Articles

Osteoporosis is a terrible disease. A progressive loss of minerals, bone mass and bone density, it affects men as well as women, and can result in fractures of the hip, shoulder, ribs, vertebra, forearm or wrist. In women, it is believed that bone loss begins several years before menopause and then gets worse afterwards, creating an ever-increasing risk of debilitating breakages. Osteoporosis is now the most common bone disorder. Worldwide, the illness causes more than 8.9 million fractures annually—in effect, a fracture every 3 seconds. SILENT KILLER In Britain, the incidence of the illness has increased six times in the past 30 years. One in three women and one in eight men develop it. In the United States, statistics are even worse: The illness currently costs the country more than 11 billion dollars a year. 25% of women whose hips fracture die within two years—not always directly from the fracture, but from ending up in nursing homes where inactivity, alienation and loss of control over their lives defeats them. Today, more women in the industrialized world die of fractures related to bone thinning than from cancers of the womb, cervix and breast put together. Now for the good news: Osteoporosis is preventable and treatable naturally, so take heart. Bone loss is no simple disorder. And it is most certainly not another so-called estrogen deficiency disease, as mainstream medicine would have us believe. Neither is it preventable or treatable by drinking milk or stuffing yourself with calcium supplements. In fact, both of these actions can actually make the condition worse. A FEW FACTS Osteoporosis regularly occurs in men who are deficient in testosterone and in women who are deficient in progesterone. Black women have less bone loss than white women, big women less than small women, and fat women less than their skinny sisters. Meat-eaters are at greater risk of the disease than vegetarians. A high calcium intake has long been toted as essential in preventing bone thinning. Yet people in third-world countries whose daily intake of calcium is less than half our own have a very low incidence of the disease. Couch potatoes are far more prone to the condition than men and women who get regular exercise—particularly weight bearing exercise. Osteoporosis is a complex condition. To prevent it, you need to understand it. And, despite all the fear-mongering surrounding the disease, learn the ropes. Then you can take action to halt bone loss and to reverse it no matter what your age. BEWARE OF DRUGS Most people believe that a prescription drug plus megadoses of calcium supplements are the answer to strong, healthy bones. But bisphosphonate drugs like Fosamax, Actonel, and Boniva carry serious side effects, including—believe it or not—an increased risk of bone fracture! Users of prescription drugs have more osteoporosis than people who do not take any medication. Bone loss is by no means inevitable as we get older, despite our being told that on average we experience about 1% loss of bone mass a year. But, like hypertension and insulin resistance, bone loss is another silent killer. How do we stop it in its tracks? It’s easier than you might think. MEET THE BIG FIVE Together, specific nutrients—omega 3 fats, vitamin D3, Vitamin K2, magnesium, and calcium help build the nutritional foundation for creating and restoring bone strength. They need to be supplied in good balance by eating natural foods and shunning the packaged convenience stuff that fills supermarket shelves. I call these nutrients the big five because, together with putting yourself on a program of regular weight bearing exercise, this combination forges strong healthy bones. Vitamin K2 is especially important, by the way, since one of its major physiological skills is moving calcium into your bones and teeth and removing calcium from parts of the body where it does not belong, such as your arteries and soft tissues. However the right nutrition can only do its stuff to protect your bones if you also you incorporate weight bearing exercise or whole vibration training in your life. MILK & CALCIUM PILLS—NO GO As for drinking milk? Forget it. We are constantly being told to drink more milk and take more tablets of calcium. Yet in the United States, the intake of calcium by supplementation or through milk drinking is the highest in the world and they have the highest rate of osteoporosis. In Oriental countries such as China where milk is not drunk and the intake of calcium is one of the lowest in the world, osteoporosis is virtually unknown. The Chinese get their calcium the way cows do—by eating green plants. Equally important not to do is take calcium pills. You need to get your calcium the same way grazing cows do by taking in lots of organic fresh greens which are full of it in a form that your body can make good use of. You see, calcium metabolism is a complex process and the absorption of calcium from water or mineral salts tends to be highly inefficient. Only somewhere between 20-30% of the calcium you take in through supplementation or processed foods will even be absorbed. And most of that will either get filtered through your kidneys then excreted in urine or sweat, eliminated through feces, or stored in your body’s tissues where it does not belong, contributing to heart disease. BUILD STRONG BONES Doing weight bearing exercise regularly at least three times a week is the second second thing you need to do if you want to protect your body from bone loss or reverse bone loss after it has started. There is something else important about weight bearing exercise—something I discovered for myself at the age of 50 when I decided I wanted to learn weight training from a Welsh champion weightlifter. It’s this: Working out with weights weights combats age degeneration and makes your body sing. There are three ways of approaching weight-bearing exercise. First, you can get yourself a few dumbbells, watch a good video for beginners and get to work. Second, you can do exercise using only your body weight to carry out the various movements so you don’t need dumbbells at all. Third, you can do accelerating training on a Power Plate. This is a great way to enhance bone density and build strength, and it is easy enough that even the weak and disabled can benefit from doing it. Also called whole body vibrational training, the Power Plate has a platform, which moves from front to back as well as vertically and horizontally. Power Plate training is readily available in studios where you can work with someone who teaches you how to use the equipment and show you how to