2013!

A change is underway. I'm ready for it. Whatever it may turn out to be. So to prepare myself and to move forward in that change, my mantra for the year is:

Let go. Be Present.

That's pretty contradictory to what I would have thought I needed to do to prepare for change 10 years ago. But for the past few years I've slowly been learning not to live in the future, in what's next or what I wanted to be next. The future will come, it may unfold just as I hope and it may not. I have everything in the here and now I need, it is exactly where I'm supposed to be, and I can find complete contentment in this moment, just as it is. That's my grounding as the world around me swirls and spins and changes. My life is like an open hand: the only thing I need is what is resting in it right now; not what may fall into it later, or what may fall out of it.

On New Year's Eve, I went to Harmony Yoga to participate in "The Forgiveness Series" created by Sri Baba Hari Dass. It's a very simple vinyasa (a series of yoga postures linked by breath) accompanied by mantra, repeated 28 times focusing on the removal of 28 different negative attitudes. It fit just right with the "Let Go" piece of my 2013 mantra. And cleaning out all that negativity left behind a lot of space. Space is a beautiful thing: it allows for breathe, movement, stillness, and peacefulness. But I also felt inspired to contemplate what I want more of in the new year. It's much more productive in the long term to focus on what we do want, on the positive rather than the negative. Whatever we focus our thoughts on, that's where our energy goes. So I decided to create a list of antonyms for the 28 negative things we focused on removing, a list of positive things that I want to focus on generating in my life. Here's both lists.

So, as the sun set on 2012, I focused on removing a lot of negative attitudes. And with the dawning of 2012, I focus on attaining a lot of positive energy. And in the spirit of compassion and non-violence to myself, in the spirit of Letting Go and Being Present, this list represents not what I will beat myself up for not achieving, but what I will come back to and ground myself with. I'm not perfect now, and (probably) never will be, but I'll do the best I can do.

The Amazing Powers of Tea Tree Oil

Tea Tree Oil is a natural anti-septic that I have used in the past on cuts and I've found it works so effectively that I don't even bother with other things like neosporin. I came to this conclusion after Pentaport Rock Festival in Korea. It was held outside, it was the rainy season, and the grounds were turned into a giant mud-pit, complete with bits of asphalt and rocks and who-knows-what. If you've ever tried to walk through 6 inch deep mud you know that the suction power is incredibly strong--making shoes just ridiculous. Over the course of 3 days our feet got cut up pretty badly, and I can only imagine what horrors were living in that mud. The only thing I had with me to treat the cuts on my feet was tea tree oil, which I applied evening and morning. One of my friends did not. Whereas my cuts did not get infected and healed quite quickly, hers did not. I always travel now with tea-tree oil.

My recent tea tree oil discovery was when I haphazardly decided to put it on my mosquito bites when I had it out to put on a cut and some mysterious cluster of bites on my knee. A few days later someone asked if I had gotten any mosquito bites (we were talking about malaria medications). I realized that since I applied the tea tree oil I hadn't scratched those bites, and they were even healed! I never before even considered putting tea-tree oil on insect bites, but I'm so glad I did! I know it's now winter in most parts of the world, and mosquitoes aren't much of an issue, but come next summer give the tea tree oil a try!

Some other tid-bits about tea tree oil, it's safe to use on your skin, but DON'T get it in your eyes or mouth. Also, it's a dry oil, so you can apply it to your face for things like pimples and eczema and it's absorbed instantly without making your skin oily. You can find it at health food stores like Whole Foods and Vitamin Cottage, but as grocery stores have started carrying more organic items you may find it there too. Happy Healing! (too bad itwon't save me from Ebola!)

"Share the Love, not the Flu"shot

The campaigning and propagandizing for people to get flu immunizations seems to me bigger than ever. This is a problem for me because, like most everything pharmacueticals do, it's not about your health or that of your family, but about making money. The fact is that the average, healthy adult should NOT be getting a flu shot.

WHO SHOULD GET A FLU SHOT?
The CDC recommends children (6 months to 5 years), pregnant women, those with chronic medical conditions, adults over 50, and those living in longterm care/nursing home facilities get vaccinated. In addition, people who live with those who are at risk/cannot get vaccinated (eg if you have an infant under 6 months or care for someone with a chronic illness).

It is dangerous to get a vaccine if you are allergic to chicken eggs, had a severe reaction to the vaccine in the past, if you developed Guillain-Barre Syndrome after receiving the vaccine in the past, if you are under 6 months of age (and I'm SO impressed you're reading this if you are!), or if you have a fever.

However, the following factors (not to mention that GBS issue!) lead me to question if even the recommended population should get the vaccine.

WHY NOT GET A FLU SHOT?
1. The vaccine contains chemicals such as mercury, aluminum, ethylene glycol (antifreeze), phenol, and formaldehyde. Aluminum and mercury have been linked to Alzheimer's. Pretty sure everyone knows antifreeze and formaldehyde are poison. You may be thinking that these things must only be in very small concentrations, but these toxins do build up in your system year after year.

2. There is no guarantee! There are lots of strains of the flu virus out there, and they are all adapting and changing. The vaccine that is given each year is a "one-size fits all" solution--scientists monitoring and evaluating these changes choose which strains they think will be most common that year--given to everyone everywhere. The vaccine does not protect you against all strains. It takes time to produce the vaccine, and sometimes the predictions made so far in advance as to which strains will be common are wrong. Also, after several months the strain your body produced antibodies for could very well have already mutated, rendering that vaccine less effective.

3. If you have a chronic medical illness your immune response may be depressed enough that even in the presence of the inactivated virus particles it does not produce sufficient antibodies to protect you if you are infected.

4. Increased use of vaccines (in a case like this where evolution occurs so quickly), and antibiotics, can only increase the virulence of a pathogen. Meaning that we are acting to create a pathogen that will be far more deadly than it currently is, so we are not doing ourselves any favors.

WHAT ARE THE ALTERNATIVES?
Promote a healthy immune system! It's there to protect us from harmful invaders, so why not fully equip it?
Diet is essential:
-Avoid sugar! It suppresses the immune system and most of us are totally oblivious to the amount of sugar we are actually eating/drinking each day. I challenge you to try to go just one day without consuming any sugar--read labels!--just to make you aware of where it's coming from in your diet and better equip you to limit your intake.
-Avoid processed foods. They have been stripped of nutrients and contain harmful ingredients.
-Avoid junk food, fast food, trans-fats, etc. (obvious)
-Do consume essential fats and complex carbs
-If you eat meat, buy naturally raised (free-range, hormone-free, antibiotic-free) meat.

Sleep is essential. Do it!

Move your body. The more the better.

Do things that make you happy. (ok, I can't say I've read any studies linking happiness and healthy immune systems--which doesn't mean they're not out there--but as long as I'm talking about a healthy lifestyle, I figure this is pretty important. And it's easy to forget.)

Ultimately everyone has to judge their own situation and decide for themselves what they are, and are not, willing to do. Just don't be guilted into anything by a commercial!