Physical Health and Body Archives - Page 22 of 24

8 Ways to Avoid Stress Eating Anxiety and Holiday Stress

stress eating

Stress eating can be real anxiety for the best of us (that can easily become a bad habit).

Feeling anxious from a negative thought can cause overeating and shoveling food into our mouths. This feeds our natural desire to enjoy pleasure. But then we regret our decision the next day, as it shows up on our body and then can turn into anxious body thoughts (in the mind-body connection).

Below are some ways to break the stress-eating vicious cycle, especially around the winter holidays.

Especially in December, we can’t avoid messages about the new year being around the corner, that brings awareness to what we need to do to finish up the year, and then that reminds us of the hoopla of what happened and disappointments of what hasn’t yet. We just want peace, joy, and love.

By no fault of your own, holiday anxieties can be triggered in your mind-body, and aggravate stress eating as a comforting behavior that disturbs healthy living aspirations.

One way you can start to change this is to find a healthy set of friends (or a virtual community) who will support you and you can share your successful moments with. Choose these optimistic friends over complainers. You want to leave your near-year ending on a sweet (not sour) high note. Stay encouraged, growing, believing, and finding new year inspiration.

On that note, I have some holiday stress management encouragement…

Because we all bear some kind of stress as humans. At a bare minimum, you may have been thrown a few monkey wrenches within the year and an uneventful holiday ending.

You may have thought you’ve had enough, and you would just coast the rest of the year and take time off, and then something suddenly came up. You’re asked to make an off-course decision or two, be more creative than you’ve been (thinking outside the box), and work harder in your uphill climb despite facing ups and downs.

You’re not alone.

Look on the brighter side of things, you’re needed and you have a chance to make an impact in some unique way.

Those you-matter thoughts help your inner peace, that you can get back and are just a few steps away in your meditation practice, prayer life, or relaxed walk.

By a simple choice, you can change your mind and attitude just like that if you want to, despite your feelings or moods.

You always feel better than you did after the fact. You never know what thoughts and ideas are on the other side, but the time you put in is rewarded.

You’re better off if you find some way to be optimistic, even if it’s just borrowing a belief. Sometimes you have to just do it, to adopt a new way.

stress eating

Recently I was tasked to virtually decorate my Zoom screen background for a holiday meetup… those are common this year, right?

I don’t how you feel about yourself in a digital world, but coming up with a digital holiday background isn’t in my go-to wheelhouse bag of tricks, and maybe not in yours either. So I dug deep and basically looked around (…isn’t that how we were resourceful when we were younger?), and that led me to bring out the soft felted stockings and artificial decorations from the Christmas storage bin.

I’m an arts and crafts type. As a scrapbooker, I like handmade, decorating with brads and ribbons, and the whole nine yards for anything you can touch and feel… Continue reading “8 Ways to Avoid Stress Eating Anxiety and Holiday Stress”

Arm, Leg, and Butt Exercises Inspired by Physical Therapy and Yoga

If you’ve ever been to physical therapy, the approach to restorative body healing uses repetitive movements, such as core, arm, leg, and butt exercises. Like yoga, physical therapy exercises are healthy and help to increase your flexibility, strength, and balance.

When you’re not healing from an injury, your body is malleable and wants YOU to work out.

That’s our natural way, like horses and greyhound dogs that are born to race. If they’re not galloping and running, they’ve lost the opportunity to do what they’re happily born to do. We as humans, similarly are naturally meant to think, be and do.

When we take the opportunity to get active and move, we gain energy and better our health, and that makes us feel better.

If your body could speak, it would say, “put me to work.”But your mind shares back, “I don’t feel like it,”…and then that puts an end to your physical activity. Your mind wins and you actually lose in that moment.

But if you could convince your mind that exercise is easy, effortless… oh, and fun! …whoaa, that could be a game-changer, and your mind, body and you could all be on the same page.