hone your skills as you become accustomed to the process. You can also buy a Power Plate to use at home, but they are pricy. Having said that, I did buy one three years ago. I’ve used it three to five times a week ever since both for strength training and deep relaxation. In 2013 a research project involving 28 post menopausal women who practiced this kind of vibrational training three times a week for five minutes at a time, in only six months increased their bone density and strength by 2%, while the control group lost 0.5% in bone density during the same period. THE BEST SUPPLEMENTS Calcium, Vitamin K2, Vitamin D3, magnesium and omega-3 oils work together to build strong healthy bones and to restore strength to bodies that have lost strength. The best way to get vitamin D3, which builds bone density by encouraging the body to absorb calcium, is to get out into the sun for half an hour or more each day. If you choose to take vitamin D3 in supplement form, make sure you also supplement with Vitamin K2 to ensure that calcium from your foods are directed to bones and teeth. Vitamin K2 also helps your body remove calcium buildup in other areas of the body where it does not belong, such as the arteries. These two vitamins along with magnesium work brilliantly together to promote healthy bones. By the way, the ratio of calcium intake to magnesium in the body should be 1:1. EAT FOR YOUR LIFE Here is a quick checklist to follow if you want to build bones and keep them strong: Throw out all the packaged processed foods that the majority of the Western world still eats. The sugars, grain based carbs and artificial ingredients they contain deplete your bones of calcium and disturb the balance of nutrients you need most for increasing and maintaining bone density. Never drink sodas—even sugar-free. Eat from 50% of your foods raw and organic. Make green vegetables the cornerstone of your meals and also drink a glass of freshly made vegetable juice once a day. Replace table salt with Himalayan salt, as it contains more than 80% of the mineral elements your body and bones need to thrive—including both sodium and potassium in good balance. Get plenty of animal based omega-3 fats and avoid the golden oils sold in supermarkets or anything containing them like the plague. Use seaweeds in your salads and soups. Eat plenty of leafy green vegetables like kale and spinach, which are rich in magnesium—as are sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds and avocados. Use a top quality magnesium supplement daily to work well with calcium, Vitamin D3 and vitamin K2. Do weight bearing exercise at least three t imes a week for 20 to 30 minutes at a time. Recommended Reading: Ppro The Calcium Lie By Dr Robert Thompson Read The Calcium Lie by Dr Robert Thompson or Dr Kate Rheaum-Blue’s book Vitamin K2 and the Calcium Paradox: How a Little Known Vitamin Could Save Your Life Buy The Calcium Lie On Amazon Here are some of my own preferred nutritional supplements: Zoi Research, Vitamin K2 & D3 Take 1 softgel daily or as directed by a health care practitioner. Buy Vitamin K2 & D3 Nordic Naturals, Omega-3 Purified Fish Oil, Lemon Each serving of Nordic Naturals Omega-3 liquid provides approximately 1725 mg of important omega-3 fatty acids, generously fulfilling the daily recommendation by international experts of a minimum of 500 mg per day. Omega-3 fatty acids are essential for good nutrition and overall wellness. Since the body cannot produce these fats, they must be consumed through diet or supplementation. Buy Nordic Naturals Source Naturals, Magtein, Magnesium L-Threonate Magnesium (Mg) plays an essential role in supporting cognitive function and brain health as well as bone support. Suggested Use 3 capsules daily, preferably 2 capsules during the day and 1 capsule 1-2 hours before bed. Start with 1 capsule daily and gradually increase to 3 capsules day Buy Source Naturals

Leslie Kenton’s New Cura Romana Weightloss Plan is out now. A thick handbook in bright orange, this little gem is no simple revision of the earlier book. It breaks new ground for weight loss while exploring territory in the exciting realm of quantum wellbeing. The book brings together Leslie’s hands-on experience with thousands of men and women on the Cura Romana program, merging it with stunning up-to-the-minute discoveries about optimal nutrition and disease prevention. It guides you through Cura Romana’s next-generation protocol for effective, hunger-free weight loss, then reveals practical secrets for becoming radiantly healthy and lean for life. THREE STEP PROCESS The combination of Essential Spray and the easy-to-follow, exacting dietary plan fosters good functioning in the brain’s control centers—for appetite, fat burning, hormone regulation, emotional balance, and self-confidence. This automatically triggers natural fat-burning. Specific guidance on banishing addictions, rejuvenating the body and clearing food cravings comes next. Then, transformative breakthroughs in body, mind and spirit begin. Many who have experienced this three step Cura Romana process on The Journey Program or The Inner Circle Gold say it can be life-changing. LIES, DAMN LIES AND STATISTICS Some of what you read in Leslie Kenton’s New Cura Romana Weightloss Plan is likely to shock you. Since the early 1950s, most of what the powers-that-be have led us to believe about what constitutes a healthy diet has been totally wrong. It has been based not on reliable research but on woolly conjecture, misinformation, and plain old lies. Most of us have conscientiously swallowed their advice. So has the media and even the medical profession. As a result, in the past sixty years, obesity and associated illnesses have reached epidemic proportions worldwide. HORRIFIC ADVICE They taught us that natural fats like butter, extra virgin olive oil and coconut oil are supposed to be dangerous. Wrong. They directed everyone to eat a low-fat-high-carb diet, full of grain-based carbohydrates such as cereals. We need lots of carbs for energy, they insisted. Wrong again. We unknowingly trusted guidance from these so-called experts. We ate baked potatoes instead of fries and started buying all sorts of packaged foods thinking that we were making “healthy option” choices. PERILS OF CONVENIENCE Food manufacturers were quick to seize upon governments’ nutritional directives. They whipped up high-carb, low-fat convenience fare. There was one major draw back to all of this: When you remove fat from a carbohydrate food it tastes like cardboard. So, in order to make their packaged goods acceptable to the public, they were