My Healing Story and Yours

Tags

arthritis, curing, healing, HIV/AIDS, Kebba Buckley Button, Natural pain solutions, stress, UpBeat Living

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

© 2015 Kebba Buckley Button, MS, OM.  World Rights Reserved.

Is there something in your body or your life that you wish were healed?  The spectrum of positive outcomes is limitless.  Understandings and many other tools can lead us to comfort, peace, release, and relief.

Recently, I went to my first meeting of a healing ministry at my church.  The church is a large Episcopal Church in Scottsdale, Arizona.  The lay healing ministers shared stories of healings they had experienced, and we discussed dimensions of healing.

I am deeply committed  to focusing on the positive, the Upbeat Living, the joy– all the Highest and Best.  Not the past or the pain.  However, that day I was moved to share with this loving group my most dramatic healing story: mine. Here it is.

When I was 26, one evening, I began to feel cranky.  I thought “[H]ow odd!  What’s going on?”  My body replied that the large joints of my hands were burning!  Realizing that startled me.  But I thought, “[N]o problem.  Mom has had mild arthritis since my age.  I’ll take aspirin, like she does.”  Oh no!  Within a year, I had a burning sensation from head to toe.  And there was a terrible stiffness with the pain; I could only walk slowly.  Over a few months, my joints began to enlarge and I could hardly use my hands.  In the cafeteria at work, I had to carry my lunch tray on my forearms, then hit it with my hip to slide it onto the lunch table.  On my worst day, it took me 2 hours to be able to turn over, reach the phone, call in to work, and finally sit up in bed.

The wish for healing has always been half of health.

                                        ~ Lucius Annaeus Seneca

I was terrified at the reality that, if this kept rapidly progressing, I would be needing a wheelchair by my mid-thirties, and there would be no marriage or children.  As an engineering manager, I went at potential solutions like a top-priority vital project, with a major passion. Already a dancer, meditator, and yoga practitioner, I learned the latest on nutrition and supplements, controlled my diet, and took up oriental energy healing, primarily Jin Shin Jyutsu.  I learned ChiKung (Chinese yoga).  I learned to muscle-test for supplements and other helps.  I learned there are many approaches other than medication, to beat a painful condition.

When I was 33, I was at a party, and an acquaintance was talking about her arthritis as though she had married it.  She was obsessed with it, in love with it.  But that’s another column.  I heard myself say to her, “[W]ell, when I had horrible crippling arthritis, I found several things really helped…”  From there, I have no memory of what I shared with her, because I was so shocked to hear myself speak of my hellish condition in the past tense.  It had finished leaving sometime over the previous few months!  I learned that just because you have a condition doesn’t mean it has to be progressive.  Just because you have a diagnosis doesn’t mean you have to keep it.  Later, as my joints actually healed and shrank, I learned that just because you have organic body damage, it doesn’t mean it can’t reverse.  These were huge revelations to me.  Now, at 63, most days, I have no pain of any kind whatsoever.  And people take me for much younger; my health age is younger than I am.

Photo by Microsoft

The opportunity to experience that crippling condition was a transformative gift in my life.  I became so fascinated with natural pain solutions and healing possibilities that I left engineering and morphed into an energy- and spiritual healer.  I began giving stress management trainings.  I became an ordained minister, a spiritual teacher and an award-winning author.

In the 1980’s, the AIDS epidemic hit Phoenix.  I volunteered at the Malta Center, a community healing organization funded by a Catholic charity.  We served HIV/AIDS patients and their loved ones, without regard to their income. We comforted and listened. We helped the clients organize the practical help they needed.  We had Red Cross classes on understanding HIV/AIDS.  We had funeral planning workshops.  We had a lot of funerals.  I had extraordinary conversations with many people experiencing the embrace of AIDS, and with their families.  I heard a lot of angel stories.

I learned that I had friends who had been HIV-positive for 10 years, with no symptoms at all, even fatigue.  I learned that some AIDS patients got very close to the Divine in their last weeks.  I learned that some seemed to go into a state of Grace in their last weeks, in complete harmony with Life, the Universe, and God. Some said their lives were healed, and then they passed on.  They weren’t cured, but they were healed.  Today, the Clinton Initiative and other organizations stream pharmaceutical protocols to many countries, and HIV is not the frightening specter it once was.

