All posts tagged: health and fitness

How to Prevent Common Yoga Injuries

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Yoga is magical. After you finish a class, you basically float out on a tide of goodwill and feel like you’re riding on the back of a unicorn while sweet baby angels sing into your ear. But beyond the undeniably euphoric effects of yoga, it can be a truly healing experience, both mentally and physically. This aspect of yoga draws many people initially to their mat, so when injuries occur, it can legit feel like a gianty-giant let down. Is it not enough that we endure demanding jobs, horrific traffic, depressing articles in the news (I cannot handle anything related to current events right now), and global warming?! Must we also experience injuries during our cherished outlet known as yoga?! Good news, fellow yogi: injuries are preventable, and I’m about to tell you how.  Get that good mojo and keep it! The topic of yoga injuries is near and dear to my heart, because I’ve gone through a slew of them while doing some intense Ashtanga/Mysore training. I’ve cracked my sternum, busted some ribs, did …

Anti-Aging, Fat Blasting Blueberry Smoothie

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All these low-carb/no-carb diets are giving fruit a bad rap, but the truth is carbs aren’t evil. It just depends on the kinds of carbs you’re consuming. The brilliant thing about berries is they have a lower sugar content than other fruit, so you can eat them without experiencing a potentially drastic sugar spike. Blueberries reign supreme as a not only a power food, but also a beautifying food. When you eat beautifying foods, the ingredients work from the inside out, creating total body change. You can slather the most expensive lotions and potions and magical ingredients on your skin, but the saying “skin deep” exists for a reason. These ingredients literally mask the results of poor health and/or an unhealthy diet, but it’s impossible for those expensive ingredients to really penetrate the deeper layers of skin. All the creams in the world don’t do anything for your total body wellness. Blueberries have the highest antioxidant capacity of all commonly consumed fruits and vegetables.  If that’s not enough to convince you to try out this …

Eat Your Way to Youthful Skin

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We live in a society that’s pretty obsessed with beauty—outer beauty that is. The makeup industry is a multi-billion dollar corporation, and the average medicine cabinet is overflowing with lotions and potions and concoctions promising to make up more beautiful. More youthful. More desirable. Beauty is a business, and booming one at that. Somewhere along the way though, health and beauty became two very separate entities. The ingredients in these “anti-aging” and “beautifying” products often cause way more harm than good. Recently, I went to my dermatologist for the good old Let There Be No Skin Cancer checkup (all good in the hood; all those years of drenching myself in SPF and assiduously hiding under an umbrella at the beach like a stowaway vampire have finally paid off). I had just run out of the nighttime essential oils I use, so I asked about moisturizers and an anti-aging cream. She gave me two products and sent me on my merry way. Both creams cost around $200 (JESUS TAKE THE WHEEL) and what’s worse, when I looked …

How to Do: Side Crow

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Arm balances just makes me soooo happy, I can hardly stand it. I mean, honestly, every time a yoga instructor calls out an option for an arm balance or an inversion, I’m literally like, YAAAAAS GAWD. Unless I’ve eaten all the things right before class and feel as though I’m made of bricks. Then I’m like, WHHHHYYY, make the lambs stop screaming!!! Yoga is cruel to the gluttonous, just so you know. But when a girl’s gotta eat, she’s gotta eat. Even if it’s right before class. Here’s the thing I like to tell my own clients regarding the oh-so-tricky art of arm balances and inversions: it should be fun. Sure, it’s difficult—really difficult. After all, you’re both balancing and holding yourself up on a tiny portion of your body. But this isn’t the time to go Type A or let your perfectionism kick in. This is the exact moment to practice patience and give yourself grace. Before you even start, lay your ego at the door. Hey, I know you just skimmed that sentence! …

Sunscreen Swaps: the Best Picks for Children

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Currently, my husband and I are spending the week in Vegas. I’m not into the casino scene, but we are having such an amazing time together. I’m convinced that you can have the time of there life wherever they are, if you’re with your Person. We got to put this to the test when our flight in was bumped, and we chilled at the airport all day…and had a ball. I’ve always been a big believer that you can make extraordinary memories from the most ordinary of days, and so far, life has proven that to be true. Meanwhile, Vegas is literally hotter than crawling into an oven, and now all those crimes on CSI make so much more sense. People are probably going crazy from the heat! Surprisingly, we adapted to the weather pretty quickly (read: we stay inside/poolside), and I’ve been pile on a bottle of sunscreen per day to protect my oh so fair skin from this desert sun. That’s an exaggeration…but just barely. If you’ve read my post/rant about sunscreens for …

