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Inflammatory Eczema Allergy Foods

Inflammatory eczema allergy foods is something I became deeply aware of when I experienced adult eczema in a nightmarish way during the world pandemic.

Backing up some, I was familiar with the common allergy foods as I planned parties and food menus working with thousands of groups with food allergies and gluten sensitivities.

But heightening my own sensitivities to food allergies showing up as adult eczema for the first time took the cake. It was a 3 month saga I’d love to forget.

Gluten didn’t help as a common offender in food and white flours so I’ll mention more on that below.

White flour is a common inflammatory eczema allergy food source.
White flour is a common source of gluten food allergies and inflammation.

…Another food category was sweets!

That’s probably no surprise as too much sugar can make your skin crawl and no research has sanely suggested that sugar is good for you (other than your taste buds 😋).

But that’s hard news to swallow when you’re a sweet tooth (and a Vata body like me).

…And if sugar-tipped over the edge, then eczema can be the outcome where rashes mysteriously appear around the body.

They stay until the body is calm. It’s not like a mosquito bite where the poison and bite effects fade after a few days.

But I’m happy to say that even though I love baking (and do it weekly), I’ve learned how to bake healthy and keep eczema at bay. And yes the bakes are delicious (otherwise why bother?).

Firstly, I’m a foodie…

And when I started in catering management for upscale hotel chains, there were only vegetarian food categories other than the menu everyone else ate from.

Then common requests grew like “hold the onions” and “hold the garlic.”

At some point, I saw peanut and nut allergies crop up.

When I dug deeper into creating menus for food allergy group requests, we found that guests who had some peanut allergies could sometimes eat tree nuts like pine nuts.

With awareness, we never had a problem with food allergy association groups.

Shellfish can be another tricky area, but gratefully I didn’t work much with those foods.

An affected person who has even a trace of the shellfish can experience a life threatening allergic reaction called anaphylaxis shock.

We always had Benadryl in the First Aid kit nearby for general allergy reactions.

And by the time I was planning party events for busy American restaurants serving authentic Mediterranean cuisine, food awareness had grown even further.

Celiac Disease grew. It’s an allergy disease that can cause severe allergic reactions because gluten triggers the immune system.

And I can attest that gluten in moderation is better even for eczema skin allergy symptoms.

Your body gives different health conditions signs as warning. But a warning is a warning.

It can’t give a sour face. ☹️ Only you and I can do that. But it can give a health condition as a sign.

And the source can be the same ingredient culprits.

And so as we evolved in the world, allergies and preferences became the general norm.

Restaurant servers greeted you at your table asking, “does anyone have any allergies?”

A century ago that would’ve never been asked as you ate what you could and anti-inflammatory eczema allergy foods didn’t exist.

Anti-Inflammatory Eczema Allergy Foods 

In my trial-and-error food tasting experiences, I learned eczema was dramatically reduced with low daily refined sugar intake and cutting out most processed flours.

Those foods created inflammation that showed up as skin inflammation.

So learning healthy food substitution to sugar and flour was the healthier way.

And there is plenty of healthy alternatives in our abundant earth and sourcing grocery stores.

Anti-inflammatory eczema allergy foods include vegetables, whole fruits, lean healthy proteins, healthy fats and whole grains.

All grains are not created equal. How they are prepared and the details of their ingredient profiles change the effect.

A frequently asked question is: what foods are high in gluten?

The answer: whole grains are healthy. They’re also guilty. 

Wheat, barley, and rye are the sources.

Being smart about healthier low-glycemic index starchy carbs and nutrient-dense foods pays off.

Also corn, oats, and quinoa (pseudo-grain) meals are good ideas since they are gluten-free so they bypass some decision fatigue.

Corn is the largest agricultural crop produced in the United States.

So there are still many options for gluten allergies.

Oh, and we also should consider…

Our different bodies where we react differently.

…What spikes the blood sugar of one person is different for another.

