And this happened.

Yes, that’s a syringe.

6 hours Adobe Illustrator well spent!

You can deprive the body but the soul needs chocolate.

Times are a-changin’ – studies show that Americans are indeed eating more fresh food than they did a few years ago. We seem to be on the brink of a nutrition shift here in America – I mean, how could we not be? There are tons of new documentaries about nutrition coming out and with Netflix instant watch at my fingertips I can watch them all to my heart’s content!

I give “Hungry for Change” a solid 4/5 stars. It advocates a plant based diet, saying we’re overfed but starving on a nutritional level – I couldn’t agree more. There was some wonderful information about artificial sweeteners and also how dangerous foods get approved by the FDA: companies fund research reports and skew the results in their favor while the objective studies that show negative symptoms stand idly by.

It talks about juicing and how beneficial it can be for our health when we otherwise wouldn’t be eating vegetables. The last quarter of the movie addresses emotional eating, which I was glad to see – you can easily advise someone to stop eating so much cake, but this of course is not addressing the root problem of why they’re eating.

“Hungry for Change” reminded me of a sequel to “Forks over Knives” and “Food Matters” with interesting twists and a few new topics. Overall a good documentary and worth the watch if you have a few hours to kill.

Have you ever heard someone say how yogurt contains healthy “live cultures” or “bacteria”? Probiotics are bacteria naturally found in the body that help it run smoothly as opposed to the ones that make us sick. Many fermented food or drinks like kombucha or yogurt contain healthy probiotics. Fermentation is chemical breakdown of a substance by bacteria, yeast, or other microorganisms.

Antibiotics are given to you when you are sick. They flush out all the bacteria in your body to fight infection, including the good probiotics. Get it? Antibiotics and probiotics?

Having an adequate amount of bacteria in your body makes foreign bacteria – like the cold or flu – more common to the body. Basically your body is accustomed and efficient on dealing with viruses and bacteria. My dad recently had been on an antibiotic for a infected cut and he quite easily picked up the flu my step-mom had and I didn’t. Immunity power up!

Probiotics regulate bacteria in your colon which helps us digest food and absorb nutrients. Patients on antibiotics, who are stripped clean of probiotics, report having diarrhea. They also help with IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) and urinary tract syndrome.

Kombucha tends to be $3-4 a bottle, so my mom and I have been making our own at home. I love the taste of Kombucha, and it gives me an energy/vitality boost even more so than coffee (caffiene randomly stopped having an effect on me!). Kombucha simply makes me feel good, and usually cures a headache too. You can buy Kombucha tea at QFC, Whole Foods, most health food stores, and Safeway near the Naked and POM juice.

I went to a five day meditation retreat and I wanted to share my experience.

The first day felt a little uncomfortable; it took a day or two to get into the swing of things. Our days consisted of about four hours of teaching/meditation/discussion broken up in sessions, meals at 8am, 12pm, and 6pm, and any extra time was free time or classes/hiking/other arranged activities.

During most of my free time I helped cook in the kitchen for a lower program fee. Here I had the pleasure of working with the most laid-back kitchen crew I’ve ever encountered. When I would ask how much olive oil to add to a salad, the head chef would claim, “whatever tastes good, my dear!” If she and the co-head chef disagreed on the menu, they would stop and hug. It was delightful to be a part of.

As the second day approached, I was making new friends and getting more comfortable. Interestingly, I found myself waiting to go home – I stopped and asked myself what I was really waiting for. Waiting for happiness is against the very nature of happiness. It doesn’t wait. Happiness doesn’t exist tomorrow, or in a week, or in a month. What have I spent so much of my life waiting for? I’m so frequently waiting and never arriving. What if I die having never arrived?

During a teaching during the third day, our teacher made a comment that really struck a chord in me. She said if someone has a capacity for compassion you wish you had yourself, just act as if you were them! This made me realize that maybe, just maybe, I already have inside me exactly what I’m searching for. That I don’t have to keep searching, because it is here, and has always been! What a relief to know I don’t have to keep searching for something that I already have, something that can never go away.