Use This Not That: Sunscreen Swaps

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Summer is officially here, and according to my Siri, it’s going to be a million degrees with a UV ray index of off the charts. This is what happens when you don’t recycle, people! Mama Earth gets angry at us all and then gets hotter than Hades! All that aside, I’m a delicate little flower when it comes to the sun. My skin is so white, I glow in the dark like a ghost. I really do; true story. I could effortlessly play a Walker on The Walking Dead, especially if I didn’t get any coffee when I woke up.  I’ve never been into tanning (read: the sun and I are genetically incompatible). It takes a lot to keep this Walker skin ridiculously young-ish and protected from the sun’s death rays, so I used to pile on the sunscreen. Then I found out most sunscreens might cause as much damage as sun exposure. I can’t even.  The reason sunscreens are harmful is because most are laden with toxic chemicals. These chemicals get directly applied and then …

When Dairy-Free Milk Wreaks Havoc on Your Gut

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Many people switch to nut milk in pursuit of healthier options, completely unaware of some companies using ingredients that are highly inflammatory for your intestinal tract and harmful to your gut microbes. It seems like everyday, more people are ditching cow’s milk and switching to healthier options, like nut milk. With increased demand comes increased supply, so many mainstream food brands are now marketing nut milk of every variety. Many people switch to nut milk in pursuit of healthier options, completely unaware of some companies using ingredients that are highly inflammatory for your intestinal tract and harmful to your gut microbes.This should be a good thing…but it’s not. While you’d might think consumers should be able to waltz into any grocery store and not have to worry about what the hell is in our food, that world just doesn’t exist anymore. The food industry is a massive business and, like many other businesses, it’s more concerned with product sale than people’s health.  The simple truth is not all dairy-free milks are created equal, but there’s …

Smoked Gouda Mac & Cheese Two Ways

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I don’t know about where you live, but the weather is moody AF here in Washington, D.C. What’s up, mama nature?! While I tend to prefer meals that are heavily plant-based, sometime life calls for some good old Southern comfort food. My mom has a collection of the best southern dishes, and while they taste ah-maaaazing, they certainly aren’t healthy. The good news is just about any recipe can be modified to fit your dietary needs. I adjusted my mom’s mac & cheese recipe two ways: 1) gluten free noodles using organic milk and cheese, 2) vegan using creamy cashew sauce Both of them tasted so delicious, I almost forgot we’re in the clutches of winter. Almost. But not quite. MAC & SMOKED GOUDA CHEESE  _________________________________________________________________ SERVES: 6 PREP TIME: 10-15 minutes COOK TIME: 35-40  INGREDIENTS: 4 cups dried GF macaroni 1 whole egg 1/2 stick (4 tablespoons) butter 1/4 cup all-purpose flour 2 1/2 cups ORGANIC whole milk 2 heaping teaspoons dry mustard (more if desired) 1 pound Gouda cheese, grated (not pre-grated cheese) Seasoned salt …

Ditch the Sugar, Lose the Weight

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  Pour some sugar on me… But not on my food. No way, no ma’am, no thank you. I not-so-secretly adore sugary things. Actually, I love salty foods. Fatty foods. Fried foods. If it is dyed an obnoxious color, I’ll probably like that too. (Those chewy Swedish fish make my day. Some part of my brain knows it’s not a real food, that fish are neither chewy nor bright red nor sweet, but I become 100% committed to devouring the entire box the second they’re in my hands.) I use so much salt on my food, it looks like a literal snow blizzard has descended upon my plate. But out of all my vices, I think my sweet tooth is the worst. Scratch that, it’s not a sweet tooth, but teeth. Like, a mouth full of ’em. I’m pretty sure my body is out to get me. When science is finally confessing sugar is silently killing us and likens it to a hyper addictive drug, what’s a girl to do? Find ways to cut sugar out …

Review: Best Yoga Books (for yoga addicts like you)

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I collect two things in life: books and music. And according to my bank account, I apparently go a little overboard with my obsession for both. I am unrepentant. I am without question a book fanatic/literarazzi/reader-of-all-the-things. I don’t know about you, but any location that houses books in a happy place: libraries, used bookstores, Barnes and Noble, that random pop up store down the street, etc etc etc. I’m not kidding when I say I read at least a book or two a week. I will happily turn down social engagements to snuggle up with a my fat cat and a book. HEAVEN IS A PLACE ON EARTH—called my sofaaaaaaaa. Anyway, now that we all know the real reason I’m sometimes a terrible friend (those books aren’t gonna read themselves, people), I wanted to share with you several that I’ve found really beneficial to my yoga practice. Inspirational and philosophical books are pretty easy to come across, but books with a technical focus are often difficult to find. I’ve curated several gems along the way, and they’ve made …