Today, I serve people with any level of physical, mental, emotional, spiritual distress.  I offer holistic consulting, energy transformations and oriental energy therapy, nutritional consulting, muscle testing, intuitive assistance, and many specific stress-conquering methods and meditation techniques.  Do you want healing?  Let’s remember:

• There are many approaches other than medication, to beat horrible pain and other health conditions.
• Just because you have a diagnosis doesn’t mean it gets to rule your life.
• Just because you have a condition doesn’t mean it has to be progressive.
• Just because there was never a medical protocol before doesn’t mean there won’t be one soon, if you like medical protocols.
• Just because you’re not cured doesn’t mean you can’t be healed.

What body/mind/heart/spirit hurts do you have today?  Why wait to call and start your healing?  Living your life in positive power is truly Upbeat Living!

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Energy – Peace – Meditation

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• If you enjoy this post, please click “like” in the FB widget in the right hand column. You’ll have our undying gratitude plus a huge rise in your Good Karma! Due to a recent FB change, our “likes” look low.  Thanks for your help!
• Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert and has a natural healing practice.  She is also an ordained minister. She is the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br), plus the 2013 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition(http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc ). Her newest book is Sacred Meditation: Embracing the Divine, available through her office.  Just email SacredMeditation@kebba.com. 
• For an appointment or to ask Kebba to speak for your group: call 480-250-1177 or email bookings@kebba.com .

Fatigue Stress Secret: Jazz Up Your Joy Juice

Tags

DHEA, fatigue, Fatigue Stress, Feeling energized, In-joy-meant, Kebba Buckley Button, meditation, stress, Stress Management, Trade stress for energy, UpBeat Living

© 2015  Kebba Buckley Button, MS, OM.  World Rights Reserved.

iStockPhoto

A lot of people have Fatigue Stress: their fatigue is keeping them from doing what they want or as much as they want.  This is the biggest challenge my clients deal with.  I teach a system of re-energizing, helping people develop Upbeat Living, for increasingly responding differently  to stress and actually building a whole new level of energy.

Today I’m focusing on the biggest secret to fighting fatigue: you can pump up your own master hormone, dehydroepiandrosterone, usually known simply as DHEA.  If you have heard that you can buy DHEA as a sports supplement, STOP!  Unless your doctor has prescribed it, taking DHEA as a supplement will cause your body to stop making it!  So the supplement as shortcut gives you no benefit.  Here’s why you want more DHEA and how to get it.

Why you want more DHEA.  This is the master hormone, the precursor to estrogen, androgens, and basically all the hormone-related production in your body.  It’s in your bloodstream and can be measured in nanograms per decaliter.  But you don’t need to measure it to get your body to make more.  DHEA gives you more strength, more vitality, less sensitivity to pain (weaker people are more sensitive to pain), more zeal, and basically more pzazz.  You’ll be able to golf more holes and take longer hikes, even spend more and better tango time with your beloved.  DHEA optimizes everything in your physical body!

How to get more DHEA free and fast.  Again, nix the supplement route!  DHEA is naturally made by your body, quickly, when you are in contact with nature and when you do things that feel great and pull up your passion.  Could it be this easy?  Yes!  Let’s just call it your Joy Juice.  Your DHEA zooms in 20 minutes when you:

• Do things outside.
• Walk barefoot on natural surfaces. Concrete counts, being chopped pressed stone.
• Exercise.
• Meditate.
• Pray or participate in a religious service, if you are a spiritual person.
• Sing.
• Make love with your beloved.
• Laugh.
• Do anything that thrills you or gives you joy, even watching comedy performances.

 

We are truly in-joy-meant!  So get out there and enjoy your life!  Sing in the shower, dance like no one is watching, and spend a lot of time with your honey.  Notice your zip and zeal zooming, and everything getting easier and more enjoyable. Soon you’ll beat your Fatigue Stress for good, by trading in your stress for energy.  Now that’s Upbeat Living!

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Energy – Peace – Meditation

 

 

 

 

 

 

Want to know more?  Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert and award-winning author.  She also is an ordained minister and has a natural healing practice. Among her books are: Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br),and Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition(http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc ). Her newest book is Sacred Meditation: Embracing the Divine.  Both Sacred Meditation and Peace Within are available through her office.  Just email SacredMeditation@kebba.com.  