Getting to know your body with individual foods and enjoying in moderation is a good idea for all, and each of us living in our bodies.

Plus, lowering processed gluten foods for everyone is a good idea in general, considering all the environmental factors and chemicals (plastics, pesticides, and phthalates) we have no control over in the current state of food manufacturing processes.

For foods, adding more organic plant-based 🌱 in nature when possible, and not plant-based in factories 🏭 helps your entire body system run better.

Every little bit of our effort counts…

Adding more healthy variety, and nutrient-dense plant-forward foods is a double win scoring points for our bodies and our earth. 🎉

It can be as easy as exchanging pasta made from flour once in a while for spaghetti squash. See easy spaghetti squash recipe below. 🍴🍝

A spaghetti squash dish is a good gluten-allergy substitute.
Spaghetti squash looks like spaghetti but doesn’t have gluten.

 

Focusing on anti-inflammatory foods and including Mediterranean Diet foods that overlap in your meals, helps.

According to the American Heart Association, The Mediterranean Diet is known to be the healthiest diet overall for preventative cardiovascular health and brain health today.

https://www.heart.org/en/healthy-living/healthy-eating/eat-smart/nutrition-basics/mediterranean-diet

Overlapping with anti-inflammatory eczema allergy foods, focusing on healthy foods is as important as minimizing the bad food buckets, such as:

Processed, white sugar foods

Fried foods and unhealthy fats (such as high processed meats)

Eliminating these excesses from your diet can help reduce and potentially prevent life-shortening diseases and precursor chronic body inflammations from occurring.

These are lifestyle choices we get to make.

Replacing emptier calorie and excessively sweet snacks to healthier whole fruit and nut snacks, high quality dairy, and lean proteins help curb hunger in between meals.

Some foods may be classified as healthy, but are still just as bad. I used to fill up on nutritional bars as filler snacks… but the problem is often they’re loaded with sugar.

I realized I would have been better off with a Snickers.

So I quit the bars habit along with sodas for breakfast.

…Maybe you can relate with your food habits?

I replaced sodas for black coffee and unsweetened teas that are more enjoyable as a caffeine morning practice.

I now do and recommend a cold brew coffee method if you have a sensitive stomach or acid causes issues. ☕️

Changing your habits like a regular sweet one for a plant-based breakfast is doable. I’m living proof. 😊

And I take a page from my catering days where Crudite was a platter offered at almost every event.

That’s basically raw veggies like cauliflower, carrots, broccoli, and asparagus.

Those are good sources of fiber that your body needs to better absorb foods.

We often forget about the fiber as we’ve been primed to think of the macros (protein, carbs, and fat).

So fiber is my prime start of the day… and maybe yours (now)?

The Inflammation Free Diet for Food Allergies

The book I had been using as a guidebook for preparing meals, The Inflammation-Free Diet, re-entered my memory after my pandemic eczema inflammation episode.

I realized that there was a connection bridged between spiking sugar inflammation and foods and that made me even more on purpose for consuming anti-inflammatory eczema allergy foods.

In making healthy food choices, moderation and choosing to balance good back-to-earth foods seems to be the better ageless answer to healthily feed our bodies.

Getting anti-inflammatory food ideas for meals waved in front of us doesn’t hurt either! 😉

Using your natural Ayurvedic healthy body to sway to your advantage helps too.

You could discover your body likes more astringent or bitter foods.

This is common in Kapha body types so lean in on this healthy advantage.

And you can find food like garlic or onions aren’t favorable to your body. But that doesn’t mean you have an allergy.

It could just mean eat less.

Managing Eczema Food Allergy Inflammation

If you experience chronic body or skin inflammations in your life, find out what food allergens could be a trigger for your body. Food triggers change as you age.

Try adding more anti-inflammatory eczema allergy foods like vegetables, fruits, and low-glycemic index grains, and see if those make a difference.

Many people are allergic to nightshade foods because of alkaloids in plants.

