“Wisdom is your perspective on life, your sense of balance, your understanding of how the various parts and principles apply and relate to each other. It embraces judgment, discernment, comprehension. It is a gestalt or oneness, and integrated wholeness.”  Stephen R. Covey

What steps can you take to be more proactive about living in wholeness?

Dear friends, this is now my second letter to you. I have written both of them as reminders to stimulate you to wholesome thinking.  (2 Peter 3:1; NIV)

Jerry and I talk a lot about wellness.  We’re passionate about educating others on how they can obtain and maintain wellness and walk in optimal health, ultimately fulfilling their God-given destiny while here on earth.  When we walk in wellness, we’re also walking in wholeness.

Dictionary.com states that wholeness is, “The quality or state of being whole, entire, or sound; entireness; totality; completeness.”  Let’s look at seven ways that one can “Live in Wholeness.”

Attitude of gratitude.  When one is thankful, life is better.  The more we think of ways to be thankful, the more things occur for us to be thankful.  A wonderful exercise is to end a day with speaking out loud five or ten things that happened that day that you’re thankful for.

Accept and offer forgiveness.  Offering forgiveness to someone when we’ve been wronged brings freedom to us.  We’re set free from the bitterness that has the potential to destroy us.  Accepting forgiveness from the Lord and from others when we’ve been wrong also will bring restoration and wholeness to us.

Accelerate activity.  Moving more not only helps our physical body become healthier, but our emotions, our ability to handle stress, and our sleep are greatly impacted positively the more we move and develop consistent exercise routines.  Learn what your body loves to do to move more.

Adequate sleep.  Most people don’t get enough sleep nor is their sleep deep and sound.  Sound sleep is essential for living a life of wholeness.  It is the ultimate “pause that refreshes.”  Develop a consistent bedtime, preferably before 10:30 PM and sleep in as dark a room as possible.

Ample hydration.  We all know that water is essential for life.  Water is the single most important nutrient for our bodies.  Without adequate hydration of clean, pure water, no one can walk in wholeness.  Become a serious water drinker, drinking at least half of your body weight in ounces of water per day.

Avoid artificial food and aspartame.  Eat real food.  Eat whole food to become whole.  Eat foods that rot or spoil, but eat them before they do.  Think vegetables, fruits, lean, clean meats and poultry, eggs, raw nuts and seeds, beans, avocados, olive and coconut oil.

Arsenal of supplements.  It’s known science that it is no longer possible to get all of the nutrients we need for life and health from the food we eat.  We must add supplementation to our diets for ultimate wholeness.  Whole foods vitamins, minerals, anti-oxidants, probiotics, essential fatty acids, and glyconutrients are some of the major players needed.

Father, thank You that You have given us all that we need to walk in wholeness.  Direct our steps in acquiring all that is necessary.

UNCOMMON Wellness Coaching

Blessings on you as pursue wholeness.

“With the way food is today, it’s a fact that you need to consume around 4,000 calories of food per day in order to get all the nutrition your body needs. That is around 3 times more than an average man or woman needs in order to maintain a healthy weight so not only is it expensive, you will get fat in the process.”  Sarah Ross

What is a pill to you?  Medicine?  Food?  Either?  Can some foods be considered medicine?  Should they?

On each side of the river grew a tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, with a fresh crop each month. The leaves were used for medicine to heal the nations.  (Rev. 22:;2b, NLT)

I happened to run across an incredibly insightful article regarding the need to supplement last week and really felt compelled to share it with you.  Unfortunately, I do not know the author, Sarah Ross, nor is the link given at the end of her article functional.  So there is no practical way to contact her to for further permission other than given in the last paragraph of the article.  Nevertheless, I felt the the information Sarah presents is so “right on” that I chose to go ahead and make it available to our loyal DG readers.

The Road to Wellness is Paved with ‘Pills and Potions’

Nutrition and supplementation plays a major role in the overall health process. The 20th century brought about some major medical developments in the sickness industry, which helped fight infectious disease, improved the effectiveness of antibiotics and immunizations and resulted in a doubling of the average lifespan.

However, the older you get the more medication you seem to need and the sicker you become. So where’s the benefit to living longer when your quality of life deteriorates?

The 21st century is focusing medical developments on the wellness industry — helping people live better and live longer through natural yet scientifically developed nutritional supplements.

