll learn a whole lot about how others think and experience the world, not to mention other random topics they’re concerned about, which may be interesting as well.
True leadership starts with listening, and if you both listen and act on what you hear with compassion (without losing yourself, because you’re an essential part of any interaction), you’ll be able to build a better life for yourself and begin to lead others to better things as well. How can you listen compassionately to someone else this week?
Showing Your Body Some Love
“To keep the body in good health is a duty... otherwise we shall not be able to keep our mind strong and clear.”
If you’re reading this, it’s probably because you’re on the lookout for ways to improve your daily experience of life. If you could be happier, healthier, more energetic, more successful in your personal projects, that would be worth the effort, right? This week, I want to remind you of just how much leverage you can create by taking good care of your physical body.
I think I just heard some groans, because doing the daily work of paying attention to and cultivating health in the body tend not to be people’s favorite things to do. This is not a glamorous job. It’s also not inherently social, because your body is unique, and decoding its signals takes inward focus and trial and error; others can help and offer you companionship throughout this process, but you’re the only one who can know for sure whether your efforts are succeeding. Moving constantly toward more healthy habits takes dedication, and a willingness to stay observant and flexible, because our bodies’ needs change over time. No matter what your goals are in life, care and feeding for a human body that you’d like to last for a good long time is a lifelong side project that takes up energy you could be putting toward other things—many of which will often seem like a lot more fun!
You’ve probably had the experience of recovering from illness and being a amazed at just how great you feel now that you’re no longer feverish, blowing your nose, coughing, etc. On the other hand, when it’s been a while since you’ve been sick, it’s easy to forget how good your normal feels. There’s so much joy that is open to you if you just take a few moments to notice what feels good about your body in any given moment. There’s actually no need for high contrast in order for you to appreciate what your body does well, and why not allow yourself that pleasure? It feels great to take the time to feel good, even if that’s only a minute or so. In addition, getting a tune-up by doing whatever kind of exercise you enjoy, eating healthier food, or utilizing the services of any of a wide variety of practitioners whose job it is to optimize physical functioning can add enormously to your well being.
I was recently reminded of this when I sought out an accupuncturist to help me with healing from a foot injury, and managing pain while I got through the process. Not only did I get help with my specific issue, but because of the wholistic nature of acupuncture and the skill of this practitioner, I immediately noticed a difference in my overall energy and outlook. When I was feeling better overall, it was SO much easier to feel calm and resourceful, as well as resilient in the face of challenge and disappointment.
Now, you all know that I’m a huge proponent of techniques and habits that each of us can learn and master in order to empower ourselves across a wide range of situations that life can throw at us—that’s why I love Tapping so much. It’s simple, and provides quick, reliable, and noticeable results once you learn to use it. And yet, there is so much help available to us in areas where we can’t just do it all ourselves. Sometimes what you need is a surgeon, and let’s face it, there’s no substitute for that! Or you need someone with specific skills, talents, and an outside perspective to light the way forward for you, and assist with the process of change you’re looking to effect. As with your own efforts, it may take trial and error to find modalities and practitioners who are the right fit for you, but when you do, the gains you make can be truly life changing.
Ignoring your physical health and needs may be easy to do when you’re busy (and most of us are!) but it’s also so much easier to be happy when your body is feeling good and running at high capacity. There will always be tension between conflicting demands on your time and focus. You must decide on where to take your ease and where to invest your time and energy in order to create more. Keep an eye out for ways that you can fine tune your body this week, and you’ll have a greater chance of enjoying your life in every moment.
For Your Health
“The key to success is to keep growing in all areas of life - mental, emotional, spiritual, as well as physical.”
This week I’m keeping it short and sweet, sharing an article about why repressing emotion is not the way to go. Think on this quote from the article: “…a 2013 study by the Harvard School of Public Health and the University of Rochester showed people who bottled up their emotions increased their chance of premature death from all causes by more than 30%, with their risk of being diagnosed with cancer increasing by 70%.” Yikes! While I believe that practicing and supporting your own happiness is an incredibly important goal, if you’re not setting aside time for it, maybe this insight will spur your interest in actually making time to work on your emotional health. If you’ve been reading for any length of time, you know that I’m a big fan of Tapping (Emotional Freedom Techniques, in my case), but there are many helpful ways to address how you feel on a daily basis. Whatever allows you to express what’s true for you and hopefully have some fun in the process, get out there and do it this week! It’s important not just for your happiness, but for your long-term health.