I’ve found (and maybe you agree), that if you find an easy, almost effortless, and rewarding routine, then you would continue doing (like your lifelong healthy eating diet plan)…

Well, on that mission, I discovered some arm, leg, and butt exercises (described below), that give our overall delicate bodies, better results with little effort, that never gets old, and help you stay young and ageless.

Not to mention, the benefit of exercising without a gym. You can do these exercises when you just need a break (instead of opening the fridge for a snack or when you want to watch a few minutes of television).

If you do get to the gym… we love our gyms! then be sure to make use of the expensive and well-maintained machines. Continue reading “Arm, Leg, and Butt Exercises Inspired by Physical Therapy and Yoga”

Sixteen Candles and Balancing Aromatherapy Healing Scents

This is more than 16 candles, it’s closer to 66 candles!

Sixteen Candles was one of the coming-of-age comedy genre movies that existed during the Brat Pack Days. If you don’t know what that is or means, don’t worry ‘bout it… if you’re interested in candles and aromatherapy healing, you’re in the right place.

And if you haven’t seen the 80’s classic movie, the Actress Molly Ringwald played the slightly quirky and embarrassed teenager who had a crush on the most popular boy in the school.

Her family forgets her 16^th birthday around the planning of her sister’s wedding and all kinds of family chaos. With her signature pouty mouth and rolled eyes typical of teenagers (…remember those rebellious years?), her character, Samantha, says it all in this one line… “this is the single worst day of my entire life.”

Because when you’re a teenager everything is so magnified and important.

…Long story short, the movie has a sweet ending that includes birthday candles.

You and I have long passed our sweet 16^th birthdays, and have created so many memories since. Whether yours was uneventful or memorable, you’ve survived.

And you can choose to live each day like a happy birthday if you’re doing and being well.

I was able to relive my fond memories by bringing out these bright cotton candy pink, white, sunny yellow, and navy blue candles, that have special meaning to me. They’re the ones you can find at the dollar stores. They were also the ones I saw on many kids’ birthday cakes.

sixteen candles

…maybe you have a similar or favorite birthday memory that brings happy nostalgia feelings?

As an adult, you can make your own great memories, and that’s something to celebrate. One way I do regularly in joy and celebration is with scented candles that create a happier mood.

Scented candles can be healing for your soul. The light’s warmth and the aromatherapy effects, positively affect your mind and moods. Candles are powerful and healing. They can define a practice in a special way. You could be meditating, journaling, or just creating a new room atmosphere.

Sixteen Candles

These are my favorite balancing sixteen candles, that are easy to find online or at stores, and come in all shapes and sizes. There’s also one called “Birthday Cake” that smells like yellow or vanilla cake batter (similar to Christmas Cookie), but I think that candle is retired.

Sand + Fog candles Limoncello
Sand + Fog Mango Tangerine
Yankee Candle Christmas Cookie
Yankee Candle Vanilla Cupcake
Yankee Candle Juicy Citrus and Sea Salt
Yankee Candle Belgian Waffles
Yankee Candle Sugar & Spice
Yankee Candle Tangerine
Yankee Candle French Vanilla
Yankee Candle Pumpkin Pie
Village Candle Orange Dreamsicle – orange and vanilla candles have special powers over anxiety. If you don’t smell them or they’re sickenly sweet then it’s a good indicator that you’re Vata balanced overall at the moment… or if you never liked those scents, that’s not your natural dosha.
Yankee Candle Fresh Cut Roses
Yankee Candle Lemon Lavender
Yankee Candle Mistletoe
Yankee Candle Balsam and Cedar
Yankee Candle Sparkling Cinnamon

“Continue reading” for more aromatherapy option ideas and some photos of my personal, fun favorites 🙂
Continue reading “Sixteen Candles and Balancing Aromatherapy Healing Scents”

The Mind-Body Connection For Mental Health

In America, our culture has noticeably woken up in awareness of this mind-body connection reality.

Your mental health is a reflection of your overall health, showing up in your physical body, through the internal mind-body connection.

If you were born before the internet, this could be a newer idea to you as you didn’t grow up with yoga or meditation practice.