Wellness is more than just the absence of disease, it causes cellular radiance; radiating good health from the inside out because you are giving your body everything it needs so that every cell functions at its very best.

The foundation of good health is good nutrition which means making sure your body has all the macro nutrients (protein, carbohydrates, fat) and micro nutrients (vitamins, minerals, trace elements) it requires to function like a well oiled car.

Our current food supply has some major challenges. Many people live in remote areas and food loses a lot of its goodness and suffers as a result of the lengthy transportation of food to these remote areas. Fast food outlets are everywhere. People are too busy to cook so they eat away from home or choose takeaway foods that are higher in calories, animal fats, salt and sugar. And many foods that are available are so processed that they have minimal nutritional value and micro-nutrients. This is why there’s a strong focus on the importance of dietary supplements to provide what’s missing from our food.

When it comes to micro-nutrients (vitamins, minerals, trace elements) it’s important to give your body no less than exactly what it needs or it will not function properly. All those important processes your body performs daily through your liver, kidneys, digestive system, heart, stomach, etc. will labor under the lack of lubrication and nutrition. Just like putting cooking oil in your car’s engine, it may run okay for a while but eventually,

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“I was extremely fit and strong, and made much of our food from scratch, yet my body was still nearly destroyed.  I took no vitamins, believing the lie that they only caused expensive urine.”  Sharon L Graham

What are you willing to sacrifice so that you can nourish your body with the most comprehensive and high quality supplements?

…my people are destroyed from lack of knowledge (Hosea 4:6; NIV)

I did long distance cycling.  I took several aerobic classes each week.  I ran (jogged) six days a week.  In the winter months I did cross country skiing as well as down hill skiing.  I was fit and strong.  I also enjoyed preparing much of the food we ate from scratch.  I made our own yogurt, bread, and granola.  I made our own pasta sauce from the tomatoes we grew in our garden.  I even made our ketchup.  I picked ample berries and other fruits in the summer months and froze them to use all winter long.  I also dried various fruits and vegetables in a food dehydrator and enjoyed those in the winter months.

Yet, in spite of all the good things I was doing, I still began developing some very bizarre physical symptoms.  My hip and knee joints began screaming at me that they no longer wanted to run.  It was harder and harder to get out of bed each morning with stiffness and soreness becoming a constant companion.  Common items such as detergents and cleaning products brought headaches, a burning, sore throat, and even mental confusion.  My once strong and fit body was having a revolt.

Many of you know much of my story.  For those of you who aren’t familiar with what happened, I’ll offer the condensed version.  We now know that my immune system was being severely damaged from the chemicals in our fairly new home as well as from a large, new church building of which we frequented often.  We also know that various chemical exposures while working as a nurse played into this growing nightmare as well.

My body literally became allergic to most all things in the environment.  It saw common, everyday items such as plastic, synthetic fibers, perfumes, and detergents as “foreign” substances and as something it must attack.  That caused destruction at the cellular level in my body which in turn brought major inflammation, infection, and destruction.

In spite of my healthy diet and rigorous exercise, my body still succumbed.  The training I had as nurse still echoed in my head saying that vitamins only caused expensive urine.  That was nearly twenty five years ago and I’ve learned a “tad” from that journey.  Thankfully, and to God be the glory, my body has been restored.  Among the many things God used during the restoration process was a number of vitamins and supplements.

The basic unit of the body is the cell.  Life begins in the cell.  If the cells are unhealthy, when they multiply, forming other cells, those cells will also be unhealthy.  (Like begets like.)  It’s impossible for the body to heal when the basic cellular unit is being harmed or lacking the nutrients it needs to multiply healthy cells.  After trying many, many supplements and spending thousands of dollars, I began to grasp this concept.  It was only after providing my cells with the nutrients they needed, and ridding my body of the things causing destruction, that my body could heal.  For me, supplements are a matter of life and death.  I choose LIFE!

Prayer Power
Father, I pray that my words will inspire and educate.  I pray against anyone feeling condemnation or guilt.  May our readers be empowered with this information.

Link of the Day
Bias Against Natural Products

Blessings on you as you seek Him for why you should take supplements.