A Surprisingly Acrobatic Mineral
“It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver.”
As we've discussed many times before here, the endeavor toward happiness is greatly supported by excellent health, and the resultant high functioning it makes possible. While there is a raging debate on so many aspects of arriving at and supporting good health, including the levels of various nutrients we need for best results, I personally am drawn to constant reading on this subject. We do know through the results of many scientific studies that the human body cannot do without many vitamins and minerals. One of the most versatile seems to be magnesium. You may have heard that it helps us to absorb calcium, which is essential for maintaining healthy bones, and you may have taken it in certain forms for digestive complaints. It might surprise you to know that there are many more essential bodily functions that also require it.
I came across this article this week and wanted to share it because it may give you a sense of what a jack-of-all-trades this humble mineral is, and the different forms of it you might want on your radar. Here's another, in case you want more information, and of course there's a lot more to be found on the good old Internet! Depending on your situation, you might want to look into supplementing with a few of these forms if your diet may not be consistently yielding enough magnesium. Always check with your health professional, but this is one of the substances you don't want to overlook because of the sheer number of highly important functions it supports. That's all for this holiday week. To your continuing vibrant health!
Indulge a Little
“Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance, order, rhythm and harmony.”
This is a holiday week in the U.S. and I want to keep it simple, so today I'll just offer a thought or two about the benefits of enjoying the good things in life. Small indulgences can be a part of living a healthy, balanced life and enjoying the ride; life is hard enough without denying ourselves things that bring us joy. This could include putting down the to-do list long enough to watch the sunset, or savoring a glass of wine here and there. It could mean carving out time to read the kind of book made for a hammock and a summer afternoon. In this spirit, I'd like to pass on some positive facts about about my favorite treat, dark chocolate (and of course there may be positive health-related aspects to whatever your own preferred version of indulgence may be, as many things that relieve stress can be considered healthy). This article lays out some of the known boons of small amounts of high-quality chocolate on our health. Here's another article you might find interesting if chocolate is your vice of choice. Keep in mind that you can find bars made with honey, stevia, and other more healthful sweeteners than sugar if that's your concern! Have a wonderful week and enjoy some small indulgence that you love and can enjoy in moderation.
The Health Risks of Loneliness
“A true community is not just about being geographically close to someone or part of the same social web network. It’s about feeling connected and responsible for what happens. Humanity is our ultimate community, and everyone plays a crucial role.”
There is increasing scientific evidence that loneliness is extremely unhealthy. We all know that it feels bad, but it is now apparent that lonely people have worse health outcomes than those who are not plagued by loneliness, often to a striking degree. This article mentions many ways in which the problem presents itself, but one of the most amazing statistics I found in my travels was that chronic loneliness has negative impact that is comparable to smoking about 15 packs of cigarettes a day! Well, when you put it that way, I guess we all need to pay attention!
There can be many reasons for rampant loneliness, as the causes of it are obviously subjective. Some of the main factors may be:
- The pace of modern life, which leaves little time for the kinds of unhurried interactions in which we build feelings of closeness with others
- The fact that we often don't live in close proximity to those we care most about, when in olden days we would have lived in small villages where everyone knew each other, and everyone we knew was physically close
- Young people may experience a great deal of social isolation until they build social skills and find acceptance in a group of friends. This can take much longer than is healthy
- Older people who made friends in school through proximity with others may not have built adequate social skills to continue making friends throughout life. Social skills are generally not specifically taught, so those not naturally talented in this area may struggle for a lifetime
- Because the expression of emotions is still considered taboo in many ways, those in the midst of adversity may retreat inward; admitting to having difficulty could lead to being judged as weak. They then don't receive the healthy support that could help them get through the tough times, which reinforces the experience of loneliness
- Mental and emotional health assistance is still stigmatized, so many who could really use professional health of some kind don't seek it
- Social media, where many get a lot of their interactions these days, can foment nastiness and resentments in public discourse as much as they connect us with creativity and support
Obviously these are just a smattering of the possible causes of modern loneliness, but do any of these sound familiar? Knowing that your long-term health may depend on it, what do you think you might do differently in order to foster deeper, more satisfying relationships? We'll look more at possible solutions going forward, but why not start thinking about ways that you can make the most of the social time you do get?
