Avoid that Late Winter Cold.

Avoid Late-Winter Colds.

Sigh…it's that time of year…again!!
So many friends are coming to class with a head cold.
It's not allergies people - the trees are barely giving up their sap for syrup-ing.
There is NO pollen in the air.

But what happens this time of year - in the transition from mid-Winter to late-Winter is this:
THERE IS MUCH MORE MOISTURE IN THE AIR.

We see this in the midday when Winter starts to thaw. The snow melts.
If there is precipitation it comes in a "Wintery Mix" of snow-sleet-rain…and that all adds up to
SLUSH.

Not just on the ground, but in your body, cells and tissues!!
Extra moisture in your body can create a condition where your body has to, wants to must get rid of that excess liquid in order to stay healthy.

So what happens?

Your body squeezes that extra moisture (from the melting snow & moist air) out of you.
The fastest way is in the form of a nasty head-cold.

But hold on here…this is a health blog!!
Is there a good way to avoid, mitigate or lessen the effect of this Winter to Spring transition?
Absolutely!!

Here's how:
Switch your diet with the seasons!!
This time of year is is important to eat more bitter, astringent and pungent foods.
These foods help rig your body of excess mucus and liquid, and act as a tonic to the tissues.

Pungent root vegetables are great:
Beets, parsnips, all radishes (daikon, red, watermelon radish), turnips, burdock to name a few.

Beans are a must!!
Any type of bean - black, navy, lentil, kidney, aduki, cannellini, red, mung…
Beans absorb water - that's what they do. So start fresh with dried beans.  Soak 'em over night and cook in fresh water with a little kombu seaweed. When tender add salt to taste.

Green Leafy:
All green leafy have a bitter quality  - even if they taste pungent, sour, bitter, or sweet.
The darker the better!! For amazing results add them to your beans at the very end and let them wilt in.

Cut out ALL snot producing foods - like dairy, wheat and sugar - for a few weeks. Eat much less whole grains for a few weeks or choose ones like buckwheat and corn that suck water out.
And voila - you'll walk right around that old cold germ from which everyone else is sneezing.

Want to know how to stay healthy with the seasons?
Join my iLEAP: Into Life Empowered & Present Wellness Course and I'll show you how.

2014: Expand Your Consciousness

Sunday, March 2, 2014

This morning I awoke with an inkling of an impression to write another blog.
Something deep inside me was yearning to come out. It started as an almost imperceptible murmur,
the subtlest impression of a thought at it's very moment of inception. Barely audible, I had to work my mind to grab and hold on to this very fine strand of cognition. It seemed relevant and important.

And so a simple inner dialogue arose gently, between my deeper Self and my dreaming/waking-up self.
It went something like this:

Self: "Hmmmm..."           Me: Huh?                                
Self: "Consciousness…"  Me: What?
Self: "Expansive…"        Me: Where?
Self: "Humans…'             Me: Which?

Me: Tell me more?
Self: "Blog. Expansion, consciousness and humanity…"


What IS this inner voice? And who/what causes it to speak? Who is speaking to whom?

As I reflect on THAT moment of waking up, I know that "That Something" started deep within the belly of the UNIVERSE. In a place where there are no 'things'. The universe stirred, wanting to arise.
It came forth, to express something important through me. An accurate metaphor would go like this:
If I were a funnel, the pulsation of the cosmos whirled through me to create a thought-form inside my brain, and I received that thought-form and thought my senses created something from it.

This phenomena is the crux of Tantra.

Facts: You and I definitely exist. Source definitely exists. A relationship between these two exists.
There is a name for You-Source-Relationship. It's called the Triadic Heart. But more on that later.

These tiny moments of relationship are happening ALL the time. Every human has an inner voice. Many can hear it, many do not. Some will heed that voice, while others ignore it. Some even try to suppress or destroy that voice. What about you? Do you listen for the whispers of the cosmos?

The RELATIONSHIP between YOU and SOURCE is the MOST IMPORTANT PART of the HUMAN EXPERIENCE-EXPERIMENT. It's the most relevant aspect in the quandary of whether we will survival as a species, a planet and all life forms on it…or not!!