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“When it comes to buying dietary supplements, you essentially have two choices: buy according to price, or buy according to quality. If you buy the cheapest supplement, you’ll end up with an inferior product that may not improve your health. Therefore buying the cheapest is a waste of your money. In fact, the lowest-price products may contain impurities or additives that could actually make you worse.”  Connecticut Center for Health

What things that you routinely use do you purchase according to price?  What things according to quality?

Those who cheat with dishonest weights and measures are detestable to the LORD your God.  (Deut. 25:16; NLT)

Yesterday, we left off by saying that there was one more major aspect of vitamins and minerals that contributes greatly to the rampant confusion and continued stream of mis-information, i.e., quality.  The following discussion of this major issue leans heavily on the article written by my friend Richard Goutal.

You may have selected the right kind of vitamin and mineral product only to end up with something quite unexpected.  Unfortunately, just choosing from the shelf can be like spinning the wheel of fortune.

Over the last 20 years, thousands of supplements have become available in stores and on the Internet.  And the quality has not been consistent nor reliable.  In 2004, for example, Consumer Lab analyzed 11 echinacea products — echinacea is an herbal supplement many believe helps to reduce colds.  Of the 11 samples, five failed.  They either had unacceptable levels of lead in the supplement, or they had lower amounts of the echinacea ingredient than was claimed on the label.  Incidentally, one of the failed products was marketed by a well-known and respected, healthy foods grocery store.

The Consumer Lab results are not especially surprising when you know that the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center had examined 59 echinacea products that they purchased locally just two years previously.  They found that NOT ONE sample matched the promise on the label.  Six had no evidence of echinacea in the product at all!

In 2004, Consumer Lab looked at 1000 supplements of different kinds.  25% simply did not contain what the label claimed!  In addition, many had heavy metals or pesticide residue — hardly what one expects in a health supplement.

And, very relevant to the headlines in the last few years, is the surprising and often deliberate, addition of hidden ingredients, especially in diet products or products designed for athletes.

More specific to the topic of our series, in 2007 Consumer Lab looked at 39 vitamin and mineral products.  Once again a substantial number of products were not reliable.

Today’s link give some guidelines that consumers should follow as they decide where and what supplement products to purchase.  There are a few companies out there that stress quality procedures that meet or exceed the Good Manufacturing Practices (GMPs).  With a little effort, you can learn who they are.  You just need to learn to ask questions and expect reasonable answers.

But you must also be willing to pay more for those supplements than you would at the local discount store.  In fact, it is rare that you will find the kind of quality you want in any retail store.  In many of the cheaper brands, the major cost component of the product is the packaging.  And it is not stretching the truth too much to suggest that the packaging would be more nutritious than is the contents.

Well, that about wraps it up for our look at vitamins and minerals.  Feel free to contact us if you have any questions about anything we’ve written here.

Prayer Power
Father, none of us like to get “taken” when we make a purchase.  We ask that You pour out Your gift of discernment into each and every one of us so that we can not be duped into exchanging our hard-earned finances for valueless junk.

Link of the Day
What You Need to Know When Buying Nutritional Supplements

Blessings on you as you begin the research necessary to be a wise steward.

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“Vitamin C had a number of factors working against it — sometimes the results of these studies were negative because the researchers doing the studies designed them to fail in order to protect pharmaceutical-based medicine.”  Dr. Russell Blaylock

When given two completely different conclusions both from allegedly reputable and credible sources, how do you decide who to believe?

A bribe seems to work like magic for those who give it; they succeed in all they do. (Prov. 17:8; NLT)

Yesterday’s DG addressed the Vitamin C “impostor” ascorbic acid. Impostor is a strong accusation, but let the following information from Judith DeCava’s book titled The Real Truth about Vitamins and Anti-Oxidants, adjudicate your own conclusion.

–Synthetic and fractinated ascorbic acid has been shown by modern studies to have no effect on pneumonia while whole Vitamin C, used years ago, demonstrated remarkable effects.
–Synthetic and fractinated ascorbic acid alone works like an antihistamine but does not prevent “colds” while whole Vitamin C does not have this drug-like effect.
–Synthetic and fractinated ascorbic acid alone has no effect on cancer prevention while 33 studies show a reduction in cancer risk when taking at least 60 mg of whole Vitamin C in food.
–Synthetic and fractinated ascorbic acid requires hundreds of milligrams to do what a few milligrams of whole Vitamin C in real food can do.
–Synthetic and fractinated ascorbic acid alone has numerous adverse effects while whole Vitamin C does not have any of those adverse effects.

