7 Daily Essentials for Optimal Health

How many times have you made resolutions to eat healthier or quit smoking, only to feel overwhelmed with all the adjustments and slip back into old habits? For most, the biggest mistake is trying to make all these major changes at once. 

Studies show making small, incremental changes can be far more effective in developing new habits than an all at once 'cold-turkey' process. To help get you started, we have compiled a general list of things anyone can do daily to improve overall health.

1. Eliminate simple sugars. 

Simple sugars can all wreak havoc on the body’s ability to heal itself. Aside from being highly addictive empty calories, they can cause spikes in insulin and lead to diabetes. Anything that is enriched or bleached should be tossed. Also, avoid hidden sugars disguised as high fructose corn syrup, evaporated cane sugar, and brown rice sugar. Use unbleached whole grain flour and whole grain breads & pasta as substitutes. Try raw cane sugar, sea salt, and brown rice or quinoa instead of white rice.

2. Make sure at least half of every meal is protein. 

More valuable nutrients for our bodies come from proteins, than any other food source, and with far fewer calories.  While leafy greens and other vegetables are packed with anti-inflammatory properties, most of them stay locked inside the fiber and unavailable to us, so they get converted to starches or passed through. Best to cook your veggies into a broth for the biggest nutritional bang. 

Note: While vegetable fiber is beneficial for regulating the digestive process, high quality meat proteins and fats will give your body most of what it needs to stay healthy and satiated throughout the day. Remember, the body can only use or store carbs and sugars for fuel. Unlike proteins and fats, they cannot be used to rebuild or repair the body.

3. Eat an egg (or two). 

Eggs are nutritional powerhouses that provide 6 grams of protein with only 4% of your daily calories. Eggs have a variety of other benefits as well, such as fighting frailty, and reducing inflammation in the brain, which has been linked to Alzheimer’s. Boiled is the most convenient way of eating them, but scrambled or poached is good, too. You can even eat them raw, although they can be more digestible when cooked slightly.

4. Breathe and stretch for at least 5 minutes. 

With today’s busy lifestyles, we are always on the go and it seems like we struggle just to keep up, often at the expense of our own well-being.  Allowing time to quiet the mind by just breathing deeply and gently stretching the muscles will not only reduce stress, but will also improve blood flow to help rejuvenate the body’s energy.

5. Have sex (passion). 

I suppose to some people, this one might seem like a no-brain-er, but sex (yes, even ‘solo’ sex) can trigger the release of endorphins in the body which help to stimulate a variety of internal healing mechanisms, not to mention it keeps your blood flowing. And, a recent study shows that sex is also good for your brain, leading to improved interconnections in the brain as well as stress reduction in the body. 

The point here is to have passion. Do SOMETHING every day that makes your heart jump, gives you butterflies or even sparks a sense of fear. These natural ‘rushes’ are good for you. Cold shower, anyone?

6. Get at least 7 hours of sleep a day. 

Again, most of us believe there isn’t enough time for this, but I can’t emphasize enough the importance of giving your body the sleep it needs to rejuvenate and heal itself.  When you sleep, your body is able to devote itself to restoring strength, healing wounds, and detoxifying.  Depriving yourself of this vital time can be the causal foundation of countless illnesses and dis-ease.  If you have trouble falling asleep, eat a banana an hour before bedtime.

7. Sit less, move more. 

Groundbreaking research shows that for every hour a day you spend sitting, your risk of death increases by 11%. If you have a desk job, get up every hour and walk around for two minutes. Ideally, you want to take at least 10,000 steps a day, and most mobile devices have apps for helping you track this. Even small movements throughout the day, such as fidgeting, can add up to major health benefits.

8 (Bonus). Don't smoke!

This seems obvious, but since we used the ashtray picture above in a sort of ironic way, we want to be sure and mention that nicotine is a dangerously addictive substance and should be avoided for optimal health.

Whether you are a health nut or a couch potato, adding even a few of these small changes to your daily routine can help nudge you in the right direction. Pretty soon you'll be making healthier choices without even thinking about it!

Does "Dramatic" Behavior Indicate a Lack of Responsibility?

It seems that "dramatic" people, those who get overly emotional in conversations for no apparent reason, demonstrate a lack of emotional intelligence needed to handle certain topics. When someone's behavior includes outbursts and other mental tactics used to derail a conversation or shift focus, they are reacting with emotion rather than responding with reason. In that sense, they lack “response-ability”. 

The biggest hurdle most of us face in being response-able, is coming to terms with being accountable for our choices, remembering that allowing others to treat us badly is a choice. We have to realize our need to make better choices, and God’s way of showing us that is through suffering. 

Rather than seeing discomfort and annoyance as God’s cues for internal growth and leaning into them to find the lesson, most of us practice avoidance or some form of manipulation to disregard or remove the source of the discomfort, so we don’t have to face the lesson. This dysfunction inevitably results in fractured families and community discord. 

We never seem to understand our suffering while we are in its midst. We don’t suffer because we are a ‘bad’ person or doing ‘bad’ things. We suffer because we make poor choices from being misguided, manipulated, and/or misunderstood...often left to our own devices for figuring things out.