 

Why Your 2014 Business Goals Flopped and How to Prevent a Repeat

Tags

exhaustion, failure, goals, peace within, stress, success, your mission

© 2015  Kebba Buckley Button, MS, OM.  World Rights Reserved.

 

Looking Backwards Through 2014

 

 

For several days, we’ve been talking about New Year’s Resolutions. Those are great, if you follow the wisdom in the last 3 articles. On New Year’s Day, I recommended you wait to make resolutions, and just gently transition into the New Year (http://wp.me/pw4HM-kV). On January 2d, I shared the biggest secret roadblock to resolutions working (http://wp.me/pw4HM-l0). Yesterday, I covered resolutions that will work powerfully for you, and why they will (http://wp.me/pw4HM-l5).

 

Today, it’s time to really look backward at our recent failures. Let’s see why some of your previous business goals FLOPPED. After all, why waste time pushing yourself toward a goal, if it’s a non-starter? So get out your paper and pen, your iPad or the like, your iPhone Notes app or something similar, and let’s rock!

 

This is the hard part: look backward through your 2014 and list your attempts that failed, starting with December, because it’s freshest in your mind. No one will see your notes, so be honest. You can burn them or delete them, right after we cover this, if you like. Now, what do those failures have in common? I’ll wait. Ready with your list? Then consider if the following examples ring familiar chimes.

 

 

Goals are simply tools to focus your energy in positive directions. These can be changed as your priorities change, new ones added, and others dropped.

 ~ Christopher Columbus

 

The biggest reason for your business goals flopping are that they were the wrong goals—for you. Striving to meet someone else’s goals is a major waste of time and energy. So you took up product sales with a company that has great products, great customer service online and by phone, and even a training system. But you stalled out after a few weeks, exhausted and fog-brained. Exhaustion is your biggest gift: it tells you you’ve been on the wrong track.

 

Selling product and a sales system involves many hundreds of interactions with people. Maintaining others’ interest in your team requires incredible amounts of energy. So whose idea was it for you to take up multilevel sales? Who are you trying to please, Uncle Louie, who said he really needed you on his team? But maybe you are a true introvert and you’re drained by sales meetings and hundreds of emails and calls trying to line people up and get those sales and maintain that team. Getting more and more tired and foggy is a sure sign you’re in the wrong business or wrong business structure. Look for something with a different structure, or a different role in supporting Uncle Louie, like doing all his bookkeeping, inventory, and scheduling. Louie comes back from those meetings all jazzed. He’s the extrovert and he’s the one suited to it.

 

Maybe you got yourself into medical school, and you hate the material and sick people, but you feel obligated to become a doctor and “make good money”. What about moving sideways into medical research, where it’s quiet, or into medical device design? Now set your financial goal for the year. Or maybe you’ve become an accountant, because your whole family are accountants, but you are going insane sitting at the keyboard all day. You can’t wait to go to group lunches, birthday happy hours, and professional conferences—and actually see some people! What about taking over the marketing for your family’s business, and going out to give lively and popular talks to different groups about healthy money management? A true extrovert will wither in a quiet environment. There’s no point in setting “audacious goals” for financial success when you really don’t even want to be there.

 

This pointer is for those of you who are people of faith. Maybe you’ve never really felt you were in your groove, professionally—yet. Maybe you’re not yet in your life’s mission? Maybe you haven’t yet heard your Call? I know a couple who were successful by others’ standards, when they realized they were called to devote their lives to furniture ministry. They heard the Call to sell almost everything they had and create a new nonprofit, collecting furniture for veterans moving into newly provided housing. They are one of the happiest couples I know. Ask yourself now if you have been hearing guidance to shift what you are doing. Pray for direction and clarity, and be open to what you may hear. It may not involve any dramatic changes like moving to a different continent. But being on track with your life’s mission will certainly bring you satisfaction and peace within.

 

So check in with yourself as you think backward through the last year. Do you need to dump some activities, goals, or Board positions you thought you “should” have? Do you need to downsize or rightsize or move sideways in some of your activities? Once you’ve corrected your compass bearings for this year, then it’s time to actually set your goals. And prevent a repeat of last year’s flops.  This year, I wish you the greatest joy, satisfaction, and success!

