Tag Archives: inner strength

The Healing Power of Celebration

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My parents have just pulled away. It was a fun, noisy, food- & laughter-filled 5 days of family coming & going through Easter weekend. Now that we’ve moved to a different city, these pockets of both familiar comfort and reacquainting are an important part to keeping me grounded in this new life.

Sure, there are times when my brothers and I still rub each other the wrong way, but these first relationships remind me of where I come from, help me reaffirm who I am at my core and give me an extra glimpse at who I don’t want to become.

Sometimes daily life can do that as well. The part about who you don’t want to be. You know, when you have those days that feel like life is living you: when the kids’ activities and work deadlines and the laundry…the shoulds are driving the boat, and it’s like you’re just being pulled along for the ride?

At times like those, I can lose sight of my own values and needs, as they get trampled by the schedule.

I know that I’ve fallen into that mode when I literally feel breathless adding one more item to my to-do list. My heart pounds like I’ve run a race. Like I’m scrambling to catch up with myself even though I’m not sure where I’m headed.

When my sense of overwhelm is through the roof like that, I usually feel quite down on myself. OK, that’s putting it mildly. When stress gets the better of me, whatever self-confidence I have flies out the window and, depending on the day, anxiety or depression hook right in – I’m running on fear, a ball of insecurity.

Inevitably, as stress will do, those are also times when my minor ailments (asthma and digestive woes) get a little louder, or I hurt myself with small accidents – a head bump on the cupboard door or a twisted ankle on the stairs. Though, of course, there’s no time to rest or see someone to help, because there aren’t enough hours in the day.

I have a recurring dream of frantically packing or trying to find a cab for a flight to Paris that leaves in an hour. When that dream shows up, I now know it’s telling me to take the stressed-out foot off the gas and reassess.

One thing that has become unfailingly clear when I take a step back on those days is that most of my focus is on the stuff that has yet to be done. Or the stuff that needs to get fixed because I did it wrong. Which only adds to the list, and the snowball grows.

It took years of noticing to be able to catch onto that piece of awareness, but what to do about it?

 

Thank Goddess for the circles I hang out in, and their penchant for soulful activities. Like my family, they are among the relationships that ground and remind me who I am, yet they also hold space for the woman I want to become.

You see, the world of work and family and kids necessarily involves deferring to the other, looking outside for information. I mean, our role as women was all about keeping the tribe safe within the village, which meant a constant vigilant gaze while stirring the pot and tending the children, right? That’s great, but then we get stuck in that mode,  forgetting that tribal life also involved a great deal of ritual – honouring and gratitude and allowing stillness in the ebb & flow of the days & seasons.

So, we need to take time to turn back inward. In the 90s I used to hear people talk about “finding their edges” and I had no idea what they were talking about. That’s probably because I didn’t have a good sense, at the time, of who I was inside; my edges just blurred with those of others around me.

Turning inward is more involved than simply putting your feet up and taking a break in the midst of the turmoil. As a matter of fact, if I try to take a break when I’ve got an overly full plate, it just stresses me out more as I sit there thinking of all the nitty-gritty details that will keep all the balls in the air.

Turning inward is the magical celebration

Turning inward needs a sense of ritual, in that it needs a deliberate intention.

Perhaps it turns into a meditation practice or a daily gratitude journal or plain old journaling or affirmations. First off, a specific intention focuses your attention on something other than the list, which will truly allow your mind to rest. Like a good nap, you will have more energy to tackle what’s next.

The effects of that rest then trickle down through your physiology, as the stress-induced chemicals wash away. Enter the reset of your mood AND your immune system given a fighting chance. The clouds will drift and you’ll spot some clear blue sky in your day.

Turning inward also allows you to turn around, in a sense. Rather than obsessing over what you have yet to do, you can take a moment to ponder what you have done. How often do you complete task A, only to jump right into activity B?