As a kid, I would get an allergic reaction when I ate eggplants. A rash would move up my back quickly.

But as life moved, this was no longer an allergy trigger.

So don’t assume what was a food allergy trigger before is still your predicament.

Test in small quantities.

Because we want to keep a variety of healthy foods and food categories in our diet as diversity helps the gut and body.

Plus, foods are enjoyable so we don’t want to rob ourselves.

To better manage food allergies, you can read food label ingredients and gain knowledge and awareness.

Another thing you can do is order a medical food allergy-specific prick test at an allergist’s office.

Also do a self-diagnose check-in on your stress in life.

Stress can come from past, present, or future-related thoughts and situations. Past trauma that you may know about, and future uncertainty can confusingly show up in an inflammation body life.

The symptoms on and in your body tell a story in the mind-body connection.

To help restore balance no matter what the source cause, you can take the 2-minute body balance quiz.

And, enjoy this gluten-free spaghetti squash recipe. One medium-size quash will yield about as much as a pasta box you would buy at the store.

It’s a smart and healthy plant-based way to stretch a grocery dollar.

spaghetti squash dish.
Print

Spaghetti Squash (Gluten-Free)

I discovered spaghetti squash as a meal when vegetarians were the main special food needs categories for groups I planned catered meals for. Food allergies didn't exist in the zeitgeist back then.
Course dinner, lunch
Cuisine American
Author Brandy @ Healthy Happy Life Secrets

Equipment

  • Bread knife or safer sawing knife.
  • Spoon

Ingredients

  • spaghetti squash gourd
  • extra virgin olive oil

Instructions

  • Score the gourd lengthwise. do not try to cut the hard gourd raw 
  • Bake your spaghetti squash for about 20 minutes at 350°F or so. Then softened, you can cut where you scored. Tip: for the ends (like on pumpkins, take the firmly planted inside squash knife and twist to the right at the top and then at the bottom of the squash and that should do the trick break it open fully into two halves)
  • Face the two halves down on a baking sheet. You can add a ‘lil EVOO if you like.
  • Bake for 50 minutes or until you can scoop out strands easily with a spoon. You can test with a fork if you like. About half way through, when you see browning, flip the halves so they're facing up, and add a 'lil more EVOO drizzle.
  • Optional: keep the healthy seeds and enjoy them as snacks! Roast them along when you're baking the squash.

 

Heart and Soul Centering To Live Your Best Life Now!

Heart and soul is a part of our bodies that we can’t see, but we can feel daily. Pizza is heart and soul food (recipe below for making a heart shaped pizza 🧡).

This sky painting over the water is heart and soul spirit in one.A daily heart and soul-centering check-in can change your life! You could be an old soul or have an old soul like some of us who remember young life before the internet.

…I remember when I first started out working and ambitiously I thought I wanted to climb the corporate ladder. It didn’t take many years before I shifted my priority to wanting better work-life balance.

And with those intentions, I career pivoted that gave me that outcome. But had I not picked my head up to see what my heart and soul was telling me (and now I know my spirit was helping me), I would’ve missed the message about finding time to work on me. Personal growth was something I had to go outside of work to find in volunteering and discovering myself.

It’s never too early to start checking in. Maybe now is a good time to set this priority in your life as you had to rethink parts of your life in 2020, along with everyone else (so you’re in good company!).

There were many external changes made affecting your life, that you had no control over, and may help you later on in ways you may not see how yet at this moment.

So for now, you can just keep going, growing, and focusing on creating the best that your life offers in abundant possibilities that you put intention to until the next step. There’s always a next step when the timing is right.

It’s better to think this optimistic way and joyfully pivot into your forming newer overall life, including work, relationships, passion, and purpose, so you can enjoy the process with greater ease (and not create unnecessary dis-ease or woes-me feelings).

That doesn’t mean you don’t have varying feelings with so many gray areas and small decisions you need to make, but that you’re finding your happier way now in the process (and possibly then seeing through a different lens than the one you may have been previously looking from).

