What you Eat, Think and Do... Matters!

My mission is to inspire, educate and empower you to feel and look your best at any age. When you feel good, there is a ripple effect to your loved ones and community. It's contagious.  I also believe that it takes a village. This is why I love collaboration and partnerships; from collaborating with you on your personal health, to supporting people that bring positive change to the world. So over the next several days, I'm going to be sharing with you just a few of my favorite people, products and services that may help you thrive through the holidays.

People. I'm partnering with Susan Brady, Physical Therapist, Doctor of Integrative Medicine and Certified Nutritionist to bring you an exclusive online membership program. (You will get a separate invitation soon.) You've already heard about the Healthy Aging Summit that she's spent the last year creating for you. You still have two days left to listen to it for free. My interview was the first day but I also interviewed Dr. Lindsey Berkson which you can hear tomorrow on Sunday if you register today. She's the author of 22 books of which I have three of them and they've been transformational for me and my husband. Please don't miss out on getting inspired and educated this weekend!

Susan and I also put together a video on our favorite holiday recipes. Email me if you don't have them or want them.

Products. If you've worked with me for any health issues from gut issues to autoimmune disease or cancer you know about the healing power of bone broth soup. I often say, "Good, Better, Best" as a goal.

Drinking bone broth soup is good to heal the gut and nourish your mind and body. Better is to buy organic bone broth from grass fed and finished beef. Best is to make (or have it made for you) with love infused. Kettle and Fire has the best organic grass fed bone broth that can be shipped to your home and a good price and it is on sale for the next several days. Stock up for your holiday soups and see all the wonderful flavors they have for you! Sip it like a tea 2-4 times a day to heal the gut and nourish your emotions through the season. I may do a whole post for you on the benefits of bone broth. If you or a loved one are going through chemotherapy then for sure drink bone broth to protect and rebuild the gut lining. Bone broth is great for joint pain or autoimmune issues too.

What good is it to drink bone broth soup, take supplements, and heal from within, if you are still putting crap on your skin? If you've taken my KickStart to Wellness Program, you know my mantra to Maximize, Minimize and Prioritize for optimal health.

If you listened to my interview on the Healthy Aging Summit, I said to think of the skin as a large mouth. What you put on your skin matters!

This summer while I was working on videos for our upcoming members and our daughters wedding, I realized that I needed some makeup and I found a line of hair care, skin care and makeup that I've fallen in love with. The company is a B corp. That means it puts people and the planet first, before profit in every decision it makes. The founder is passionate about changing the beauty industry to only including non toxic ingredients. Imagine that! Do you know that the word fragrance alone can have up to 3,000 chemicals included?

Many ingredients in the most expensive beauty products are carcinogenic or include heavy metals.

Lead is a common ingredient in lipstick. Who needs to be eating this? As I said in my talk for the Healthy Aging Summit, your skin care should be clean enough to eat.  So I'm super excited to tell you that starting this weekend, you can get BIG discounts to looking and feeling your best! These make amazing thoughtful gifts too! I am absolutely in love with their lipstick. It feels and looks good too. I bought the entire line so I can share with you at my Open House on December 2nd from 7-9 pm. But don't wait for then to order because this is a Clean Friday special only good until December 1st. They may offer a Cyber Monday deal but I'm not privy to that.  The company has committed to omitting  over 1500 toxic chemicals that are commonly found in beauty products. This is a company I want to support. Here's a link for more information and to shop. If you are local and want to stop by and see products, let me know that too. Or if you want me to come speak to a group about healthy living and the importance of what you eat, think and do I would love that too.

Services: Dianne Rhodes, Certified Hypnotist of Inner Horizons is offering  a Holiday Stress Buster Program which includes a hypnotherapy session (can be done online via Zoom) plus a digital recording. Email her dreamyourinnerhorizons@gmail.com

Rise Well-Being Center offers meditation, yoga, movement to music classes and workshops. This is a fantastic place to explore the inner world within you. They also have hosted some amazing workshops. Good to get on their mailing list. I will be teaching only 2 more Wednesday 7:30 am yoga for improvement classes in December and two more 10 am movement to music classes. First class is free to check it out.