There are all those sayings about how the small steps lead to big changes, and you get that, you take the steps one at a time, but then you forget to look at the benefit it had. I see that with clients all the time: it’s been 2 weeks since her last appointment, she’s started to shift her habits, and she comes in telling me that her belly still bloats after certain meals. She completely bypasses the fact that her face hasn’t broken out or that she didn’t need the Advil this month.

Taking that pause on a regular basis – daily, weekly, hourly if you need it – is a moment of celebration.

Sometimes I feel like we’re all waiting for that perfect moment to celebrate. As if celebration can only be the cork-popping party at the end of the big deal, which you probably know by now, may never actually come. Goals and intentions are out there to lead us in a specific direction, and we can take whatever steps we learn and believe will get us there, however, we have no control over the actual outcome.

In putting off the celebration, in only seeing the end result as the acceptable finish, we’re setting ourselves up for failure on a daily basis. And then we wonder where all the anxiety, depression and stress-related ailments come from!

Which gets me to the point: I encourage you, I urge you, I implore you to take a breath after each beat of your day. Celebrate yourself all day long! Maybe you treat yourself to a nice meal or a happy dance or glass of lime-infused water or a walk around the block or a bouquet of flowers or a self-hug or a fist-pump and an “I did it!”.

At the very least, put a hand to your heart and take in what you did. You wrote that email, you cooked veggies with breakfast, you didn’t yell at the kids, you planned supper before 5 pm, you planned out the next quarter, you told your father the truth. It can be anything. Take. In. What. You. Did. In this moment, that’s all that you really have.

Those tiny moments will accumulate and gain momentum when you give them your attention, just as the shoulds usually do. That’s when the magic of celebration shows its true power, in that it makes the overwhelm, the frantic thoughts, the fear-driven scramble disappear.

Granted, there’s still stuff on the list – there will always be stuff on the list – but it’s now infused with ease. Heartbeat settles, shoulders drop, exhale.

The true benefit of turning inward, of celebrating where you’ve been, is that it helps to ground you back into who you are. This is how you grow the key relationship in your life: the one to You.

 

If you’ve lost sight of who You are in the sea of shoulds, let me light your way.

I invite you to join a series called Spring into Celebrating You, in which I walk you through 3 rituals & explorations to (re)connect with that most fundamental relationship of who you are and how to feel at home within the needs of your body.

If there’s one place that you deserve to be comfortable, it’s at home in yourself.

Learn more about this basket full of essential garden tools right here.

 

Why Am I Dealing with This AGAIN?!?

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As I settle into the rhythms of the New Year, I’ve been revisiting the basics of my business and coming face-to-face with where I get stuck over and over again. Notions of branding and editorial calendars and the like.

WAIT! Before you think you’re in the wrong place or that I’ve changed tacks altogether, bear with me…I’ll get to the point that you need to hear.

When I started out as a practitioner, that’s what I wanted to do: practice modalities to help clients find ease with their health. It never occurred to me, until I was thrown into the wilds after graduation, that I’d also have to think about message and networking. Marketing has become the bellyache that has me lying awake at night considering the possibility of giving it all up in frustration for a simple life of suburban housewifery.

That’s not why I got into this profession! I went back to school so I could guide women to a deeper understanding of their bodies, to teach them about the choices they have to address their health, not to learn about metrics.

It’s my mission to have you to hear the call of you soul as it whispers urges to change a few habits, so your entire being can shine. I can’t do that unless I shine: I have to get out there and do the stuff I’d rather not do.

It’s a form of self-care. You have habits in place which mean you will be feeling your best, that you have the stamina to get through your day, so you can be the effective professional and the present mom you strive to be despite the chaos that has been your life.

So, I do what I gotta do – perhaps grumbling a bit at first – inevitably I learn something about myself, my abilities, my strengths & weaknesses, and a much deeper understanding of how I might help. I learn something new about business in general and maybe navigate the world of marketing with a bit more confidence and skill than before.

One of the coaches I follow describes it as a spiral staircase: you keep going around the same circle, getting to the same place over and over, but each time you do, it’s from a higher vantage point. You’re older, wiser, more experienced and can see the benefits (or downfalls) of what you did before, giving you the foothold to get up to the next level.

