Make Healthy Travel Simple: What to Pack

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Summer is here – hopefully you have a get-away or two coming up.  While I absolutely adore going new places and visiting friends and family, traveling itself can be stressful. Plus, trips tend to disrupt the healthy routines I have in place at home.

Recently I flew to Dallas for a 3-day conference. Between airplanes, changing time zones, hotel beds, a packed schedule, and Texas’s reputation as not-exactly-a-hotbed of organic, plant-based eating, I was a little concerned about how I was going to take care of myself.

Here’s what I took with me to help feel my best while traveling:

  • My neti pot and some sea salt. When I arrive at my room, among the first things I do is take a shower and rinse my sinuses to rid myself of the skeevy airplane air.
  • Lavender and peppermint essential oils. I anoint points on my wrists and neck to give myself my own bubble of germ-killing air on the plane. A drop of peppermint on my neck and shoulders also helps me stay alert, relaxes muscles, benefits digestion, and treats headaches. A few drops of lavender on my pillow or inner wrist comes in handy for relaxation and sleep.
  • My breakfast-in-a-bag: Before I leave, I assemble the following  in a ziplock bag: 3 TB rolled oats, 2 TB chia seeds (protein), a sprinkling of shredded coconut (good fat), a handful of raisins or goji berries (antioxidants), ½ tsp. cinnamon (balance blood sugar, enhance digestion), pinch of salt, 1 tsp. hemp seeds or sesame seeds (protein and essential fatty acids, plus they’re intestinal moisteners that prevent constipation), a pinch of ground ginger or cardamom (or both) to kindle digestion. I actually multiplied this recipe by 4, one for each morning of my trip. Use the in-room coffee maker to heat water, and it cooks itself in 10 minutes.
  • A spoon and pyrex with which to eat my breakfast. They’re smaller and lighter than my Vitamix!
  • Some fresh food: A gallon-sized bag of cut up carrots, celery, and cucumber ensures I’ll have the vegetables my body’s used to getting while I travel.  A couple of apples and a small bag of almonds make easy, packable snacks.
  • Favorite Chinese herbs: I bring Free and Easy Wanderer to help adapt to the changes in routine, Suan Zao Ren Tang for sleep, and some emergency Gan Mao Ling in case I feel a cold coming on.
  • A few tea bags of tulsi tea for its stress-relieving and immune-booting properties
  • Good walking shoes so I could make sure to take a 15-minute walk during every break in the action. If you’ve ever spent a weekend in a conference room cave, you know how important it is to get outside and move.
  • Workout clothes – and I made sure to hit the workout room early each day.
  • My meditation and qi gong practices: no packing required, and  yet so essential for me to feel grounded and connected to myself

What helps you stay healthy when you travel?

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How to Become Your Most Resilient Self

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I say it all the time: Self-care is not self-ish.

It’s a premise that’s easy to grasp and even easier to shrug off if we’re the type of people who tend to just buckle down, work harder to get the job done, and take care of other people regardless of how depleted we are — until our bodies force us to re-examine our choices. If you’re still shrugging off self-care as a nice but non-essential notion, perhaps this story will change your mind:

A young woman I love recently suffered a major loss — one of those unthinkable, heartbreaking events that draws a “before” and “after” line across a life, changing it forever. I won’t go into the details, as it’s not my story to tell. But in her process of sorting out her shock, grief, loss, pain, anger, fear, and whatever else, she noticed something remarkable and surprising: her own tremendous resiliency.

This formerly Type A woman used to internalize a ton of stress. She worried a lot, and had the frequent debilitating migraines, rock-hard neck and shoulders, insomnia, overall sense of unease, and hormone imbalances to prove it. But she wrote to me yesterday:

“I am now not only waking up every day feeling like there’s still beauty in the world, but helping other people cope with change in a healthy way as part of my job. The mere fact that I’m able to not feel completely overwhelmed by my own life changes but can use that to help others find grace in change is incredible.”

Indeed. I am in awe of her strength, her ability to reckon with what came her way, and to bounce back.

How did she build these muscles of resiliency?