Beloved Yoga Studio is where I received my 300 hour training and certification and where I continue to practice. There are classes for everyone here and a wide variety of offerings. It's called a sanctuary for all for a reason. View their video for more information.

Mom's Organic Market and Great Falls Farmers Market are two of my favorite places to shop for local organic food for my table.

I'm off to yoga now and then to do shopping for Thanksgiving dinner. Please know how grateful I am to have you on my email list and I hope to get to know you better in the New Year through our online membership program where you will have access to support from Susan and I as well as discounts on healthy products and services. More to follow...

Carpe Diem,

Lisa

PS
If you enjoy any of these resources, please feel free to share and pass along to friends and family!

About Lisa Jackson, RN, CHC, RYT-500, FDN-P, AFMC

Lisa is an author, functional nutrition and functional medicine trained health coach, yoga teacher, and retired Registered Nurse with the mission to "Inspire, Educate and Empower" individuals and corporations to achieve optimal health.

Lisa's book, Savvy Secrets: Eat, Think & Thrive is a self-health book offering her Seven Steps to Optimal Health.

When she is not coaching, or speaking, you can find Lisa joyfully sharing Carpe Diem Dance or playing with her two grandchildren. She is the mother of four adult children and believes, "Optimal health should not be a secret."

What's my Secret? Yoga

A week ago Friday, was International Yoga Day. I was too busy living my yoga to write about it then. Last Sunday I was a sub teacher for a yin yoga class at 5pm at Beloved Yoga Studio in Reston, Va and thought I would share a few thoughts.

Yoga is a philosophy. It's a roadmap for healthy living that includes rules for living, exercises to enable a closer relationship with self, and prepare you for meditation. I often share with my clients how the body follows the mind and the mind follows the breath. Due to early conditioning, most of us don't know how to fully breathe to stimulate the parasympathetic nervous system, (PNS). Through deep belly breathing, we can teach our bodies that it is safe to rest and repair, rest and digest, and mate and ovulate. This is the yin within the yin and the yang.

There is a yoga for everyone. You are never too sick or never too old to learn, or to begin. Even if you've been practicing on and off for decades as I have, it's important to always have a beginners mind. I believe this is true in business and in life too. In keeping a beginners mind, you cultivate discernment. You can practice moving from fear to curiosity. Notice when you feel challenged, breathe into the pose and relax. Notice any automatic negative thoughts or self limiting beliefs arising. Practice compassion and self love for your current limitations. Notice where you are holding tension. Visualize and breathe healing oxygen into the space.  With practice your body will begin to change. Your mind, your body and your spirit will open up.  One of my students in my Wednesday morning Carpe Diem Dance class (movement to music with yoga and breathwork) told me this week that before coming to the class she hadn't raised her hands over her head for decades! She risked stretching her comfort zone and is pleased with her results.

Speaking of stretching...It's easy to overstretch muscles and to pull a tendon or a ligament when moving mindlessly or too fast. The more you try to force a stretch, the tighter your ligaments and tendons work to protect you. This is an innate, self loving response. Remember the body is self loving, self healing, and self repairing. The way to stretch and nourish tendons and ligaments is through deep relaxation. Yin is a way to move into a pose just to the point of resistance and then to practice relaxing and letting go. This may seem counter intuitive. For those of us who are action oriented, this can be a challenge. Practice quieting your mind when it starts to breed old negative thoughts that no longer serve you.

This practice is not about what you look like or how far you can go into the pose. It's about connecting to how you feel. In this respect, it is a more advanced practice. It's a practice in discernment over effort and ease. It's a practice in self care. How challenging you make it is up to you. You choose whether you want to practice yin or relaxation, within every pose. Discover how each moment allows you the opportunity for choice and discernment.

This is how we cultivate the ability to find calm in the midst of chaos. 

You can easily see the value of taking these lessons off the mat and into your consciousness.
Modern living stress our nervous system. It's easy to stay stuck in the sympathetic nervous system. Yoga can teach you to use your breath, your body, and your mind to stimulate the parasympathetic nervous system necessary for optimal health.

