Vitamins Minerals and Herbs (oh my!)
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Nutrition testing
One of the things that seems to always be of interest to Specialized Kinesiology students is how to test foods and supplements. I was writing some content for Knowlative regarding basic nutrition testing protocols and it occurred to me that this might be of value to others outside of that platform, so I’m sharing it here too! Be aware though, the content here does assume a certain familiarity with muscle testing, so if you don’t have that, you may want to click along to something more accessible now! Muscle testing can tell you if there is stress when a certain food or supplement is introduced to the system, or it…
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GEMS Nutrition
We love food. I have written before about how, when you start doing any type of homesteading, you become basically food-obsessed. I think many people in the holistic health industry find themselves in this position, learning more about the body means learning more about how to feed it for optimum performance. GEMS Nutrition is a course that has been percolating in my mind for a long time. I thought it was done nearly two years ago, then found out to my chagrin when I sent the files to a student, that I had somehow saved over some of the files incorrectly. As we had just moved to the rainforest all…
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Wandering Herbalist: Costa Rica Fruits
I have a confession to make that usually puzzles my clients and students who know me to be a food “expert”: I don’t usually eat fruit. It’s not that I don’t like it, it’s that, for some reason that I have never fully understood, my body just doesn’t seem to metabolize fructose very well. To put it bluntly; fruit makes me fat. But, it is impossible for a self professed food fiend to travel to a new country learning about plants and food and not eat what grows locally! So, I eat it all. And I’ve gained weight, but that’s beside the point! One thing that I really enjoy about…
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Wandering Herbalist: Mamon (Rambutan)
Medicinal plants, fruit: Mamon The fruit stacked high on the table at the market looks almost alien. Spiky, with little barbs radiating outward, bright red and about the size of a ping-pong ball; here in Costa Rica, this fruit is known as mammon, though in Asia it is better known as rambutan. Don’t be fooled by its’ strange appearance – it is delicious. And at this time of year when it is in season, it is ridiculously cheap and can be found everywhere. There was a lady selling bags on the side of the highway out of the back of her truck today; one kilo for one mil colones (just…
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Chan – the Next Super Seed
Chia seeds, flax seeds, hemp seeds – the Western world is getting familiar with the idea that seeds are superfoods. Little powerhouses of nutrition, seeds are packed with enough goodness to give an entire plant or tree it’s start in life and as such are usually pretty good for you. As I listen to the deafening noise of the cicadas in the rain forest of Costa Rica I sip on a weird local concoction that might just be the next superfood seed to add to the list. The first time we tried the strange drink called fresco de chan was five years ago when we were out for dinner and…
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Best Supplements for Everyday and Someday
I often see people grumpily pacing the aisles of Health Food Stores, bewildered by the sheer vastness of selection. When I give presentations to large groups, inevitably someone will ask during the Q & A “What supplements do you take?” I believe that supplements fall into three categories: the first are the things that you take every day for maintenance and general good health, second are things that you take for a specific length of time to address a certain issue and then don’t need again, and the third are things that you should keep on hand for occasions when they are needed. Think of it like your spice rack…
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3 Herbs to start Wildcrafting
Tis the season for wildcrafting. If this is a term you are unfamiliar with, ‘wildcrafting’ means to find medicinal and culinary herbs and plants in their natural habitat and harvest them in a sustainable (read: not picking every last flower or enraging the Lorax) way. I am lucky enough to live in the Central Okanagan in an area where two ecosystems brush up against each other; one being desert like, and the other a wet rich cedar forest. Between these two areas there are many medicinal plants to be found, most of which people think of as weeds. While it can be dangerous to simply start picking and eating plants…
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Emotional Rescue: Bach Flower Remedies
Ever hear about something that just seems too simple to be real? As in “if it was that easy then surely someone would have realized this before!”? Bach Flower Remedies have that effect on people. These flower remedies are a basic system of homeopathy that was created by Dr. Edward Bach in the 1930’s to balance your emotions. There are many wonderful resources out there if you wish to learn more about the way these are made or what specific remedies are for (www.bachcentre.com is a good one to try). This is not that resource though: this is a place for telling stories. I was first introduced to Bach Remedies…