I provide a lasting impactful way to do a heart and soul check-in, further below. ⬇️

Encouragement: Our Society, You, and Your Gained Ideas

In America, convenience is at our fingertips, and many of us started last year to positively lean into our interests, curiosities, and skills development.

You may have learned how to grocery shop differently, cook meals, bake your own bread, and learn new digital skills as a way to communicate with the rest of our virtual world and the local community.

You picked up other life skills that everyone needs so you could stay relevant.

You may have even discovered or rediscovered a few passions and hobbies, and read more books than you sought out originally to do. Those were some of the common gains for many of us.

All was not lost in our home life, and more has been gained (and is being gained) in our overall lives if we choose to focus on the higher lens way of living.

It’s helpful for you to reflect and personally remind yourself of the progress over perfection you’ve made, so you can stay feeling uplifted in your spirit. It’s too easy to get sourly influenced in our culture.

You can be less on guard, open up to your authentic self and reap the benefits in a new era where we’re all finding our way in many ways.

Over the past year especially, you may have changed some lifestyle habits or behaviors that you like, that work better, and that you decide to keep forever.

And you may have gained clarity about what you want in the next chapter of your life. Even though you wouldn’t have done this if you weren’t challenged to do so. But you can use your situation to your good advantage!

You may even have found the better way, and experienced that good changes in your life can show up as a combination of thinking, doing, and feeling what is right for you. You get internal clues and they can help you find your second or next act.

If you took or take your connect-the-dot lessons one step further, you can reflect on how you felt about what you first thought about specific ideas. You can then take another brave leap of action so you can try and replicate best practices and discover even more new ways, as our world is evolving. This creates innovation and gives you a better way of doing things.

For example, you’re inspired to try a new recipe and that seemed to work out and made you happy, so the next time you tweak the recipe and create something new and different that you enjoy. This works the same with a new workout, new route, or a new passion project you’re developing. Variety and innovation keep you making progress!

And that’s how personal growth attitudes and creative progress are fed and can seep into every fiber of your life if you’re open to new ways and ideas.

New ideas can take time to form in the process and as you start dabbling with curiosity, you can become less intimidated to make mistakes. That’s how you grow and learn.

In this forming introspective way of life, you can also dig deeper into yourself to find what gives you more meaning and joy than what you previously found made you happy, as you become more of who you are and will become.

You can also reach higher levels of contentment and then feel fewer emotional ups and downs.

Many positive changes can be happening all at once in this complex life, with yourself and your life.

You may have even re-thought your life’s retirement plans and this year’s optimistic and realistic plans. And you’ve probably learned to be more grounded in reality and to get back to simple basics, focusing on what actually is happening to you and around you.

As a global society, we’re still not able to freely travel and create safe, live events. From these changes, new ways have been born and are birthing, such as the newer apps where you’re entering live global event conversations safely and without travel hassles.

You could use the saved travel time and energy to work on your life, to double down on a new purposeful trajectory, or seek a new mission in your life.

Just one idea can change your life and if you have an extra few minutes, that could be the difference-maker in your life.

So where would you spend those extra minutes? Here’s what I do and what I suggest.

Prioritize a Daily Heart and Soul Check-in

Especially as we’re all distracted, prioritizing a heart and soul check-in can be the best way to (re)focus on your life.

Below you can be reminded or learn to take a specific step for long-term impact and to find your daily heart and soul-filled joy, peace, and balance. Continue reading “Heart and Soul Centering To Live Your Best Life Now!”

Orange Dream Smoothie – Low Sugar

Orange dream smoothie with creamy popsicle vibes is one frozen treat I grew up around ice cream trucks and drink stands with colorful fun signs.

Orange stand to inspire an orange smoothie drink.

This sign is orange (and not lemon-ade) like you often see.

And you can make a healthy orange dream smoothie with oranges like these.

And for beverages, the orange flavor is calming to the body.