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Energy – Peace – Meditation

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert.  She also has a natural healing practice and is an ordained minister. She is the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br), plus the 2013 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition(http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc ). Her newest book is Sacred Meditation: Embracing the Divine, available through her office. Just email SacredMeditation@kebba.com.
• For an appointment or to ask Kebba to speak for your group: bookings@kebba.com .

 

Upbeat Living: Beat Acidosis to Beat Illness and Feel Great!

Tags

Acidosis, beating fatigue, breath, Eating, Eating right, energy, exhaustion, fatigue, Feeling energized, Health, pH balance, stress, Stress Management, tired, UpBeat Living

© 2014  Kebba Buckley Button, MS, OM.  World Rights Reserved.

Microsoft

The Upbeat Living philosophy is to encourage people to switch little habits that will lead to big results, to feel our best and enjoy life the most. And little changes often can help you have a lot more energy, plus feeling and looking younger!  Would you consider making one or two easy changes in your daily habits, if you could feel much better as a result?

Here are some points to ponder regarding a condition affecting many people and causing silently deteriorating health, yet which you can easily and inexpensively control. It’s called acidosis, meaning excess acid in the body’s fluids.  Stress, eating habits, lack of exercise, and too little sleep all contribute to this condition.  And dealing with stress, changing your eating habits, exercising, and sleeping more—these can all help correct the condition.

Relative acidity is measured on the pH, or potential hydrogen, scale that indicates hydrogen  ion concentration. The pH scale goes from 1 (extremely acidic) to 14 (extremely basic, or alkaline). The body operates best when its acid balance, or pH, is between 7.35 and 7.45, ideally at 7.4. Yet diet and stress tend to acidify the body’s fluids. More biochemical waste in the body can also lower pH, making the body more acidic.  To see some beautiful graphics of the pH scale, put “pH scale” in your search bar and enjoy.

While the condition is simple, the symptoms are many. A person with acidosis may experience frequent fatigue, allergies, bronchitis, colds and flu, foot fungus, acne, boils, eczema, age spots, arthritis, diarrhea and/or constipation. Effects less easy for the individual to see are serious internal processes, such as the inflammation of veins, arteries, and the muscle tissue of the heart. This creates cardiac system issues that result in elevated blood pressure, which in turn increases heart deterioration.

Fotolia

Acidosis also leads to premature aging via accelerating free-radical damage to cells. Cells are actually poisoned by inefficiently eliminated cell waste. An acidic pH prevents the proper storage and release of cellular energy, meaning that the body cannot respond fully to stress or infection.  This means you’re tired! Red blood cells clump together, which limits their oxygen-carrying capacity and leads to fatigue and weakness. Cancer cells thrive in lower-oxygen  (acidic) environments such as acidosis can create. Other mechanisms caused by acidosis may lead to pancreatic dysfunction, diabetes, weight gain, and osteoporosis.

The body has natural mechanisms for monitoring and controlling its acid-base balance. When plasma is too acidic, the respiratory system speeds breathing, and the kidneys can produce substances that turn the pH around. The body also uses intracellular absorption of hydrogen atoms by molecules of protein, phosphate, and carbonate in bone, thus raising the pH to less acidity.

So what can you do to help yourself beat acidosis? First, get litmus paper from your pharmacy and test your saliva. The litmus paper will turn color to show the acidity of your saliva. If your saliva’s pH is too low/acidic, re-assess your current stress, exercise (or lack thereof), sleep, and diet. Consider these dietary changes:

1. Stop drinking any sodas or sugared drinks, or any artificially sweetened products. Switch to juices or filtered water.
2. Stop eating sugared desserts and foods made mainly with white flour and yeast, such as pizza and bagels.
3. Eat dark-green leafy salads, other green vegetables (broccoli, cabbage, celery, parsley), and root vegetables (carrots, yams, daikon radish).
4. Eat fruits, especially fresh fruits, such as apples, apricots, bananas, cantaloupe, dates, figs, grapefruit, peaches, and grapes. For dried fruit, try raisins.
5. Eat rice and buckwheat, almonds, dairy products, and eggs.

Try changing your diet for a week, and add exercise and sleep more. Check your pH again. Notice if these changes make you more relaxed, clear-minded, and vital. If so, you are making a major investment in your long-term health. Why not feel your best, starting now?  That’s Upbeat Living!