Currently, I am teaching a beginners yoga 7:30am Wednesday mornings at Rise Wellbeing Center in Reston. If that is too early for you, then join us at 10am for a yoga dance class @ Rise.

There are many styles of yoga now being offered. Explore this rich diversity and find a class that speaks to you. Better yet, see if you can add some diversity in your exercise routine for balance.  Better balance equates to overall peace.

Carpe Diem,

Lisa

About Lisa Jackson, RN, CHC, RYT-500, FDN-P, AFMC

Lisa is an author, functional nutrition and functional medicine trained health coach, yoga teacher, and retired Registered Nurse with the mission to "Inspire, Educate and Empower" individuals and corporations to achieve optimal health.

Lisa's book, Savvy Secrets: Eat, Think & Thrive is a self-health book offering her Seven Steps to Optimal Health.

When she is not coaching, or speaking, you can find Lisa joyfully sharing Carpe Diem Dance or playing with her two grandchildren. She is the mother of four adult children and believes, "Optimal health should not be a secret."

Who Knew? What you eat (and do) 4-6 months before conceiving a baby can affect your pregnancy, your baby, and your grandchildren? As a Grandmother and Mother of 4 adult children, I am deeply passionate about helping you conceive and deliver the healthiest baby possible. 

In my lifetime, I’ve witnessed a dramatic and frightening increase in autism, autoimmune disease and cancers…developing in younger people than in my generation. What has changed? Our genes have not changed, it takes thousands of years to change a gene. Our diets and lifestyles have changed, which affects the genetic expression. This is called epigenetics.

Here are two brown mice with identical genes. Both mice were kept in the same environment and fed the same food. The Mother of the healthier brown mouse was given supplementation prior to pregnancy, during, and while nursing.

Nutrients will give you a genetic advantage!

If you are healthy, it takes 3-4 months to prepare a couple for optimal conception.  It takes optimal nutrition to provide the optimal blueprint for your egg and sperm. 

Also, when the egg and sperm come together, you have the second opportunity to rewrite genetic expression. Epigenetics is so important for all stages of rapid growth, from preconception to fetal development and puberty. Eggs and sperm take 4 months to mature prior to conception. This time is vital!

It takes optimal nutrition, stress reduction and exercise to provide the optimal blueprint for your egg and sperm. For healthy couples, it takes 3-4 months to prepare you for optimal conception. 

If you need to heal or detoxify the body, you must start earlier. For many, this can be 6 months to 2 years prior to conception.  In 2005, a study spearheaded by the Environmental Working Group found over 200 known toxins in the umbilical cord blood of newborn babies. Clean up the body and diet prior to getting pregnant. Functional testing and health coaching is a perfect gift for newly engaged couples.

Nutrition is not just what you eat, it’s what is absorbed and then assimilated into the cells.

Many things can interfere with this. Together we will look at your micronutrient status, food sensitivities, gastrointestinal health, hormone balance, stress levels (both hidden toxic burden and external stressors), exercise, and emotional considerations. Of course, nutrition is the foundation and once we get the results from testing, we can co-create an optimal diet and lifestyle plan for your unique bodies.  

Contact me if you are ready to commit to a transformational 3-6-month program for you and your future family.  

If you are considering pregnancy, are pregnant or just had a baby, Beloved Yoga Studio is having a Prenatal & Postnatal Wellness Forum  at their Reston, Va studio next Saturday from 12-5pm. 

Carpe Diem,

Lisa

About Lisa Jackson, RN, CHC, RYT-500, AFMC

Lisa is an author, functional nutrition and functional medicine trained health coach, yoga teacher, and retired Registered Nurse with the mission to "Inspire, Educate and Empower" individuals and corporations to achieve optimal health.

Lisa's book, Savvy Secrets: Eat, Think & Thrive is a self-health book offering her Seven Steps to Optimal Health.

When she is not coaching, or speaking, you can find Lisa joyfully sharing Carpe Diem Dance or playing with her two grandchildren. She is the mother of four adult children and believes, "Optimal health should not be a secret."