Good Health is Not That Hard to Achieve. Really.
You and I are constantly bombarded with conflicting information about our health. What’s good. What’s bad. We’re complex beings. Good health involves our bodies physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. You may not agree with all the information on these pages. But, for me, these words resonate with the truth.
For me, good health comes down to 7daily habits:
Not Smoking is Essential.
I put this habit first because it has a tendency to make people angry when they hear about not smoking or read about not smoking. So, I’m just getting it out there in front. That way, you can get over your anger reaction when we move on to the other essential habits which are easier to deal with and much more positive.
But, before we move on I do have one suggestion: Reduce your habit to five cigarettes a day. When you get down to five a day, zero is an easy goal.
Have you tried the gum from the pharmacy?
Is there a smokers support group in your area?
Hypnotherapy? Biofeedback?
Whatever?. Do whatever you have to do to give up the smoking.
Maintain a Healthy Weight.
Losing or gaining weight to reach your ideal weight gets harder with every passing year, so the younger you are when you work on your weight, the easier it is. Weight Watchers or Overeaters Anonymous may be a good option for you. Biofeedback can help.
An interested nutritionist can guide you to your goal and include specific foods contributing to your continued good health at the same time. You’ll get twice the bang for your buck with nutritional guidance. For example, if you need to gain or lose weight, and you have heart health issues, a nutritionist can work on the weight situation along with your heart disease. I don’t know about you, but I love I love to accomplish two things at a time.
Eat Many Fruits and Vegetables.
Wellness gurus teach five servings of fruits and vegetables are a minimum number for a well-nourished person to eat daily. This five-serving recommendation is easy for me to share. It can be fun. I like the idea of thinking about which five fruits and vegetables will be on my plate today. Planning for each day’s selection gives them focus and importance. Planning gives me a chance to experiment a bit. You can do this, too. It’s easier than you think. Choose one new vegetable or fruit each week at your grocery. Take it home and learn about it:
What is it called?
Where is home for this food?
What are some popular ways to cook it?
How should it be stored?
What is the best way to combine it with other foods?
How should it be eaten?
If you discover one new fruit or vegetable weekly, your dietary skills will be vastly different in a year.
Exercise Regularly
The field is open here. Your exercise can be drudgery or fun. Spend as little or as much money as you want. Choose one or two activities to participate in regularly. The point is to stay active throughout your life. Combine exercise with other daily habits. I wear a fitness watch which beeps when I don’t move enough. It also rewards me with a beep when I’ve exceeded my daily goal. I have a job requiring that I stay off my seat and on my feet. I’m making money while exercising a fun bonus!
Avoid Stressors
Stress is a biggie. It plays a part in many health problems. Meditation walks, laughter, sharing, singing, nature bathing, journaling, drawing can help you reduce stress. Make room in your schedule for stress reduction activities.
Note: There are several articles on this subject in earlier posts in this blog. I periodically discuss stress. If you look around on the blog, you’ll find much information.
Include Healing Bodywork in Your Life.
If you’ve never gotten a massage, received Reiki therapy, or other bodywork, schedule a session. Just to learn about it. As time passes, schedule another session with a different healer. Schedule a reflexology session (or other bodywork) to celebrate an event: birthday, anniversary, a good day at work, the Spring Equinox, etc.
.In short, schedule healing bodywork sessions whenever you want. If you end up on a cruise, hang out in the spa instead of the bar.
Over time, you’ll get inspired and book regular sessions. Your body will thank you for the attention! Everything always seems to go better with reflexology!
Support Yourself.
Do something nice for yourself each day. Spend time meditating. Think positive thoughts about yourself. These supportive thoughts are a treat you give yourself. You deserve it!
Thanks for reading this blog post! New articles have been posted regularly for 10 years. For me, this blog was created to be a conduit for your own healing. Please share it with friends and family. Forward it to your preferred social media network.
For more information, check out my books on www.thurmangreco.com. Purchase them at this website in both ebook and paperbook form. So far, “A Healer’s Handbook” has gone out to readers in over 30 countries.
Contact me at thurmangreco@gmail.com.