Unwittingly, gradually, and using the same self-care tools she used to treat the migraines that first brought her into my clinic for acupuncture. In addition to getting acupuncture and taking herbs, she was willing to change how she showed up in the world. She downshifted. She stopped treating her body like a machine. She dared to do less than she was capable of. She cultivated a relationship with her breath and her body through breathing qi gong and yoga. She took the time to seek out things like acupuncture and massage to remind her nervous system what’s possible. She got over her yang addiction. None of this was easy, as our society tends to reward overwork and over-service, and to really do it differently is tough on the ego. But the debilitating migraines provided compelling motivation.

“The idea of self care and slowing down and finding the quiet was never a part of my world before I met you. I have so much gratitude for the time I got to work with you and the routines and structure for caring for myself that you helped me to build.”

The bodymind practices and self-care routines that she put in place years ago now serve as the foundation of her resilience. And as she continues to employ them, she is role-modeling this self-care for her daughter, as well as for the people she works with, and for me. She is being the change, Gandhi-style. Kinda the exact opposite of selfish.

 

Here are my 3 tips for becoming resilient:

 

  • Start with taking 30 minutes a day to yourself, away from any input from screens, other people, work, etc. Write, go for a walk, stretch, take a bath, get out of your head.
  • Develop a relationship with your breath (if you haven’t already grabbed my free breathing meditation, get it now)
  • Learn a bodymind practice like qi gong, meditation or yoga (my learn-from-anywhere qi gong class can get you started)

 

Like going to the gym, building up resilience takes consistent time and effort. But over time, you will be stronger than you ever thought possible.

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Why “I must be getting old” is the Wrong Conclusion

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One of the saddest things I hear in my practice is, “I must be getting old.” I hear this from patients as young as 29, and I know the feeling: nothing makes me feel like I’m 85 quite like back pain that I’ve had since I was a teenager.

Maybe you don’t have the energy you’d like. You feel stiff. Maybe your back hurts (or your hips, knees, neck, or shoulders). The world feels like it’s moving too fast.  But it’s not true that you have to fall apart before you die (If you have pain in one shoulder, why not the other? – it’s the same age!). You also don’t have to live on ibuprofen and caffeine, or outsource your wellness to your doctor, acupuncturist, massage therapist, or chiropractor. It’s possible to feel younger, even as the days go by.

Little things add up. Ever notice how you get an immediate surge of energy when you get an unexpected visit or email from a dear friend you haven’t seen in years? Notice how a couple days of eating processed food while visiting family makes you feel bloated and toxic? Or how about how not getting up from your desk for 15 hours when you’re under deadline can lead you to conclude that your shoulders are now cemented to your back? These all add up. It’s the things we do every day that most determine how old we feel.

 

6 things I wish everyone did every day to feel great:

 

  1. Get 7-9 hours of sleep a night
  2. Move your body in a way that feels good
  3. A body-mind practice to calm your nervous system and reconnect to yourself
  4. Drink water (half your body weight in ounces)
  5. Eat whole foods (mostly plants)
  6. Connect with love

Looking for a way to do 3 or 4 of these things at once? Keep Reading…

Meet Qi Gong: Yoga’s Less Popular Cousin

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Let me introduce you to a good friend of mine. Her name is Qi Gong. She’s Yoga and Meditation’s less-sexy, easy-to-underestimate cousin — and she’s AMAZING. She’s less flashy than her cousin Yoga. But don’t overlook her — those still waters run deep.

Here are 10 reasons why you’ll love getting to know Qi Gong:

  1. She’s an incredible healer.  She can reduce arthritis, chronic pain, heart disease, fatigue, diabetes, and inflammation, while boosting your immunity, energy, bone density, sleep, focus, and balance. She’s even got the studies to prove it.
  2. She’s over 3000 years old and still looks great. She’s got gorgeous curves. Unlike the straight lines of her angular cousin Yoga, Qi Gong moves in circles and spirals: she flows.
  3. She’s unpretentious. There’s nothing showy about her.  Her movements are slow, mindful, graceful, and powerful.  While she’s great at building strength and balance, her moves aren’t particularly difficult, and you probably won’t see her on the cover of a glossy magazine sporting lululemon. No stretchy pants are required to hang with her.
  4. She’s energizing.  Spend just 20 minutes with her and you’ll feel revitalized, more positive, and more mobile throughout your day.
  5. She’s easy to be with. Unlike her cousin Meditation (who’s awesome, but let’s face it, can be kinda uptight sometimes), Qi Gong doesn’t ask you to sit there and try to not pay attention to your thoughts. Instead, she helps the mind and nervous system to settle down by giving you lots to pay attention to, like your breath, and simple movements that repeat.
  6. She’ll help you relax. She can help tame anxiety and stress. You might even sleep better.
  7. She’ll help you get out of your head better than Yoga. Don’t get me wrong: I’ll love Yoga forever, but a lot of what she does is so challenging that it often feels like a “mind-over-body” practice rather than one of mind-body unity. It can be hard to get in touch with your body while at the same time trying to dominate it. With Qi Gong, the struggle to do it “right” or make it look like someone else’s practice goes away. The simplicity of the movements make it easy to feel the qi flowing in your body and between your hands.
  8. She’ll make you feel good. She’ll love you no matter how strong or how flexible you are, and you’ll love her back.
  9. She’ll help you love your body. Rather than seeing the body as something you need to ignore or transcend (like Meditation sometimes says), Qi Gong encourages you to tune into the body as a focal point for concentration. Your body becomes a portal for tuning into the more subtle layers. (So she’s kind of a feminist — none of that “body is dirty and mundane” baggage here.)
  10. She’s sophisticated. She’s got different routines designed to support each system of the body. She’ll even teach you some points that acupuncturists use to get qi to move properly.

Want to meet her? She’s available. And I’d be delighted to introduce you.

My new home-study course, 12 Treasures Qi Gong: Your Movement Multvitamin is now available.

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Am I Doing Enough?

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Running on empty(True story, but significant details have been altered to protect confidentiality.)

Last week I treated a woman who was exhibiting an all-too-common combo of stress and tiredness. And she was wondering “Am I doing enough?” Let’s see: full -time job? Check. Full-time husband? Check. Elderly parents and in-laws in need of care? Double check. Volunteer responsibilities? Checkety check. What got her questioning whether or not she’s doing enough was a phone call from her son, who wanted to know if she could help take care of the kids for the weekend. She said no, but was troubled by the thought of not doing enough to help. “I’d love to help,” she said, as the tears welled up, “but I’m just so exhausted. And I just feel so guilty for not doing more. ”

I could relate. It’s tough to feel like there’s not enough of you to go around – and easy to feel like you’re doing something wrong in saying no to someone you love.

I asked her if she had been getting enough sleep. Only on the weekends. Is she exercising 3-5 times a week like she’d like to? Not really. More like once or twice. Is she cooking healthy meals for herself regularly – a key part of our treatment strategy? Not so much. Is she making time for her spiritual practice? Yes, but she feels like she’s phoning it in. How about relaxing or connecting with friends? Ha.

So the absolute basic things she needs to be doing for her are barely happening. Should she be doing more? I’m going to go with “no.” How about slathering a thick layer guilt on top of that? No, and no.

Am I suggesting that everyone needs to get 100% of our own needs met 100% of the time before we can help other people? Of course not (otherwise no kid would ever make it to adulthood!). Part of love is service. It feels good to help out, and what that does for your spirit can often make up for deficiency of physical energy. But (for me, at least) those delicious feelings dry up under the harshness of overextending out of obligation. Then it’s not only unsustainable, it’s also likely to backfire, as the cry of unmet needs get externalized as resentment.

I would love to cure ebola. I would love to give away a billion dollars to help get this disease under control. But much as I’d love to write a check for a billion, I simply don’t have it to give away. I do have $50, which I can and will donate to the cause. It’s sustainable, in a way that taking out a payday loan in order to do my part in the global effort would not be.

Here’s the paradox: when we dedicate time to taking care of ourselves, we have more energy reserves to give to others. I know I’m a better practitioner (and friend, and wife, step-mom, course creator, and whatever else I am) when I’ve had enough sleep, when I’ve meditated and when I am moving from a place of presence than when I’m running myself into the ground.

