Keep it Clean!

We all know that what we put on our bodies is just as important as what we put in it, but do we REALLY stop to consider how much of an impact that items we use on a daily impact could have on our health?  One of the simplest and easiest ways to live a healthier, most sustainable lifestyle starts right in your shower, with the soap that you use. Your skin is your first line of defense against harmful toxins – it covers up to 20 square feet of your body!  It is a protective barrier between your organs and substances that could harm them.  Your skin secretes waste material and absorbs useful vitamins.  But even our skin, that is an AMAZING organism designed to protect and nurture your body, cannot keep all of the bad toxins out and these are sometimes absorbed after contact with chemical-laden soap products.

Soap is as complex as it seems simple.  Did you know that soap is actually made up of tiny salt crystals that grew in oil droplets?  When you mix oils, alkali and water, they chemically react and turn into soap and glycerin.  Soap is a very unusual and unique molecule – the oily part of it hates water and the alkali part loves the water.  When you mix soap and water – it causes the soap to lather!  In it’s most basic form, soap is exactly what your body needs to stay clean and wash away the toxins you are exposed to in the air on a daily basis.  However, it’s the chemicals that are added by many companies that cause soap to be harmful.

There are several common chemicals that carry health risks from prolonged exposure to them, that are found in many body soaps.   Benzaldehyde can depress the nervous system, which brings on dizziness, vomiting and sudden drops in blood pressure if inhaled.  Benzyl Acetate is an eye and lung irritant and a known carcinogen associated with pancreatic cancer.  Dove Beauty Bars contain Butylated Hydroxytoluene (BHT) which is a suspected carcinogen, as well as formaldehyde.

Sodium Laureth Sulfate (SLS) breaks down fats and impairs the skins ability to maintain moisture.  SLS is classified as a “mutagen” because it can alter genetic material in cells.  SLS is found in Ivory products and in many common household-cleaning products.

Another common chemical, Ethanol, is on the EPA’s hazardous waste list.  Ethanol can irritate the respiratory tract and cause vision impairments and loss of muscle control.  Ethanol can be found in Ponds and L’Oreal products.  Linalool is a narcotic substance that can harm your respiratory system and motor activity.

This and other chemicals are in the soap that you use on your skin on a daily basis.  I challenge you to go into your bathroom and read the ingredient list on the soap that you use and investigate the chemicals that are listed.

The good news is that there are now companies that are creating products that are good for your skin AND the environment.    First, skip the scents.  Unless those are added with natural oils – they are chemically based.  The best types of bar soap are made from vegetable oil blends (not mineral) and have the glycerin added back in to protect your skin’s moisture barrier.  If you’re looking for a foaming soap, try liquid castile soap.

The most important thing is for you to be aware of what you are putting on your body.  Do your research before picking a product that works best for your skin type and that is environmentally friendly. Treat your skin like the valuable asset that it is and only use products that protect it!

Self Care

We hear a lot about self-care – articles behooving us to practice it and entire lines of products dedicated to it.   But what IS self-care?  Is it just another trend that will pass in a year or two?  

Self-care is the act of improving or restoring personal health by making yourself a priority and attending to your physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual needs. WHEW!  That sounds like quite a bit of “caring” going on.  Simply put – it’s making sure you are a whole and happy individual.

Too often, we forget to focus on ourselves; whether it’s our children, our career, our significant other, or our commitment to family members or the community, we forget to take time for ourselves.  This can lead to unnecessary stress on your body, weakened immune system, shortened life, inflamed joints, and so many other unpleasant things.  Your body is your vessel that will carry you through your life, and when you aren’t taking care of yourself mentally and physically, your vessel gets run down.  Consider self-care as routine maintenance, much like you would schedule oil changes every three months on your car; you must make self care a priority as well.

This is the point where you’re thinking to yourself  “I simply don’t have time.”  I’m challenging you to MAKE TIME for it.  Start simple – set aside 10 minutes a day to focus on yourself.  An hour a week.  An afternoon a month.  Once you accomplish that, you can start fitting “you” into your schedule more.

