Top Tips for a Great Night's Sleep

1.    Blackout your bedroom
Make sure your bedroom is as dark as possible – Your delicate circadian rhythm needs darkness at night (and natural light during the day) and to operate at it’s best.   Use blackout blinds, heavy curtains and avoid things that glow (electrical equipment – see below) in your bedroom.  I also like to use an eye mask when necessary, which gives an extra layer of light protection.

2.    No electrical equipment
Bedrooms should be free from all electrical equipment including TVs, mobile phones etc.   All electrical equipment emits electromagnetic radiation that is harmful and can disrupt your sleep.  They also normally have at least one glowing light or digital clock that glows that lights up the room.   If you regularly fall asleep in bed with the TV on, move it out of your room.   At the very least, unplug it from the wall before going to sleep.  Use a battery powered alarm clock or if you use your mobile as your alarm (as I do), experiment to see if the alarm will still work when the phone is switched off.  If it’s a smart phone, switch it to ‘Airplane mode’ so it’s not sending a signal out through the night (though it will still emit electromagnetic radiation)

3.    Switch yourself off
Can’t stop thinking?  Thoughts running through your head?  There’s nothing worse than lying in bed thinking/worrying too much and not being able to drift off or waking in the night and not getting back to sleep again for what seems like hours.  I’ve got a few techniques up my sleeve for this, my favourites being

1. Essential oils - Everyone knows lavender essential oil in the bath before bed or on the pillow can help, but have you ever tried frankincense or valerian massaged into your feet?   These essential oils are grounding and balance out all the energy whizzing about in your head.  Putting them on your feet adds to the grounding effect, so that you can quieten down the ever-chattering internal voice.
2. Bach Flower Remedies - These work in much the same way as essential oils, in that they help to calm the mind.  You can get Rescue Night (or Healing Herbs’ ‘Rest’ – available at Peak Wellbeing) which is Rescue Remedy (5 Flower blend) with added White Chestnut, for ‘Unresolved, circling thoughts’.  A couple of squirts under your tongue will help to get you gently off to the land of Zzzzz.
3. Visualisation - I also like to visualise the energy/thoughts leaving my body.  I do this either by imagining the energy flowing down through my body and out the soles of my feet into the ground, where the Earth absorbs and takes it away, or with every out-breath, I visualise the thoughts leaving my body with the breath and dissipating into the atmosphere.   If I have a specific problem I need help with, to add an extra dimension, I visualise (on an in-breath if you like) the energy coming back to me through the night in a calming, positive way, enabling me to get a good night’s sleep, waking up with a new way of looking at things and hopefully a solution to the problem.

A combination of all these techniques will help to create the right atmosphere conducive to a good night’s sleep.  Of course it goes without saying that a healthy lifestyle also plays a big part.  Do you have any tools and techniques that help you get to sleep that you’d like to share on our Facebook page?

The Art of Vulnerability

What does it mean to be vulnerable? The dictionary defines it as ‘More or most likely to be exposed to the chance of being attacked or harmed, either physically or emotionally;’ [Wiktionary.org].   It may be seen as a sign of weakness to be vulnerable, but according to Brene Brown’s recent TED talk (see below), without vulnerability, we are unable to experience joy, happiness and gratitude. 

Brene has been researching human connection for over a decade, looking at courage, authenticity, shame and vulnerability.   What she found is that the people who have a sense of worthiness, ‘A strong sense of love & belonging’, believe they are worthy.  Those who struggle to connect, to be good enough, believe they aren’t worthy.  Simples.

So what underlies this belief in worthiness?  She discovered these people have the courage to be seen as imperfect, the compassion to be kind to themselves first in order to be kind to others, and connection to others – they were able to let go of who they thought they should be, in order to just be them selves and connect authentically.

And what about vulnerability?  These people believe what makes them vulnerable, makes them beautiful.  They embrace their vulnerability.  They say ‘I love you’ first, they’re not afraid to try, or afraid of failing, they ‘breathe through waiting for the doctor to call after a mammogram’.   It’s not comfortable, nor excruciating, but it is necessary to feel vulnerable in order to feel the opposite – strength, resilience and self-assurance.

By denying vulnerability, by numbing unpleasant feelings with drugs, alcohol, food, you also reject the pleasant feelings - joy, excitement, satisfaction.  Beware the downward spiral of denying all feelings to avoid pain, eliminating the opportunities to feel good and opening yourself to love & laughter.   In the words of Jill Scott ‘Just because you have a nightmare, doesn’t mean you stop dreaming’.

So what makes you feel vulnerable?  Is it asking for help when you live on your own?   Initiating sex?   Talking about the passing of a loved one?
And what/how did you gain from expressing your vulnerability?  A new friend?  The most amazing sex ever?  The joy of a shared memory?   Share it on our Facebook page.  

TEDxHouston - Brené Brown

Weight Loss Myth No 2

Weight loss myth number 2
If you eat a diet low in fat, you’ll lose fat and won’t be overweight.  It’s an assumption we all make, and with the supermarket shelves piled high with ‘Low fat’, ‘light’ and ‘0%’, it’s easy to get drawn into the hype.
So what fuelled this paradigm?  It seems to make perfect sense until you realise that obesity and heart disease are on the increase, and this low fat diet we’ve been following for decades appears to be having the opposite effect.