I know this, yet I still feel guilty when I’m taking care of myself, if I know it will disappoint someone else (including my Work Self – she’s demanding!). There are two gauges to check. First, the fuel gauge: how’s my energy? Am I tired? The second is my intention. A quick check question I use is “what is my motivation?” If the answer involves a “should” or “ought to,” I let the answer be no: otherwise it’s a social expectation overriding inner wisdom. So how do you know whether you’re doing enough? If you’ve got a good amount of fuel (energy), and if you can say yes with love in your heart, go ahead and take the detour to help someone out. But if you barely have enough gas to make it to your destination, it’s probably not wise to take the detour. No one is served when you sputter to a halt.

 

Photo by ReubenGBrewer (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-4.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Qi Gong for Difficult Conversations

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Warrior 2Do difficult conversations make you nervous? Speaking what’s true for you, while staying connected to your heart and being open to the other person can be really tough — especially as stress hormones take over. Paying attention to your body can help a lot.

Harvard social psychologist Amy Cuddy‘s research shows that putting the body into a “power posture” for two minutes raised confidence-boosting testosterone levels  and decreased the stress hormone cortisol. (If you haven’t watched her TED talk, it’s well worth seeing.) Looking at Cuddy’s research through the lens of Chinese Medicine, we see that High Power postures are the yang ones: big,  expansive poses that take up space. Low power poses are more yin: people making themselves small, collapsing their chests, crossing their legs, guarding their necks.

So here’s how we can apply this scienctifically verified bodymind technique:

Before the nerve-wracking conversation, find some privacy — even a bathroom stall could work. (You could do these poses during the conversation too, but it’s unlikely to create the kind of connection you want.) So take 2 minutes alone and put yourself in any of  the following postures, or a combination:

  •  Wonder woman pose: hands on hips, chest out, chin slightly elevated.
  •  Warrior 1 (a lunge with your arms up overhead)
  • Warrior 2 ( a side lunge with arms out to the sides)
  • Goddess pose (feet wide, knees bent and angled in line with the feet, arms out to the sides and bent, palms up)

Now that your cortisol levels are dropping and your confidence is rising, you’re ready for The Talk, and for some invisible qi gong.  During the interaction, remember these 3 tips:

1)    Ground yourself. Put your feet flat on the floor. Feel the bottoms of your feet connecting with your shoes. And below that, the floor, the foundation of the building, and to the Earth itself. Let its solidness — groundedness – root you to the earth like a tree.  Imagine energy  from the Earth flowing into the bottom of your feet and up your inner legs to your low belly.

2)    Root your breath deep in your belly. This takes you into your center of gravity, or your lower dan tian in qi gong terms.  If you’re nervous, the breath will likely retreat to the  upper chest, which will reinforce to the body that you’re stressed. You can help to break that biofeedback loop by consciously allowing your breath to sink and lengthen.

3)   Keep your heart lifted and arms uncrossed. The heart lift will make it more likely that your communication will be open and compassionate. (The tongue is the sprout of the heart according to Chinese Medicine.)  Arms crossed in front of the chest are low-power poses and can signify defiance and opposition, making it less likely that your conversation will be harmonious.

Want to learn more about what you can do to feel calm and confident no matter what life throws at you? I’m super-excited to be developing my first e-course on self-care practices for anxiety.  Join my email list and you’ll be the first to know about it!  If you learned something here, please share this post with a friend.  Sharing is caring.

The difference between health and fitness

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RunningRecently one of my patients -a beautiful, strong, and conscious, woman- told me that her qi gong practice has taught her to examine the difference between health and fitness in her life. She went on to explain how some of the things she had been doing to “stay fit” were actually compromising her health. Too much running and biking were causing back pain, knee pain, and fatigue. But in moderation, these same exercises helped her feel great. Listening to her body’s wisdom, she was able to keep herself feeling pain-free and energetic through doing less of what her mind was telling her she needed in order to be fit. Some days that meant a gentle walk rather than a vigorous run.

