What do you do when - despite the internet and social media - disconnection is running rampant and modern life is overflowing with stress? If you are one out of the nearly two adults in the United States who is faced with a health challenge, and you want to protect your body from the harmful effects of stress, here is something that can help: reconnect to joy. The medical literature is filled with evidence showing how stress, disconnection and social isolation lead to worse outcomes of all sorts of illnesses like cancer, and heart disease, diabetes, autoimmune disease, allergies, asthma, … [Read more...]
Love Food
What do we do when food has become an enemy? There is so much confusion and stress about what we should eat to maximize health and wellness: don’t eat gluten, eat only raw foods, cook your foods well, avoid sugar, go grain free, eat more grains, eat more fish, fish contain toxins, eat macrobiotic, eat less, eat more, eat enough protein, don’t eat too much protein. Just look on Amazon and you will find over 45,000 books with divergent recommendations about nutrition and food. I have spent the last few years knee deep in the nutrition research and I say, “enough already!” All of this conflicting … [Read more...]
Wellness: Getting There Together
This past Saturday, I sat in circle with a group of wise and compassionate women and men: doctors, nurses, practitioners, therapists, and healers - each deeply concerned about the state of health care. Knowing that so much healing is being lost amid the beaurocracy of our current system, this wellness alliance is seeking authentic, compassionate, and effective roads to wellness. As health professionals we see clearly how the treatment of symptoms is only a part what ultimately helps a patient to heal. To create wellness we must consider the body, the mind, the environment, and the society in … [Read more...]
Mindful Awareness: How Tasting Raisins Can Change Your Life
How on earth did I get there: captivated by a room full of people slowly and mindfully eating raisins? This is what I thought when I first attempted the practice of mindfulness. I would never have guessed that slowly squishing a raisin around in my mouth, becoming aware of the texture and mindful of the flavors, would yield all that much. At the time, my initial response was, “You have got to be kidding! What a waste of time. We all know what raisins taste like.” But something at a deeper level resonated with me and so I stayed. Very soon I realized that, in all of my busyness in life, I … [Read more...]
Healing – One Step at a Time
If you have a chronic health challenge, you probably have realized that there is no magic bullet treatment that will make the illness disappear. Believe me, I have often wished there were. Things would be so much easier. But, then again, maybe easier isn’t necessarily better. I don’t say that lightly. I know what it is like to feel broken and to want to be fixed and made well again. But when easy solutions are not available, it forces us to change and to grow and to think outside the box. In the current box of modern medicine, we fix things when they are broken. In fact, we excel in our … [Read more...]