In one of our last meditation practices I realized the way we interpret our emotions is essentially how we interpret our lives. I have the tendency to resist how I feel, given it is a negative emotion. If I feel depressed, anxious, stressed, whatever, I resist and repress it with everything I have. All this does is gets me more tangled in a mess of emotions.

In this meditation practice we were taught to embrace our emotions. Own them. If you’re feeling depressed, hell, feel depressed! Feel the intensity of the emotion with every molecule in your body. And while you are at it, search for the beauty in it. Maybe a particular negative emotion will teach you such a priceless lesson that wouldn’t exist in your life otherwise. Our teachers advised us to greet every emotion that comes into our lives at the door and welcome it inside with a hug. I even took the liberty to give it my finest room.

These were the insights I came home with from five powerful days – it’s not easy to integrate them into my life but I’m working at it. What else can we do? Just greet this challenge of life at the door and try not to get lost!

Sweat is a mix of primarily water, salt, and potassium (no wonder recovery drinks contain potassium!) Our body sweats to regulate the body temperature when we are exercising to prevent overheating. When we exercise regularly, our sweat glands become larger to more efficiently regulate our body temperature, and therefore we are capable of sweating more.

Our thirst is activated only when we are partially de-hydrated, so it is best to drink water even when we don’t feel particularly thirsty. You should drink enough water to replenish the fluids you lose by sweating, which is on average 14 to 24 oz during 30 minutes of exercise. Fun fact: women have more sweat glands then men, but men on average sweat more because theirs are more active.

What if we started looking at the difficulties in our lives in a different light? What if instead of looking at adversity as tearing us down we focused on empowerment and the invaluable lessons we’ve learned through it? “The person who has had more experience of hardships can stand more firmly in the face of problems than the person who has never experienced suffering. From this angle, then, some suffering can be a good lesson for life.” –Dalai Lama

Struggles in our life have been shown to alter our priorities and philosophies. For example, if we have a life threatening moment, we may find the true meaning in “living each day to the fullest”. The trials in our life make us who we are, we we need to be, for one reason or another. As Aron Fulston (the guy which “127 Hours” the movie was based on) puts it, “Everything happens for a reason, and part of that beauty of life is that we’re not allowed to know those reasons for certain.”

In “The Happiness Hypothesis”, two versions of the adversity hypothesis are presented. The weaker version is that adversity can lead to growth, strength, and improvement. The stronger hypothesis is that we must face adversity in order to grow.

Optimists usually grow the most from trauma because they believe making an effort to grow from it will pay off. Even if they fail, they conclude that everything happens for a reason. On the other hand, pessimists tend to dwell in a life of low self esteem and threats, spending more time managing pain rather than solving problems. Although, that doesn’t mean pessimists are hopeless. As long as they focus on making sense of adversity and what they’ve learned, they too can grow – it just takes some extra effort.

So instead of running away from struggle, our best bet is to embrace and grow from it. Life is full of pain and joy, so we are best off accepting that truth rather than denying it. That way we can be happier people!

What foods do you typically eat, and how do they make you feel?
- I eat a lot of vegetables! I try to incorporate vegetables into all my meals, and also snack on them during the day. To me, vegetables are key to a healthy diet. They keep me from getting bloated, give me all the nutrients I need and makes me feel good and “clean” on the inside. I also eat a lot of fruits, nuts (especially almonds), beans and fish.

Do you feel healthier if you drink a lot of water?
- Definitely! I rarely drink anything other than water (well, except for my morning smoothie and the occasional coffee), and I’m usually pretty good at remembering to drink a lot of it. Whenever I’m travelling or something else gets in the way of my usual water intake, I can feel my energy lacking though, which tells me that water is important for me.

How much do you like to exercise every day, and how does it make you feel?

- I’m a total endorphins junkie, and I usually exercise for about an 1-1½ hours a day, 5-6 times a week. If I go for several days without exercising, my mood drops and I start being grumpy. A long run always put me in a better mood!