Self-care doesn’t have to be expensive or time consuming.  Think about what it is that you liked to do, before the kids or career or community involvement.  Think about what it is that you’d like to do now.  Be reasonable with your expectations and goals and set a time line and activity that you know you can meet.  However, I think it’s important to have big goals as well.  Don’t worry if they seem far away or implausible.  Feel free to dream and dream as big as you possibly can.  Make a bucket list that contains all of those great dreams and teeny goals and start checking them off.  Nothing feels better than placing a checkmark next to a goal!  Once you start, you’ll find that you enjoy it and you are ready to work toward the big dreams.

Self-care suggestions and ideas:

• Start an art journal, set aside a little time every day or every week to work on it.
• Read a book for pleasure.  You might have a “100 Books To Read” list like I do that contains everything from sci-fi to literary “greats”.   But you might also enjoy romance novels or a good murder mystery.  Don’t worry about what anyone else thinks of what you are reading; read simply for the joy of it.
• Take yourself out for the afternoon. Go see a movie or browse a bookstore.  Meet a friend for coffee and catch-up.  Set aside an entire stretch of time to merely focus on you.  
• Allow yourself to cry.  Do you have a tearjerker movie that gets you every time?  Pop it in and grab the tissues.  Crying can release tension and help you feel more balanced and ready to take on the world!
• Reframe your mind with positive affirmations.  A positive affirmation is something spoken aloud that you want to believe or want to be true.  Repeat this affirmation daily and it can help to shift your internal dialogue from negative to positive.
• Take a class and learn something new.  Whether it is a cooking class, a foreign language, or government policy course – your brain LOVES to soak up new information.
• Get a massage or a facial.  Set aside a little money to treat yourself.  You won’t regret it!

Self-care, in the end, is all about you.  Figure out what will help you to recharge and DO IT.  

Pregnancy or Prenatal Massage is a big help for Mom's to be

Prenatal Massage to the rescue!

Pregnancy can be an amazing journey for a woman; a journey that allows them to feel their child as it grows and flourishes within them.  However, it can be stressful on a woman’s body at the same time – the body is suddenly meeting the demands of two beings rather than one.  Studies show that massage therapy performed during pregnancy can help reduce some of this stress as well as reduce anxiety, decrease symptoms of depression, relieve muscle aches and joint pains, and improve labor outcomes and newborn health.

Hormone regulation is a key benefit of prenatal massage.  With massage during pregnancy relaxation increases and stress decreases leading to mood regulation and improved cardiovascular health.  “Stress hormones” such as cortisol and norepinephrine are reduced and “happy hormones” like dopamine and serotonin are increased.  Low levels of dopamine and serotonin are associated with depression during and post-pregnancy.  These changes in hormone levels can lead to fewer complications during birth.  Studies have also shown that there are fewer complications for the newborns, such as low birth weight.

Another benefit of prenatal massage is a reduction of swelling.  How often have you heard (or experienced yourself) a pregnant woman’s concern with their swollen joints?  Swollen joints are the result of reduced circulation and increased pressure on the major blood vessels by the heavy uterus.  Massage can relieve this swelling by stimulating soft tissues to reduce the collection of fluids in the joints.  This can also help to improve the removal of tissue waste that are carried by the body’s lymph system.

Even without all of these benefits, prenatal massage has an additional benefit for a pregnant woman – it just plain feels good.  Reward yourself and your body during those times when it is stressed and struggling to carry extra weight and provide for two rather than one and schedule a weekly massage.  Your body will thank you for it!

Want to learn more about our new equine coaching?

The bond between horses and humans is a truly beautiful thing to witness and experience.  Horses have, for centuries, travelled and learned alongside their human companions. 

But how often do we stop and listen to what THEY are teaching us? Really stopped and watched how horses interact with the world?  Horses are naturally intuitive creatures that trust their instincts to guide them at every moment and in every encounter.  We humans have suppressed our intuition, our empathy, and our openness to learning from the world around us. 