It works the same way with your health.

When you’re dealing with a chronic condition, like IBS or anxiety, or when you get one cold after another through the winter: there are times when you feel like you’ve licked it. Whatever remedies or diets or bodywork you’ve tried has you feeling better than you have in ages and you’re convinced it’s gone for good. And maybe it does go for a few weeks, months, years even, but then it shows up again.

Symptoms that are all too familiar – that particular stabbing under your ribs, the spinning thoughts that won’t let you focus or the bone-deep tiredness that signals you’re about to get sick. Again.

So you go on the hunt once more. You head to the doctor, the mindfulness coach, the nutritionist who will have the right answer this time, all the while kicking yourself for the ways you believe you went wrong.

After that anger and self-flagellation and the defeatist rant – that’s it, this is going to stick around for the rest of my life! – after these feelings pass, take a moment to observe what’s actually going on.

Is it exactly the same as it was before or have things shifted, even by the tiniest amount?

Though familiar, is the pain perhaps a little less intense than usual?

Are you having fewer panic attacks?

Does this virus feel like it’s moving through rather than taking up residence in your chest?

Is it possible that you are, in fact, experiencing these symptoms from higher up on the path to full health?

Could it be that what you were doing has helped and this set-back is here for you to learn & integrate the next piece?

 

In playing with my Tarot cards at the new year, I pulled the Wheel of Fortune in response to what I might experience through the few first months.

At face value, I took it to mean that things are going to be up & down – there will be good days and bad – what else is new?!? Looking more closely, I was drawn to the way that the king and queen hold hands as if they’re trying to keep each other from falling off.

Well, things got rough already last week (set-backs in both business and health), I was immediately reminded to look for that hand to hold. To get out of the worries in my head and talk to my friends and healers and coaches and support groups until I could find a solution, or at least feel stable enough to handle it on my own.

When my gallbladder acted up, I was in the country without my usual arsenal of remedies and without service to reach any wise-women. It forced me to get back to the basics of nourishing food and journaling about what’s happened lately that might have triggered the flare-up. By the time I got home and was able to take some homeopathics, things cleared pretty quickly.

Easy for you, you might think; yes, I have the knowledge and the products at hand. This time, I did. To be honest, that’s not always the case. Sometimes, fear and frustration block my ability to think for myself and I need to call out for help, which might be in the form of new guidance or might simply remind me of what I already know and have.

With business, I got stuck with which direction to take with my ideas, so I jumped in with a coach, started writing out scenarios based on her prompts, only to realise I’d written it all before. Like with my belly, I have what I need already.

AHA! That card is telling me to “Stop reinventing the wheel!” With my business, with my belly – heck, with parenting, marriage and daily routines – I have the tools for success, and I know who I can call to help when I don’t.

It all comes down to stepping back onto that wheel – taking the action that will move you out of what’s going on, that will create the momentum to move you forward and up to the next level. The ride might be a challenge, and you might need to hold on for dear life for a time so you don’t fall off, yet you will get out of the pitfalls faster than if you let yourself fall off the edge entirely.

If things are bad for you right now, if you’re frustrated to be suffering the same pain, your pants still tight and your energy still flat, let me be the hand you need.

Reach out and I’ll take hold: Let’s talk. I have availability to chat with 12 women this month…a half hour to get you moving in the right direction, let’s set up a time!

 

How to Overcome Resistance Before It Overpowers You

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Many of the health-based conversations I have lately revolve around motivation. Actually, it’s not just with health. We’ve got so many reasons why we can’t find the energy to improve our eating habits or our self-care routines or our parenting or our relationships or our work.

Excuses run rampant through your head and stuff happens in your life which stops you from moving forward with your best intentions.

Like when you make a conscious decision to eat more vegetables, cut out the sugar and take a proper break for lunch. Then the usual reasons come flooding in, “reminding” you why you need eat at your desk, and grab a slice of banana bread every afternoon.

