Divine Weight Loss Tip #7, #8, #9, #10

Wait, what?!  Tips #7 through #10 in one fell swoop? 

My answer is yes. These are basic lifestyle habits that make your body soar with feel good energy, happiness, and balance your body weight.  When you feel good... you want to feel better. Health begets health; wellness begets wellness. It is an addictive thing!

Now that I have brought up the issue of addictions... Have you labeled yourself as an addictive personality type? "I can't give up sugar (or soda, or chips, or whatever), I am so addicted."

Why do addictions always seem to be for "bad" things, unhealthy choices? If we can get addicted, why not get addicted to:

• healthy choices,

• fitness,

• fruits and veggies,

• choosing to be happy despite what is going on around you,

• real food grown by real farmers,

• yoga,

• walking in the woods,

• gratitude,

• taking your health into your own hands?

Go ahead; ponder over what being addicted to healthy things could be like in your life. Sit. Be quiet. Breathe. Visualize healthy living coming from your core being. What does that look like? Feel Like? How can you put it into action, reality, in your life?

Eli, my youngest son, doing what he does when frustrated, angry, or overwhelmed with energy: quiet, breathe, visualize being calm.

Seeing 2 of Eli? Can you guess why? Leave a comment with your guess.

OK, now for Tip #7 through Tip #10

#7  Get plenty of sleep!  Skimping on sleep to “get things done” is not a whole health habit!  Getting to sleep before 10 PM maximizes production of melatonin and works with the earth's circadian rhythms for great sleep and health.  

Going to sleep, before 10 PM, reduces cortisol levels. Cortisol is a stress hormone that helps the body put on and keep on abdominal weight. Sleep peacefully to reduce your cortisol levels.

Stay away from bright lights and screens (computers, etc.) for 3 hours before sleep.  Bright lights make your body think it is daytime and impair the sleep cycles.  Get all lights out of the sleep area; even LED lights disturb good sleep hormone production. 

The moon and stars are fine!

#8 Daily physical activity. Start now and continue for life.  Your body is a beautiful creation meant for movement, poetry in motion. Your bones, muscles, and joints are singing out to be put into this motion. Listen; hear your body begging to be moved!

Hint: Get outside and move.  Fresh air and natural light are imperative to good health, endorphin, hormone, and neurotransmitter production. See below.

#9 Daily exposure to natural sun light and fresh air.  Exercise, work, play, read, and relax outside! And for an extra bonus... get to sleep (before 10 PM) outside! Seriously, sleeping outside is a health enhancing habit!

The natural light exposure, again, enhances the body's circadian rhythms. Fresh air and the sounds of nature calm and soothe body, mind, and spirit.

When our bodies function, with the rhythms of the earth, we are so much more balanced as human beings. This inner balance makes it easier to choose healthy lifestyle habits.

#10 Increase your intake of water; clean, pure water!  Water is crucial to healthy cell function. Just as your body cells need to be nourished with whole foods, so too they need water to carry on the processes of metabolism. Keep your cells happy, feed them water.

Use clean, pure water to make herbal teas. Herbal teas are high in minerals and nutrients that add to body cell nourishment.

Your gorgeous body cell. You want all of them to be healthy! There are trillions. One thing I find amazing about this is that every thing we eat has an impact on trillions of life forms (all a part of you!).

If your water supply is chlorinated, filter it.  Use a chlorine shower filter so you are not absorbing and breathing in chlorine as you shower.

Divine Weight Loss Tips 1-6 & final Tip:

1. https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/blog/2014/8/2/divine-weight-loss-tip-1

2. https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/blog/1370

3. https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/blog/2014/8/4/divine-weight-loss-tip-3

4. https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/blog/2014/8/5/divine-weight-loss-tip-4

5. https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/blog/2014/8/6/divine-weight-loss-tip-5

6. https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/blog/2014/8/7/divine-weight-loss-tip-6

7. https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/blog/2014/8/11/divine-weight-loss-final-tip-11

Stocking Up the Natural Medicine Cabinet

Learning natural healing, the time honored methods of supporting the body's innate ability to heal itself, is a sure fire method of invoking true healing in your body.

Think of this: every time you cut yourself the cut heals.  That is how your whole body will function, will heal, if you give it what it needs and remove those things that "get in the way" of healing.

Your immune system is your system that works to repair and heal your body.  It works synergistically, in symphony, with every system in your body.  That is the beauty of the whole: holistic healing.

Healing comes from inside you.

A "healer" is a guide who steers you back to your own path, your space of healing. A healer knows the natural ways to invoke the immune system's ability to repair and heal mind, body, and spirit. 

You are your own best healer. 

What to do to create health and healing:

1. *Remove the lifestyle habits that created the “ill” health symptoms.
2. Learn what whole foods are and eat a whole food diet, your cellular health will thank you!  If we have not had this whole food conversation…it is time to say, “Hey Paula, what the heck, tell me the cellular health secrets!”  Move in the direction of more food from plants, balancing out with a comfortable amount of animal based food to keep your body healthy. Listen to your body's needs, not someone else's food rules.
3. Add in herbs and/or other whole food supplements to re-fortify your cellular health, get your nutritional savings account over flowing with life enhancing nutrition!
4. Move your body:  sedentary living kills, movement heals.
5. Fresh air and sunshine…"love" two birds with one action, get outside AND move! (This sounds better than the kill two birds line...)
6. Sleep.
7. Stress: get rid of it or change your attitude about that which you can’t get rid of. (Might I suggest yoga and meditation?)  Which leads me to…
8. Healthy attitude toward yourself, all others on this planet and life in general.  Practice a kindness attitude towards all, starting with you.  Self-care, and its ripple effects for your health and how you perceive and interact with the world, cannot be  emphasized enough.
9. Ask me for my “lifestyle” suggestions handout.  It contains more thoughts on healthy lifestyle choices for you to contemplate and add to your own bag of healthy living and healing tricks!

*Remove the lifestyle habits that created the “ill” health symptoms, some examples:

• Can't sleep?  Remove caffeine and stress for starters.  This may mean finding new ways of perceiving stress and learning to let go of stress.  (see yoga and meditation suggestion above!)
• Breathing problems?  Smoker? Quitting is one obvious solution in your healing quest.
• Allergies? 100% whole foods, raw honey from local bees, remove allergens from your life and living space...
• Constipation?  Stress clamps down the colon; see can't sleep above.  Refined foods clog up the body, your colon... see whole foods above.
• Headaches?  Stress, refined foods, sugar, artificial sweeteners, prescription medications, birth control pills, chemical household cleaners, chemical body care products.... all, and many more synthetics, can contribute to your body imbalance that triggers headaches.

Here's a peek inside my herbal healing cabinets:  the formulas I have used over the years (and trust) and the dried herbs I keep on hand to make my own healing blends.

The Healing Medicine cabinet in my downstairs bathroom.

Dried herbs and raw, local honey...ready to make tinctures and infusions (medicinal strength teas).

The upstairs bathroom healing cabinet.

Peeking down into my herbal first aid kit.

Teaching the art of using herbs, as part of a whole health lifestyle, is a passion for me!  

On Monday, June 30th I taught a fun class at my home:  Making Herbal Medicines 101.

Interested in learning, give me a yell!  This Fall will be a great time for another Herbal Medicine Class!

Blessings and HUGS, Paula