Wellness Wednesday

Hallo dear friends.

As announced we are starting a new ongoing event right now, the

WELLNESS WEDNESDAY.

For my own part, I am going to post something about nutrition every Wednesday from now on. Today it's more of an introduction and a small start.

Feel free to post anything related to wellness, health, wellbeing and anything related today.

May the Force be with you all.

Dear friends,

in the last few years I have dealt with nutrition a lot. I have always had problems with overweight, but in 2016 I managed to lose 23 kg of weight and I have kept the new weight since then. Although I achieved this mainly by cutting back calories in a restrictive way, I was constantly looking for ways to improve my nutrition. Sooner or later I came across the website nutritionfacts.org by M. Greger, which I found very convincing. I also listened to the audio book “How Not to Die” by the same author.

I would like to share the knowledge I gained in that time with you. I am planning to present a few studies each weak that show evidence which foods are best implemented in an everyday routine.

You will notice that I will almost always recommend plant based food. That is not because I am vegetarian or vegan or because I am on a mission to propagate plant based diets. That is simply because I only found evidence pointing to plant based food being beneficial.

I don´t like the terms “vegan” or “vegetarian”, because they only define what one would NOT eat instead of defining what to eat actually. For example you can eat only French fries with ketchup, drink beer and coke and your practically living vegan, but not at all healthy.

I rather like to find foods that are promoting a good health whenever they are eaten. I also think, we shouldn´t try to find the one perfect diet for every day or even switch to that diet from one day to the other. My purpose is to show you the evidence that is there, so that each of you can decide on their own if they would like to eat those foods – well, not necessarily every day, but more often. Because no one I think is able to eat the perfect food every day. But if I tell you that it is a very good idea to eat berries as often as possible, you will be better off if you eat berries 3 days a weak than if you haven´t eaten berries at all so far or very rarely.

So, today let´s start with legumes. There seems to be a lot of evidence that it is a good idea to eat legumes as often as possible and as much as possible. Legumes, mainly lentils and kidney beans are full of antioxidants and soluble fibre which both are very healthy. I will show you some of the studies I found in the links below, there is even evidence that the more legumes you eat, the longer you live! Try to find any medication out there that can do this: make you live longer, what do you think, people would pay for such a pill? Michael Greger suggests the following legumes to be eaten ideally on a regular basis: Cooked beans, split peas, lentils, tofu, tempeh, fresh peas, sprouted lentils, hummus or bean dip (I mean, come on! Who doesn´t like hummus?)


https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15228991/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21899787/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22648714/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2986447/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22524810/

Will the topic of probiotics call your attention? Was denken Sie?

For this Wellness Wednesday I want to talk about Ginger. For those of you who don't know , I actually suffer from anxiety and a lot of times my anxiety is so bad that I sometimes vomit. To help with my anxiety all I need to do is go to sleep, but when you are feeling sick to your stomach, sleep is next to Impossible. I don't like to take medication though, so things like Pepto Bismol and other nausea aidst don't really work for me. During one of my anxiety spells I was able to do some research and found Ginger should be very helpful for nausea.

The ginger gum I had delivered relieved my nausea and helped me become calm enough to go to sleep. I also have ginger tea and ginger candy. Ginger has other added benefits as well. Look here for some articles:

https://www.theladders.com/career-advice/i-drank-ginger-tea-every-day-for-a-week-heres-how-it-affected-my-mental-health

https://www.lifehack.org/articles/lifestyle/12-benefits-ginger-tea-you-probably-dont-know.html

Rosalyn i suffer from anxiety too, i ve had the same symptoms as you do now but somehow i managed to work through it and it has gone better. If you want to share i ll be glad to talk to you. Maybe i can help

Hi Jhannuzs. In my opinion, the best probiotics are natural Whole Foods. These build a foundation for a sane microbiome. I will probably come back to that later so that I can show you appropriate scientific sources for what I say now, right now, I don't have them at hand. When you eat the right food it is not necessary to eat certain bacteria. One important aspect is that whenever you eat a lot of meat and animal products the good bacteria in your guts aren't able to survive, whether you take them as a pill or not. On the other hand if you eat the right food, the good bacteria come along with that and start to thrive within your guts...