It was in the seventies when the research was carried out claiming a high fat diet leads to coronary heart disease, hence the birth of the low-fat craze in the early eighties that has been with us ever since.  But this research was flawed, not analysed properly, and has led us all astray. 

The research was based on LDL (low density lipoproteins, aka ‘bad cholesterol’) levels in the body.   Here’s what it concludes:
In the mid seventies they discovered that dietary fat (A) raises LDL (B):
   A → B
In the late seventies it was found that LDL (B) levels correlated with cardiovascular disease (C):
   B → C
So therefore, dietary fat leads to heart disease:
   A → C
Right?  

Wrong.  Here’s why:
There are two types of LDL that can currently only be tested as one:

1. Pattern A, large, buoyant LDL that floats through the bloodstream and doesn’t stick to your arteries (neutral)
2. Pattern B, small, dense LDL, which starts the plaque formation that causes heart disease (bad).

You have to look at the ratio of HDL (high density lipoproteins) to triglycerides (other fatty substances) to determine if the LDL you have is bad or neutral – low triglycerides to high HDL is considered good, high triglycerides to low HDL is considered bad. 

So what causes these different types of LDL to rise?   Pattern A is affected dietary fat, pattern B is affected by carbohydrates. 

And then what happened?   The American government started a campaign to reduce the amount of fat in the diet from 40% to 30%, and in true British style, we followed.  And achieved it.   But by reducing the fat in food, you also reduce the flavour, and it becomes unpalatable.  So to make it taste nice (and therefore sellable), food manufacturers added sugar, and sweeteners.   And what’s sugar?  A carbohydrate. And what do carbohydrates do?  Increase the bad form of LDL.   So we were doubly duped!
Click here for my previous article on sugar.  Sweeteners are just as, if not more evil than sugar – don’t get me started on them!   

Now I’m not proposing you give up all carbohydrates and eat bacon for the rest of your days, it’s all about finding out what’s right for your body.  Listen to it, it will tell you.  Feel bloated after bread?   Don’t eat it.  Get heartburn after fatty food?  Stay off it.   These are just a couple of examples of your body telling you it doesn’t like what you’re giving it.  And then of course there are my general guidelines such as avoiding sugar, exercising, eating whole, unprocessed foods, lots of fruit and veg and being happy.   Simples.

Weight Loss Myth No 1.

Weight loss myth number 1

You’ve all heard it – to lose weight you need to burn more calories than you take in.   Sounds like simple maths to me.  But have you ever actually worked out what that means in real terms?

An average woman may eat 2000 calories (give or take) per day and weigh 10 stone.   If she were to run a mile in 10 minutes, she’d burn 106 calories (nearly 2 Oreo cookies’ worth).   At that rate, she’d have to run 20 miles per day to burn just 120 calories more than her daily intake (2120 calories in total).  That’s 3 hours and 20 minutes of running.  Who’s up for a marathon today then?!!!

So if that’s the case, what’s the point in exercising at all?   It does help you lose weight, just not in the way you may have thought.  As you exercise, your metabolism is increased (by improving your insulin sensitivity in your liver & skeletal muscles), and it’s this that helps you burn more energy, more efficiently.   An increase in insulin sensitivity also reduces the rate of diabetes, along with high blood pressure, heart disease and bone loss.

The best reason though, I think, for exercising is because it makes you feel good.    Those wonderful happy hormones, endorphins, are stimulated when you exercise, leading to a feeling of exhilaration and wellbeing.
It’s also a great stress buster.   I remember as a child watching people playing squash, and wondering why they hit the ball so hard and made such a noise!  Now I realise they were probably imagining the ball was their boss’ head…   Ever wondered why people pace the room or tap their fingers when they’re tense?   Movement helps to relieve the primitive ‘freeze’ response to stress, and not forgetting those happy hormones giving you an extra anti-stress boost.

Even a professional marathon runner wouldn’t run 20 miles every day, and look how skinny they are!  So how does it become achievable and sustainable in everyday life?   The current NHS “Recommended activity levels:

• Adults: 30 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity at least five days a week.
• Children: 60 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity each day.
• Targets can be achieved with 10-minute bursts of activity spread throughout the day.”

‘Moderate-intensity’ exercise means getting a bit out of breath, so you feel that warm glow as the blood (and endorphins) pump through your body.   It’s the ten minute bursts that entice me, as it means I can do a spurt of vigorous vacuuming before work (the sooner it’s over and done with the better if you ask me), go for a quick power walk at lunch, and when I get home, I can dance to a few tracks via the Xbox Kinect.   Bob’s your uncle, 30 minutes of ‘moderate-intensity physical activity’ done.   It really helps your motivation to find something you enjoy doing, so you keep wanting to go back for more.  My favourites include dancing, walking and horse riding.  What are yours?

C'mon get happy...

Be happy now – five things to do today

1. Connect
Delight in putting your time and energy into friends loved ones, and connect with those around you. Take your neighbour some flowers out of your garden, invite your friends for round for a cuppa, or join a local group who shares your interests.