Oranges calm our parasympathetic nerves that directly impact if we feel anxious or not. It’s also one healthy way to celebrate that we have decadent beverage variety choices when we get a ‘lil creative.

The orange calming factor can give you a new reason to be happy today. 😊

An orange dream smoothie like this will help your calming morning with your breakfast.
Orange dream smoothie recipe below.👇

Your body, balance, and sensitivity to tastes and smells change all the time. What’s good for you in this season may change in the next or even tomorrow.

You can come up with your own creative dream smoothie ideas like I did  and stumbled on the creamy dream orange smoothie.

Stumbling upon keeps life interesting!

And this is one sweet and healthy smoothie to add to your list.

As a natural Ayurvedic Vata, I was born with a sweet tooth, so if I think a dessert is too sweet, then believe me… it has waaay too much sugar, so that’s why I came up with less sweet, healthier options!

Especially in America, where foods are loaded with sugars, our healthy taste buds and sense can be off track.

The average American consumes over 70 grams of sugar a day, when 25 grams of maximum recommended added or processed sugar is agreed on by both the FDA and American Heart Association.

While fruit sugar (fructose) is a better kind of sugar, it’s still sugar at the end of the day.

Going From Morning Frappucino and Coca Cola to Low Sugar

In our American diets, we can go over the recommendation in just our breakfast beverage choices alone!

If you like Frappuccinos like many of us do, whether your drink has added whipped cream or not, you’re looking at 50 grams of sugar or more for a 16-ounce drink.

That’s okay once in a celebratory while, but if you order a Starbucks Short size beverage (regular 8-ounce glass size drink), you’ve used up all the recommended sugar for the day… and it may not even be 10 am yet!

And actually, you can see most Americans carrying around the Tall or Grande size beverages (or larger). Our small is often a super size large in other countries.

The healthier order option with no sugar is black coffee or tea. So then, getting back to basics, the only safe beverage out there is water, as pure and healthy… but are they all?…

You can clearly taste the difference between purified waters and artesian waters like Fiji brand water.

The water variety is all sold in plastic bottles and available on grocery shelves, but the cost difference gives you an indicator of the quality difference. And you can clearly taste the difference between Evian and purified water.

In America, you can commonly buy a water bottle case (24-16 ounce bottles) of purified water for under $4.

They’re usually advertised “on-sale” and you can find them in the front of the store when you first walk in.

Higher-end, luxury water brands you can find in the water aisle selections also, but you can expect to pay closer to a dollar or more a bottle.

The good news is most tap water in America is drinkable and many households use a Brita pitcher with a filter or similar.

So as we question drinks such as basic water, we have to wonder about other consumable beverages.

Coca-Cola is known for its evolving trends as society changes and as a popular beverage consumed around the world.

There’s even a Coca-Cola museum in Atlanta, GA where you can taste different versions of Coke served all around the world.

As you can imagine the American Coke version is loaded with sugar (too scary to even mention how many sugar grams per can, but you can look it up!).

In my late 20’s I used to drink sodas for breakfast when it was trendy and corporate offices stocked their refrigerators full of soda cans for employees and invited visitors to grab.

I quit the unhealthy soda habit after a few years in healthy awareness although Coke will always be beloved.

I traded caffeinated sodas for healthier morning teas, coffee, and slowly moved drifted over to water and then added back a creamsicle orange dream smoothie and other breakfast smoothies as better choices with redeeming health benefits… and hopefully this inspires you if you haven’t done the switch already!

If you want more energy and vitality, getting off sodas and high-sugar drinks is a good move. Often they have 40-70 grams of soda per can!

Water can seem boring to taste, but that’s what our bodies want and will reward you for.

You can always mix it up with carbonated water and naturally flavored waters that are enjoyable.

Despite some of our generally unhealthy cultural habits, Americans have made drinking water, chic and cool, as we carry around water bottles to our work and of course to our workouts and yoga.

