Breathing Exercise to Cleanse Your Cells!

Right now check in with yourself, are you holding your breathe?

We tend to take quick, short and shallow breaths when we are under stress and it keeps us… stressed! When we are overwhelmed, anxious, rushed or overly busy, physical tension can build up in our chests which causes the muscles to contract – the result – we breathe faster and more shallow.

The problem with shallow breathing is that it deprives our cells of much needed oxygen. But what if you could calm digestive issues without medication, release anxiety by calming your racing heart or naturally lower your blood pressure? Different breathing techniques can do all of these things and more.

I have begun talking about cleansing the bodies cells and a great way to do this is with the Kapalabhati breathing technique. It is a simple detox tool that will help cleanse the cells of the body by releasing emotional and physical toxins! This technique is amazing at clearing the nasal passages (mucus anyone?) with the force of the breath. If you are experiencing mucus in your nasal passages or feel tightness or tension in your chest  this is a great tool to help alleviate your symptoms. It consists of a series of forceful exhalations followed by passive inhalations.

OK, enough suspense here is how to safely perform the Kapalabhati* techhnique:

1.) Sit comfortably making sure your spine is straight with shoulders gently back, rest your hands on your lower belly.

2.) Take two normal breaths. Inhale. Now exhale, pulling in your abdomen. Repeat twenty times, keeping a steady rhythm and emphasizing the exhalation each time.

3.) Then inhale and exhale completely, inhale fully and hold your breath for as long as you comfortably can. Slowly exhale.

*Please note: do not practice Kapalabhati if you are pregnant.


**Here is a great video to get you started. Cleansing Breath Video


How do you feel now? You may feel more relaxed, energized, grounded or safe? Again, this is an awesome exercise for releasing toxins in your body. It’s one of my favorites. It does take some time get the hang of but it is well worth it to keep you feeling your best. It would be a great benefit to your your cells to try adding this to your weekly routine for added health and healing! Let me know what you think after you give it a try!

I’m Getting Personal…

Being a holistic health practitioner I know first hand that the foods we eat, the thoughts we think, the actions we take all throughout our lives create who we are. (I’m sure you may recall hearing the phrase you are what you eat?) Food literally creates our cells and ultimately what we look like and how healthy we are. It’s funny that we create food rules in our heads or justify why a certain food is ‘healthy’. Maybe we need to upgrade our health from ‘normal’ to ‘extraordinary’. Even negative emotions and thoughts have an impact on our cells!

Want to know my personal challenge for 2011? This year, I will be preparing my body for pregnancy! Wait… let me explain.

My theory (and there are many others in my field that agree with me) is that my cells and my husband’s cells will together be making the cells of our baby. If I was eating junk food (processed: chemical laden, artificial, genetically modified, and pumped with additives) that would ultimately be what my future baby would be created from! Just think about that for a minute.

I got to thinking, is this fair of me to be pre-disposing my child to illness, developmental problems, allergies and so on because I wanted a __________ (insert your favorite food you know is bad for you here). So, this year I will be sharing here, on my blog the steps I am taking to clean up my body even further to create the healthiest baby possible in my future. I will be sharing my personal journey, the steps I am taking to clean house on my cells and I already have some great books, DVDs and other fun resources lined up to share with you.

I know some people have already told me they think I am off my rocker ;) You are healthy already they tell me. You look great. Are you an extremist? To these I just laugh it off and do you know why? Because something deep at the core of my being is telling me to share this information, to be a powerful leader by example – and I am going with it! Part of what I teach my clients is to honor those thoughts that pop into our heads telling us to do something we would never ordinarily do – it’s called our intuition!

Check back every Tuesday and throughout the week for new blog posts. We will be getting into the details of cleanses, emotions, cell repair and clean up and tons of tips around how exactly to become super healthy in 2011!
Big Hugs,
PS – Maybe some of you are in the same boat and would like to join me, I would LOVE that!

What to eat this holiday season, free recipe…

One of the questions I get a lot, especially now with the holiday season here, is what to eat! We spend so much time worrying about counting calories, beating ourselves up for not ‘sticking to the diet’ and trying to figure out a meal plan that will work for us that well, usually doesn’t work!

Rose Cole is a holistic nutritionist like me and a great teacher of mine! She has put together what I think is a powerful tool to stay slim and full during the holidays and beyond with her Stay Slim Holiday Recipe Cookbook. I’ve already raved to my newsletter list about this goodie and now I’m sharing this with you too. (If you’d like to be on my newsletter list to get cool ideas, tips, videos just put your email address in the box to the right ;)

One of my favorite things about this cookbook is that all of the recipes are soy, gluten, dairy and sugar free. Most of the time the things we crave tend to be the things we are sensitive or intolerant to. Like me for instance, I love love love sugar. Being completely transparent here, it’s a struggle to stay away from sugar especially this time of year and I know exactly how the excess shows up in my life – with intense emotions, breakouts, needing a nap around 3pm and much more. It’s tough and makes you feel bad. I know I’ve been there. How about you? What do you crave and how does it make you feel when you eat that food?

Well, this cookbook is a tool I use to help me get back to eating well without feeling like I’m dying or eating tree bark! You can check it out for yourself here. When you do you get instant access to her yummy and amazing Chilled Holiday Nog recipe for FREE!

Hope you love the taste of these healthy, satisfying and delish recipes just like I do.

Headaches? Stressed? Try This

It’s cold outside! Brrr. Not only have I been having a ton of people ask me questions lately about how to get rid of headaches but also, what’s the fastest, quickest way to de-stress. Well, my answer is super simple – a warm, relaxing bath!

I know what it is like to suffer from headaches day to day and even migraines. Often headaches are a sign of something much bigger and out of balance in the body. Diet is of course the number one thing you need to look at but today I’m going to give you an quick recipe for headache relief in the form of a 20 minute soak in the tub.

Here’s what you will need:

1 cup epsom salts

2-3 drops of lavender essential oils

Just add the epsom salts and essential oils to your bath water and soak for about 20 minutes. Often when we have headaches we are way stressed out. This bath helps release toxins and the magnesium in the epsom salts will help to eliminate your headache. (Headaches can sometimes come on because of a lack of magnesium) It’s quick relief and feels so good to be renewed in such a stressful time of the year! Enjoy :)