Being headstrong and stubborn, I learned my lessons the hard way, through repetition. I have experienced first-hand the harsh realities of life, loss, and spiritual fracturing that I wouldn’t wish upon anybody. My life has been a journey forged in fire, only most of the time I was the one holding the match! 

To truly step into Christ, we must let go of hoping someone else will ‘save us’ and summon the courage from within to face the darkness within. In doing so, our eyes adjust and we can begin to see our own light shine. Only then can we truly understand that the direction of our sacred journey is inward. 

We must learn to choose with intention and purpose to have Christ in our heart in each moment. 

This doesn’t mean becoming a ‘goody-two-shoes’ who claims to be saved and it’s all on Jesus now. It means that after feeling the electricity in the body coming from a full awakening (or chakra activation), we only wish to duplicate its resonance. This vibrational frequency generates gratitude, authenticity, and love within our hearts, and is undeniable once experienced. Who wouldn't want to stay there?

It also doesn’t mean trying to always be happy or comfortable. It means being present to and at peace with how we observe our experiences, so we have the ability to respond. Response-ability. This is what generates happiness within each moment, not what others do or say or think.

Be the Moon, Embrace the Darkness

 

Malachi 4 - "The Last Chapter"

Malachi, Chapter 4 (NLT)

1 The LORD of Heaven’s Armies says, “The day of judgment is coming, burning like a furnace. On that day the arrogant and the wicked will be burned up like straw. They will be consumed—roots, branches, and all.

2 “But for you who fear my name, the Sun of Righteousness will rise with healing in his wings. And you will go free, leaping with joy like calves let out to pasture.

3 On the day when I act, you will tread upon the wicked as if they were dust under your feet,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

4 “Remember to obey the Law of Moses, my servant—all the decrees and regulations that I gave him on Mount Sinai for all Israel.

5 “Look, I am sending you the prophet Elijah before the great and dreadful day of the LORD arrives.

6 His preaching will turn the hearts of fathers to their children, and the hearts of children to their fathers. Otherwise I will come and strike the land with a curse.” 

Takeaway: 

None of us can expect to escape the curse (suffering) of God's broken law, nor to enjoy the happiness (liberation) of his chosen and redeemed people, unless their hearts (focus) are turned from sin and the world (external), to Christ and holiness (internal). 

We must each restore in our hearts the connection between the inner child and inner parent that exist within our personality and reconcile the two. It's time for the 'adult' in the brain to take back control of your personality and clean things up. Collect the 'garbage' (toxicity) and take it out of your 'house', nurture the child into adulthood by providing the 'parenting' it deserved and realize how to love yourself from the inside. Otherwise we face immense suffering.

Four Simple Steps to Manifest Anything

There are four simple yet powerful steps in the manifesting process. They are vital in directing your vibrational energy towards what you want to achieve. I have seen these steps work in my life many times, and I have seen things not work when any one of these steps are omitted.

1. Ask/Declare: Whatever it is you are wanting to accomplish or see happen in your life, you must set the energy in motion, or 'plant the seed'. Some refer to this step as praying, others as visualizing. However you describe it, the important thing is that you focus your thoughts on the desired outcome and BOLDLY declare it as Truth in your life.

Remember, there is tremendous power in the spoken word. It is literally the act of creation in process. The old saying, "Careful what you wish for, it might come true." is based on this principle. The Bible says ask and you shall receive. Choose your words carefully to speak your desires specifically and all will be set in motion. When you are ask-ing, you are expressing as-King.  Command your reality!

2. Believe: A common practice for those beginning their journey towards conscious living is to ask for something, or declare it as a possibility, but then tell themselves they can't do what it takes or will see little progress and believe they don't deserve what they are asking for.

Believing in yourself, or rather, having faith in YOU, is key to accomplishing anything, but to truly manifest your life intentionally, you must also believe or have faith that you DESERVE what it is you are as-king. If for no other reason than by virtue of being born, a fulfilling life is YOURS to claim!

3. Act: The purpose of this step is two-fold. In one sense, you must take action in the direction of your goal in order to keep yourself in the flow of creation. Nothing really grows in stagnant water. It also indicates that you must act AS IF your goal has already been achieved. If you desire something, but act like it's coming in the future, you emit a specific energy of keeping your goal in the future.

Suppose your goal is to become CEO of your own company. Thinking and acting like a CEO now will change your mindset into that of a CEO. The Universe has no choice but to correspond to your new 'way of being'. It's then up to you to just act on what is presented to you.

4. Receive: Of all the steps taken to realize our goals, this is the one that is most often overlooked. The hardest part of receiving is simply allowing it to happen. Many times people will set their mind on something and then, when it doesn't appear right away, they get frustrated and either quit or begin to look for evidence of failure.

Subconsciously, we engineer lots of ways to stay just under the radar so that, IF we fail, we fail small. Then if things do start to happen, we sabotage ourselves with doubt and suspicion. We get in our own way. If we could just focus on doing what we love, release our attachment to any given outcome and allow The Universe to do its work, what we desire will come to us.