With Equine Guided Education (EGE) the focus is on “being in the world”; guiding you back to yourself, to what really matters, and to an openness and understanding of the word around us.  The Equine Guided Educator will help individuals to identify their future goals and to develop a healthy self-knowledge and responsibility. 

Horses guide individuals toward a healthier sense of self during the course of the education.  Because horses experience the world in a way that is truly unique to them, they are able to react to each experience without doubt in their abilities and their place in the world.  By opening themselves to the horse’s way of experiencing life, individuals open themselves to an education in life itself.

 The guide, horse, helps find paths through previously unexplored territory; unexplored territory such as healthy thought processes, awareness of goals, and connection with the world.  Learning methods like kinesthetic learning are employed with hands on activities to help individuals feel what the horse is feeling and to connect physically with their guide. 

EGE can be useful in many different life arenas – building workplace confidence, parenting, therapy, leadership development, etc. The Equine Guided Educator is trained to recognize each individual’s strengths and weaknesses and to plan a unique educational experience with these in mind. The horse, Educator, and individual, will embark on a journey together toward a healthier and happier life.

Stop the self-abuse, silence the critic!

We all have that little voice in our heads.  You know the one – that inner critic that nags at you and worries away at your confidence and happiness, that pipes up with sneering remarks after a silly blunder or before a big step in life.  Don’t you just HATE that inner voice?  When we let that inner critic influence our decisions or our daily life, that’s called self-sabotage. Self-sabotaging in a nutshell is simply acting against your own best interest.  It’s that little critical voice in the back of your head that tells you that you aren’t smart enough, funny enough, pretty enough, lacking in SOME way. 

We all self-sabotage in one way or another; whether its in some small way, such as thinking you’re not good enough to ask for a promotion or in a bigger way such as picking an argument with your significant other for no reason when everything is going “too well”. The good news is, you don’t have to listen to your inner critic.  You can change your thought patterns, and thus your self-sabotaging behavior.  As Roderick Thorpe, the American novelist, puts it: “We have to learn to be our own best friends because we fall too easily into the trap of being our own worst enemies.”

The first step to becoming your own best friend – confront the inner critic.  Okay, I know this is the scary part but to overcome it, you have to face it!  Imagine yourself as a knight armored to face a fire breathing dragon if that helps, or imagine the inner critic as a grumpy Muppet (that’s what I do J ).  Listen to all of those terrible untrue things the inner critic is telling you.  Write them down.  All of them. Read them again.  Maybe twice, if necessary.  This could be as little as a ten minute process for you or you might consider taking a few days – carry a notebook with you and write down every negative thought that comes to mind. 

NOW KILL THE INNER CRITIC!  Slay the dragon!  Burn the paper where you wrote down the negative thoughts!  Flush it down the toilet! Bury it! Maybe just throwing it away will suffice, but acknowledge that the inner critic is wrong, that you are good and worthy, and then make up your mind to never let the inner critic triumph again!

Which leads us to the second step (hey, this should be fairly easy after you just slay a dragon, right?!), relearning how to think about yourself.  Cognitive therapists recommend keeping a negative thought journal where you track the thought and then refute it with evidence as to why it’s not true and why you won’t listen to it.  For example: “I think I look fat in this dress BUT my husband thinks it looks great on me and I received several compliments while wearing it so that must not be true”.

 A negative thoughts journal may not be the right choice for you, just keep in mind with whatever method you choose that the point is to confront the inner critic and nip it in the bud before it leads to self-sabotage. Relearning how to think about yourself is as simple as recognizing the fallacy of your negative thoughts. 

Never forget: YOU ARE AWESOME, AMAZING, AND WONDERFUL.

It's Just a Massage

"You're just a massage therapist, gee-whiz, why do you take everything/ it / rude comments / not funny jokes / etc so personally?"

Skipping past the maniacal obsession that all business owners must possess in order to be in business for themselves, cuz the money sure ain't there (can we talk about the tax rate in this great state??)... and
hop-skipping over the latent, though recovering, bout of perfectionism I have suffered from ALL MY FREAKING LIFE (seriously, I only liked milk from the left tit), and jump skipping over the fact that I am totally with Meg Ryan by 'wondering what is so wrong with taking things personally, surely it should all begin by being personal' etc...