I could relate. My own internal “should” voice can be very strong. And loud. At times shrill. And I have definite ideas about what I need to be doing in order to be healthy, which don’t always line up with what my body needs. Is it better to force myself to get up and meditate, or get an extra hour of sleep? Green smoothies can be wonderfully healthy, but is my digestive qi up to the challenge of digesting them in the cold, damp, winter? Maybe oatmeal would be a better choice. My intellectual mind doesn’t always know the answers, but my bodymind does. That information is always there when I bother to tune in and ask, rather than let my mind run the show.

Qigong is a practice of turning into the bodymind. But the benefits of the practice are not confined to the half hour of going through the qigong routine: there’s a spillover effect. Tuning into what’s going on inside moment by moment, day by day, we allow the what the Taoists call “right action” to arise by itself, which is the secret to living in harmony with nature, and with one’s own heart. And that’s where the joy lives. Interestingly enough, the 2011 study by Massachusetts General Hospital showed increased grey matter density in brain in areas associated with self-awareness, introspection, compassion, empathy, memory and learning, decision-making (plus decreased size of the region associated with stress) when participants practiced meditation for 30-minutes a day for 8 weeks.

Could you benefit from a practice of tuning in? A new qigong session begins January 4, and another on Feb. 1. I invite you to sign up.

Let there be space

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A colleague showed up at my office yesterday and asked “what are you doing tonight at 7:30?”  For the first time in weeks, the answer was “I don’t have any plans, actually.” She smiled, presented me with a free ticket to the Aviv String Quartet’s performance that her husband wasn’t able to use, and left.

As I sat in the concert hall, listening, the music worked its magic.  It felt as though the sound waves were massaging my brain into a dreamy, peaceful, yet creative and inspiring state.  I came out of it feeling deeply rejuvenated, like an especially deep meditation or trip to “acu-land.”  While feeling deeply grateful that I was there having this experience,  I was reminded of this passage from the Tao Te Ching:

We join spokes together in a wheel,
but it is the center hole
that makes the wagon move.

We shape clay into a pot,
but it is the emptiness inside
that holds whatever we want.

We hammer wood for a house,
but it is the inner space
that makes it livable.

We work with being,
but non-being is what we use.

–Tao Te Ching interpreted by Stephen Mitchell

If there’s no space, nothing happens. We need yin to engender yang.

It’s so easy for me to see space as simply something that needs to be filled up.  This keeps me very busy (usually with things I love!)  but doesn’t allow for a whole lot of spontaneity. What would happen if I left a little more space ?

The One Book I Hope Everyone Reads this Year

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Recently, one of my patients recommended I read Anticancer: A New Way of Life by David Servan-Schreiber, M.D., Ph.D (Viking, New York, NY, 2009). I am very grateful for her recommendation, as it seems like the number of people I know, both personally and professionally who are dealing with this brutal disease — and the harsh treatment it so often necessitates — is way too high. And yet, there are many things we can do to make our bodies far less hospitable to cancer.

Written by an M.D. who was diagnosed with a brain tumor 15 years ago and was dissatisfied with his oncologist’s assessment that what he did wouldn’t have any affect on his health, this book is highly readable, peppered with interesting scientific studies, and very practical advice. He considers what makes the ecosystem that is each human body conducive to cancer’s growth? Turns out, food, chronic helplessness and other emotions, and toxins in the environment have a lot to do with it.

Some points I found particularly interesting:
The role of inflammation
Cancer can’t grow without supply lines: blood vessels to get it resources. Blood vessels don’t multiply for no reason — only when the body is in need of tissue repair. Cancer hijacks the body’s inflammation process to create the bloods vessel infrastructure it needs to support its rapid growth. Foods that increase inflammation (like sugar, fried stuff, and pretty much everything else in the Standard American Diet) act as cancer fertilizer, and foods that are anti-inflammatory cut off the supply lines.

The power of synergy
Turmeric, a the bright yellow-orange spice common in Indian cooking that adds color and flavor to curries, has long-been recognized by both Chinese Medicine and Ayurveda as an anti-inflammatory herb. It has been shown not only to prevent tumor growth, but to force cancer cells to kill themselves. But when combined with black pepper or ginger, it becomes 2,000 percent more effective.