What are your favorite exercises and how do you stay motivated?
- I try to do a lot of different forms of exercising, to keep myself from getting bored. Running is and probably always will be my favorite form of exercising, but I also enjoy taking boxing, Pilates and yoga classes at my local gym. For the most time, I’m pretty good at staying motivated – I’m very competitive (in the way that I always want to beat my own records), which is one of the reasons I enjoy running so much. I rarely have days where I don’t want to run, but when it comes to strength training I currently have a really hard time to get myself to do it! I keep reading how good it is for you, and I know that it will probably benefit my running, but I am just so bored with it! Whenever I feel like this, I try to remind myself why I exercise. I want to live a long, happy and fulfilling life, and I want to be that grandmother who is still going strong at 90! When I keep that in mind, it helps my gain more motivation.

Do you like to listen to music, watch movies, or for it just to be quiet when exercising?
- I always listen to music while I run, but I feel like it’s more a “background” kind of music, than it dominating my whole run. Whenever I do other cardio workouts, I NEED something to distract me or I’ll get bored after 20 seconds, so I watch television, turn up the music louder, or if I’m at home on my dad’s stationary bike, I keep my laptop in a window next to me, so I can use it. Reading blogs AND exercising at the same time is awesome!

If you had to eat one food for the rest of your life, what would it be?
- Peas. My family always make fun of me for this, but I LOVE green peas to death! I eat them in every shape and form, and especially like them completely fresh or frozen.

How do artificial sweeteners make you feel?
- I try to stay away from them as best as I can. This is hard, though, since they can be hidden in pretty much anything nowadays, which is why it’s important for me to eat fresh, organic and clean food. I rarely ever drink soda, but I remember drinking some Coca Cola Zero at a friend’s birthday party last year, and I became so bloated the rest of the day. It made me feel awful, so I try to stay away from it.

What is your least favorite unhealthy food?
- Probably hotdogs. I think sausages tastes terrible, and people always put so much dressing and condiments on their hotdogs. I’m pretty weird, because I absolutely HATE all kinds of dressing. I don’t even like the tiniest bit in my salads and sandwiches, so I will substitute it for pesto to give it more taste. I LOVE pesto.

I’ve always been a fan of pudding but those pre-made packs you buy at the store are always so full of artificial colors, additives, ect. It didn’t even occur to me I can easily make my own homemade pudding at home until recently! All it requires is a few ingredients and about five minutes.

Ingredients

1/2 cup milk and 1/2 water or all milk/water, depending on preference

1 tbsp corn starch

Dash of salt

1 tsp vanilla extract

1-2 packets sweetener (table sugar, Splenda, agave, Xylitol… whatever your preference)

Directions

In a pan on the stove, mix milk and cornstarch together. Add the rest of the ingredients and heat on medium until boiling while stirring constantly. Once boiling, it will start to thicken. Heat until desired thickness. Serve and enjoy, or stick in fridge/freezer if you want it cold. You can also add cocoa powder, cinnamon, peanut butter, or other ingredients to make different flavors. I personally love cocoa powder – chocolate pudding is my favorite!

Here are the arguments.

Soy milk is processed. True. Like other kinds of milk, soy milk is processed. Ideally, we could all soak our soy beans and strain them to make homemade, un-processed soy milk. Although, this is not extremely practical for everyone. We won’t die if we drink processed soy milk as long as it is in moderate consumption. If you are on a die-hard unprocessed diet, you’ll probably want to avoid many soy products.

Soy contains dangerous estrogens that can cause cancer. No evidence has been found to support this claim. Estrogen is a hormone naturally found in human bodies. The phytoestrogens that has been called dangerous are also found in flaxseeds, sesame seeds, hummus, garlic, peanuts, and more. One study found that men who consume soymilk daily actually had a 70% reduced risk of prostate cancer.

Soy products are genetically modified. That is true. Some are. It’s best to buy Non-GMO or organic.

Soy contains anti-nutrients causes trouble with digestion. True – these anti-nutrients, or trypsin inhibitors, can upset digestion. These substances are deactivated by cooking and fermentation. Soy milk is unfermented so it is best to drink in moderation. Interestingly, Thomas Badger and his colleagues found that infants on soy milk formula don’t suffer from any specific digestion issues.

These days all health related topics seem to be controversial. In the end we all get to make our own decisions and know personally what is best for us. If you like soy products (like me), you continue to enjoy them in moderation.