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Beauty is More than Skin Deep – Cleaning Up Your Personal Care Products

With winter approaching,  dry indoor and outdoor air can leave your skin feeling crepey and flaky.  How do you find the best body lotions and moisturizers that will help soothe your skin while supporting your health and personal skin care goals? 

Many personal care products look good on the surface but are actually laden with chemicals that can cause harmful effects, including carcinogens, endocrine disruptors, and allergens. So, if you spend a lot of time considering what you put into yo…

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How to Use Houseplants to Clean Indoor Air

houseplant air cleaner

As fires rage across the west and health guidelines require that we social distance to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus, many of us are spending more time at home than ever before.  And some wonderful, creative DIY home projects have blossomed as people are working to enhance their surroundings. 

If you’re looking for a quick, fun DIY project that will help you enjoy the relaxing effects of nature and improve your indoor air, consider adding houseplants to your living space.

Did …

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Just Breathe

Breathe

Most of us pay little attention to our breathing and may habitually have shallow breathing, which can add to chronic stress, tension, and even decreased cognitive function and brain fog. With our breath, we inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide, removing acidity from the blood.

Breathing also affects our parasympathetic nervous system (the rest and digest part of our nervous system), regulates heart rate variability (which is a measure of stress), influences the microbiome, and changes in…

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Sugar and Sweeteners: What is Best?

In my prior post I discussed that drinking sweet stuff is not good for you. But how about eating it?

From an Ayurvedic perspective, the sweet taste is one of the six fundamental tastes and provides nourishment to your body, mind, and spirit (the other tastes are sour, salty, pungent, bitter, astringent). We get sweetness in a variety of forms—beyond foods we typically think of as sweets like pastries and ice cream, the sweet taste is found in fruit, starchy vegetables, grains, nuts, seeds, …

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Aromatherapy for Calm and Focus

Our sense of smell is truly amazing. It is said that the human nose can identify more than 1 trillion scents! And these aromas can have powerful effects on our mood, our thoughts, and even our behavior.

Have you ever smelled a certain food cooking and been transported to a memory in childhood? Or gotten a whiff of someone’s cologne/perfume that reminded you of a past significant relationship?

Our sense of smell is coordinated with receptors in the nose that link up through the first crania…

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BPA: A Hidden Hazard in Your Everyday Life

BPA receipts cans bottles

(Adapted from “Resilient Health: How to Thrive In Our Toxic World)

Bisphenol A (BPA) is a hormone mimicking chemical that is present in many products that we are exposed to on a daily basis. It’s so widespread, that a 2007 study by the Centers for Disease Control showed that 93 percent of Americans have BPA in their bodies. BPA is an endocrine disruptor linked to abnormal fetal development, neurodevelopmental disorders, diabetes, obesity, insulin resistance, heart disease, cancer and erecti…

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Quinoa Cucumber Tomato Spinach Salad

Quinoa Cucumber Tomato Spinach Salad

 

  • 1 cup uncooked quinoa
  • 1 cup fresh cherry or grape tomatoes, halved
  • 1 large organic cucumber, chopped
  • 1 cup organic baby spinach, roughly chopped
  • 1/4 cup red onion, finely chopped
  • 1 avocado, pit removed and chopped
  • 1/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
  • 4 tbsp red wine vinegar
  • 2 tbsp Dijon mustard
  • 1 tsp dried oregano
  • 1 clove garlic, minced
  • 1/2 cup olive oil
  • 1 lemon (or 2-3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
  • salt and pepper, to taste
  1. Rinse…

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Plant Powered Protein

While I wrote about the benefits of plant versus animal protein in “Resilient Health: How to Thrive in Our Toxic World,” I only recently watched the 2018 documentary “Game Changers” about successful elite athletes who made the switch to a completely plant-based diet. All I can say is “WOW!

This film is a must-see and will open your eyes to one of the biggest food myths that we have been served – which is that plant-based proteins are somehow not enough to be able to fully sustain us. And y…

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The Truth About Sugar, Sweeteners, and Diet Drinks

Sugary drinks like soda, fruit punch, lemonade, sports and energy drinks, and other sugar-sweetened beverages can contribute to obesity and diabetes. But did you know that consuming too much added sugar can also raise blood pressure and increase chronic inflammation? And excessive sugar can impair the liver’s ability to clear toxic compounds from the bloodstream and lead to fatty liver disease.

One sneaky way these added sugars get in is in what we drink. The average can of sugar-sweetened …

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