You have too much to do and there’s a bonus attached to finishing that contract…it takes time to actually cook the squash and beets and greens you finally remembered to buy…your kid’s hockey schedule changes at the last minute…an email alerts you to a crisis that needs your immediate attention,…

How many times do you blame your boss or a colleague for the amount of stress at work, or your husband for the lack of intimacy in your marriage?

Even in my woo-woo circles, people seem to love hearing that Mercury Retrograde is in full swing, because it offers a cosmic reason why every type of communication and forward motion they attempt gets derailed for days or weeks at a time.

When you weed through the tangle of every possible reason you can’t or don’t move forward, it usually filters down to some form of resistance.

Resistance is the current catchword that practically gives us permission to stay stuck where we are.

We post about it in our favourite groups, so our friends can nod knowingly and send us a virtual hug and some sympathy – “Yeah, been there, know what you’re going through, sister!”

Now you feel heard and understood, but you’re no further ahead in the face of your frustrations.

What if resistance weren’t a bad thing? What if it had a purpose other than making you feel that the Universe is conspiring against every effort you try to make?

What is resistance anyway?

Let’s start by doing a little physics lesson.

A resistor is a passive component in an electrical circuit that converts electricity into heat, which dissipates into the air. A resistor impacts how easily electricity can flow, depending what it’s made of; a metal tube has little resistance, a piece of plastic, a lot. When passing through a material with high resistance, the current has to work much harder to get through it. (The technical definition of resistance is the voltage needed for 1 amp of current to flow through a circuit.)

Electrical resistance is valuable. You actually make practical use of it; without it, the appliances in your house wouldn’t work.

It takes so much energy for the flow to get through the little filament in a standard lightbulb, that the wire heats up and gives off light. The element in your kettle and oven work the same way. The volume control on your TV has a variable resistor that lets more or less sound out when a little or a lot of resistance is applied.

What does that mean for you?

Apply the same principles to the flow of movement you want to create in your life, like when you’re trying to eat better.

First and very important point to repeat: a resistor is a passive component. Like the rain, it’s neither good nor bad, it’s not the Universe’s way of trying to derail your efforts. It’s just there. It’s the nature of the resistor and your level of opposition to it that causes the issues, and determine how hard you have to work to get around it.

So, you’ve decided to cut out sugar. Inevitable circumstances happen (as described above) which make it harder to plan and get around the shortcuts.

* The self-denigrating voices start in your head, “I can’t do this…I don’t know what to eat…I hate kale…it’s too much work…I’ll never look like Kate Moss no matter what I try…”

* Your mother’s voice nags in there too, “Just eat smaller portions and you’ll be fine…have you seen all the weight Betty lost on her diet…”

* The associations start to surface: the need for a cookie or a big plate of pasta after an argument, the need for a drink after a hard day at work.

Those parts of life come up. They just are.

You can choose to fight those facts and listen to the voices, you can let them derail you – not to mention increase the pain of the pressure they inflict by beating yourself up about it. Like with the electrical resistor, the energy you use to let these circumstances antagonize you will only get dissipated.

All the effort you would have put into the doing of the improvement gets diverted in any number of ways.

Functionally an electrical resistor will

  • slow the flow of current, that is, make it seem like no progress is being made, like when your pants still don’t fit;
  • adjust levels, or make the goal harder to meet, like when the excuses for why you can’t accomplish this simple goal get the better of you, “I don’t have time…I’m too tired…it’ll never work…”;
  • divide voltages, that is, distract you from your original intention and/or split your focus, like when you finally decide to go ahead and eat Paleo, only to come across a great article about the virtues of veganism and your best friend raves how the Mediterranean diet changed her life;
  • terminate transmission lines, in other words, stop you in your efforts altogether, like when you cheat on the second day and give up completely.

Great for the electrician who places a particular component into his circuit to achieve one of those specific electrical effects, but how can this have a purpose for you?

Could it be that the Universe places those resistors in your life for a specific reason as well?