When you begin to put this all together, and if you assume that our bodies don’t readily absorb synthetic impostors or fractions of the whole for any vitamin or mineral, it begins to suggest a very plausible explanation for the mixed results often seen from one study to the next that are all so widely publicized by the media. Consider the possibility that one study uses the real thing and the other study uses the “impostor” and yields completely different results. Then push this possibility one step further and ask yourself why anyone would waste their time and money doing a study revolving around an impostor — unless they were trying to make a point? Then ask yourself if they are really spending their money…or somebody else’s? I’ll leave it at that.

Today’s link looks at the next vital step in the chain of mis-information. On Monday, I quoted Neil Levin to say, “Poor scientific work done by physicians and scientists — plus a lack of proper filters in journalism’s coverage of science — is contributing to misleading and contradictory dietary supplement health information seen by consumers, leading to them making poor health choices.”  I believe that the quote may take on new meaning as you have read yesterday and today’s DG. So I have included Levin’s article as the Link of the Day.

Tomorrow, we’ll look at one more aspect that contributes greatly to the rampant confusion and continued stream of mis-information, i.e., quality.

Prayer Power
Father, only You can show us the truth. We humbly as You for that guidance as the “noisy conflict” increases in intensity.

Link of the Day
Land of Confusion: How Poor Science and Misleading Media Coverage Create Public Confusion About How Dietary Supplements Affect Health

Blessings on you as you ask yourself some hard questions about who to believe.

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“Frequently, it is stated in the literature that vitamins appear in the urine a short time following administration. These are synthetic vitamins and the body is actively ridding itself of these foreign substances. Further, it has been shown that the body selectively absorbs whole vitamin complexes in preference to the synthetic forms.”  Ron Carston

When is the last time you took Vitamin C for a cold?  What was the result?

But true wisdom and power are with God; counsel and understanding are his.  (Job 12:13; NLT)

Yesterday’s DG concluded with a promise to focus on a specific vitamin as a way of making the point that there is a huge difference in vitamins.  I’m choosing Vitamin C as the example.  After all, everybody knows how fantastic Vitamin C is for you.

First a little history of Vitamin C taken from the article by Richard Goutal.  In 1747, surgeon John Lind proved with a controlled experiment that citrus fruit in sailors’ diets prevented scurvy–a major killer of sailors during those times.  By 1933, Hungarian Albert Szent-Gyogyi isolated the property in plants believed to be that which prevented scurvy, and labeled it ascorbic acid.  Szent-Gyogyi received a Nobel prize for this in 1937.  The following year, other scientists devised ways to synthesize the molecule.  Hoffmann-LaRoche became the first Big Pharma company to mass produce synthetic “Vitamin C.”

Ironically, by the time Szent-Gyogyi received the nobel Prize, he was already convinced that ascorbic acid alone was not the only factor in preventing scurvy; he had identified something he called Vitamin P (P Factors) which he said must be provided with the ascorbic acid.  However, the manufacture of synthetic “Vitamin C” was well underway causing the two terms to be considered synonyms.

Here is an overview of the manufacturing process for ascorbic acid which actually requires dozens of steps.  First, plain corn syrup is converted into d-sorbitol.  At that point, acetone–the solvent used in many commercial cleaning processes, is added.  This is then refined into a powder which is sold as Vitamin C.

Contrast that with “whole vitamins.”  Vitamins found in foods are an integral part of a nutritive mixture of a compound which is exquisitely interlaced and fused with the whole food itself.  Although considered a single substance, each vitamin in food is actually a group of chemically related compounds.  Food-based vitamins are commonly referred to as “whole” or complete vitamins.  In short, a whole vitamin is a complete complex of organic, living molecules

So if you were able to remove a portion of that complex, you would have a result known as a fractionated, or separated, substance.  You cannot do that without denaturing or killing the complex.  So when a manufacturer wants to obtain a fractionated single part of the whole complex, he just synthesizes it resulting in a chemical of little or no value to living cells.