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● Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert.  She is the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br), plus the 2013 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc).  She also has a natural healing practice and is an ordained minister.

● Liked this article?  You can buy Kebba’s books:  just click the links!

• Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br). 
• Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (Second Edition) (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc)             

● Enjoyed this post?  Please click “like” in the FB widget in the right hand column!  You’ll have our undying gratitude plus a huge rise in your Good Karma.

● Please comment!

● Get these articles by email– just click the Subscribe Free option in the right column.

● Reach the writer at kebba@kebba.com .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Upbeat Living: Your Mind’s Eye

Tags

blood pressure, energy, Ernest Holmes, exhaustion, fatigue, heat, Kebba Buckley Button, mind-body, Negativity, nervous system, positive thoughts, positivity, stress, Summer, UpBeat Living

© 2014 Kebba Buckley Button.  World Rights Reserved.

 

iStockPhoto.com

Whatever your belief system, it is crucial to hold the most positive thoughts and images in your mind.  Ernest Holmes (1887-1960), the founder of Science of Mind, described “The Law of Mental Equivalents.”  He said, basically, that what you hold in consciousness is what you will get in your reality.  This has been proven true in a number of fields, as the brain and body take instruction from the thoughts.

 

Do you ever wonder why some people always cheerfully achieve success, while others are down in mood and fail at many doorsteps of opportunity?  Success is very much in your mind.  Your thoughts are acted out by your nervous system.

 

Try this experiment.  Find a 10-pound object or a gallon bottle of liquid, and lift it before and after you say these phrases.  Ready?  Lift the object.  Notice how heavy or light it is for you at this moment.  Say 10 times, at any speed, “I am a weak and unworthy person.”  Your nervous system will take this literally.  Now pick up the object again.  Notice how much heavier it is?  Now reverse the effect.  Say 10 times, at any speed, “I am a vital, strong, valuable person.”  Pick up the object again.  Notice it has become lighter.

 

Affirm: I am a vital, strong, valuable person.

~ Kebba Buckley Button

 

Always remember that your brain and nervous system are listening to everything you say.  Consider the phenomenon that your brain and nervous system do not know the difference between a real situation of terrible conflict, like a nasty fight or an assault, and a portrayed situation, as in a TV show or movie.  When you are in a good mood, go to a movie theater and see any of the currently popular end-of-the human-race movies.  You know:  Machines are arising or attacking from space, and the situation is impossible.  Although not currently in theaters, Independence Day is a great example of this genre.

 

If you have a blood pressure monitor, take your blood pressure before and after you see this movie.  At the end of this movie, you will feel very stressed, your adrenaline will be rushing, and your blood pressure will be up.  You may feel hyped up or exhausted, fearful or cranky, and easily startled.  Leaving the venue, you may be driving “with a heavy foot.”

 

Your brain and nervous system thought they were in a real war.  If you really want to take in movies like this, but you want less of a stressful effect on yourself, try this.  Rent or download them, show them at home, and when you feel your stress building up, look at other objects in the room and think of puppies and babies.  Notice your whole body-mind system shifting when you shift your attention.

 

Do not get sucked into anyone’s negativity, on any subject! 

You will pay for it with fatigue and an unclear mind.

~ Kebba Buckley Button

 

Truly, you choose what stress and negativity you feed your mind and body.  Consider an apparently mundane example.  Today may be a really hot, humid summer day where you are.  It may be so hot that you would prefer to not to be out in that weather.  Your passion might be to zip efficiently from your air-conditioned home to your air-conditioned car to your air-conditioned office.  That’s a healthy strategy!  However, we all know people who, on this kind of day, must chant out loud, “Boy is it hot!  It is so sticky!  Aren’t you hot?  How can you wear that?  Aren’t you miserable?  It’s just miserable!

 

Chanting like that, the person will begin to feel hotter and hotter, because the brain is listening to every word they say.  And if you listen and/or repeat their comments, silently or to others, you will feel hotter also!  Do not dismiss this as “just psychological.”