How can you stay present with the most important people in your life? If you have a choice to make about how to spend time and one of your choices might deepen a friendship, can you choose that one this week? Can you write a note or have a quick conversation with someone about something meaningful to remind both of you of the bond of trust you share? I bet if you just keep thinking about this in the background of your routines, you can find little ways to appreciate and build the relationships you have in small but impactful ways. Relationships are built and nurtured over time, so there's never a better time to start than now. The benefits of growing better habits are and will remain of the utmost importance to the quality of your health and happiness.
Powering Up
“Energy and persistence conquer all things.”
When you're working on goals that are important to you, no matter the area of your life under which they fall, you're always going to need as much energy as you can muster to keep moving through challenges that will inevitably arise throughout the process. If you can't keep up with the demands of your project physically (in which case your clarity of thinking, willpower, emotional stability, and ability to have faith that your daily actions will build to a final result will also suffer) then you won't have a chance of staying in the game long enough to win. Many of us have heard things like, "I'll sleep when I'm dead," or "I don't need food, just more coffee" uttered as a brag, but imagine what those fueling their lives on bravado and nutritional vapor could do with the support of better choices, and how much happier, healthier, and more stable they could feel while doing it. Not to mention how much more pleasant things would be for those around them! Living out a constant cycle of mania and crash, or just one big crash created by years of imbalance, means that whatever your level of achievement, it's not sustainable. I don't know about you, but I'd rather be unstoppable for as long as I have left on this planet.
Some things we know about energy:
- Sleep is incredibly important for the human body, including the brain. If you don't get enough, the body doesn't heal and recharge itself, and you won't be able to think straight or exercise logic or self-control, not to mention creativity
- Move it or lose it. The more sedentary you are, the less energetic you will feel. You don't have to run marathons, but you need to move and stretch your body every day if you want it to feel good. Check out this article for some compelling information pulled from scientific studies about the incredible ways in which exercise helps you, and some tips on how to get the amount you need to achieve your health goals.
- In order to power all the activity your life requires, your body needs fuel, and not all fuels are the same. Will you fill it with dirty, gunky fuel that will stop up the works (cheap fast food loaded with synthetic chemicals and bad fats) or clean, whole foods that it will recognize and utilize as highly beneficial nutrients? If you want more energy, you know what the answer is. Now, I know that nutrition is one of the most confusing subjects out there for people, because there's so much conflicting information out there. Some of that makes more sense if you follow the money. In any case, I am convinced that the future of nutrition is customization for each unique person, because my body and lifestyle is not yours. My best recommendation is to make a commitment to eating organic, whole foods no matter what, and to experiment from there until you find what works for you. A visit to a professional nutritionist who is familiar with any dietary restrictions you may be working with (allergies, illness, religious restrictions, or what have you) can be one of the best investments you'll ever make, because in the quest for energy, many factors may change, but you will always have to eat.
- The last of the most basic fuels for sustained energy is a sense of purpose. Quite simply, if you don't know what you're doing it all for, you'll give up when the going gets tough. A good life coach or other counselor can help you clarify this if you feel adrift, and help you stay focused on it over time. Any positive vision can provide this sense of purpose, whether it's focused on yourself, people you know, strangers in need, or the world. You decide what vision excites you, plus your level of commitment and the amount of effort you will dedicate, but you must be working toward something, or you'll feel blah and unmotivated.
Next week, we'll look at blocks to sustaining your energy that are less within your control, and how to deal with them and keep moving. Until then, pick an area mentioned above and take some action toward creating more energy!
Exploring the Emotional Jungle
“If you don’t think your anxiety, depression, sadness and stress impact your physical health, think again. All of these emotions trigger chemical reactions in your body, which can lead to inflammation and a weakened immune system. Learn how to cope, sweet friend. There will always be dark days.”