I take 'massage' so personally because it should be the basis of human interaction, touch. It leads to understanding, love, nurturing, and elevates us to the highest level of human expression. It is an art. It is a science. It incorporates all intuition about being a person, standing witness to someone's life, and trying to help.

I have put my hands on four generations of people that all came through my door looking for something. I have worked on people in all seasons of their life and in all stages of their experience on this planet. Celebrities to homeless, babies to octogenarians. Just born to dying. I have worked on social welfare workers, many of whom had filed bankruptcy, get this.... in order TO KEEP WORKING and one was sleeping in her car to help feed her clients. Heroes come in all shapes and sizes. Their words echo in my head for years.

To me, massage is a response that is life affirming and natural and celebratory and soothing.

I have given my best to those in need when I was breaking inside, past breaking, broken. I know I will continue if blind, battered, or limbless. It is a calling and my religion. My door is open to those in need and I will continue to be grateful for this opportunity.

Buried in Plastic!!

In my last post I mentioned that plastic exudes an exogenous estrogen... This affects reptiles, fish, birds, mammals, and us.

In fact I was part of the original study based out of Shawnee National Forest to catch and study Leopard frogs and record anomalies (extra legs or other obvious physical mutations) and ratio of sexes. You can tell a male by looking at his larger.... ears. Seriously. At the time, I was a high school student volunteering, and certainly wasn't enlightened as to the seriousness of the research. I just knew it was great fun to skip school, wade through ponds, and play with froggies. It wasn't until I caught up with the state biologist years later that I found out the point behind those blissful, school-free days. We were studying the effects of exogenous estrogens, whether this was causing mutations, and if the populations were being skewed to female. This was in the 1980s! It has been known that plastic impacts health negatively for almost THIRTY YEARS!

What's the main component of plastic? Petrochemicals. What are petrochemicals? Chemicals made from petroleum and distillates. Can't imagine why plastics are endemic.

So... leaving politics, global economies, and social response behind... how do YOU eliminate plastic from your life and that of your family's? It is by far cheaper and not that much harder to start making your own products - future blog post might cover this if there is an interest. Below assumes all goods to be purchased and some of the best places to do so.

General house: carpets, upholstery, clothes, or other fabrics that are made from recycled plastic bottles are great from a recycling standpoint - but terrible for your health!!
Choose wool, wood, concrete, cotton, glass, metal for flooring, furniture, and building material.

Laundry room: Use glass milk bottles (save the cap!!) and refill from the bulk aisle (make sure you label). You can also buy decorative glass jars - but unless you spend some money and get a thick, SOLID jug, it will break easily. If you iron - use a glass spray bottle and make your own spritzer.

Bathroom: Use bar soap, wood toothbrushes, powdered cleaners. Many bodycare products only come in plastic: make sure the plastic is PET-, Paraben-, BPA, and PVC free, and always be on the lookout for alternatives.

Pets: Buy kitty litter and pet food in bags, use stainless steel bowls.

Living room: for candles or scented products, use a canning jar and poke holes in the lid - use a decorative square of fabric and screw on the ring (use wide mouth jars). Coasters can be ceramic, wood, or glass.

Dining room: Use only glass, wood, or metal to eat from. Use fabric placemats (easier to wash than those made from rushes) and fabric tablecloths.

Kitchen: Glass tupperware, canning jars, and parchment paper will be your friends. Textured olive oil bottles with a spout work for dish soap, dishwashing and most cleaners can be bought in powdered form, or in bulk.

When you buy goods: look at the packaging - many times it is indicative of the product quality. Use baskets, canvas bags, and cotton bags when you go shopping. Old pillowcases make great veggie bags. Eggs can be bought in cardboard boxes. If you can buy your meat from a butcher it will be wrapped in paper. Buy bread and keep it in a bread box (good ones available from King Arthur's Flour).

If you have any questions or would like suggestions of how to keep plastic out of YOUR house, feel free to post here.