It’s a comparison observation I made when I was in Rome in 2019 and saw that even though all the public water sources and fountains are deemed clean and drinkable, you won’t easily find reasonably priced water bottles around. …how funny is that?

So, we’ve gotten better at drinking water regularly and not just taking a vitamin supplement or while we work out.

We know that drinking proper water amounts prevents kidney stones, keeps our bodies functioning and our skin looking young.

So on that healthier level, we can make healthier breakfast drinks like a smoothie easily with the Magic Bullet gadget or a blender.

You can add protein powders or if you like bananas, they’re a good smoothie staple.

Bananas have a higher glycemic index that can spike inflammation, but they are rich in fiber, potassium, and B vitamins, so they’re still a good natural super food good for filling an empty or upset stomach.

And that’s what makes this orange dream smoothie irresistible!

When I first made this creamsicle orange dream smoothie, I loved the textured beige-cream frothy color beverage (and maybe you do too!)

A creamy orange smoothie like this will help your calming morning.
A creamy orange smoothie like this will help your calming morning.

The whole orange is much healthier than concentrated orange juice if you want to do a small step replacement for healthy habits.

And a much healthier version than the childhood popsicles that this special creamy orange dream smoothie comes from.

Use one whole orange. A Calfornia navel, blood orange, or Cara Cara navel orange will give you a more balanced sweetness than a Florida orange.

If you can, opt for organic or heirloom oranges especially if you’re using the outside peel or zest that’s a great idea for taste and texture.

Heirloom navel orange peel for ayurveda elixir drinks and creamsicle smoothie drinks is a healthy start and finish if you prefer.
Look for heirloom, organic, or local farmers market produce as in season (free of pesticides, good for us and the environment). This would be good for your drinks, bakes, and even Creamy Orange Smoothie.

The magic add is 1 tsp orange marmalade (add bold sweetness but you don’t need much) or you can stay wholesome with your orange zest only

Add vanilla milk

Also add vanilla yogurt (to thicken) or if you prefer, you can add a banana that will slightly alter the taste but still pair well with an orange.

And ideally you will have a full-on orange dream smootie.

How?

Make some orange zest from one medium orange.

Blend with a teaspoon of marmalade, yogurt, and vanilla milk. Marmalade has sugar so that’s why keeping in moderation is a tasty-good idea for this Creamy Orange Dream Smoothie.

This one tastes like the orange cream popsicle but without so much sugar. If you want to add some protein, blend in fine almonds or add powders.

And if you want to have low-sugar, then eliminate the marmalade and cut down on the orange zest.

Enjoy your cream orange dream smoothie morning!

A creamsicle smoothie like this will help your calming morning.
Print

Creamy Orange Dream Smoothie

Course beverage, Dessert
Cuisine American
Prep Time 5 minutes
Author Brandy @ Healthy Happy Life Secrets

Ingredients

  • 1 orange (a navel or California orange will give you a balanced sweetness)
  • 1 tsp marmalade (add bold sweetness but you don’t need much)
  • Vanilla milk to thickness liking
  • Vanilla Yogurt (to thicken)

Instructions

  • Blend. Zhugh glass rim with orange zest. Enjoy!

Notes

Creamsicle Creative Smoothie
1 orange (a navel or California orange will give you a balanced sweetness)
1 tsp marmalade (add bold sweetness but you don’t need much)
Vanilla milk
Vanilla Yogurt (to thicken)
Make orange zest from one medium orange, blend with a teaspoon of marmalade, yogurt, and vanilla milk.
This one tastes like an orange creamsicle popsicle if you know what those are. If you want to add some protein, blend in fine almonds or add powders. And if you want to eliminate sugar, then eliminate the marmalade and cut down on the orange zest.
Moving on to dessert tea ideas…

 

 

Check out other and the latest healthy beverage recipes!