forced add masses of sugar. Conscientiously, we continued to eat the foods they were selling—much to our detriment—all the while believing that we were doing the right thing. For decades, the FDA’s infamous food pyramid—to which all developed countries turn for guidance—ruled supreme. Meanwhile, the incidence of Diseases of Civilization—from obesity and heart disease, to cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease, mental disorders and depression—has soared exponentially. All of which has earned billions for multi-national food manufacturers but created terrible human suffering. LET TRUTH BE TOLD Leslie Kenton’s New Cura Romana Weightloss Plan sets the record straight. It not only covers significant facts in relation to weight control, it also introduces a whole new way of eating and living to protect from early aging and chronic illness while enhancing wellbeing all round. It reveals truths about weight gain and weight loss. (They have nothing to do with calories in, calories out as we’ve been told.) Cura Romana’s redeveloped Consolidation process guides you step-by-step through procedures that can make a new slim body last. The new, advanced Consolidation program gleans its power and effectiveness from valid, accurate, independent research projects destined to turn the dangerous misinformation we’ve been fed for half a century on its head. The information from such truth-telling has only begun to appear in the last three or four years. It is still little-recognized publicly. But it was tried and tested for three years with the help of hundreds of willing participants on Cura Romana’s web-based programs before being incorporated into the next-generation protocol which you will learn about in this book. BREAKTHROUGHS While developing and testing this new program, it became clear that the gifts it brings go further than helping people recover their body’s natural shape and weight. It enables participants to experience not only a transformation in weight and health but an enrichment in one’s quality of life—physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Incidentally, since Cura Romana’s inception almost five years ago, these intentions have always been the foundation on which all of its programs are built. In Leslie’s words: “The ways and means of living a lean and healthy life must no longer be reserved for a privileged few. During my 45 years of researching, teaching and writing about natural health, the most important thing I’ve learned is this: Each one of us, regardless of age, can transform our current life circumstances into an experience of expanded wellbeing, creativity and purpose. We are free to draw on the work of visionary thinkers, and be guided by the valid discoveries of independent pioneers in human health and growth. It is only thanks to the endless generosity and encouragement of such people, and to the support of my visionary publisher, Brenda Kimber, that I am able to share with you my Cura Romana next-generation program. It’s my hope that this new handbook will bring as much benefit to your own life as the research and testing needed to create it has brought to mine. Every blessing... The New Cura Romana Weight Loss Plan Book Award-winning writer Leslie Kenton is renowned for her expertise in all matters relating to wellbeing. Her New Cura Romana Weightloss Plan is the culmination of her forty years of research, experience and expertise in life-transforming weightloss. ·You have known forever that the essential you is slim, healthy and full of life. It is time to experience this for real...time to say goodbye to struggles and self-criticism... time set yourself free. ·Now you can discover how to look and feel ten years younger and have more vitality, emotional strength, mental clarity and joy by making simple but powerful changes in how you eat and live. Buy The New New Cura Romana Weight Loss Plan Book At Amazon

The greatest art any parent needs to develop to support the graceful unfolding of a child's unique seedpower is the art of listening. Not only can it help you learn from each child what you need to know at any moment in time to help heal, guide and nurture him, it can also help you rediscover the joy of living within yourself - a sense which we as busy, responsible adults so often lose. Children make the greatest teachers when we are willing to enter their worlds, lay aside our preconceived ideas and learn about how each of them views life. It is only in doing this that a real relationship develops between you and your child, and it is in honest and vital relationships that the power to rear Nature's child easily and gracefully lies. Looking at the world through the eyes of a child transforms humdrum reality into a magical land of the unexpected. It can also teach you a lot about how your child thinks and grows emotionally. `Cigars are fattening,' my eight-year-old son Jesse announced one day. `I know because all the men who smoke them are fat.' Children have incredible wit and freshness. Everything is new to them. The most trivial event can bring to a child the kind of pleasure we adults spend a lot of money searching for. But that's not all. In subtle ways, they are able to teach us truths that we might otherwise never learn. Once, when we were experiencing gale-force winds, five year old Jesse sat at the window watching what the wind did to the trees. Finally he turned to me and said, `Reflexible trees are stronger than ordinary trees. Do you think reflexible people are stronger than other people?' I was slow to answer as I couldn't imagine what he was talking about. `Jesse, what are reflexible trees?' I asked. `They're the kind that bend all the way to the ground when the wind blows instead of pushing against it,' he said. `The reflexible ones don't get cracked like the others.' `Yes,' I replied, `I guess you're right. Reflexible trees and reflexible people really are stronger than the rest.' Through thirty four years of motherhood, plus years working with young children in nursery school, I have never stopped learning from them. I know it is supposed to be the other way around - and I have always done my best to explain the intricacies of life to my children and pupils - but in the meantime, they have taught me lessons I won't soon forget: lessons in courtesy, humor, responsibility. They have shown me how to be angry and how to forgive, how to care for another and still demand my own right to separateness. Most of all, through knowing and watching them, I've begun learning how to love - an art that, on too many occasions during these years, I had almost forgotten.