 

The sensations are real, and you have a right to live the best and most comfortable life that you can construct for yourself.  That is the Upbeat Living philosophy.  So be ready with several cheerful replies to the heat-chanters, for when they start in.  The one I use most is (delivered in a light and cheery tone), “Yes!  You know, it’s almost like Phoenix in the summertime!”  Then I quickly leave the area so the chanter can’t argue.

 

Do not get sucked into anyone’s negativity, on any subject!  You will pay for the indulgence with fatigue and an unclear mind.  If you are a person of faith, remember God wants you to use your creativity to make the most of your life and your gifts.  God never wants you to be stalled out by negativity.

 

So do you want to live your best life now?  Great!  Then notice negative programming, make notes, and work toward creating the best brain, body, and lifestyle you can.  That’s real Upbeat Living, and it’s up to you to choose it!

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● Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert.  She is the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br), plus the 2013 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc).  She also has a natural healing practice and is an ordained minister.

● Liked this article?  You can buy Kebba’s books:  just click the links!

• Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br). 
• Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (Second Edition) (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc)             

● Enjoyed this post?  Please click “like” in the FB widget in the right hand column!  You’ll have our undying gratitude plus a huge rise in your Good Karma.

● Please comment!

● Get these articles by email– just click the Subscribe Free option in the right column.

● Reach the writer at kebba@kebba.com .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

UpBeat Living: Cooling Foods and Drinks for Hot Days (Not Always What You Think)

Tags

Effective living, energy, energy foods, exhausted, fatigue, Feeling energized, heat stress, stress, Stress Management, Summer stress

© 2014  Kebba Buckley Button, M.S., O.M.  World Rights Reserved.

 

Old Mission San Juan Capistrano
© 2014 Kebba Buckley Button, M.S., O.M. World Rights Reserved.

Is it blazing hot and really dry where you live?  Yet life can be beautiful in these conditions.  I want you to thrive all the time.  In the Summer heat, that can be challenging.  But you’ll be up for it if you’ve read all 3 of my summer thriving articles.  This is the third.

 

In the last 2 articles on dealing with the hottest Summer days, I covered :

• – Protecting your body and skin
• – Getting enough rest, and
• – How to strategize to have the most energy you can

 

In this article, I offer ideas on how to eat– and drink– cool to keep cool!  This is not always the cold foods you would think.  And it’s not always the sweet, icy, and alcoholic drinks you might think of, to cool you off.  Follow these three tips to switch what you swallow, to feel your best:

 

1.  Stay hydrated!  Drink filtered water, that is, water with the chlorine removed.  Do not pay for an expensive water-conversion system to alter the water molecules (which we’ll discuss in another article), without first removing the chlorine.  Chlorine is a poison to microorganisms (germs) which is the exact reason they put it in the public water supply.  Your body doesn’t need it, and it’s bad for you.

A simple table-top carbon-filter pitcher will filter out the chlorine, fluoride, and other bad-tasting elements of tap water.  You may find this water more refreshing if you keep it in the refrigerator.  You may also want to ask your local health food store about mineral drops to add to filtered water.  If your body is low on minerals, the drops added to your beverages will bring your stamina up the same day, or sooner.

Water is the most hydrating liquid you can drink.  If you hate plain water, try adding a little cherry juice concentrate, which will also give you a few carbs, potassium, and anti-inflammatory compounds.  If you’re hiking or working outside, you may enjoy half water and half organic apple juice, which again will provide a few carbs and a lot of potassium.

If you will be working or exercising outdoors a lot, do eat salty snacks!  They’ll make you thirsty and keep you from losing too much of your body’s moisture through sweat.  Check with your doctor about your ideal personal salt balance.

 

“Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.”

– Thomas A. Edison

 

 

2. Avoid sugary foods and drinks, and alcohol!  These will make you more thirsty and tired after the initial refreshing sensation.  Avoid all artificial sweeteners (which we’ll discuss in a future article), going for fruit juices and concentrates as flavors.  Anything with sugar, alcohol, or caffeine will give you a little boost, then put the squeeze on your kidneys.  Alcohol is, for some purposes, a super sugar.  So limit that, plus all refined sugars and caffeine, when you’re hot.  The decaf coffee drinks still are loaded with antioxidants, so you still will get a boost, but a healthy one.