Going back to the cosmic example will make this point easier to understand. As frustrating as it can be, Mercury Retrograde has a purpose in your soul’s journey. It forces you to stop what you’re doing, take stock and re-evaluate whether those are in fact the steps you want to be taking. Its energy could even make you look backwards and force you to see (and shed!) some of the baggage that’s still dragging you down around this particular movement.

What if, like with Mercury Retrograde, you could look at those circumstances as a need to slow down and re-evaluate?

Is your time worth more that the overall quality of the food you eat?

How can you set yourself up to weather sudden changes in the day?

Do you need to recognize the voices in your head as your ego trying to steer you clear of failure?

Is it time that you released your mother’s “helpful” comments into the compost of no-longer-serve-you items?

If you can’t avoid stopping for food as you rush from A to B, is there a wiser choice you can make? If not, can you swallow a side order of compassion with the chicken nuggets?

 

The other term that comes to mind as I let the word dance around in my head is resistance training, AKA strength training. This is the practice – with weights, machines, straps and certain yoga poses – whereby you contract a muscle against an external force to improve strength, tone and endurance.

What if you use the resistance that shows in your life up as the means to strengthen your resolve and your efforts? That is, sometimes we need to be reminded that life changes, big projects, enriched relationships take a certain amount of effort and work.

The pride you feel from saying no to the fries or the cookie on offer provides an energy boost to your stamina for doing better yet again tomorrow. The more you exercise the buy-&-cook-more-vegetables muscle this week, the more efficiently you’ll flex it next. The relief of saying No, that is when the pressure to say to say Yes is lifted from your shoulders, you’ll be able to stand that much taller in your resolve and your needs.

Strength training also improves bone density, your circulation, blood sugar balance and coordination – it impacts more than just the muscles doing the direct work. Using your energy to lean into, work through or push past the hindrances that show up in your life will have an overall benefit to your entire being. Balance, flow and peace of mind can only follow when you move with life as it happens rather than fighting it.

 

Slowing down to work with the resistance that shows up in your life gives you the energy necessary to shine brightly and speak loud & clear through the flow of your personal current.

Let me put this another way: the root of the word resist is sistere, Latin for “to take a stand”.

When faced with resistance, you are being called to (again) take a stand for who you are, your values, your priorities, and how you want to move through life.

 

Stop fighting it!

Go with the flow!

 

Need more concrete help moving through the many faces of resistance in your life? Here are some suggestion to help you withstand a few of them:

 

How do you get past the resistance that blocks your efforts? When you share in the comments, you open the possibilities for others.

Don’t hold this idea back – let it flow to your friends so they can shine more brightly too:
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I credit Wikipedia and explainthatstuff.com for a bit of a physics refresher.
Thanks to emedicine.com and nerdfitness.com for details about strength training.

Read This When Your Heart is Breaking

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You have to be as blind as Cupid not to notice that it’s Valentine’s Day, but how do you celebrate a day of love when your heart is breaking? I don’t mean the Hallmark, boy-just-broke-up-with-you heartbreak of adolescence. (Painful, yes.)

I’m talking about the energy-draining way your heart breaks when you have to fold your business, when you sell your house, when your period stops for good, or yes, when your man walks out on you (or you leave him). A breaking heart carries with it the heavy sadness that makes you want to curl into a ball, close your heart off from any more potential for hurt, and hide under a blanket for the foreseeable future.

Yet, you’re expected to be happy about the changes in your life (sure some are indeed for the best), to let go and move on, to keep putting one foot in front of the other. I mean, aren’t we all about being healthy in our processes – doesn’t being healthy mean feeling good?

The decades of twists & turns, ups & downs of my life have taught me differently. Circumstances like divorce, loss, injustices, as well as triumphs, opened me to the rainbow of emotions I hadn’t always understood before. Mainly, I hadn’t understood how they were connected to my health.

I often talk about how I learned that emotions are felt in the body, from a book. These weren’t separate phenomena going on in my head that had no practical bearing on me. They were actual, physiological responses altering my moods, my eating habits and essential to my survival. (Read more about the impact of emotions on your eating habits here; read more about the necessity of the core emotions here)

I learned – through joy and sorrow, success and hardship – that allowing the flow of all my emotions is part of the quickest path to renewed health, inner strength, productivity, and to love…loving myself, that is.