In 2008, I attended yoga studios and classes weekly, but you had to do some research to find a general type of yoga class like Hatha or Vinyasa yoga. Over a decade later, you can find studios everywhere, for beginner and advanced yoga, and every class flavor in between.

This growing popularity of yoga in the western world bridged eastern philosophies that the mind directly affects the body. There’s a fine line between fact and woo, and distinction to spiritual thinking.

The mind-body connection is factually based, and you can find enough supportive evidence without too much effort on just about any credible mental health site. Personally, I’ve been living this out since my Perfect Health mind-body transformative experience.

Why the mind-body connection matters

Living in America, the bottom line to why mind-body connection matters to us are that we want to live our Best Self, so that:

1) we can have a great career, work-life, or business (or all three).

2) we can attract and keep a good relationship, have a happy family and friendships too.

3) we can stay healthy and look good and have the energy to pursue our passions, contribute, and give back.

Our Collective Bodies Today in America

In America, as a whole society, our bodies can get brushed aside unless we prioritize taking care of ourselves. This has stayed steady through the generations and hasn’t changed much from past decades.

It still takes work to maintain our bodies, and how much we do this can depend on our limitations, body, genes, lifestyle, attitudes, and thoughts.

We take care of our bodies, first so we can look good and appear healthy, and we’ll spend the money to invest in ourselves.

No matter what our motivations are, by taking care of our bodies with healthy foods, exercise, and good habits, our bodies are naturally resilient and strong, and we can get back to our normal health with relative ease if we’re healthy.

Like so many, when I was in my twenties I felt healthy enough, so having life longevity goals just wasn’t a top priority (like in other countries around the world).

In some other countries, patients are told they’re physically well so that they think themselves to better health. A healthy mind does good for the body.

In America, health prevention and pacing ourselves is not the way our society is set up. We don’t usually take the time to find out what’s going on behind the scenes in our bodies unless something goes wrong.

If we’re on the toilet too often or not enough, that becomes a mild concern as it’s telling us something about our current health story.

We hope and rely on modern medicine to cure and correct any building-up health problems.

If you go to the doctor’s office, they will prescribe some form of medication even if it’s just a mild pain killer. They won’t usually just send you home with happy thoughts and a list of foods to eat.

Expecting to hear something wrong and how to fix the problem can cause pre-conditioned responses. In thinking that we need medicine to heal or use as a “feel-better” crutch, addictions can take control (over minds and lives) if we’re not careful.

That can lead to hypochondriac thoughts and obsession over the smallest physical symptom that gets worse because of the excessive energy and worry thoughts put towards inflammation or ailment.

These are not good places for our minds to be. We want our thoughts to be happy, positive, and loving so we have healthy bodies (in the mind-body connection).

The thoughts that you agree with will drive your results. Stress eating and unknown caused inflammation that often gets brushed under the rug as minor, are potential signs that a place in your mind isn’t happy.

Practical Mindful Tips for Mind-Body Connection Health

Here, I want to give you some practical mind tips to positively affect your mental health, so you can improve your physical health. These can be wise gems you apply for longevity, overall good health, and a rockin’ body!

Begin with an open mind for what you want to achieve, whether that’s a great physical body or a healthy body, and your intention will help get you there in the mind-body connection.

Continue reading “The Mind-Body Connection For Mental Health”

Cracker Barrel Menu Calorie Counter + Healthy Losing Weight Tips

Cracker Barrel menu vs. fast food is night and day. Cracker Barrel uses slow cooking methods for some dishes that us foodie enthusiasts appreciate! This homestyle burnt-top Cellantani and cheese (with a healthy option) recipe is below.

If a Cracker Barrel menu is not close to you, you can make your own homestyle slow cooking comfort foods like burnt-top corkscrew pasta macaroni and cheese. — Homestyle burnt top baked macaroni and cheese reminds one of slow cooking, the Cracker Barrel restaurant, and the fond eating childhood memories. 🧡

In this post, you’ll get tips to lose weight from snacking, ordering off a Cracker Barrel menu, and how to make calories count! And how to to get the tasty burnt-top on your baked macaroni without drying out the pasta.

