Drugs do not heal. Lifestyle changes do.

Self Healing has been an important part of who I am and what / how I live and teach since I was a very young adult. And, quite frankly, I intuitively knew this growing up. I was the kid asking Mom to buy me the "brown bread" not the fluffy white, Millbrook bread. Remember that stuff?! 

Nursing school was a HUGE wake up call that what our system of medicine actually does is generally not about healing the body. Modern Western Medicine covers up a person's ill health symptoms with medications. 

Let me explain briefly & simply, using blood pressure medication as an example. When a person takes blood pressure medication, and there are many types using different mechanisms in the body, the medication makes the numbers on the blood pressure cuff or machine go down. All looks well. Life goes on as per usual. But, if nothing is done to change what actually contributed to the high blood pressure developing:

• unhealthy food choices over years of living

• stress

• excess body weight

• sedentary lifestyle

• lack of contact with the Natural World, remember You ARE Nature…

then the damage that these above lifestyle habits wreck on the body are still happening. Yes, the medication may make your blood pressure look as if it has changed, and the numbers have changed, but what you do in your daily life that causes bodily harm and damage, down to each and every body cell, is still happening.

If you want to heal your high blood pressure or other health symptoms, issues, and diagnoses (and there is a *never ending list of lifestyle diagnoses)… You have to change your life.

Now let me explain another point: Western Medications have had very life saving impacts in many, many instances over the years & decades. Yes, Western Medicine is less than 100 years old. Natural Medicine - Herbs & Naturopathy - are thousands of years old. Let that thought sink in for a bit.

Western Medicine is amazing Emergency & Trauma Medicine. When there is an acute, gonna die right now or a trauma issue (think broken bones), Western Medicine can & does save lives and limbs. Using medications and medical skills for life saving moments is a VERY beautiful thing.

If you want to invoke real healing right down to the cellular level… this takes Lifestyle Medicine, Natural Medicine: changing the way you eat, live, and function in this world.

When You live and function as Nature intended, You will blossom with Vibrant Health & Longevity as Nature intended.

It IS that simple. Drugs, taken over the long haul, cannot heal your body.

Your body heals itself. That is what Nature does and You ARE Nature.

No one has deficiencies of chemical drugs. Illnesses are not caused by deficiencies of these drugs.

Change Your Lifestyle & Change the Way You Live.

Because Food DOES Matter in How Your Body:
Feels,
Functions,
Self Heals, &
Ages.

Free Natural Health-Lifestyle Medicine Information: Yes, click that blue link and change your life, heal yourself, make your life a better place to be!

*Just some of the diagnoses in the *never-ending list of diseases contributed to by one’s lifestyle habits:

• high blood pressure

• type 2 diabetes & obesity

• anxiety

• depression

• ADD / ADHD

• atherosclerosis, heart disease, and stroke

Wikipedia’s Lifestyle Disease Page:

Lifestyle diseases are defined as diseases linked with the way people live their life. This is commonly caused by alcohol, drug and smoking abuse as well as lack of physical activity and unhealthy eating. Diseases that impact on our lifestyle are heart disease, stroke, obesity and type II diabetes.[1] The diseases that appear to increase in frequency as countries become more industrialized and people live longer can include Alzheimer's disease, arthritis, atherosclerosis, asthma, cancer, chronic liver disease or cirrhosis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, metabolic syndrome, chronic renal failure, osteoporosis, stroke, depression, obesity and vascular dementia. In the UK the death rate is four times higher from respiratory disease caused by an unhealthy lifestyle.[2]

Some commenters maintain a distinction between diseases of longevity and diseases of civilization or diseases of affluence.[3] Certain diseases, such as diabetes, dental caries and asthma, appear at greater rates in young populations living in the "western" way; their increased incidence is not related to age, so the terms cannot accurately be used interchangeably for all diseases.[4]

Why I love Yoga... Take 2

When the weather drops below 45, I move to the porch: bright, cheery, & open window for fresh air. Below zero, bright sunny days, are still Yoga pleasant on the porch.

4+ years ago I wrote an article titled  Why I Love Yoga and Other Thoughts on Whole Food, Whole Health Healing. I have shared, many times, the ways in which Yoga benefits healing body, mind, and spirit. Type "Yoga" into the search bar, over there to the right, and you will find Yoga posts on weight loss, healing, body benefits, stress... you name it. I recommend it. Yoga that is.

Yoga is a self healing retreat every time you step onto the mat and every time you step out into your world living life from a space of deep interconnectedness that Yoga spins and weaves for you; that you spin and weave for yourself.  

If 45 degrees F... yoga on the deck is my preferred place to practice. Yes, cats are a reoccurring theme in this mindfulness; sensing & appreciating the peaceful energy.

So often people tell me: "Oh, I do stretching exercises, I don't need yoga."  Most people equate yoga with doing poses. Yoga is not just about the poses on the mat. That is part of it. Yoga is a way to bring presence of mind to your daily awareness. The poses are a way to embody mindfulness. Poses help to move life force energy, embody breath with movement, and guide our actions into a conscious connection with our true self.

Poses support you synchronizing breath with body, mind, and spirit. Breath is spirit. Yoga poses teach you how to be strong, flexible, and balanced in body, mind, and spirit so you can step off the mat and be strong, balanced, and flexible in all areas of your life activities, in all of your interactions, in your essence of being in this world.

Yoga is a way of being in the world that supports our moving with the flow of the universe, making conscious decisions based upon thoughtful wisdom and mindfulness around choice and consequence, and walking through daily happenings with a presence of peace and contentment (even when life seems to hand us chaos).