Plant-Based Diet to A Balanced Meal Plan

Plant-based diet doesn’t mean you  have to give up non-plant based foods like meats. It simply means adding more natural plants into your diet (and less processed plants 🏭).

plate of plant based greens.
A plate of greens is good for adding more plant-based foods into your system 🌱 that are healthy and sustainable (vs. plant based) 🏭

While a full plant-based diet is not what I do, I have incorporated one plant-based meal per day that matters. I share below a meal plan that I think is a good way to maintain a consistently healthy ideal weight, year after year.

Eating healthy and balanced doesn’t just affect your physical body, it also positively impacts your brain, daily thinking mind, and mental health.

Getting proper vitamins and minerals that come from animal proteins help our brains function properly, that helps us keep our mind-body system balance.

I believe that not including fish, meats, carbs, fruits, and vegetables is missing what God gave us here on this earth. We hurt our bodies when we don’t eat enough from any of these categories, or we eat too much.

In most meals, strict vegetarians don’t receive enough vitamins and micronutrients (minerals), some that are richly found in animal protein.  Fish that are also considered animal meat, contains necessary B vitamins and good omega fat sources that healthy vegetarians usually come to realize they’re missing.

If only we could take vitamin supplements as a 1:1 nutrient exchange for food, but that’s not the case and especially with diluted vitamin pills.

Here’s just a quick journey into how I evolved into my way of eating today.

Journey to My Daily Meal Plan

I’ve eaten the same general diet for over two decades now, which includes the same food categories that are on the nutritional food charts. That may sound boring, but it has worked to keep me at the same ideal healthy weight.

Growing up, the four basic food groups turned into the FDA-approved 23 servings per day pyramid food group that’s still used. In America, we don’t necessarily take FDA rules as gospel as there are always changes, but that should tell us a ‘lil something. Whether it’s 4 categories or 23 servings, we need many food vitamin sources to function daily, in a healthy way.

When I was a child, my diet contained mostly fruits, vegetables, breads, cereals, rice, pasta, whole milk, yogurt, animal proteins, and too many processed snacks. Like many American diets back then when there were less healthy options, I ate more orange salty snacks than orange fruits.  Definitely as far away from a plant-based diet as one could see.

Continue reading “Plant-Based Diet to A Balanced Meal Plan”

Morning Thoughts Healthy Reframe Exercise

Morning thoughts that aren’t always pleasant tpop up when we’re groggy and half awake coming out of dreams we don’t control.

And we can change our thoughts and attitude from this one exercise and yoga exercise habits described below. 👇

Below are some yoga moves so even you wake up on the wrong side of the bed or have a busy day, you don’t miss out on your best day where you feel good when your head hits the pillow at night.

Morning routine can include letting the sunlight in.Wake up, Sunshine! Rise and shine. In the morning when you get out of bed with groggy morning thoughts.

But you can change this with your breaths in present moment.

Morning is a great time to start deep breathing for more oxygen… a natural way to get more energy.

Sitting up and standing helps to clear your passages that can be stuffy from laying down.

Survey your home and where the best morning light is if you’ve never done that.

That will be the eastern exposure windows or if you have indoor/outdoor living.

Be sure to let light into your eyes for at least 30 seconds.

Wearing blue glasses to protect eyes from digital screens and shades during the day outside is is a good idea! 😎

In the morning when it’s not direct sunlight like at noon, take them off to look outside and see what’s happening in your natural environment while you enjoy your morning water, smoothie, coffee, etc.

If you’re not a morning person, this is especially good so you wake up.

And if you experience seasonal affective disorder (SAD), this can change your outcomes.

Women need more sleep than men and children need more sleep than adults. Waking up adult energy changes and depends on many factors including a Kapha imbalance (could be mind or body).

If you’re naturally a Kapha body, then this is your natural way more than your Vata and Pitta counterparts.

If you’re not sure which imbalances you currently have and want restoring suggestions on your specific body imbalance symptoms, then I encourage you to take the body balance quiz.

Morning Yoga

Morning yoga even for 5-minutes is worth the effort for restoring good morning thoughts!