One of the things I've learned about working with emotions is that they exist in a complex, ever-changing ecosystem, and interrelate with many elements of the self and dimensions of one's outer environment. This may seem to be a fairly obvious statement, but I find the degree of complexity of these interactions to be well beyond what most people have had occasion to deeply consider and fully realize. In a culture that tends to sweep emotional experiences under the rug as unimportant and even sometimes shameful, we are not taught how to value the emotional realm and healthfully integrate it into our daily experiences. Beginning to do a better job of this requires that we respect the complexity and the mysterious non-logic that governs emotions, as well as become open to adventures of a new an unfamiliar kind as we learn to effectively navigate this jungle.
In the subconscious, where the vast majority of resistance to change and progress originates, the coin of the realm is emotion; the subconscious speaks in symbol and color, in the way our bodies feel, and in the way our emotions mysteriously interact with all of this. A truth that can be maddening to the logical mind and the ego is that it takes openness to a more feminine-energy process than the analytical mind can comprehend to make progress in these shiftings sands. We're all familiar with the concepts of structured goals and linear processes to get to them, because these are all we've been offered. In fact, we've been so entrained by millennia of masculine-energy, logical-mind-and-discipline glorification that we think to enter the mysterious waters of the subconscious and to let a helpful process evolve organically (which, for some goals, is absolutely the most useful process) is folly, weakness, wishful thinking of the most ridiculous kind. After all, this period of history has given us some excellent understanding about how to use logic and discipline effectively, and there are many great success stories that have resulted from these methods. And yet, when you invest some time in getting to know the vicissitudes of your emotions, you find that there are actually discernible patterns that can guide your journey through them into greater wisdom and effectiveness on a whole different level than can be accomplished only with the accoutrements of the conscious mind.
No matter how much you "understand" where your resistance comes from, as my partner Andrew likes to say, "the mind is not the right tool for every job." You can't "think" yourself out of the physical and emotional effects of trauma, for instance. No amount of pure logic will dislodge entrenched emotional patterns that you learned before you were old enough to notice what was happening. This is what cellular biologist Candice Pert was getting at when she said, "The body is the subconscious mind." Bruce Lipton, another cellular biologist, writes about how the subconscious mind is like a tape recorder. Yelling at the recording won't accomplish anything. If you want to change the recording, you have to overwrite it, and that can happen only at the level of the subconscious mind, which is very much connected to the physical body.
To make things more confusing, though, emotions can be influenced by thoughts, experiences, and words we've encountered at any point in our lives, whether or not they were even ours. When we're children, we pick up a great deal of our learning through observation, and we don't yet have the awareness and intellect to discard the rubbish that gets thrown into our paths. The untold number of chemical reactions and communications going on in the physical body at any given moment influence emotion in subtle and not-so-subtle ways, some of which we can influence with factors like food and exercise. Our emotional habits draw us in certain directions. What's going on around us, including the macro of world events all the way down to the micro of how those closest to us are feeling, influences us. How energy is moving through our body's meridians affects emotion. All of these together form the basis of interactions so complex as to be nearly inscrutable. It can seem as though our emotions behave like wave forms as random as crashing surf on an uneven coastline.
If you want to master the art of working with your emotions, as with any worthwhile goal, it does take some time and commitment. It also takes familiarity with tools designed for this purpose. There's a lot of great information out there on ideas for accepting and working with this essential part of yourself, and I encourage you to seek methods that appeal to and work well for you, realizing that learning anything complex may require trial and error. For me, the use of EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) has been revolutionary because it elegantly incorporates so many essential pieces of the emotional puzzle, surpassing the utility of anything else I know:
- It calms both the body's physical fight/flight/freeze response and the amygdala, the limbic center of the brain (which deals with emotion)
- It helps energy to flow more evenly through the body's energy meridians, which Traditional Chinese Medicine and other systems have recognized as key to the maintenance of human health for thousands of years
- It gives you a strong, calming focus for your mind, acting like a moving meditation with extra benefits
- It facilitates the opening of a conversation with your subconscious mind, allowing game-changing bolts of insight to surface about the origins of your habits/patterns, and your resistance to the changes you want to make in your life
- Overall, it helps you to quiet noise on all levels and get back to feeling a sense of clarity about yourself and your situation, as well as build confidence that you can accomplish the goals you seek
Wherever you are currently on the scale of comfort and facility with your emotions, I hope you find ways to move forward in your exploration, as no one can be whole without greater-than-average skill in this historically neglected area. If you befriend your emotions and learn to value them for the valuable guidance they can offer you, you actually open up new abilities to blaze trails more quickly and with less resistance and confusion and mess than ever before.