Hey Rosalyn, if you suffer from nausea, I am sure that ginger is a very good idea. Look here : https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25912592/

If you suffer from anxiety, try simply smelling good lavender oil, look what lavender oil can do: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7897075/

This is, of course, one way to treat anxiety, a way that surely doesn't do any harm at all and can be simply tested individually. If you suffer from anxiety so much that it affects you in a serious way, I guess nothing can replace individual medical advice...

Ginger? Im still not ginger --Said Dr Who.

Sometimes anxiety eats us because of real problems or something else...

We all create anxiety by fluctuating adversities, a biochemical test provides numbers of my body, this avoids losing dimension about the subjective and organic aspects. Then each person can improve with several routes: mental, toning the vagus nerve, inner silence, healthy food...

How to acquire a healthy colorful habit when you just like: sugar, coffee and junk food?

Jhannuzs Ian wrote: Ginger? Im still not ginger --Said Dr Who.

Sometimes anxiety eats us because of real problems or something else...

We all create anxiety by fluctuating adversities, a biochemical test provides numbers of my body, this avoids losing dimension about the subjective and organic aspects. Then each person can improve with several routes: mental, toning the vagus nerve, inner silence, healthy food...

How to acquire a healthy colorful habit when you just like: sugar, coffee and junk food?

.:.

Tell me a little about the Vagus nerve
How to acquire a healthy colorful habit when you just like: sugar, coffee and junk food?

I know, right ?

Sure Master Rosalyn, one route to regulate the Vagus nerve: singing melodies without lyrics while we are mentally silent. Here is a video that provides more information (always compare several sources to verify validity

Wouldn't the valsalva maneuver be easier?

I tried to post on Wednesday, but somehow did not manage to do it correctly, so I am trying again.

Thank you all for the interesting info. Yes, I DO love Hummus! Thank you for the inspiration to eat more legumes. And I find breath work helpful for all kinds of things, so I imagine singing exercises might be similar.

I also LOVE ginger. Some of my favorite ways to ingest ginger are fresh root in smoothies; lemon ginger tea (Stash brand is nice); home made "tea" with fresh (or frozen) ginger, cayenne pepper, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice and honey; candied ginger; and Trader Joes Triple Ginger Snaps.

What I mainly came on the Wellness forum to post about is SLEEP. For me it is the foundation of my health. When I get good quantity and quality sleep, then I feel my whole life goes better, and when I don't, then I tend to do less well with all my other health related behaviors too. And as I pay more attention to my sleep, it shows me other imbalances in my life, some that I might not have thought needed to be addressed - like getting excited to be thinking about many spiritual topics and myths - surely all good! Until I'm awake at 2am, thinking, thinking, thinking. Clearly more grounding activity needed - e.g. need to DO more meditation, not just think about how cool it is.

Some books I've enjoyed about sleep:
Healing Night by Rubin Naiman
Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker

And one of my favorite inspirational quotes on the topic:
"Gnight
Don't wait until low power mode.
Close your eyes.
Close all unnecessary apps.
Recharge."
by Lin-Manuel Miranda

Hello everyone here is something found by Edan and it is really an eye opener:" https://elemental.medium.com/anxiety-is-in-your-body-not-your-mind-93031abd14eb . It is a must read, maybe we could discus it later here or on discord

Interesting information Vincent

I agree, it is important to drain the excess of adrenaline and cortisol and check my mental systems that produce anxiety.

Anxiety from one area of my life to another ... from my past to the present by the transference of an unprocessed imprint... but many people can differenciate and separate topics to process each imprint in its phenomenology.

I still vote for CBT to learn to dissolve those beliefs that amplify the subjective suffering, measuring the magnitude of a danger is vital as doing as repatterning neuronal systems that are activated automatically but are dysfunctional because they "interpret greater danger" and these neural conditioning "seem" to dictate the response to adversity.