Turns out that ascorbic acid is only part of the natural Vitamin C complex.  Other parts are P-Factors (Szent-Gyogyi’s Vitamin P), K-Factors, J-Factors, and bioflavonoids.  Therefore, synthetic, fractionated ascorbic acid is devoid of all its synergists, i.e., factors which cooperatively work together to enable biochemical operation.

Why is it that most so-called Vitamin C consists only of ascorbic acid?  Because it is relatively simple to make and therefore inexpensive to manufacture.  I’m running out of room again today, but keep in mind that what I’ve said about ascorbic acid (aka Vitamin C) also applies to virtually every other synthetic vitamin on the market.    Hopefully you’re beginning to catch a glimpse of the difference between the inexpensive vitamins and the more costly whole food vitamins.

To be continued.

Prayer Power
Father, please forgive us as we sometimes believe we really do have a way to reproduce what You have created in our chemistry labs.  But it turns out that we can never have a complete understanding of what we’re doing and our valiant efforts virtually always result in unexpected and sometimes devastating consequences.

Link of the Day
The Truth About Vitamins

Blessings on you as you consider the difference between synthetic vitamins and food-based vitamins.

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“Poor scientific work done by physicians and scientists — plus a lack of proper filters in journalism’s coverage of science — is contributing to misleading and contradictory dietary supplement health information seen by consumers, leading to them making poor health choices.”  Neil Levin

With all the controversy regarding the use of vitamins, who do you believe and why?

Lord, your discipline is good, for it leads to life and health. You have restored my health and have allowed me to live!  (Isa. 38:16; NLT)

There is hardly a week go by that the media doesn’t ballyhoo a new alleged research study that touts the findings that vitamins are a waste of money.  Then it seems as if after just a few days here comes a study that shows just the opposite.  How can this be?  Talk about confusing.  How can two highly qualified researchers come up with such contradictory results?

I’m certainly not a researcher, and I may be overstepping my bounds here, but one very real possibility for such dissonance might just be semantical at it’s roots.  It other words, it all depends on what the definition of a vitamin is.  Oh come now…how could there be disagreement over a term that has been around as long as vitamin?

Well, I had the good fortune to come across a brilliant article by a friend of mine, Richard Goutal.  Richard points out that vitamins are “complex organic molecules.”  They are a category of nutrients required for the ongoing functionality of cells including human cells.  They are the raw materials for the biochemical reactions that allow the cells to do their work.  When all of the cells are working right, your organs work right.  When your organs work right, you are healthy.

So, when you have all of the vitamins and other nutrients that you need, your cells function properly.  Functioning cells mean healthy organs; healthy organs mean healthy bodies.  Most of these raw materials come from food because our bodies are able to manufacture some of these vitamins, if…and a big if here…if the foods the body ingests have the needed raw materials in them in the first place.

In our modern age of industrial agriculture, it seems that quality of food has been sacrificed for quantity.  Foods are picked green, shipped for weeks at a time, than gassed or radiated to make them appear ripe and nutritious, but the diminishing nutrition that was in the soil was left on the vine due to the green harvesting.  Even the American Medical Association came out a couple of years ago and reversed their long standing position against the need for supplements.  They now admit that the nutrient value of our food supply has diminished so drastically that it is virtually impossible to get all the nutrients one needs from food alone.

So, if more and more are admitting the need to supplement, then the issue comes back around to the one I alluded to earlier  What is a vitamin, anyway?  It turns out that there are more than 10 known vitamins and over 14 minerals which the body must get from food.  What’s the difference between some of those lower cost “vitamins” that only require 1 pill a day and some of the higher priced versions that advocate 4-6 pills a day.  Is there really a difference that justifies the huge difference in cost?

This is getting a little long, so I’m going to stop here and pick it up again on Wednesday.  To simplify things, I’m going to focus on just one vitamin, i.e., Vitamin C.  I’ll leave it to you to extrapolate some of the story I’m going to tell to the other 9 vitamins required by our bodies.

Prayer Power
Father, the foods you designed for us to eat were perfect in every way in their ability to deliver the life-sustaining nutrients that our bodies need for health and well-being.  However, science has come along with “a better idea” for which we are just now beginning to realize have some unsuspected consequences.  Grant us the wisdom to sort through all the conflicting information to arrive at what is truth for us.

Link of the day
Are Vitamins BAD for You?