Sniff, Cough, Blech
“‘Tis healthy to be sick sometimes.”
No matter how well you take care of yourself, there will be times when you get sick and need to take some time to recover. Modern life is a complex, high-speed high-wire balancing act with a lot of moving parts. Think about it—if you're moving around at all during the day and eating food you haven't produced yourself, then you're constantly coming into contact with various microbes from far-flung locations and all manner of influences that are potentially challenging to your system. Everyone is trying to get our attention for one reason or another, not to mention influence our behavior. We are asked to be more and do more than ever before. We're completely out of touch with natural rhythms because of the 24/7 opportunities technology has produced. We live in a world of high demands and we don't get enough high-quality rest, nutrition, and exercise unless we're really prioritizing our own high functioning. For many reasons, most of us aren't. But even if we are, being human means that sometimes plans go awry.
Which leads me to my main point. Getting sick is not a failing. Sure, it may point out to you some of the ways in which you need to up your game in the arena of your own care and feeding, but it doesn't necessarily mean that everything is out of balance, or that you should have been able to avert this. Our bodies have natural defense systems that respond when they come into contact with invaders, building up immunity to those microbes in the future, but this takes time, and sometimes we experience symptoms until this work is complete. In this case, your body is doing exactly what it's supposed to do.
Sometimes, as our bodies balance with the cacophony of daily influences, a clearing out becomes necessary. Perhaps some substance has accrued to unsustainable levels in the body, and needs to be expelled. This is sort of like spring cleaning, and though I'm not a health specialist of any formal kind, from my own observation, I think this happens to all of us sometimes. Our bodies do their very best to maintain health no matter what we put them through, and they use various tools and options to do that.
When you feel under the weather, it's a fine time to consider what you might do better in supporting your health and balance from the outside, as well as how your own stress levels and mental and emotional discord may have gotten out of control. Stress is now widely understood to be a major risk factor in not just immunity to day-to-day threats like the common cold, but also in more serious health conditions across the board. Look first to the classic trifecta of sleep, exercise, and good nutrition. During times of high demand, you might also want to think about supplementing with herbs such as adaptogens, which help your body to keep returning to balance no matter in which direction you tend to get off track, whether too yin or too yang, "too much" or "too little." It's always best to consult with a professional before trying this, as herbs are powerful, and not generally a one-size-fits-all solution. I'm fortunate to have a close friend who is an accomplished herbalist, but you can probably find someone good locally by checking online reviews for your own and nearby communities. You should also talk to your main health practitioner so that everyone advising you knows what's going on.
To me, it's excellent common sense, now that we know the pervasive corosiveness of stress to our long-term health, to get serious about dealing with it—not just when sick, but on a daily basis. That's why I suggest having a daily practice that addresses this area of your life. Everyone knows that you can't just exercise one time and feel great forever. I'm telling you that you also need to think about what an "emotional gym membership" would look like. Some people get a lot of mileage out of pure expression—talking things out with friends, writing in a journal, creating artwork in any number of media. While I agree that all of those are wonderful outlets, for me, the practice of regularly using EFT has added an exponentially more powerful dimension to the mix. It allows for faster, more complete processing of thoughts and emotions, and facilitates amazing new understanding of self and others in a way that's easier, more enjoyable, and more natural than anything else I've found. Whatever you find appealing, choose to use it more often and you'll most likely find your ability to relax, renew, and heal improving over time. The goal is not a perfect body (impossible) but one that can bounce back from times of higher demand with some measure of grace. When you support it with what it needs, you make that more possible, more probable, with every helpful action. So what will you do this week to build a better set of resources for your body and your long-term health?
You Are What You Eat, So Know What You're Eating!