An adrenaline and cortisol test provides biochemical reference, then we could compare if "our symbolic creations" jump too quickly between levels: little, regular, a lot and total anxiety.

• 1st image below: mental aspects.

• 2d image: sensorial aspects and mental aspects

Thank this is very good ! Now is anyone care to share how they have so far manage to deal with their anxiety or other mental health problems? what progress or process, how are you now, talk about your journey.

I guess it would be fare that i start.
My journey with a simple advice that was something like; your life and problem are going around a circle, get out of it.
Then i was given a book : " the ways of the peaceful warrior". At the time i was having difficulties understanding what was happening to me, i had panic attack, i often vomited , i couldnt deal with things like eating in public , going on a date. Living in the moment or here and now was some kind of start but still i did not know how to apply it to my life correctly. Later i realize some things like at the worse of my stressed feelings and anxiety i often kept part of my body tense ( listen to your body) i as well was obsessing or kept some thoughts going around my head in a loop ( meditate, live in the moment, distract your mind) i started to learn tai-chi, this somehow help me make major progress, i started living a bit more normally. At the time i was learning to become a driving instructor, I had to pass exams and the first time i just could make it, i was so anxious, i literally forced my self through as it was a must to do it, i made it, i felt stronger (dont give up, dont give your self too many excuses, face your fears) My whole story with anxiety as an adult has been over 15 years, with up and downs. I moved to Asia, this was a major challenge, it broke all the progress i made in my confort zone. One song always helped me if anyone knows , The water boys : this is the sea https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umVgdWalrUI . Part of it says : "this was the river, this is the sea". I realized that even if my anxiety has came back facing a totally new life, my past was the river and this (today ) was the sea, as i did made progress, i was stronger, i gain knowledge tomorrow wont be like yesterday. And yes i still passed out my mind feeling crazy with anxiety , and yes i lost appetite but then my life did change, i had kids and i had to fight. I learned and used
martial art breathing technics, i gave my self a break, i slept when that was all i could do. My anxiety often changed and happened out of different reasons, or with no apparent reasons, i started using a different way to deal with it, i told my self some form of positive thoughts : "you can do it' " what do not kill you make you stronger" "you are stronger than you think". I learned yoga and have a daily tai-chi, yoga program, i keep my self busy, cleaning, gardening, home diy, i eat properly and healthily. I somehow did a little of self analyze, i realised that i suffered anxiety while i was a baby, after he lost of my sister and the fact that my parents suffered that much, it came back with a revenge after i had a bad building working accident that left me handicap and not capable to live as i used to (so i felt weak and vulnerable), i realized all that and accepted it. So here i m now, i still have trace of anxiety but i do not let it control my life, i do not think about it too much, i feel proud of my self, i feel stronger.
What about you, anyone

It´s Wellness Wednesday again.

Today I want to once more talkt o you about something wonderful eating legumes does to your body before I proceed to my second favorite topic “berries” next week. (By the way, you can already start eating a handful of berries every day, I promise you, you won´t regret it, and they´re delicious too. Berries are all small fruit that have the term “berry” in their name, so I am not talking about “berries” in terms of the botanical classification.)

There is much evidence that the Resting Heart Rate (RHR) is a strong predictor for your chance of survival. The lower your RHR is, the better (well, to a certain degree of course). Actually anything above 65/min is questionable.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22718796/

A rise of 10 beats / min roughly equals a rise of risk to die from cardiovascular diseases by 10 to 20 percent actually.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20362720/

Higher levels of resting heart rate (HR) have been associated with sudden cardiac death (SCD).