After your turkey feast has come and gone, what are the secrets to keep a healthy, trim body you aspire to? …I share my best tips below. And they don’t require giving up macaroni-n-cheese if that’s one of your favorites.

If you’re on the road, it’s easy to get off-balanced in your diet. I recommend the Cracker Barrel menu that’s loaded with options for a conscious calorie counter, where you can find a healthy meal for under a thousand calories. Real homey comfort food and not a frozen packaged one.

👇 You can get to my Cracker Barrrel menu selections if you scroll way below.

…But, as with most my blog articles, there is jam-packed meaty healthy inspiration and tips in between. So that’s where I’ll start… with my story.

My Food Life Lessons

I think I’m lucky because I have pretty much maintained the same ideal healthy weight since my late 20s (after some hairy years working around decadent catering food).

And yep, I’m a Vata so my genetics play a big, big part. I’m not a vain person, but I am self-conscious (another Vata trait we call sensitive). That could be you too.

We are all unique in that we have a different one-and-only body that’s given to us to maintain for our entire life. And that’s daily changing.

So we want to optimize our body and body image that’s relative to each of us. There are some tips that work for all of us females and humans. Some ideas that work better for some of us than others.

And you know your body better than anybody else.

For the lifestyle part, like everyone, I had to learn in life’s journey.

Early on I went into a testing phase and tried to listen to reliable sources about how to have a healthy body. I wanted to get more tone and slender so I tried the trendy health fad diets with so many others.

Back then, I focused on one diet in particular, where I counted calories. You can probably guess what happened?… I gained more weight during that season. I craved foods and especially pasta that I grew up eating and had given up.

I was also craving sweet foods I normally ate and gave up. If you have a sweet tooth (e.g. for Vatas that’s your middle name), bread just doesn’t cut it as a sweet if ya know what I mean.

That’s when I realized self-discipline and willpower produce backfiring results…

When I told myself “no” to certain foods, that just made me want them more. …sound familiar?

That’s because our minds, don’t actually hear “no.” Instead, your mind hears you’re putting energy towards that food item, so then you just want it more. English isn’t your mind and body’s first language. Your mind-body interprets words by your feelings and actions…hmmm.

…so I ended up essentially on a “yo-yo” diet, where I was below weight, gained it back, and then went over the weight that I started with as I got a taste of the foods I loved like mac-n-cheese.

These were years before Oprah was popular on television and we learned all about the yo-yo diet effects from her sharing journey to the masses.

And, weight and size are relative to each of our bodies. In my body size journey, I went down to a size 2 (from a size 6 at the time) and grew to a size 8.

I have fit into the same size clothing and maintained a size 4 since then (it’s funny how some clothing pieces have come back in style a few times and I can live them up again!). …OK, so before you judge or playfully roll your eyes at me, I KNOW what you’re thinking…

Oh my gosh, I would love to be a size 4 or 6 (if you are, you know what I’m talking about!)… Or maybe you prefer your ideal size whatever that is…

But the truth is, it doesn’t matter what your number, size, or weight is, as much as keeping overall balanced body proportions to your frame, where you like and feel better about yourself. When your feed your mind happiness, that shows up in a healthier body as body love (and NOT body shame).

That’s the ultimate goal (to feel good about ourselves and our self-image). We need to build up our self-esteem especially if it was beaten down in the past. You may have experienced PTSD or had a rocky childhood.

Or maybe you still need to heal from wounds, build self-confidence from insecurities, and develop an abundant mentality to replace the victim mentality. That’s common for most of us.

And like most personal growth goals, it’s up to you to make your choices along the way. That’s where replacing habits helps (plus, not denying yourself any one specific food or category to reach the goal).

Along my journey, these are a few tips I discovered in choices that I’ve found that make the biggest impact.

3 Weight Loss Tips for Daily Menus

Continue reading “Cracker Barrel Menu Calorie Counter + Healthy Losing Weight Tips”