And yet this relationship is entirely up for grabs!! Nothing pre-arranged. Nothing is guaranteed. We have to create, feed and nourish this relationship - just as we would as any other important relationship. Your capacity to receive these impulses and do something with them is the heart of living yoga daily. Yoga is the art of living life as a fully embodied, fully aware, fully connected and fully expressive human being…each and every day…and knowing that you are ALWAYS and forever a PART of the WHOLE COSMIC ORDER.

Now, getting back to the metaphor of my funnel experience, which is the crux of this blogpost.

IT'S TIME TO EXPAND OUR AWARENESS OF WHAT IT MEANS TO BE HUMAN.

As a collective of humans on earth, we tend to get myopic, ego-centric and way too contracted!!
When we think of ourselves as ONLY a PHYSICAL BEING, an earthbound human, we are going to exacerbate this reality. We will cut ourselves off from nature, from one another, and from our Source. Culturally, we will stay more indoors, start more wars, communicate through devises rather than face-to-face…and all of this will make us feel more dejected, separate, neurotic and alone.

The year 2014 marks the greatest time of expansion in the entire history of humanity and the universe. Never before in time has the universe been this expanded and this complex. In fact, creating expansion and complexity is the Source's main priority and function.

To sync up with this ever expanding reality we MUST SHIFT our PERSPECTIVE about who and what we are. We literally can and must expand our consciousness, our senses, our mind and our beliefs!! We trade in our smallness for a bigger cosmic reality that is powerful, exciting and real.

CHANGE is the NATURE of the UNIVERSE.
So let's roll with it, and roll with me here:

Imagine yourself a magnificent, unlimited and all-knowing being. As such a great being, you are not limited to time and space; you are not stuck in one place and you are not stuck in one physical body.

In fact, as a human being on earth, you come equipped with five bodies to help you navigate a world of three dimensions - time, space, gravity. Your first body is the most obvious - the physical body. You  must nourish this physical body and take care of its material needs (food, clothing, shelter) or perish.

You also have a mental body - your brain comes well equipped to figure out how to navigate this material reality on earth. It organizes all the sensory input to make sense of things. Friend or foe? Food or poison? Now or later?

You have an emotional body - which tells you how well you are navigating your physical and mental bodies. The center of the emotional body is your heart which acts as an inner compass for your own spiritual life and development. Right from wrong? Kind or mean? Harmful or helpful? Love or hate?

Then there is your pranic body - which is nourished by breathing!! Breathing - what a novel idea!!
Breathing properly nourishes ALL the bodies and connects you to Source.

In your intuitive body great things happen. You can receive these tiny little messages from Universal Spirit of Source Energy. You can tap into a vast unbounded consortium of wisdom and use it to inform everything you think, say and do. And when you do - you just know stuff!!

Finally there is the bliss body - or Body of Light. You know this one when you are SO HAPPY. You're LIT-UP, filled with joy & peace, connected to everything everywhere - because you are!!
Actually, this is the first body to arise when Spirit creates conditions for a soul to coalesce it's energy and condense The Light enough to embody as a human being.

The practice of yoga - asana, pranayama, concentration, contemplation, mediation, chanting, prayer, and devotion will strengthen this triadic relationship in a manner that is conscious and effective. So that you will feel your self expand and connect with pure love, pure light, pure consciousness. Then you will know who and what you are as a human being.

NOW - it's time for you to expand. Consider how completely different your life would be if you knew how to nourish each of your bodies and become completely alive!! How much fun it would be to live from an expanded point of view. Instead of believing: I am a poor miserable lonely person in pain. You could know: I am an awakened, connected, embodied being that is full of the same Light as Source!!

WOW - now that would be cool!
The best part of all is that this SHIFT is happening all over the world. It's powered by Universal Love individuals are speaking up, living and acting from their hearts instead of from their heads; indigenous people are rising up; women are standing up; new consciousness is arising.  Ordinary people are joining together in UNITY CONSCIOUSNESS to CELEBRATE this AMAZING LIFE and to HONOR ALL LIFE FORMS EVERYWHERE…

Love is the source of the Source.
Love is the expression of that Source (you and me).
Love is the relationship between then!

How will you expand this year?