2. Be Active
There’s nothing better to shake off a bad mood than getting physical. When you feel really pent up and about to explode, go and pound the pavement, clean vigorously, sprint like there’s no tomorrow or dance like you don’t give a damn. Relax as your shoulders stop hugging your ears, your mind focuses on something else and your breathing slows to calm your whole body. Soon you’ll be wondering what all the fuss was about, feeling serene and have a smile on your face.

3. Take notice
Have you stopped to appreciate the changing of the seasons? Have you noticed how crunchy the leaves are when you walk on them? It sounds simple, even childish, but do you remember how much fun it used to be, walking to school, stomping on the leaves and jumping in the puddles, rather than hurrying along, eyes to the ground, oblivious to nature and all it’s beauty.

4. Keep learning
Curiosity didn’t kill the cat, and you can teach an old dog new tricks, especially beneficial as older people show better health outcomes when they keep learning. It’s not just about formal learning, you don’t have to do any exams or write any essays if you don’t want to. Try learning a new recipe, the names of the stars and constellations, or how to make your own clothes.

5. Give
Our compassion, generosity and altruism contribute to our level of happiness. In his TED talk, The Happy Planet Index, Nic Marks cites studies where two groups of people were given $100 at the start of the day. One group was told to spend it on themselves, and the other group was told to spend it on others. Guess who gained a much better sense of wellbeing and was happiest at the end of the day? The people who spent it on others of course!

6. Be thankful *
Instead of focusing on what you haven’t got, be thankful for what you have got. Everyone reading this has a computer (or at least access to one), so I can therefore safely assume you have a roof over your head, a bed to sleep in, food in your belly and a license for your telly…
* No. 6 is a Bessie Bonus

We now stock the full range of Healing Herbs Bach Flower Remedies.

As far as I’m aware, we’re the only people in Belper to stock the full range, and we’re happy to post them to you if necessary. When you’re feeling a little low, angry or tearful, remember there’s a flower remedy to help lift you.

Is Cancer a fungus?

Part 2 will automatically load on the YouTube page (to the right) when you click on the video above.

Could this be true? Could cancer be fungus? Can the cure be as simple as sodium bicarbonate? From the research I’ve been doing this year to write these articles for you and the reading I do at home, this does ring true for me.

Further research suggests that up to 97% of cancer patients have an overgrowth of the fungus candida albicans, and cancer patient’s blood is 1,000 times more acidic than that of healthy people. Cancer (and any other disease) thrives in acidic conditions, and cannot survive in an alkaline environment. Sodium bicarbonate, when dissolved in water, is an alkaline solution.

Conventional doctrine dictates that candida is present because patient’s immune systems are low (it’s opportunistic). Dr Simoncini turns this theory upside down by theorising that it’s the candida that is the cause of tumours and the reason for their spread.

According to Dr Simoncini’s website [www.curenaturalicancro.com], his remission rate is up to 90%, using sodium bicarbonate to flush the tumours to radically alter their pH from acidic to alkaline. It’s performed using a catheter, so don’t try it at home! Within seven days there is no sign of the tumour, with patients also given a diet to follow. It’s no surprise to learn that the diet they’re given to follow is an anti-candida diet, which has many crossovers with an alkaline diet.

When you look at the stats for 5-year cancer survival rates in adults in the US treated with cytotoxic chemotherapy, it’s just above 2% for all cancers. 2%! I’m flabbergasted by this fact, and horrified as currently, this is the best conventional medicine can do. Many chemotherapy drugs work on cells that are actively reproducing, with no distinction between whether the reproducing cell is healthy or cancerous, so therefore destroys both. I guess the clue is in the title: ‘cytotoxic’, which means toxic to living cells.

If I had cancer, I know which treatment I’d use, and I’m not alone either. On Dr Simoncini’s website, he claims up to 75% of doctors would refuse chemotherapy if they had cancer due to it’s ineffectiveness and devastating side effects.

So if cancer is a fungus, what can be done to prevent it’s overgrowth? And how do you know if you’ve got it?
Common symptoms of candida/fungal overgrowth include lethargy, sugar & carbohydrate cravings, thrush/vaginitis, weight gain, food intolerances, migraines and depression. I know from personal experience how the sugar cravings can take over, how you feel powerless to do anything because you just feel so low and how hard it is to get rid of the condition completely. I’ve had all the symptoms listed above, and still I find it hard to stay on top of it and remain healthy. It’s also not a pleasant process to go through to get rid of it, as the ‘die-off’ can seem worse than the original symptoms, but once you’ve gone through it and come out the other side, you’ll have never felt better.

Staying off sugar and refined carbs (white flour, bread, rice etc) helps as the fungus feeds on sugar. Keeping to an alkaline diet is one of the best ways to improve your health overall, as stated earlier, cancer, fungus and other disease can’t survive in an alkaline environment. Detoxing the gut to kill off the fungus and boosting your intestinal flora with good bacteria (probiotic tablets, not the yoghurts as they’ve got sugar in) will ultimately replace the candida and leave you feeling energised, healthy and vibrant again.