Every one of our cells needs a continual supply of oxygen. It is this oxygen that feeds our brain, sparks metabolism and calms nerves. One of the reasons why regular aerobic exercise is so beneficial in slowing down the rate at which you age and warding off degenerative diseases is because it improves your use of oxygen. So can learning to breathe fully. It can also improve your mood, increase your resistance to colds and illness, and improve sleep as well. Full breathing is also an important tool for encouraging waste elimination. It is a kind of spring-cleaning process that can go on all year round every day of your life. Chinese medicine (which I spent three years studying and working with) has a long tradition of natural-law ageless aging. And a great deal of it centers around the use of the breath. This is something to which we give little attention in the West and it is strange to think that specific breathing techniques are so ignored when the body's use of oxygen is the central determinant of the rate at which we age. Few people breathe fully. Most of us, particularly if we have sedentary jobs, breathe high - that is we breathe quickly and shallowly concentrating the inhalations in the upper chest area which is the part of the lungs which holds the smallest quantity of air. Not only does this kind of breathing inhibit oxygen intake, it can also encourage the lungs to atrophy and to lose much of their natural elasticity - something which is a common occurrence as people get older. Other people, who allow the air to flow deeper into their lungs are mid-breathers - an improvement over breathing high because it encourages the ribcage to move and brings more oxygen into the lungs for body use. But to make the best use of oxygen for ageless aging it's important to develop the habit of taking total breaths so they become your normal way of breathing. The Total Breath This is not something that you can learn overnight for there is nothing more unconscious and habitual than the way we breathe and that takes time and a little persistent effort to change. In breathing totally all of your breathing apparatus comes into play - the chest and ribs are lifted but not by themselves. The intercostal muscles also expand the ribs outward to create a large space in which your lungs can inflate to their maximum. Finally the diaphragm moves down, pulling the lower ribs outward which lets even the very bottom of your lungs fill up completely with air. With total breathing a much higher proportion of your lung power is used, as are most of your chest, rib and stomach muscles. Practice it lying down for five minutes a couple of times a day - perhaps just on awakening or just before going to sleep - and gradually it will become an automatic way of breathing which will not only help in ageless aging but will also improve your resistance to fatigue, improve the glow of your skin and help protect you from minor illness. Here's How Lying flat on your back with a small pillow beneath your neck, place one hand on your abdomen and rest the other on one side of your ribcage. Now inhale slowly through your nose while imagining that you are sending your breath to a place about 2 inches below your navel. Your tummy will start to well outward rather like a balloon. This has the effect of filling the lower part of your lungs with fresh air. As the in-breath continues, let it fill the rest of your stomach and then expand your ribcage outwards to the side as well as the midsection of your chest. You can feel this side expansion by keeping your hand against one side of your ribcage and making sure it moves outward. Now let the fresh breath fill the upper part of your chest area as well, watching it as it expands outward and to the side. (The whole process of inhalation should take about 5 seconds altogether.) Hold your breath for another 5 seconds. (In time you will find you can hold it much longer which gives your lungs a good opportunity to absorb all the oxygen available to them.) Now exhale following the same process you did in inhaling: first contract your lower abdomen gently to move the air upwards then as the lower lungs deflate you should feel the ribcage contracting again followed by the upper chest. This process too should take about 5 seconds. Rest for a second or two before beginning the whole cycle again.

How often do you rejoice your body? How often do you feel absolutely at ease in your skin, at peace in yourself and in harmony with your world? For many the answer is seldom. Instead we tend to us put up with the body rather like some slightly cumbersome baggage we carry with us as we go about. Yet all thought, all feeling, every response to beauty and to horror is mediated through the body. In fact your body is the medium for experiencing everything in life. As any healthy two year old knows, when it is fully alive you are fully alive. This aliveness is something we often have to rediscover. Television, films and advertising are replete with photographs of long legged pencil-thin females who are meant to be paragons of womanhood against whom we measure ourselves. Magazines and newspapers spend a large part of their time giving us advice about diets, clothes, exercise which supposedly will help the bodies of their readers more closely approach whatever shape, size and texture body the general consensus at any moment in time considers ideal. Meanwhile millions of women who, because of the way they are built, their personalities, and their own values (whether or not these values operate consciously or unconsciously) have not a hope in hell of ever looking like that ideal. And they suffer. This suffering goes deep - far beyond the simple (yet often painful) feelings of inadequacy which come with having been built with broad shoulders, big feet or a flat chest when the world you live in tells you you are supposed to be different. (Some of us alas have the misfortune of being blessed with all three). For implicit in the whole way in which the body is presented in almost everything we do and think are two far more crippling assumptions: That the body is separate from the spirit or person and that it is ultimately inferior. These assumptions are anchored deep into the belief systems from the Greco-Roman and Christian traditions in which our society has developed. They have led us to view the body either as something not to be trusted - like a wild animal that needs taming lest it gets out of hand or like a physical object outside ourselves to be watched, studied and manipulated. For most Western women their bodies are things separate from themselves, either to be prodded, criticized, and hidden or narcissistically exposed as a sexual object - something useful in gaining attention or drawing to oneself what one needs (or think she needs). In either case there is a sense of estrangement not only from the body but at a deeper level from ones self. Out of this estrangement comes a sense of powerlessness so that one begins to think that what one needs to be happy, to be complete, to be fulfilled can only be found outside oneself - by accomplishment in the world, or wearing the right clothes, by earning the love of a man or by conforming to some abstract ideal. So long as one is driven by a sense of separateness from ones body whether you succeed or fail in getting what you want from the outside world is irrelevant. For neither success nor failure bring you any closer to living freely with real health and beauty. Rediscovering the aliveness of the child and the innocence of bodily freedom can. It helps heal the wounds of separation and free a woman to live in the fullness of her own being.