“Looking good and feeling good go hand in hand. If you have a healthy lifestyle, your diet and nutrition are set, and you’re working out, you’re going to feel good.”
I've just finished reading what I think is an extraordinarily helpful book about food, so I'm interrupting our ordinarily scheduled programming to tell you about it. Before you decide you don't have time for one more "diet" theory, let me just assure you that it's not a strict, one-size-fits-all set of claims. It's The PlantPlus Diet Solution by Dr. Joan Borysenko, and unlike most fad-ish diet books out there, this one examines each of the most familiar concepts currently in vogue about what humans should eat, and provides a summary of the scientific research available regarding them. It explains why each may work well for certain people but not others. It also examines biases and the psychology of different food choices in a way that I found illuminating.
While I have no connection with the book financially or otherwise, I want to highly recommend that you read it. Because of my own personal experiences, I came to the conclusion years ago that each of us is unique, and would do well to observe our own results carefully and personalize our diets accordingly. That is also the conclusion of this book. If that sounds like a daunting task, don't worry! The author lays out the basics of what we currently know about healthy eating, and gives us guidelines on how to figure out what's really best for us. My first introduction to this personalized eating concept was Eat Right for Your Type by Peter J. D'Adamo, which suggests which foods are best for the particular chemistry of each blood type. When I tried the suggestions for mine for two weeks, I found that I felt much better than I had previously, and that convinced me that even within a healthy diet one can enhance it based on trial and error and observation of one's unique body.
There are no doubt many excellent books about sensible eating plans, but this one is also unique in that it lists medical tests you can ask your doctor for that will reveal some of the best guidelines for your personal eating plan. How does your body handle carbohydrates versus fats versus proteins? You're about to find out! There are also recommended tests that will reveal over time how any changes you've made are affecting unhealthy markers like inflammation. Most doctors get almost no training on diet and nutrition in medical school, so they most likely won't do these unless you ask, but these tests can help you avoid eating a "healthy" diet that's all wrong for optimizing your ability to thrive throughout your life. You can gain a lot of insight through observation, but medical testing can really shorten the learning curve and reveal things that most of us just aren't going to be able to tune into.
Even if you're already eating a fresh, organic whole foods diet, the name of the game is now personalization. The difference between illness and brilliant health can be about small but powerful refinements. It might not seem all that exciting to do this detective work, but I'll tell you what is exciting—living a pain-free, high-energy life in a physically fit body. No matter where you're starting, I'd be willing to bet you can make strides toward this vision by focusing some attention on providing your body with its most appropriate fuel. Even if you don't get those medical tests done right away, you'll finish the book having acquired an excellent basis for making food choices with increased understanding. Science will keep evolving, but why not utilize the best of what's currently available? This book covers some technical information, but remains pretty fun to read, and I think you'll find it useful as you make your daily food choices.
Gene Pool: Sink or Swim?
“Aging is not lost youth but a new stage of opportunity and strength.”
The unfortunate effects of aging, like lower energy levels, physical discomforts, waistline increase, and grumpiness, are normal. Right? That's what we're told, and it seems like these things are inevitable. After all, older people who manage to avoid the worst of these seem few and far between; we tend to think of them as lucky ducks who inherited gold-standard genes. But recent discoveries are showing us that we actually have far more power to affect our own gene expression than we've been taught. Bruce Lipton’s book, The Biology of Belief, examines how cells function in relation to their environment, and explains how genes are turned on and off by environmental factors; he also touches on how many areas of scientific study, including biology, are woefully behind the times because the discoveries of quantum physics have never been accepted and incorporated into their thinking. The book is a fascinating explanation of how much power we have to affect the way our bodies function, and about how much of the body’s functioning happens at the non-material, energetic level. Dr. Lipton is one of the pioneers of the new field of epigenetics, which delves into the mechanisms behind how environment (everything but gene sequence) affects physical functions. Dawson Church’s Genie in Your Genes is also chock-full of interesting data about how our environments and actions affect life span and quality of life. For example, he writes that according to James W. Vaupel at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany, identical twins, who may lead very different lives and develop different habits, die an average of ten years apart! They have the same genes. Environment, physical and mental/emotional, seems to be what makes the difference.