Blessings on you as you ponder the value of supplements to your health.

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“We’re beginning now to understand things that we know in our hearts were true but could not measure. As we get better at understanding how little we know about the body, we begin to realize that the next big frontier, in medicine, is energy medicine. It’s not the mechanistic parts of the joints moving. It’s not the chemistry of our bodies. It’s understanding for the first time, how energy influences how we feel.”  Dr. Mehmet Oz

How willing are you to look beyond the familiar for answers?  Do you have an example?

Trust in the LORD with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding.  (Prov. 3:5; NLT)

Well, this week-long look at stress was precipitated by my being home alone for a week, i.e., home alone means I’m without my wife.  If all goes according to plan, she will be returning home today — an event which I am truly looking forward to with great anticipation.  Thanks for all your prayers…I’m still living, albeit a little hungry.  (No one can cook like my incredible wife.)

Yesterday, we turned the corner and started looking at some stress management techniques which are widely accepted and recognized as having an effect on a person’s overall stress issues.  The problem with all those I mentioned yesterday is that they are all addressing one or more symptoms of stress rather than going down after the root cause of the stress.

The “one last stress management technique” I want to bring to your attention is from the genre known as energy medicine.  Most people have never heard of it as it is relatively “cutting edge.”  Energy medicine is both a complement to more traditional approaches to medical care, and it’s also a complete system for self-care and self-help.  It can address physical illnesses and emotional or mental disorders and can also promote high level wellness and peak performance.

Energy medicine is based on quantum physics, like Einstein’s famous equation, e = mc², which simply means to us lay people that everything is energy.  Absolutely everything is energy.  Energy medicine works at the cellular level to bring about change.  Lest you think this is all pretty “woo-woo,” some very prominent and public medical doctors, such as Dr. Mehmet Oz, author of the “New York Time’s” best seller You: The Owner’s Manual (and an almost weekly guest on the Oprah show), wrote in his book that the next big frontier in medicine is energy medicine.  So, this is something that you might want to explore further.

The particular implementation of energy medicine I have been working with for several years now is known as The Healing Codes.  I’ve written a number of articles that have been published by EzineArticles and several other Internet article directories.  For the complete list of articles published on EzineArticles, see http://thecoachingpair.com/THC_Articles.php.

So that about does it for stress.  Thank you for bearing with me all week.  I trust it hasn’t been too stressful.  My “week of stress” will officially end as soon as I see my lovely wife walk through the door at the airport.  I can hardly wait!  Have a great weekend.  I know I will!

Prayer Power
Father, thank You for the various methods you have provided for us to effectively manage the stress that comes with living in today’s world.  Guide each and every one of our readers to just the right few for them.

Link of the Day
The Healing Codes Institute

Blessings on you as you take proactive steps to reduce your “stress load” this weekend.  Schedule some R & R.

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“The time to relax is when you don’t have time for it.”  Unknown

What are some of the things you do when you’re feeling really stressed out?

Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.  (Phil. 4:6; NLT)

Stress…well, three days of telling you all the bad news about stress is about all I can take.  Time to turn our attention to some of the many stress management or stress reduction techniques that are available.  As you can surmise from the three days of bad news, these management techniques are something we all need to pay attention to.

There are several ways to cope with stress or to handle stress.  Let’s call them “stress busters”.  I’ve heard that term and kind of like that.  Stress busters are good, so I don’t want to disparage them in any way at all.

–The number one way to handle stress, for the Christian anyway, is clearly prayer and meditation.  And that’s not just religion talking.  It has been proven with study after study — the value of prayer and the value of meditation in healing, or otherwise dealing with stress.

–We need to guard the words that we speak, not just the words we speak about others, but the words that we speak about our self.  Many times — and I used to be very guilty about this — using a self deprecating style of humor.  But those words are very, very significant and very, very important.  We have to be very careful and guard the beliefs that we hold dear, and not just the beliefs about other things, but also the beliefs about ourself.  We have to watch the thoughts that we think.  It’s the beliefs that are generating the thoughts.  What is our self talk?  What is going on in our heads?  What are we thinking about ourselves, about our situation?

–As Sharon has written countless times in previous DGs, we have to monitor the food we eat.  We have to be very careful because many of the foods of our modern culture create stress in the organs of our bodies.