All that to say that even if you’re not bursting with thoughts of romance and crepe-paper hearts this week, that’s ok.

You’re feeling what you’re feeling and that’s not only ok, it’s necessary.

When you give yourself the time and space to literally curl inward, sleep a few extra hours, watch too much TV and only talk to your journal, you are performing a beautiful act of self-love. If your daughter was heartbroken, you’d make her tea and let her cry on your shoulder – chances are that’s what you need as well.

It’s extremely difficult to allow yourself that kind of wallowing; trust me, I know. When you’re the one who keeps everyone going, when you’re the one in control of the situation, it can seem nigh on impossible to fall apart. Perhaps you even harbour a fear that if you let go, you’ll sink into a rabbit hole of sadness and self-pity, even debilitating depression, and never find your way out.

That won’t happen. Emotions are simply energy-in-motion. Given the freedom to move, they do what they have to do and subside, like a wave. The times I surrendered to the depths of how I was feeling, I’ve always bounced right back within a day or two, recharged and motivated to take whatever necessary steps were next.

Sometimes you need to get to the bottom of the well before you can turn around and see the light.

If your heart is breaking – scratch that, WHEN your heart is breaking, because it will break, there’s no getting around that in this life – be gentle with yourself.

Listen deeply to what your body and your heart truly need in the moment and give it. Treat yourself with the loving care you would offer your best friend in the same situation.

Make your favourite, creamy soup and eat it 3 meals a day.

Spend the hours you need curled in bed pouring your sorrows into your journal.

Call the one person who will listen without judgment or advice.

Put on some heart-wrenching music; sing at the top of your lungs, dance in whatever way you’re your body wants to move, and let the tears flow when they come.

If nothing else, breathe. Connect to the one certain thing in the moment and the rest will follow as it needs.

Need help opening the doors to your heart again? Here’s a little ray of light you can let seep into the cracks and get things started.

My morning routine has become the ritual that allows me time to reassess, to nourish my whole being, and to start each day with intention. Next time I’ll discuss how to stay focused even when things are falling apart. (Sign up in the box below if you want to hear more.)

What nourishes you the most when your heart is breaking? When you share in the comments, you open the possibilities for others.

Have a friend whose heart is breaking this Valentine’s Day? Pay the love forward by using any (or all!) of the pretty green buttons.

How to Have a Wholly Healthy Holiday

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It’s mid-December. Life just got a tad more hectic and will stay that way until the kids go back to school in January.

You kick yourself for not having honoured last year’s vow to be organized earlier. You harp on about the excessive consumerism and the social obligations – loud office parties and stilted conversations with people you only see once a year. There’s cooking and shopping and wrapping and planning. There’ll be food from your naughty list on offer everywhere you turn.

Your belly clenches in anticipation, even as you fear you won’t get it all done, so you run too fast, stay up too late, say yes to more events and volunteering than you know is good for you. You start to feel your life getting away from you; you’re scrambling to keep it all packaged in a manageable bundle. (Writing this, I picture my arms flying through the air, trying to gain control over some invisible chaos.)

How can you get it all done without burning yourself out? How can you actually enjoy the celebrations after all the work?

How can you maintain the spirit of the season without compromising your own spirit?

The hustle and bustle of Christmas tips so easily into stress & overwhelm when there’s no connection. If you’re anything like me, a certain amount of what you do at this time of year comes from outside expectations – your husband and kids’ needs, of course, but also what your sister-in-law or your mother expect of you, office obligations, and maybe a small dose of keeping-up-with-the-Jones’.

When you lose sight of the meaning behind the traditions in favour of trying to do it all, you end up losing sight of yourself in the process.

The other morning I headed out the door for an early appointment, into the soundless dark of that first deep snowfall. Because I’d taken on an extra contract recently, my time for all the Christmas necessities became suddenly limited and I felt that panic welling in me by the minute. My thoughts threatened to spin out of control as I walked to the bus. There was something about the peace of the day, however, that drew my attention more strongly.