Conventional diets for shedding unwanted depend on self-denial and willpower. They are full of complex methods for dealing with what is commonly known as cheating. Here's an example. Say you go off your diet by eating a piece of chocolate cake. Then you're supposed to tell yourself, "Never mind, tomorrow I'll skip dinner to make up for it." Except that by the time tomorrow arrives, you've developed even more cravings for even more chocolate, carby stuff and sugary drinks. Anybody trying to lose weight this way is doomed to fail. As soon as their diet ends any fat they've shed begins slowly but surely to creep back on. Then they're back where they started. Cura is different Cura is different. Let me tell you how. The secret behind Cura's life-changing success rate is hidden deep within the brain. Yes, really. Here's how it works. On any Cura program, unwanted fat is shed not as the result of strenuous effort or willpower but gently and progressively thanks to Cura's unique ability to restore healthy functioning to the control centers in your brain. Few people—this includes the majority of scientists—even know that the body's fat regulating system is located in an area of the mid-brain called the diencephalon. Probably the most sensitive and complex locus of control in the body, it houses a collection of vital structures including the thalamus, hypothalamus, and pituitary which govern emotions, stress and moods. It oversees the entire autonomic nervous system. The hypothalamus itself links directly to the nervous and endocrine systems via the pituitary. It regulates both hunger and thirst and, with the help of the other members of the diencephalon team, decides whether your body is to lay down fat or shed unwanted fat on your body. Other powerful centers in this area of the brain determine mental functions and emotional balance—even the perceptions we have about ourselves along with heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature, electrolyte balance, sexuality and our sleep cycles. Following Cura's specific food protocol and using the Essential Spray—from beginning to end—allows these control centers to function correctly. This is how natural, progressive, effective fat burning takes place without willpower or manipulation. Cura's celebrated success is both as simple and as profound as this. not your fault What few of us realize is that unwanted fat, insulin resistance and the blood sugar issues that come with them are not their fault. Nor are they some accident of fate. These things occur as a result of vital control centers of the brain not functioning as they are meant to in a healthy body. And what messes up the functioning of these control centers? This is important: For more than 70 years we have been misinformed and let astray by governments, pharmaceutical companies and multinational food corporations. We've been told that the way to stay lean and healthy is by following a low-fat high carb diet. We have eaten artificially made foods promoted by the media, multinational food manufacturers and governments. We've told to buy and eat convenience foods, chockablock with carbohydrates, sugars and chemicals. increase in degenerative diseases Doing this has resulted in the rampant increase in degenerative diseases and the widespread dependence on dangerous pharmaceuticals, used only to suppress symptoms but unable to bring true healing to the body. High carb low-fat eating is a major cause of worldwide obesity, addictions and food cravings, as well as the struggles so many experience trying to lose weight. This includes feelings of hopelessness, confusion, self-blame and fear that they will never be able to shed excess fat from our bodies, keep it off, and restore high-level health. Back in the mid-1940s, there were very few poisons sprayed on the foods we bought. They were organically grown on small farms. Today agriculture is big business in control of gigantic corporations whose only goal is fattening their bottom line. In animal farming, drugs such as antibiotics and hormones are injected to boost an animal's growth and cut down on feed requirements virtually all over the world. Residues of these drugs are as hazardous to your own health as they are to the animals that receive them. They undermine your vitality and make those of us with a tendency to gain weight get fat. The level of harm from exposure to pesticides, animal antibiotics and hormones is dose related. This means the more you consume, the greater your potential risk not only of illnesses and long-term degenerative conditions from Heart Disease and Cancer, to serious hormone disorders, depression, Alzheimer’s and distortions in the brain—in many cases from the time of birth to death. Meanwhile all this continues to increase exponentially. convenience foods The convenience foods that line the shelves of supermarkets everywhere are filled with pesticides, chemical additives and GMO. Corporations are intent on selling products that can themselves be destructive to life long term, rather than helping the public learn about the power of natural healing that is carried in the body itself. Eating these foods are responsible for insulin resistance, blood sugar issues and dangerous levels of obesity. If you want to shed excess fat from your body and restore high-level health we need to stop eating them and feeding them to our families. The goals of Cura online programs are two fold: First to guide you progressively through the natural process of shedding unwanted fat from your body. Second they show you how to build whole new ways of living and eating to set you free for to experience long term leanness and radiant health. To my knowledge, no other online program has ever been able to accomplish all this at such a scale. Do join one of our online programs and experience all this for yourself.