 

3. Set your goal to get the most energy out of whatever you swallow.  Think of it this way: part of the art of eating well and healthfully in the hottest times of summer is having quick food to grab.  Because you and your family will often come home tired on blasting hot days, you’ll be grateful to yourself for keeping healthy cool foods ready to eat.  Some of these could be:  celery sticks, jicama sticks, cucumber slices, cherry tomatoes, cherries, berries, grapes, bananas, pineapple chunks, dates, peaches, nectarines, yogurts, roasted chicken (available at your grocery store), pan-broiled salmon (you made it last night and chilled it), hard-boiled eggs, boiled organic potato chunks, cans of organic beans or chick peas, and raw almonds or cashews.

You might call this collection, “the fastest slow food you can get”.  Your grocery store now has trays of veggies, trays of fruits, prepared chicken, and even heat-and-eat ribs.  There are salads ready-to-go and salad kits in bags. Green salad is your friend, and as light greens go, Romaine lettuce is the most energizing.  It’s the lettuce in every “Caesar Salad”, prepared or in a kit.  As dark greens go, kale is the star of the nutritional show. Have a large dark green salad for dinner almost every night, with pieces of potato, avocado, and chicken.  Topped with your favorite dressing, it’s a quick and restorative meal.  You’ll feel alert and clear-minded all evening, and then you’ll sleep well.

Can you have great days and wonderful relationships in the desert summer season?  Absolutely, you can.  Eat well for the weather, follow the other tips in this series, and you will sail triumphantly through the hot season!

________________________________________________________________

● Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert and the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br), plus the 2013 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc).  She also has a natural healing practice and is an ordained minister.

● Liked this article?  You can buy Kebba’s books:  just click the links!

• Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br). 
• Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (Second Edition) (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc)             

● Enjoyed this post?  Please click “like” in the FB widget in the right hand column!  You’ll have our undying gratitude plus a huge rise in your Good Karma.

● Please comment!

● Get these articles by email– just click the Subscribe Free option in the right column.

● Reach the writer at kebba@kebba.com .

 

 

UpBeat Living: Tips for Hot Summer Thriving

Tags

Eating, Effective living, energy, energy foods, exhausted, fatigue, Feeling energized, heat, heat stress, heat stress tips, hot days, Kebba, stress, summer stress tips, The life you want

© 2014  Kebba Buckley Button, M.S., O.M.  World Rights Reserved.

Yikes!  It hit 110 degrees today in Phoenix!  Summer is our weather-stress season, like winter is in cooler areas.  In the Summer heat where you live, have you felt great today?  Or were you hot, tired, and fog-brained?  Maybe even a little sick?  So could you use some expert heat-stress tips?

Feeling good, being well, and being productive, can be challenging in weather like this.  But you can feel great and thrive during even our desert summers, if you take these tips to heart:

1.  Get out of the heat. Do get 15 minutes of sun on your hands and face each day, for your body to produce enough Vitamin D. But you can get that while driving to an errand. The rest of the time, get out of the sun or wear sunscreen and sleeves.  And don’t stop to think in the full sun!  Adjust that grocery list before you go out the front door!

If you love to be outside, you can now buy special sun-blocking clothes from travel companies. You can get shirts designed to provide SPF 50 or higher, plus broad-brimmed hats with mesh-side crowns for through-flow of air. More difficult to find is the safari hat with its own built-in fan, but they are great for hiking. Cooling neck scarves are now widely available. Soak them to activate the gel inside, and store them in the frij between wearings.  Water bottles, with a battery-operated personal fan attached, are amusing and do actually help you keep cooler.

If you get too much heat, you’ll generally know it. But if people tell you your face is bright red, this is not good.  If your skin is totally dry, or if you feel nauseated or are vomiting, or if you feel totally drained and confused, these are clues you have heat exhaustion or heat stroke. Get to a cool, dim place, put a cool, damp cloth on your forehead, and try to drink water (with the chlorine filtered out).  Remember:

Only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the noonday sun.

~ Rudyard Kipling

2.  Protect your skin. If you don’t want to cover it, at least wear some sunscreen. There are new generations of sunscreen in clear or opaque forms, or colored to function as makeup foundation. Many moisturizers and makeup products contain SPF 15 or higher for day use. Powdered mineral-based foundation makeups provide non-chemical SPF 15. If you’re wild to have tan skin, and you weren’t born with it, check out spray tanning or tanning moisturizers. Be aware that these do not provide sun protection, however, and skin cancer is a concern.  And remember to drink water to hydrate your skin. Support your skin by also eating foods that can help it stay moist and young-looking: fresh fruits, avocados, and dark greens like kale and baby romaine.  Get the organic versions if you can, and you’ll have more energy.

