BASIC REQUIREMENTS OF HEALTH: (What the body wants)
Light: Spend time out doors in full spectrum, natural light. The sun is not your enemy. Man made light is only a small part of the spectrum and can make us feel drained. Not to mention the harmful EMFs involved in creating artificial light. Even if you live where it’s foggy all the time go outdoors in a t-shirt and get some light and vitamin D in your skin. You can also buy full spectrum lighting for the house which will help improve your mood. Dr. Michael Smolensky’s (author of The Body Clock Guide to Better Health) researched circadian rhythms (biological cycle lasting 24-hours) and the sleep/wake pattern and found that: "Our words, 'menstruation,' 'moon,' and 'month,' all come from the Greek word for 'measure of time.' A woman's menstrual cycle runs its course in about twenty-eight days, one lunar cycle. Periods usually start spontaneously in the week of the full moon in women not using birth control pills or hormone replacement therapy, particularly those with ample exposure to natural daylight and dark cues. His research showed that the more we use bright lights at night, the less regular our periods. So our bodies were created to follow the natural flow of light and darkness. Modern life, however, often brings late nights in bright lights or in front of computers that disrupt the body’s natural light cues, throwing us off. You might find that dimming the lights in your home right after dinner also helps regulate your periods!
Air: Breath: holding your breath you poison yourself with carbon dioxide, raise your blood pressure and pump stress chemicals into your bloodstream. You can go without food, water, shelter for various lengths of time but a lack of oxygen will kill you in just a few minutes. Hyperbaric chambers (oxygen chambers) are being used now to treat a variety of illnesses, cheaply, and quickly. Gurus have been telling us to breathe (pranayama yoga exercises for example ) for millennium. So make a point to oxygenate your body: get lots of fresh, clean air. Get an air filter (Hepa variety) for indoors and when you go about your day, check in with your body to make sure you are taking deep breaths. Some of us tend to take shallow little breaths when we are nervous, upset, focused on something or distracted, which is just about all the time. We also are not taught to breathe correctly. Use the diaphragm and let the air go deep down into the body instead of just staying in the shoulder, upper lung area. If congestion and mucus keep you from breathing correctly, find out how to remedy the situation. Living with unnecessary symptoms will create more problems later.
Movement: Everything is moving all the time: molecules, planets and everything in between. If you have a life that requires a limited range of movements from your body make sure you include some activity that gets you moving in other ways because if you don’t use it you will lose it. People who sweat for at least 15 minutes a day are healthier than others. The lymphatic system, vital to our health and well being, requires movement. Digestion and circulation are also improved. No movement means stuck chi (energy). And that means all those toxins in your body are staying there. Movement is just like light. You need the natural full spectrum, not the man made limited variety. We humans think we can improve on nature but mostly we just make unhealthy copies of it. Go for a 15 minute fast walk and stretch. Remember yoga is about moving your whole body and attuning with it, not about hurting yourself getting into weird positions so take it easy. I also highly recommend Tai Chi, Chi gong. Get a CD if you don’t have the money for a class. They have them at the library. Remember every teacher is different so if your first time you get a bad or boring one just keep looking. Go do it outdoors and breathe deep while you’re at it and you’ll get air, light and movement all in one shot. The body will love you for it.
Water: You’ve heard it before: the planet is ¾ water and so is the body. Most of us however are ¾ soda, coffee and beer because that’s what we’re drinking instead of water. You wouldn’t put coffee in your car instead of gasoline would you? Then why are you treating your car better than your body? You need water that isn’t out of a plastic bottle and that isn’t filled with chlorine and fluoride. You aren’t a swimming pool. So get a water filter. For about $200s you can get an excellent filter that will last you about a year and a half before you need a replacement cartridge ($50). That comes out a heck of a lot cheaper than bottled water and you don’t contribute non biodegradable and toxin leaching plastic into land fill garbage dumps. What’s good for you is good for the planet. After weeks of research I found this one is the best buy for your money:
Food: The body uses food as fuel and to build itself. And what is food? Well, it isn’t stuff that comes out of cans, or shrink wrapped packages, or stuff made in factories, mass produced by machines, from farms with soil that is so depleted of vitamins they have to use tons of chemicals and pesticides to get anything to grow. Once again the emphasis is on getting something made by nature as opposed to humans. We are clever little monkeys but there is still a lot we don’t know. And a wise man is one who knows that he doesn’t know.
Peace: So now that we’ve got the external environment taken care of there is something else we need for health: balance and order in the internal environment aka Peace. Which brings happiness and health and lots of other great things. How do we get inner peace? By slowing down, quieting the fearful ego inner dialogue that keeps us running in circles, and re-learning how to be. We are all taught that it is natural and normal to worry, fret, complain, struggle, and suffer. That is one way to go through life but it is a vast and eternal universe so I’m quite sure there are at least a million ways to do any little thing. We’ve been doing it this way for a long time and it still isn’t working for us so lets try something new, shall we? Just remember: we don’t get away from pain and fear by running away from it or ignoring it. Feel what you feel then transcend.