In Sanskrit they call it lîla. The word means play. Yet not in the limited sense of our word. Lîla is free play, deep play, wild play carried out in a timeless NOW. It speaks of divine play. It’s the kind of play that sets us free to be who, in essence, we already are, even though we may not yet know it. Lîla is also the kind of creative play that brings new worlds into existence. FROM CHILDLIKE TO GENIUS In its simplest form, lîla describes the spontaneous activity of children so absorbed in what they do that they don’t even hear you when you speak to them. One morning my three-year-old friend Marina came to visit. Scrambling onto the four-poster bed where I was writing in a state of intense concentration, she told me the story of how she had climbed to the very top of a pirate’s ship as high as the stars. Like all still-innocent children, Marina entered into her imaginal world with ease—a magical realm in which creative sparks can be seeded then begin to grow. The imaginal world is a place most of us adults have lost touch with—a powerful realm in which the joys and fruits of lîla reign supreme. At a deeper level, lîla speaks of the all-encompassing absorption out of which Beethoven, then dangerously ill and nearing the end of his life, nonetheless created the most remarkable music of the 19th century: The Late Quartets. Or the obsession of Van Gogh, which led to his having painted 900 pictures and turned out 1100 drawings pictures during a lifetime. This kind of lîla is far more complex and committed than child’s play. It can produce achievements that enrich the way we look at life, that connect us to the deepest levels of our own being. Some fruits of mature lîla even transform the world. A big deal? You bet. This is play of the highest order—nothing less than an outpouring of the most intimate and essential nature of each unique human being. Living your creativity as fully as you can while you walk the earth, in whatever way most satisfies your unique nature, is the most exciting and enriching process any individual human being can experience. It brings a sense of meaning and purpose to your own life that nothing else can. CREATIVE PASSION Creativity is not a problem to be solved or a subject to be picked apart in psychologists’ laboratories. Those who try end up wandering in an endless maze of moribund words and phrases which miss the point. Meanwhile, the wrinkled fiddler on the city street plays on—smiling. He is lost in the excitement of improvisation, magically blending movement, feeling and sound—making music never heard before, that touches his heart and awakens the senses of all with ears to hear. We have grown up with some weird ideas about creative power. We’ve been taught that creativity belongs to a few select human beings whom history labels as genius. Nothing could be further from the truth. Creating is not a rare privilege—it is a right, even a necessity for all of us, if we are to live a fulfilling life. Creating anything, from cooking a healthful meal to writing poetry or playing games with children reminds us all what life is about. From this place we learn to live and work, to imagine, invent, and finally give birth—not only to things that have never been seen, heard, felt or touched before, but to a way of living more wondrous and exciting than most of us would ever have imagined. A passion to be lived, a lîla to be danced, the wild creative power within us urges us to tell the truth and shame the devil. It demands that we express our love, our obsessions, and the fascinations which pursue us. It asks that we live out life from the very core of our being. “Genius,” as late American writer John Gardner used to remind his students, “is as common as old shoes. Everybody has it.” CREATIVE RELEASE A few years ago, I began to explore not only the power and dimensions of creativity in you, me, and all of us. I wanted to discover how each of us can gain greater access to it, and how best we can live out our own creative power in our day to day lives as scientists, professional artists, musicians, writers, dancers, actors or as businesspeople, parents, teachers, lovers, gardeners, healers, craftsmen and thinkers. I was sure that on a larger scale, the way we as a group choose to use our collective creativity determines whether or not we will be able—in the wake of having laid waste to so much of our planet—to emerge as a sustainable species in a sustainable world. A lîla of enormous proportions; what could feel more powerful or more daunting? Yet the creative power on which it depends springs from the same source within each person as Marina’s imaginative play. PRIMORDIAL POWER Mysterious, enigmatic, spontaneous, occasionally even frightening, in essence creative power is the power of life itself. It is the force that gave us birth which continues to give birth to universes. It is what created us and brought each of us our own lives. It originates from a place within each one of us where we can touch and tap into the numinous energy of the Cosmos: God, Being—call it what you will. No words can adequately describe it. In truth, it is far more an experience of aliveness than a place at all. And, although we may never describe it adequately, we are perfectly equipped to enter this locus of creative power within us and find out how to live ever more of our lives from it. For the majority of artists, creativity pours forth most easily when they have intimate support for it. Shakespeare had his actors and a Globe Theatre eager for his plays, Virginia Woolf entered a room of her own and there wove tapestries of words. Emily Dickinson wrote out of the intimate community of a family who adored her, admired her and made sure she was given the space and time to carry out her imaginative work. For others who are highly creative, there is no such intimate support. Many have suffered childhood abuse, loss, illness or intense suffering. The creativity of such people can be monumental. Each man or woman is brought to the exploration and expressions of their creative power through suffering in just the same way that, so often, we discover what is most important to us by having what we believe to be of greatest value—a loved one, a job, a title—taken from us. Painful as such experiences are, often they turn out to be great gifts when it comes to freeing our creative power. Caught up in our lives of work, children, and householder duties, few of us live in such fortunate circumstances as Shakespeare and Emily Dickinson. But that does not matter. What has not been given us we can make for ourselves. Art is not the province of the privileged few. It belongs to all people—those of us who spend our days in front of computers, cooking, sweeping streets, running errands, caring for children, handling the stupidities of bureaucracy, and living our constantly changing lives in a world that is ever less secure. THE WAY AHEAD We are alive at a moment in history where one age is dying, yet another has not yet been born. We are, each one of us, faced with a choice: As we sense the foundations of our world shaking, do we withdraw in anxiety, trying in desperation to hang on to what we once believed to be “true”? Do we become paralyzed, and try to cover our fear with apathy? Or do we summon the courage offered us by a Universe in flux, honor our personal sensitivity and consciousness, then choose to face the challenge of entering the realm of creative power within? Then, trusting our individual capacity for lîla, do we begin to play in ways that may help bring forth a new world for all? Regardless or age, background, or limiting notions about what’s possible, each one of us has a choice to make. It’s a choice between continuing to conform to established belief systems that stifle the human spirit, or trusting in ourselves. Are you willing courageously to explore your intrinsic creative gifts and make use of them? “That which we give birth to from our depths is that which lives on after us. That which is inborn in us constitutes our most intimate moments—intimate with self,” says Theologian Mathew Fox, “intimate with God the Creative Spirit, and intimate with others. To speak of creativity is to speak of profound intimacy. It is also to speak of our connecting to the Divine in us and of our bringing the Divine back to the community.” Personally, I urge you to begin connecting ever more deeply with your own brand of creativity. Discover new ways of living. Leave automatic assumptions about who you think you are and learn to respond to each moment and each day of your life with new eyes and an open heart. The more you do, the richer your life can become. Such is the joy of lîla. Such is the power of lîla. If you have not yet explored it, you have an exhilarating, wondrous adventure ahead of you. Take it. Trust it. It’s the adventure of a lifetime.