Everyone has 5 minutes they can sneak in.

And getting into Table Top pose and doing Cat and Cow can change your day.

Your Ayurvedic routine can include ginger and water. And finding your imbalances. If you’re super tired, Kapha is dominant.

If you’re super hard charging, Pitta is dominant.

If you’re feeling scattered, Vata is dominant.

And if you feel all, know that your Vata runs the show. The other name for Vata is wind, so like howling wind, that will dominate. But then later in the day you may find that your other (Pitta and Kapha) moods kick in.

These are all natural but the more you can feel less moods and restore them to peace and calm, the better.

It’s like your healthy body that doesn’t have symptoms. And when there are symptoms, then you’re focusing on how you can fix the symptoms.

So in the morning, maybe in the kitchen or bathroom, survey what your mood is. Do you need to calm from anxiety, worry (Vata) or being critical of yourself or others (Pitta)? Or are you tired and withdrawn (Kapha) or the opposite extreme of being needy (also Kapha)?

Yoga can change your day. And deep breathing on your mat will help all these restoring needs…. calming anxiety, lowering blood pressure, and breathing in oxygen for energy.

This is a good way to ease into the morning even if you only have 10 minutes before someone or something needs you.

My stretch routine is below (and if you’re a yoga beginner or think you’re not-good at yoga because of body issues, I’ll explain how not to be intimidated).

Here’s a daily yoga morning practice that you can try and tweak to how you like.

Do your Sun Salutations that are done standing.

You can rise up slowly and as controlled as you can like one spinal vertebra at a time, into a standing Mountain pose position.

From there, test your body for where there are kinks in the body, where there’s tightness and especially cracking sounds that are common in the morning or if it’s cold outside.

It’ easier to do this seated or laying down.

Seated, do a Seated Spinal Twist to see if your sides are tight. This was one we did as kids (maybe, hoola hooping, doing Twister, or Sit-n-Spin).

Then check your back. Lay on your back in Corpse pose. Survey. Then when you’re ready, do a Bridge pose. See if there’s tension in your bridge.

Easy Yoga for Beginners

If you’re intimidated by the idea of yoga and doing poses wrong, don’t be

I’ve been in yoga classes before where I would hear people say they’re “not good at yoga.”

Re-framing your morning thoughts help and then you’re better at it in the future!

We all start as yoga beginners and each morning is a re-start so your body feels different than the day before. It’s a good metaphor for being a lifelong learner.

If you look at laying down flat on your back as another name for Corpse pose, you can make the connection that yoga can be a fancy name for “just being.”

Besides, the funny and interesting thing is, no one is looking at anyone else in a yoga class. Everyone is too busy concentrating and looking at their own body parts and poses.

No one talks about other people’s poses, in or after class. The point of yoga is that it’s an individual sport. You get to look inward and see yourself like when you look in a mirror.

If you’re self-conscious, then yoga can help you break away judgmental feelings about yourself.

If you’re a beginner, doing more yoga gives you self-confidence, and you feel better about your body when poses work.

When I attended my first class I didn’t like it because I didn’t know what was going on, and that’s just par for the course of learning a new skill.

And practicing yoga at home gives you more confidence. So don’t be too quick to rule out yoga as a sustainable activity for you and your morning.

If that’s you at this stage, just have fun with getting to know your body, and center your mind on parts of your body and intention for your practice. The rest will work itself out.

We all have weak spots and our vulnerabilities and bringing them to light is how to go through them. You never know, you may end up loving yoga like I did and do.

And if you’re beyond beginner yoga overthinking or any yoga insecurity, then maybe use your morning yoga practice to work on your patience and resilience.

So that’s my morning routine start (that you can use) before my coffee and catching up with my daily news.

Then I make myself a breakfast smoothie or a breakfast snack and get to productive work.

I hope by reading this, you’re a wee more happy inspired to get up in the mornings and kick those negative morning thoughts to the curb!