The idea that stress adversely affects our health in myriad ways may be familiar to you. That's been borne out in numerous studies over decades now, and you may have observed in your own life that when you're stressed out and worn down, that's when you're most likely to get sick. I know that this seems to be true for me. Learning to change one’s mindset to better cope with upsets, then, is an obvious way to decrease wear and tear on our bodies. In The Tapping Solution for Pain Relief, Nick Ortner writes about the surprising fact that pain is not an inevitability even when physical condition would suggest it should be, and vice versa: “Studies show that many people whose X-rays reveal a herniated disc have no pain, while others whose X-rays reveal no herniated disc (or any other abnormalities) report excruciating pain.” There is clearly something going on here that’s not purely physical. The placebo effect, which is widely acknowledged in the medical community, allows people to improve in health only because they think they will; the nocebo effect is the opposite, and causes a person to decline in health only because they think they must. I find it heartening knowing that these effects operate with such regularity. That means I have the power to affect my own health with the choices I make every day.
In fact, in my own work, I've found it amazing how lightening the load of one's long-standing emotional buildup can relieve both physical discomforts and the negative beliefs and thought loops that feed dissatisfaction. As we move through life, it's inevitable that we will encounter disappointments and difficulties large and small. If we don't have healthy ways to release the confusion, resentments and bitterness that often result, these will begin to affect us in ways that are profound, but often remain hidden. Tension mounts, whether we are aware of it or not, and I believe that this is a primary cause of the collection of symptoms that we ascribe to the process of aging. When someone uses EFT/Tapping (or other effective techniques that combine physical, emotional, and mental elements) for a physical issue, he can take care of the portion of the cause that may have been emotional in nature, and effects may be noticeable immediately. However, there are also many accounts of people using EFT and finding that it didn't seem to work, only to notice a few days or even weeks later that the problem they addressed with EFT is suddenly gone. When this happens, it seems to me to demonstrate that when we can get ourselves out of the way mentally and emotionally, the body can do its thing and heal itself with much greater efficiency.
I love that there are so many brilliant people now studying the complicated, holistic functioning of the human form, and I enjoy reading about what these people are learning every day. But I still find that what’s most exciting to me is having tools at my fingertips that make it possible for me to make progress of my own each day in a way that’s safe and satisfying. EFT fits that bill for me, helping me to make change toward a calm, peaceful inner life every time I use it, and to leverage a more buoyant perspective over time. While nothing will solve all your problems at once, and there will always be a place for professional medical help and advice, there are many wonderful techniques you can learn to support your health and happiness. I hope knowing that what you think about and how you feel contributes meaningfully to your body’s health as well will inspire you to learn and use some of these helpful techniques sooner rather than later. Old age need not require an inevitable decline. The sooner you build your tool box for supporting your own daily rebalancing, the sooner you can start discovering benefits and building your confidence in your own resourcefulness.
Interview with The Feng Shui Guy
“Just as your car runs more smoothly and requires less energy to go faster and farther when the wheels are in perfect alignment, you perform better when your thoughts, feelings, emotions, goals, and values are in balance.”
Ariel Joseph Towne, The Feng Shui Guy
Have you ever been curious about Feng Shui? You're in luck! I sat down with Ariel Joseph Towne, a.k.a. The Feng Shui Guy, to talk about this ancient art form: What it is, how he came to know it, and how it can help to create balance in your life. Our lively conversation ranged over topics such as how he helps people support good sleep, his secrets on fostering synchronicity, the dynamic connection between inner and outer work, and the importance of inner quiet and gratitude. Be sure to check out his Web site for more information about his books and coaching services.
Who's Driving This Thing?
“The only person who is educated is the one who has learned how to learn and change.”
I’ve noticed in my work with clients that many people are much harder on themselves than they would be on anyone else, especially people they love and care about. Something for which one would easily forgive a friend becomes unforgiveable in oneself for reasons that are hard to fathom. Sometimes the client will even say that it seems irrational for him to feel so guilty about something relatively minor, and yet he does. What gives? And why is this such a common experience?