Who would have thought that taking the right kind of walk can not only clear stress, and energize mind and body but even bring you face to face with satori? Satori brings a sense of living in the fullness of your being, moment by moment. So often, we think we need to make decisions about what we are going to do in the next hour, the next day, the next year. We worry about how to discipline our bodies, get the work done and pay the bills, as well as a thousand other things.You can find yourself walking in new ways, with different rhythms. Aches and pains diminish. You sense a new relationships developing—to yourself, your surroundings and the world as a whole. I am passionate about taking two quite different kinds of walks which I’m keen to share with you because they have brought me much pleasure as well as so many other benefits. They are, each in their own way a lot of fun to. FREE FLOW Once a day, regardless of the weather outside, and whenever it suits you, go out walking for the sheer pleasure of doing it. It can be fun to walk in sunshine, but just as wonderful to walk in rain—unhurried and unburdened by the need to ‘look good’. Look around, smell the air, notice the way your body has begun to move. The next step is likely to sound weird, but try it: When you see a tree, say silently to yourself, ‘Tree.’ When you see a flower—‘Flower.’ This simple naming practice helps you become aware of where you are in space and time. And it does this in a wonderful, spontaneous, improvizing way. As you walk, life takes on an unexpected, exciting feel. Meanwhile, futile internal monologues begin to fade away. One of my favorite books was written by a musician named Stephen Nachmanovitch. It is called Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art. It’s a superb book. If you are interested in creativity on any level—and I don’t mean just being an artist, but any and all kinds of creativity—I highly recommend it. In a chapter called ‘Inspiration and Time Flow’, Nachmanovitch describes this first way of walking I want to pass on to you. (Of course, you are probably unlikely to be walking down a street in a foreign city as he describes, but much of what he writes about this way of walking is relevant no matter where you are.) It reminds us all that it is not impossible to live our lives moment to moment, fully present with real awareness and joy. Here is what Nachmanovitch writes: A walk, following your intuitive promptings down the streets of a foreign city, holds rewards far beyond a planned tour of the tried and tested. Such a walk is totally different from random drifting. Leaving your eyes and ears wide open, you allow your likes and dislikes, your conscious and unconscious desires and irritations, your irrational hunches to guide you whenever there is a choice of turning right or left. You cut a path through a city that’s yours alone. This brings you face to face with surprises that are destined for you alone. You might discover conversations and friendships, meetings with remarkable people. When you travel in this way, when you walk in this way, you are free. There are no ‘have tos’ and ‘shoulds’. You are structured at first only by the date of the plane departure. As the pattern of people and places unfolds, the trip, like an improvised piece of music, reveals its own inner structure and rhythm. Thus do you set the stage for fateful encounters. I’ve got to add here that some of the most important ‘fateful encounters’ he speaks of are likely to be brand new encounters with yourself, in ways you may never have dreamed of. INSTANT ENERGY IS YOURS This is the second of my favorite walks. It’s a way not only of relieving stress, but of energizing yourself, learning to be present in the moment and, like Nachmanovitch’s walk, releasing your mind from the habitual chatter that prevents our feeling fully alive. I learned this technique from a Belleruth Naparstek’s “Meditations to Relieve Stress” audio. Here’s how it goes: Choose a place where you will be able to walk without meeting a lot of people, so you allow yourself to connect with your surroundings the way a child might. You don’t have to smile or relate to anyone. Instead, you will be drawing in energy from your surroundings. What will amaze you is just how much vitality you can absorb from your environment when you are not wasting your own energy with meaningless social contact. So, just for 10 to 15 minutes, let yourself retreat inwards and see what amazing things happen. GETTING EARTHED Begin your walk by shaking out your body a little. Feel the earth beneath your feet. Take a deep breath and let it out with no effort. Now look around you, at the sky, the earth, the trees, grass, rocks or flowers—whatever you find around you. Take another slow, even breath deep down into your abdomen. Now, aware of your breath going steadily in and out, start walking at a comfortable pace, opening all your senses to your environment as if it were part of you. Let yourself enjoy the light, the mist, the colors, the rocks and sand; whatever is there. Let yourself become aware of the way things move in light and shade, so you are in effect feeding on the richness of your surroundings. Let your body move easily and gently, so it feels as though it is dancing with your surroundings. Allow yourself to experience everything you see and feel, smell and touch, as though you are doing it for the first time, with the curious mind of a child. Feel the air on your skin, smell the fragrance around you in all its layers and textures as you walk. Continue to be aware of the ground beneath your feet, and