All posts tagged: holistic living

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 …

Natural Cleaner for Yoga Mats + Gym Equipment

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Just when you thought it was safe to watch documentaries, you come across The Human Experiment and life is over as you knew it. Nightmares for DAYS, people. Damn it, Netflix, why do you do me like that? The basic synopsis of The Human Experiment is that we’re all going to die. Well, ok, more specifically, we are experiencing a chemical overload via the things we use daily, ranging from food to products. Households cleaning items are rarely tested for long term effects on animals, and what data we do is not looking good. After watching that documentary my first instinct was to pack up, pulling a Walden, and getting my Henry David Thoreau-self outta here! But here’s the thing: I absolutely refuse to live my life in fear of all of the non-holistic things that go bump in the night. There’s a big difference between making smart, well-informed changes that positively impact your life verses being controlled by information that terrifies you. The point of educating ourselves about natural alternatives is to simplify, empower and protect our …

Morning Habits for Weight Loss

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In the words of Anne of Green Gables, “Tomorrow is always fresh, with no mistakes in it.” This little saying holds true for our eating habits as well, and research proves mornings are literally a blank slate to our digestive system. How we start our day calibrates our metabolism and can either aid in our health efforts, or wildly sabotage our goals. The start of our day holds another little trick up its sleeve: it can be a powerful detox session for our body if we play our cards right. It’s not news that a detoxed body= a body primed to lose weight/be a fitness beast. The great news is that we can get the most out of our morning with just a few simple habits.  I hate early mornings with an intensity that borderlines on out of control. I personally, require minimal thinking, breathing, doing, and moving in the AM, so the less complicated, the better. Let us have morning success, and let it be effortless, ammirite? I’ve found these little habits make a …

The Great, Mind-Numbing Diet Dilemma: What to Eat

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Vegan. Vegetarian. Paleo. Oh my… There are endless diets out there that swear up, down, and sideways to be the absolute best for your body. They usually sound thoroughly convincing too, until you read up on another diet that abosolutely, positively contradicts everything the first diet claims you should follow. This leaves the great, mind-numbing diet dilemma: which diet should I follow to ensure I’m maintaining optimal health?! Most people start out 110% on a particular diet, only to find it feels far too rigid and then they give it up completely. While this post is not a promo for a particular diet, I do believe there are some key guidelines we can all follow to make sure we’re making healthy food choices. Food is fuel, and cooking and eating it should be a joy. Whenever I prepare a meal, I constantly think of all the people who desperately need basic provisions, and it reminds me to be grateful that I have the ability to not just choose to eat, but what to eat and …

DIY Glowing Skin Face Mask

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THERE ARE ENDLESS BENEFITS TO LIVING A NATURAL LIFESTYLE, but one of the best perks is that when it comes to beauty, it’s a much more frugal option than mainstream counterparts and you know exactly what’s going on your skin. I repeat: you know exactly what chemicals are NOT going on your skin and therefore into your body. The skin is an organ, but we kinda forget this and the fact that it will indeed absorb whatever we slather on it. My skin routine is 100% natural, and ironically, when I switched to natural products, my skin looked so much better than when I was keeping up an expensive face routine. Not only does my health thank me for this, but so does my piggy-bank. You know, if I had one. Which, I guess Chase Bank counts, right? Remember, more expensive isn’t usually most effective. Some of my girlfriends spend a crazy amount of money on teeny tiny face product and treatments at various spas and such. It’s not necessarily to maintain gorgeous, youthful skin. …

DIY Storage Jar/Herb Garden Planter

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You’d think a city girl through and through might not be much of a tree hugger, but here’s the full disclosure: I’m crazy about nature and can’t get enough of the great outdoors. I will hike, camp, bike, boat, and play my way through nature. Fortunately, Washington, DC is filled with amazing gardens, greens, and gorgeous plants and flowers. It’s also extremely accessible to fabulous hiking trails, mountains, lakes, rivers, the ocean…I mean, this little city girl has got it made. My one limitation: growing my own garden. The one thing we don’t have a lot of in the city is a big space to grow tons of plants. That doesn’t stop me from having my own fabulous indoor garden, and I’ve been able to grow and care for a wide variety of plants in the comfort of my home. Having fresh herbs on demand is a huge plus when cooking. It absolutely changes the dynamics of any dish in the best way possible, and there’s something really enjoyable about handling fresh, bright greens. It …

Pro-body, Pro-Mind, Pro-health: Probiotics

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Researchers and scientists alike agree that we’ve ignored how essential gut health is to our overall health. And guess what our Standard American Diet (SAD) hits the hardest? Our intestines. GMO’s, processed and refined foods strip down the gut of good bacteria, creating an inflammatory reaction that has produced an epidemic of Crohn’s disease, Celiac, and other inflammatory problems as well as causing weight gain. Many of the food inventions of our brave new world are horrible for our bodies. Modern medicine is just too damn smart for its own good, or for our good that is. With all of our wonderful advances through pills, science, and surgeries, we completely ignore holistic health guidelines that have been around for thousands and thousands of years. We seem to think the body incapable of healing itself without the aid of Western medicine. While I don’t think it’s advisable to wholly use natural health alternatives, I think it’s wise to learn what we can and implement simple and yet powerfully effective measures. Remember, just because something is “natural” doesn’t mean …