I think the answer is that we have learned this behavior, usually from people who had no idea what was being passed down, in two different ways. First, the conscious part of the equation: When we’re children, we hear from all the adults around us, as well as from friends and peers, about what constitutes being a “good” person. We may have trouble unifying everything we’re told into a cohesive theory about how to behave, but we do know that we’re supposed to try to be “good.” We doubtless remember times when we were accused of behaving badly and intentionally embarrassed by someone, whether publicly or privately. We may learn that life tends to go more smoothly when we behave in a pleasing way toward others; we then take on the job of policing our own behavior, taking on the voices of people we respected or feared and obeying them even in their absence. This is relatively easy to recognize if you think about it—by which I mean that it may take some work to notice when you’re trying to please someone who’s not there, but if you pay attention to how you make decisions, you’ll probably start to see some of these habits before too long.
And now for the second part that is not conscious. Figuring out how this piece is affecting you can be quite a bit trickier. In The Biology of Belief, Bruce Lipton writes about how recent scientific study has revealed that children under the age of six spend most of their time in different brain wave states than adults. Until the age of two, children exhibit mostly delta brain waves, which in adults are associated with sleep states, and from ages two to six they spend most of their time in theta brain wave activity, which in adults is associated with the kind of “suggestible, programmable” state that hypnotherapists lead people into in order to help them accomplish change. In other words, young children are generally not in a fully conscious state that adults would recognize. They do not have access to conscious decision-making and analytical abilities. Therefore, whatever a small child hears is downloaded into her subconscious directly. Did you get that? Young children have no filter; what they hear is recorded directly into their subconscious minds as truth. When you were young, you learned a great deal that you are not aware of now, and it’s still affecting you today unless you’ve taken concrete steps to update that information.
That explains a lot about why it can be so hard to change old habits and beliefs even if we want to. The reasons why we feel a certain way may well be rooted in events and verbal commands we can’t even remember! We have years’ worth of programming that we’ve never had the opportunity to examine. We may remember plenty from childhood, and still be unaware of some pivotal beliefs that were instilled in us very early. The people who taught them to you have changed or may not be alive anymore, but the messages have not. Part of your mind is being run by ghosts.
We all know that parenting is a tough, demanding, and often exhausting job. Parents do what they can to keep us safe and healthy and stay sane at the same time. One of the methods most use is the application of shame to keep us in line—a sharp tone of voice telling us to stop it and a withering look, questions about what we were thinking when we did something that seemed really dumb or dangerous from an adult perspective, maybe a slap upside the head to let us know just how unacceptable our choice was. (Some of this is non-verbal, or even learned from things we just overheard rather than experiencing them personally.) If they can make us feel bad about certain choices, it’s less likely that we’ll make them again. While this can be effective, its continued use can also leave us with a general feeling of not being good enough/as good as others, or the feeling that we need to talk to ourselves harshly in order to avoid bad decisions and consequences. Once it’s installed, this habit of self-talk can run for decades or a lifetime without your awareness of what it’s really about, or that there are other alternatives. The only thing that really makes this second half of the equation different from the first is that it occurs before we can be fully aware of what’s happening, and we may not be able to recall it later.
Some of this may not seem very empowering. After all, what can we do about things we don’t even remember in the first place? In fact, there are ways to clean up even the mysterious things that may be holding you back. Making positive change happen in your life often requires the use of tools that can open a dialogue between your conscious and your unconscious mind. My favorite of these is EFT/Tapping because it’s highly effective, and it’s a self-help tool that almost anyone can learn and use safely. Once you’ve spent some time getting the hang of it, it’s astonishing what you can learn about yourself and what might be keeping you stuck in a particular area of your life. It takes practice to become confident in this dialogue, but it’s well worth the effort if you’re someone who would like to feel better physically, emotionally, or spiritually, or to work toward more positive mental habits. Despite what we may have been taught, it is possible to learn to treat yourself more kindly, and think and problem-solve more constructively. Quieting habitual negativity can free up a lot of energy for better physical health and greater creativity. And now that you know more about how children function, you might want to spend some time thinking about how you talk to the little ones in your life. What you say to them will shape their habits more directly than you might think. Choose your messages carefully to support their long-term health and happiness just as you learn to be more careful with how you speak to yourself.