If you enjoy the blog, you’ll enjoy my weekly shows on YOUTUBE. This program has been running with a few timeouts now and then for over 15 years. My program is an informative and entertaining unrehearsed hour with no rehearsals. You can find it on Woodstock’s own TV Channel 23 or on YOUTUBE.
My guests are people whose lives have brought them to Woodstock for a day, a week, an hour, a decade, or more.
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Poor Sleep Can Wreck Your Quality of Life
If you let it, POOR SLEEP will leave you feeling tired, confused, and depressed.
Sleep can have many causes. And, that’s one of the reasons we struggle with it. In past blog posts, I’ve written many articles about sleep and here is yet another one. And, there will probably be many more.
However, this article is different from all the rest. In this article, you will learn POOR SLEEP HAS MANY CAUSES. Investigate every one that applies to your situation.
Poor sleep causes fall in several categories.
To begin with, COFFEE, CIGARETTES, AND DIET PILLS are in their own little but potent category.
Is caffeine part of your poor sleep problem? Remember, it is found in many things beyond just the cup of coffee you have in the morning. Try to find them all and banish them from your daily life.
Are your days spent in rooms with DIM LIGHTING? Poor sleep can be the result of this environment. What can you do to remedy this situation? Getting just twenty to thirty minutes of sunlight each day can make a difference.
Do you get enough exercise? MOVING YOUR MUSCLES IS ESSENTIAL to overcoming poor sleep. It comes down to this: You have to move enough to get to sleep at the end of your day. Exercise. Exercise. Exercise.
Do you have one or more HEALTH ISSUES that promote poor sleep patterns? Some diseases make it hard to get to sleep. Others make consistent sleep throughout the night difficult. If sleep apnea, restless leg syndrome, and sinus problems interfere with a good night’s sleep, get treatment for them. The message here is this: Don’t let a medical condition cause your poor sleep.
Finally, we come to SLEEPING PILLS. For me, they are an absolute last resort. Sleeping pills come after you have done everything you possibly can to overcome poor sleep.
Why? Some of these pills create their own problems.
Several herbal remedies and supplements are on the market to combat your poor sleep. Two that come to mind are Melatonin and Valerian.
We don’t really know whether either one of them works because the studies have been sparse and contradictory. The preparations and dosages are varied so that it’s complicated to know how much and when to take either Melatonin or Valerian.
It’s best to take any sleeping preparations under the direction of a professional who knows about the products you are taking. That way, you won’t be wasting your money and you won’t be overdosing.
The BOTTOM LINE here is to encourage you to chase down each and every cause of poor sleep that you can. Deal with each and every cause in your search for blessed sleep.
Thanks for reading this article. Please refer it to your preferred social media network.
Thurman Greco
Risk Factors Don’t Act Alone
Risk factors are behaviors or conditions linked to disease. They don’t act alone.
They create their synchronicity when they react with one another. Some diseases, such as cancer, rely on multiple risk factors (age, habits, family history, health conditions, and environment) to manifest as diseases. Then, again, these same diseases can develop without any known risk factors.
When disease strikes a body without risk factors, the risk factors are energetic instead of physical. Energetic risk factors include resentment, unprocessed hurt, hatred, grief.
AGE is a risk factor in many health issues. It’s a risk factor throughout your life. Heart diseases and strokes take decades to develop, and children’s diseases focus on the youngest as the most vulnerable. Emergency rooms and physicians’ waiting rooms are populated regularly with infants, children, and seniors.
DIABETES. When you become diabetic, you are suddenly at the front of the line for a whole selection of diseases: stroke, heart attack, cataracts, glaucoma, peripheral artery disease, diabetic foot disease, neuropathy.
DNA testing is commonplace for certain types of diseases. I look forward to the day when people get their DNA tested routinely before the disease becomes dangerous, not after you’ve found it and are receiving drugs and trying to learn what other medical procedures are in your future.
FAMILY HISTORY OF A PARTICULAR DISEASE. Just because a particular disease is in your family history doesn’t mean you’ll get that disease 100%. It’s important to know about the disease and it’s important to use the knowledge to fight it.
HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE is both a treatable disease and a silent killer. No one should have to deal with the complications of high blood pressure. The medication is not expensive. High blood pressure needs treatment because it becomes a silent killer when left untreated. Because there are few symptoms people resist the lifesaving medication.