2-3 cups of green tea per day provides enough EGCG in the blood to settle on the surface of cells and prevents them from being invaded by cancers. It has been shown to even more effective when combined with soy in food form like tofu or miso (and not from concentrated soy isoflavones).

Studies where 2, 3, and 4 anti-cancer foods were combined together showed greater efficacy than administering only one of the anti-cancer foods. In Chinese Medicine, we combine herbs together for the same reason: the blend is more powerful than the individual parts.

Food as medicine
In Chinese Medicine, every time we eat is an opportunity to promote health, simply survive, or to contribute to a disease process. Servan-Schriber makes this point in the his chapter on “the anticancer foods,” as he outlines the healthful properties of berries, citrus, stone fruits, mushrooms, olive oil, leafy greens, colorful veggies, cruciferous vegetables, the mint family, garlic, dark chocolate, red wine, soy and many other wonderful foods. This chapter could easily be called the “anti-arthritis foods” or the “anti-heart disease foods,” as the recommendations are very similar with an edible cast of characters seen again and again as helpful for different diseases.

Breathing, meditation, yoga, qigong and other active relaxation practices produce coherent rhythms in the body, indicating adaptability and thus resistance to cancer and heart disease, increase the body’s ability to handle stress, and boost the immune system.

Connections
Women with breast cancer who could name 10 friends (location unimportant) had survival rates 4x higher than those who couldn’t, in a large-scale study of US nurses.

Empowerment
What I appreciated most about this book is its practicality in empowering people to take action: specifically, to eat a variety of whole foods, vegetables, fruits, and spices; reduce sugar and refined flour, animal fats, vegetable oils and other foods high in Omega-6s; deal with old emotions, stay connected to loved ones, and avoid toxins in everyday life whenever possible. This is completely in line with Chinese Medical theory that we are connected to our environment, that what we do and consume every day can move us towards or away from health, and that chronic emotions like loneliness and helplessness are just as much of risk factors for disease as cigarette smoking. I also love that someone else has compiled such excellent and digestible research that confirms what Chinese Medicine has known for thousands of years, with such great charts and graphs.

There’s lots of stuff I’m leaving out. I highly recommend reading the book. Or at the very least, eating a little turmeric with black pepper every day.

The importance of practice

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On the last night of the qigong retreat, (see previous post for more on this) there was a small ceremony honoring the students who had just completed their sixth year of study, including thousands of teaching and practice hours.  Master Liu He presented each student with a scroll, and said that on each one was a secret Taoist word that the student could use to make him/herself into a powerful qigong master.  The first student opened his scroll, but had trouble locating the word.  He turned it upside down, and then turned it over looking for the secret word. Then he smiled, realizing that there was nothing written on the paper.  Master Liu’s point was simple: there is nothing anyone can tell you that will make you a master.  There are no secret teachings which will transform you into a realized person, or whatever you aspire to be.  There is only the dedicated practice of cultivation.

In Chinese Medicine, this internal battle between the thinking mind, the yi, which is associated with the Spleen, and the zhi, the force of will, which is the soul of the Kidney.  I meditate and practice qigong daily, but despite these practices, I have a very active yi: I often believe my mind telling me that it has all the answers. And I don’t always have 50 other people around who are practicing to keep me motivated.  The thing about qigong  or meditation or probably any spiritual practice, is that as you do it, you give it the power to change you. By simply committing yourself to practicing, you put the force of your will into it.  And it’s that “will power” that makes it easier to continue practicing.  You just have to do it.

So if practice begets practice by strengthening the will, how do you get this virtuous circle going?  Some things that I have found support me in continuing to practice are:

  • Community.  Having people around to practice with definitely makes it easier.  It also adds an element of accountability.
  • Routine. If you have a time every day to practice, it makes the mind’s argument that there isn’t time, or that there are more important thigns to do, less compelling. And when something becomes routine, it’s just part of life. Most of us probably don’t have internal dialogues about whether or not we have time to take a shower — we just do it.
  • Flexibility.  Even if I don’t have 30+ minutes to practice, I do something. Maybe five minutes is not ideal, but it’s certainly better than zero.  It still serves to cultivate the will and reinforces the routine.

What helps you stay on track with your practice? I’d love to hear your thoughts.