how your breath going in and out feels. Notice how well the earth supports you. Enjoy the feel of your body in motion. See how heightened your senses become to the colors and the fragrances. Notice how clear your vision has become. This simple focus, this increased awareness of the sound of your own feet on the ground, the feel of your breath, the movement of your legs and torso will become more acute, more intense, more nourishing and more satisfying. LIKE MAGIC Colors become more and more intense, richer, clearer. You can find your senses opening as you become ever more aware of everything around you. You may even sense that you are immersed in a wonderful new ocean of reality. That the trees and the rocks, the air you breathe, and the sky have become part of you and you of them. Indulge yourself. Smell the air, feel the ground, immerse yourself in the sea of life and generosity in which you find yourself. Now, simply draw the energy of the earth into you. Let it fill you up. Breathe in the beauty of the sky. Take in every sight and sound, deep into your heart, as you become aware that you are attuned to everything around you. This energy is available to you whenever you want it. All it depends on is your own willingness to connect with the sea of life of which you are a part. Whenever you do, the whole world feeds you, belongs to you, nourishes you at every level. Continue to walk as long as you like, easily and blissfully, aware of your feet on the ground, your breath moving in and out, and the part you play in this wonderful sea of reality which belongs to you, and you to it. BACK TO SOURCE Both of these walking techniques are wonderful. Don’t just read about them—print up these descriptions and carry them with you. Then have a go. See what happens to you. Even better, take a look at where I learned about them. Stephen Nachmanovitch’s book is the best book on creativity I have ever read. I have read it at least 12 times. (As a present for Aaron who loves listening to audio books, I even made a recording of most of the chapters and gave it to him.) When it comes to Belleruth Naparstek’s work, her recordings are unparalleled in the world for their transformative power. You can purchase the one below on CD. Better still, just download it and put it on an MP3 player so you can begin using it today. You can find them below: Free Play - Stephen Nachmanovitch’s Improvisation In Life And Art - Stephen Nachmanovitch’s book is the best book on creativity I have ever read. I have read it at least 12 times. To find out more click on the links below. Order Free Play - Stephen Nachmanovitch’s from Amazon MEDITATIONS TO RELIEVE STRESS imagery for mastering anxiety; guided imagery to pump up feelings of love, safety and protection; a soothing, walking meditation for the fidgeters among us who can’t sit still; and affirmations for use anytime. (72 min.) Order Meditations To Relieve Stress at iTunes Order Meditations To Relieve Stress at Amazon

These days, unbeknown to most people, we are bombarded with toxicity at every turn. There are poisonous chemicals in the water we drink and bathe in, the foods we eat, and the electromagnetic energies to which we are exposed via mobile devices and cell towers. This makes detoxing your body an essential practice for improving your health, guarding your weight, and looking after your mental and emotional wellbeing. cleansing crisis The powerful deep cleansing of carrying out a detox is not a simple experience. It might very well give you an unpleasant headache or make you moody, temporarily create an upset stomach, a film on your tongue and teeth, or even loose bowels as the toxic wastes from your system clear themselves. If you do experience these things, rest assured they will pass. They are nothing more than signs that your body is throwing off wastes—which is great. You are only experiencing what in natural medicine is known as a cleansing crisis. Those most likely to get a bad headache or other discomforts are people who have been drinking several cups of coffee a day. This kind of reaction is triggered by your tissues dumping a lot of stored caffeine into your bloodstream all at once, in order to eliminate it from your body. home-made compress Let me share with you a technique that works wonders for any uncomfortable detox reaction. It involves using plain water in the form of a simple home-made compress around the middle of your body. It charges your cells with energy, activates circulation and stimulates your liver—the body's organ of detoxification—to let go of stored wastes so any discomfort is minimized. Here’s what to do Tear a piece of cotton cloth wide enough to reach from under your arms down to your hips and long enough to wrap around your body comfortably once. An old cotton sheet is ideal (never use nylon or polyester). Dip the cloth into cold water, then wring it out. Wrap it around your middle and secure with a large safety pin or two. Now wrap a thick dry towel around this and lie down, or even better, climb into a warm bed. You might want to put on a pair of thick socks so your feet don’t feel cold. Rest for at least half an hour. If you do this just before bed and you drop off to sleep for the night, that’s ideal. You can always remove the compress in the morning. Also take the time to relax, and be kind to yourself. Have a cup of ginger tea—it is very soothing and good for you. Remember that a healing crisis is actually a good sign. Your body is getting rid of a lot of debris so you can access a higher level of health and vitality. It will pass quickly, leaving you better than ever.