–And, of course, we have to be sure and use our bodies more.  We have to move it.  We have to get out there.  Exercise is a great stress buster.  It’s a great way to reduce stress.

–Clearly, practicing forgiveness is very important.  We need to be strengthening close relationships, friendships … relationships are vitally important.

–We must also practice gratitude.  A great exercise is to take a pencil and paper and purpose to write down  ten things that you’re grateful for.  Just do that day after day after day.  Start your day out with gratitude.

–Laugh more.  Sometimes it’s harder and harder to laugh, particularly as your stress level goes up.  So you have to purpose to put yourself into situations and find situations where you can laugh about things.

–You also must have a sense of purpose and destiny.  You have to recognize that there’s a reason for your being here.  And without understanding what that is, you’re just exacerbating your stress.

–You need to be doing work that you love to do. Don’t go to work every day and hate your job as most people in this country do.  That’s very difficult on your body.  That’s gong to create all the stress that we’ve been looking at.  So, I would just ask why are you doing that?  Why do you keep doing that?  Find something that you love and find a way to get paid for that.  So, do the work that you love to do.

Prayer Power
Father, I ask You to help me discern which of the above (or even other) stress busters would be the best for me to use and then give the grace to develop the discipline to use them.

Link of the Day
Stress Reduction, Stress Relievers

Blessings on you a you try a couple of the above stress busters and see how they work for you.

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“Stress is like an iceberg. We can see one-eighth of it above, but what about what’s below”  Unknown

When was the last time you got really angry or frightened just watching the news on TV?  How often does that happen?

As pressure and stress bear down on me, I find joy in your commands.  (Psa. 119:143; NLT)

We’ve grown up in a culture that totally buys into Louis Pasteur’s germ theory of disease which proposes that microorganisms (germs) are the cause of most diseases.  Wikipedia calls the germ theory the “cornerstone of of modern medicine.”  (Where would our pharmaceutical industry be today were it not for all those nasty little germs?)

Well, if germs are the culprit, how can something that is clearly not a germ, like stress, cause 90%-95% of all disease as credible experts such as CDC and Stanford Medical School assert? (see A Week of Stress.)  Here’s how stress works:

A stressful event creates a stress signal that’s picked up by your brain’s hypothalamus, which is responsible for controlling your body’s stress response, and therefore putting you into a chronic fight or flight mode.  Now maybe you’ve heard about fight or flight.  Let’s look at that just a moment.

Fight or flight is the body’s response to a perceived threat or danger.  During this reaction, certain hormones like adrenaline and cortisol are released, speeding up the heart rate, slowing digestion, shunting blood flow to major muscle groups, and changing various other autonomic nervous functions, giving the body a burst of energy and strength so that you can run away from the source of stress.

It was originally named for its ability to enable us to physically fight or run away when faced with danger.  But it’s now activated in situations where neither response is appropriate, like in traffic, or during a stressful day at work, or even by the telephone ringing late at night.  When the perceived threat is gone, systems are designed to return to normal function through our relaxation response.  But in our times of chronic stress this often doesn’t happen enough.

Chronic stress causes our organs to stop doing their life-sustaining work of digestion, absorption, excretion, and other functions.  Those functions provide for the growth of cells in the production of the body’s energy reserves.  Hence the stress response inhibits the growth process and further compromises the body’s survival by interfering with the generation of vital energy reserves.

Chronic stress stops the body’s natural DNA repairing system which can potentially lead to the development of cancers and other degenerative diseases.  Stress negatively affects the immune system making the body more susceptible to disease.  The body cannot metabolize fat efficiently or lose weight when under extreme stress.

All this is to suggest that germs are not the root issue.  Yes, they can and do exacerbate the problem, but the root cause is really the almost perpetual state of fight or flight that we live in today.  And when we’re not caught in the middle of a stress producing issue, we seem to go looking for our adrenalin “fix” by going to a tension-filled horror movie or even watching the nightly news.  It not only seems that we cannot escape stress, we seem to seek it.  What’s wrong with this picture?

Prayer Power
Father, help me to become more and more aware of those things that cause me stress and to then find ways to avoid or manage the effects of those stressors.

Link of the Day
Effects of Stress

Blessings on you as you process the deleterious effects of stress.

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