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23680897/

Now, what can we do to lower our RHR? Well, there is one thing you already probably now of: exercise. Regular exercise, well at least as long as it is done regularly, lowers your RHR.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19299682/

Okay, what does all of this have to do with legumes? Look at this study:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23089999/

What the scientists looked for mainly, was how beans can improve the handling of diabetes type 2. Well, they do work here, they lower HbA1c significantly if the participants only ate 1 cup of legumes a day, but what they found by the way: (you can click the link in the abstract for the full text, it´s free…)

“Both BP and heart rate were reduced on the low-GI legume diet relative to the high wheat fiber diet (systolic BP, −4.5 mm Hg; 95% CI, −7.0 to −2.1 mm Hg; P < .001; diastolic BP, −3.1 mm Hg; 95% CI, −5.0 to −1.6 mm Hg; P < .001); and heart rate (−3.1 beats per minute [bpm]; 95% CI, −4.7 to −1.5 bpm; P < .001)”

So, legumes seem to lower your RHR (1 cup a day, that´s not that much) as effectively as doing regular physical exercise!

I found that so surprising that I wanted to share that with you. Now, do I suggest, we can step back from physical exercise and eat beans instead? Well, what about doing both of it?

So much for today, take care of yourselves and have a wonderful weak!

May the Force be with you.

I totally agree, since i moved to a tropical country i faced multiple type of sickness and viruses while i was never sick back in Europe. I ve started to eat much better, plenty vegetables, fruits and spice like ginger. Truth i, it does help a lot! Best is i find that a plate full of vegetable make me happy! When we do not cook we buy cucumbers and tomatoes.
Be happy be healthy

Hallo friends.

Today I want to talk to you about berries. From all that I have heard about these small and delicious miracle fruit, I strongly suggest that we all eat at least one handful of berries every day, whenever they are available and whenever that is possible.

Now, what does “berries” mean? In fact I am talking about small colourful fruit that contain the term “berry” in their names, so I am not talking about the botanical classification here. An interesting fact is that the more colourful, the darker the berries are, the better they are for our health. That is because the colours in those berries ARE the antioxidants protecting us.

Berries are:
Acai berries
Barberries
Blackberries
Blueberries
Cherries
Concord grapes
Cranberries
Goji berries
Kumquats
Mulberries
Raspberries
Strawberries

Yes, even grapes are berries. Now, if you ask yourself which ones are better, green, light grapes or dark, violet grapes, think about what I told you earlier… guess what? Yes, the darker the better.

Now, what can berries do to our health?

They can prevent cancer, all sorts of. Look here:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18211019/

And besides containing a lot of antioxidants and secondary phytochemicals, they can also boost natural killer cell activity, look here:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22111516/

I even heard about one study (which I don´t find right now to cite here), where eating strawberries (in this case powder of freeze dried strawberries to an equivalent to 500 g of fresh strawberry) lead to a regression of precancerous alterations of the mucosa of the esophagus.

And the good thing about all of this is that berries are quite tasty, and you don´t need much more than a handful a day, so well, enjoy!

May the Force be with you.

Tobias

Hello friends.

Today I want to talk to you about fruit in general. You all probably know the rule that is called “5 a day” which tells us to eat at least 5 portions of fruit or vegetables a day. Well, according to what I have found… that is by far not enough or … let´s say, not as good as it could be.
We will come back to vegetables later on, there are also different types of vegetables which should be eaten every day, if we want to promote our health as good as we can. But for now let´s stay with fruit.

I already told you about berries last weak, now additional to that one handful of berries a day, we should eat 3 more portions of fruit, which is about one medium sized fruit like an apple or 120 g of fruit like melons or 40 g of dried fruit. We can also eat freeze dried fruit, they can be delicious as well. Now, to get your mouthes watering I am going to give you a list of fruit from which you can choose, and maybe this list can motivate us all 

Apples
Apricots
Avocados
Bananas
Cantaloupe
Clementines
Dates
Figs
Grapefruit
Honeydew
Kiwifruit
Lemons
Limes
Lychees
Mangos
Nectarines
Oranges
Papaya
Passion fruit
Peaches
Pears
Pineapple
Plums
Pluots
Pomegranates
Prunes
Tangerines
Watermelon

Buon appetit!

May the Force be with you.

Tobias