It was one of those mornings when the carpet of snow muffles every sound. The only thing I heard was my breathe, so I settled into it and the way it shifted and vibrated with my steps. The sun was just coming up behind the clouds, sending the bare trees into dramatic relief against the lightening grey. No birds sang nor squirrels chattered – they were still huddled in their cozy nests. Even my usual morning petition to earth and trees for support through my day fell flat as I felt their own energy had settled deeply below the surface.

I heard a voice inside me say, “Enjoy the quiet. Enjoy the absolute peace.”

To use traditional Chinese terminology, this is a yin season – we’re approaching the most yin day of the year on the 21st – inward moving, cold, dark, moist, introspective and receiving. Your instinct is to follow that energy –the desire to curl up under a blanket with a book, have more nights in with your family, make pots of soup – that’s you putting yin into action.

Christmas is an affirmation of the return to more yang – outward, hot, light, expansive and giving. A natural celebration of those qualities we so love; they help us connect to the world around us, and traditionally offered survival as people share limited resources for food and heat through the winter. Yet, as we North Americans love to do everything to excess, the holidays are over the top, to the point of frenzy.

The stress of the year comes, in part, from the struggle between the two poles of energy clashing.

This year, in order to maintain your energy, your sanity and your joy through the season, balance those the seasonal extremes regularly.

Connect daily – hourly – with the yin energy of the natural season (of which you are an integral part) to offset the yang of the seasonal holiday.

Here’s how:

  1. Soups, stews and congees – food cooked with water or other liquid – nourish deeply with their easily assimilated nutrients and gentle warmth. Eat one or the other daily. Squash soup, with a hint of curry, apple and coconut is my favourite, like a warm blanket in a bowl. Bonus points for drinking/using bone broth.
  2. Foods that tonify yin include millet, barley, rice (eaten as whole grains, not in flour products); beans, especially black, kidney, mung or green; beets, black- & raspberry, seaweed. Easy on the red meat, sugar/refined carbs and alcohol; remember the gratitude for the bounty along with the indulgence – celebrate conscientiously.
  3. Turn inward daily with quiet practices such as meditation, yoga, journaling, put on a fire (or a candle) and get lost in its flames. Give yourself an opportunity to turn off for a few minutes every day. Trust that it will all get done; trust that what gets done is enough.
  4. Take a walk in the early morning or the evening. Let the quiet penetrate you, and notice your limbs soften as the frenzy drops away. Though the earth is frozen, you can still tap into its energy by consciously feeling your feet connect with the snow and pavement at every step – imagine red roots running into your soles, nourishing you with the distant warmth of the core.
  5. Balance the giving with a healthy dose of receiving. We’re good at the first – not so much the second. Practise receiving compliments, an offer of a cup of tea or help in the kitchen. At a recent party, several people commented on how good I looked – after the 2nd or 3rd time, I noticed my shoulders curled in and my chest collapsed even as I thanked them. Open your heart and let the love, the gift, the compliment in. As Dr. Northrup says, it gifts the other person with the joy of having their words and other offers of love accepted. (You can start right now – see below for my present to you.)

What gets you the most stressed out at this time of year? What practices help you stay balanced? When you share in the comments, you open the opportunities for others.

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My Christmas gift to you:

Over the last few years, I’ve found a word to be my touchstone, my intention and my guide for the year. Better than a resolution, it creates a container in which to take action with healthy practices, it creates a filter through which to set my priorities and make decisions, both personal and professional.

On the 21st, the darkest day of the year, I will be posting an audio guide for helping you connect with YOUR word for 2017. Solstice is the perfect time to explore your needs and priorities and set that intention, so that it can come into the light as we head to the new year.

Access will be exclusively for the community in the Whole Health Dinner Party space. Learn more and join here.

Now practise the joy of giving: Share this post with 2 of your friends using any (or all!) of the links below.

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