Magic happens when a person practices Yoga. Yoga is a tool to connect self with life force energy: inner life force energy and the life force energy of the universe (which are one & the same).  The universe pulses on and with life force energy. Practicing yoga is a way of tapping into this universal energy, wisdom, consciousness. Yoga has been practiced for thousands of years. All indigenous cultures have healing systems for tapping into the infinite. 

Deepening Practice for you... Yes, this is your Self Healing homework.    ; )   

I will happily send you the word document or PDF files of these below Yoga pose practices. You can print and laminate them if you choose. Email me with your request.   pyoumell@gmail.com

Yoga Stick Figures by Charlotte Bradley of Yoga Flavored Life.

Healing Begins At Home

We are all healers. Healing energy is a natural part of every one of us. Cut your finger; it heals without intervention. Healing is biologically innate in living beings.

Some people are deeply in tune with this healing energy and can act to support others on their healing journey. 

When I say healing begins at home, this statement is something I mean from two perspectives. The perspective show cased above; that the body is a healing organism. Healing just happens in your body, your physical home. Also, healing begins in your home; the structure, building, your physical body dwells in. The space where your habits were born and continue to be nurtured in.

We are 100% capable of organizing our lives to create healing. The choices we make in our lives: what we eat and how we interact in the world all start at home. We learned our lifestyle habits from watching, interacting with, and repeating the lifestyle habits we observed family members engaging in . We can alter our lifestyle habits depending on the healing capacity of the way we live our daily lives. Is this habit best for my wellness?

Most people, when asked and given time to contemplate the question, can tell you exactly why they have the disease symptoms they have. Some people can get to the heart of the matter faster and more efficiently than others; they can tell you the emotional, spiritual, and the physical reasons they are wrestling with ill health and disease.

Bringing this question to people's awareness is the beginning of healing. When we can shine the light on why the disease symptoms are present in our physical health, we can start to address the underlying issues and set the healing energy back into action. 

Find a quiet spot. Sit. Ground yourself. Breathe deeply, focusing on the breath for several minutes. Ask yourself: "why do I have these ill-health symptoms." Continue to breathe deeply for several more minutes. Allow the answer to arise; maybe right now, maybe tomorrow or next week.

My 2015 healing wish for you: Discovery of personal blocks to healing and putting healing action to work in your life.

Namaste.

Change is Empowering

Change can be easy, change can be difficult.  It is all in the way you approach change.

New Year's resolutions are not something I recommend.  They are usually "plans" made in desperation or out of guilt.  Not exactly the energy needed to be behind real life empowering change.

Real change is powerful.  It has to come from the heart, mind, and soul.  

I can suggest everything you need to do to change your life, lose weight, lower blood pressure and cholesterol, and teach you habits that will invoke the self healing of your body. 

Change will happen only when you want it to happen and you make it happen.

Instead of making resolutions at the eve or dawn of a new year, well because, you know something has got to give... how about finding what fires your passion and allow yourself to metamorphosis into the healing being you already are.  

Make lifetime lifestyle resolutions.  Create the change you want to see happen in you.  Be the change, the healing energy, you innately are.

Natural forces within us are the true healers of disease. Hippocrates

Divine Weight Loss Tip #4

In Divine Weight Loss Tip #3, I suggested you take self-responsibility for your health, healing, and body weight re-balancing. I am certain some of you, maybe many of you, thought it was a great idea but (here I go with the but again!) you may be asking... "How do I get here, Paula, to this space of self-responsibility and intrinsic motivation around my own health?"

Tip #4

Yoga... I know I have said this before and I am saying it again, yoga helps you return yourself to you. It is that intrinsic motivation thing.

Yoga is an activity of mind, body, and spirit merging, reuniting. Yoga brings you back to yourself. When you work from a space of inner calmness, you will make choices based upon what is best for your health.

A friend of mine from the world of yoga, Charlotte Bradley, wrote an article on her Yoga Flavored Life blog where she stated:    "I believe that my yoga practice can help me become the best person that I can be."  She asked her readers to share with her: "What is your why for practicing yoga?" To which I replied on her blog:

"I LOVE yoga because it makes me feel good, inside and out. Truly a mind, body, soul healer that brings a calmness to everything I do in life (even my melt downs have a calmness, serenity, about them!) Can’t beat that!"

Now I will confess, you can get to this space of inner wholeness, intrinsic motivation, in other ways. There are many mind, body, spirit (M, B, S) activities that work to heal you from the inside out. This is just a partial list from off the top of my head:

• Tai Chi
• Qi Gong
• Tae Kwon Do (If you are in the Potsdam-Canton area of NY State, I recommend Andrea Malik. She teaches classes for both kids and adults and is truly an awesome human being!)
• Meditation
• Prayer
• Breath work
• Walking meditation

Practicing a mind, body, spirit activity (exercise) helps you to explore your potential and invite the real you to emerge. When you come home to yourself, you will move towards loving yourself. Loving yourself includes the inner, intrinsic desire to take better care of you. You will consciously choose to eat better and make positive lifestyle choices to improve your health. As you feel better, from your healthy lifestyle choices, you will want to feel even better. Healthy choices beget healthy choices. You will create a crazy, fun, snowball effect of health, healing, and the desire to treat yourself in a whole health way.

Will you trust me and give yoga or another M, B, S activity a try? 

Namaste, Paula

Forgiveness

"The weak can never forgive.  Forgiveness is an attribute of the strong."  Mahatma Gandhi

Forgiveness is a powerful tool in self-healing.

When we forgive others, we release the strangle hold of anger and frustration that prevents our own self from moving forward in our personal growth and development.

We release the person we forgive as well!

One of my favorite Don Henley songs. I wore out my cassette tape, in 1989, listening to this one song, over and over and over:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xezg3z5IE8I