HIGH CHOLESTEROL is truly a silent killer. Your body works much better when there are healthy numbers to work with. Taking your cholesterol medication can be an easy decision if you examine the statistics. People live longer with statins.
OBESITY is an epidemic in our country right now. How does this happen?
First, people don’t move enough to process the calories consumed. Secondly, people are now eating a lot of chemicals manufactured for human consumptions. These eating products are manufactured to eat but they are not food. Our foods are not able to properly digest these chemical-laden products.
SEDENTARY LIFESTYLE When I walk down the street on a sidewalk, I notice those around me walking. Some move rapidly, with purpose, easily. Others move slowly, with or without purpose, painfully.
I always want to ask them whether they liked moving when they were young. Some people are totally in their bodies and move easily through life. Others are not and don’t move easily. In the final analysis, I ask myself how can I convince a person who doesn’t like to move to walk or run or play a game of some kind. How can I help them see their bodies in the future? How can I help them see how much easier it is when they keep their bodies from rusting?
SMOKING is a set-up for an unhealthy end of life. When I see a person suffering from COPD trying to breathe, I always wonder whether or not they think smoking was the right thing to do. But, then, I’m sure when a person begins to smoke, COPD is never on anyone’s mind.
Thanks for reading this blog post. Please refer it to your preferred social media network.
Thanks again.
Thurman Greco
Five Things You Can Do For Your Good Health
Good health is not that hard to achieve. Really. When it comes down to a bottom line, five things are essential to establishing and maintaining your good health.
NOT SMOKING IS ESSENTIAL.
Do you smoke? Reduce your habit to five cigarettes a day. When you are down to five, you can get to zero with little effort.
Join a smokers’ support group.
Hypnotherapy and Biofeedback both offer successful results for many smokers.
The bottom line is this: Do whatever you have to do to give up this habit.
MAINTAIN A HEALTHY WEIGHT.
This is a high priority. Losing or gaining weight to reach your ideal weight for your good health gets harder with every passing year so the younger you are when you work on your weight, the easier it will be.
Weight Watchers is a good support group.
An interested nutritionist can help you reach your desired goal and include specific foods contributing to your continued good health at the same time. You’ll get twice the bang for your buck with a nutritionist.
An example of this: If you need to gain or lose weight and you have heart health issues, a nutritionist can work on the weight issues along with your heart issues. I don’t know about you, but I love to be able to do a couple of things together. I get all involved in the different aspects of synchronicity.
EAT MANY FRUITS AND VEGETABLES.
Many wellness gurus teach five servings of fruits and vegetables are a minimum number for a well nourished person to eat daily. This five serving recommendation is easy for me to pass on. And, it’s also easy to have fun with.
I like the concept of thinking about which five fruits and vegetables will be on my plate today. Planning ahead for each day’s selection gives them focus and importance.
I also like the idea that advance planning gives me a chance to play and experiment a bit. You can do this too. It’s easier than you think. All you have to do is choose one new vegetable or fruit each week.
Take it home and learn what it’s called. What countries is it commonly grown in? Learn how to cook it, store it, combine it with other foods, and finally how to eat it.
If you learn about one new fruit or vegetable each week, your dietary skills will be vastly different in a year. Adventure!
EXERCISE REGULARLY.
This can be a drudgery or it can be fun. Your good health options are open here. Participate in one or more activities regularly. The point is to keep yourself active daily as you go throughout your life.
You can put in as much time or money as you want here.
You can also combine exercise with other daily habits. I wear an exercise watch which beeps when I’m not moving enough. It also congratulates me when I’ve gone beyond my daily goal.
I went out and got a second job which requires that I stay off my seat and on my feet. So, I’m making money while exercising. I enjoy this a lot.
AVOID STRESSORS.
This can be a biggie. Stress contributes to many health problems. Like the sleep suggestion a few pages back, you’ll find a chapter on stress later in this book. Things like meditation, walks, laughter, sharing, singing, nature bathing, journaling, drawing can help you avoid stress.
Stress relief is important – just as important as your diet and exercise.
Thank you for reading this blog post. Please refer it to your favorite media network.
Thurman Greco