3.  Use common sense. Rest if you need to. Plan extra time to get enough sleep every day.  Nap if you need to.  And focus on thriving, throughout the month.

Next time: Keeping your energy up when it’s over 100!

________________________________________________________________

● Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert and the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br), plus the 2013 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc).  She also has a natural healing practice and is an ordained minister.

● Liked this article?  You can buy Kebba’s books:  just click the links!

• Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br). 
• Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (Second Edition) (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc)             

● Enjoyed this post?  Please click “like” in the FB widget in the right hand column!  You’ll have our undying gratitude plus a huge rise in your Good Karma.

● Please comment!

● Get these articles by email– just click the Subscribe Free option in the right column.

● Reach the writer at kebba@kebba.com .

UpBeat Living: Go Soak– 8 Top Tips!

Tags

detox, exhaustion, fatigue, soak, stress, UpBeat Living

 © 2014 Kebba Buckley Button.  World Rights Reserved.

Fotolia

When you were a kid, did you ever hear someone tell an angry kid, “[O]h, go soak your head!”  That always sounded to me like a suggestion to “go cool off”, to someone who was acting “hot headed”.  Another one was, “[O]h, go jump in a lake!”  The idea of getting soaked, as an attitude adjustment, was popular.

Who knew it would turn out that soaking could be good for you?  Yes!  It turns out that hot soaks not only feel good, but they can detox you, soothe your moods, and relieve your stress, aches and pains.  Here are 8 top tips for an ideal soak:

1. Clean your bathtub with something nontoxic and rinse, before filling it.
2. Put on some soft music and light some candles.
3. Fill the tub with water at your “ahhhhh” temperature, which might be 103 degrees.  Use a candy thermometer to tell you the temperature, once you have it perfect.  Then you can target that temperature for your next soak.
4. Use 1-4 cups of Epsom Salts (magnesium salts).  These restore the mineral balance in your skin and muscles, plus pulling out the toxins, so you literally feel better.
5. If you have the dry, itchy skin of winter, don’t use perfumed bubble bath.  For annoyingly itchy skin, add colloidal oatmeal (in packets from major drugstores-ask the pharmacist
6. Set a timer for 20 minutes, and stay in at least that long, to give the muscles and Epsom Salts time to commune.
7. If you love soaking, read while you soak, but only paper magazines and books.  You can even buy a special shelf to put across the tub, to hold your wine or tea and your reading material.  Journaling can be great, too, but again, no phones or electronics, all of which hate soaking.
8. You can keep running hot water in, and cool water out, and just keep soaking until about the 40-minute mark.  Your skin will tell you if you have soaked too long.

So try weekly soaks to melt away your stress, and soon you’ll be back in your upbeat living!

——————

● Kebba Buckley Button is the author of the 2013 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (Second Edition).   Keep this book with you constantly, to quickly recharge your Peace Within, with quotes, photos, and poems that take you directly there!  Kebba is a corporate stress management trainer, and she also has a holistic healing practice.

● Liked this blog?  Why not buy Kebba’s books?  Just click the links!

• Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (Second Edition)( http://perfectboundmarketing.gostorego.com/authors/kebba-buckley-button.html)
• Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br). ● Enjoyed this post?  Please click “like” in the FB widget in the right hand column!  You’ll have our undying gratitude plus a huge rise in your Good Karma.

● Your comments are welcome!

● Reach the writer at kebba@kebba.com .

UpBeat Living: Coping With AAAGH!

Tags

Dealing with stress, energy, exhaustion, Gratitude, inner peace, peace within, stress, Stress Management

 © 2013 Kebba Buckley Button.  World Rights Reserved.

Sometimes, you just have One of Those Days, right?  This morning, I had an appointment, then needed to prepare handouts and look great for a professional group meeting.  I felt pushed to get everything together on time, but by dropping the manicure, I did make the meeting on time with all my bits and pieces.  The meeting took surprising turns, yet, there was a lot of interest in my upcoming classes.  Someone even registered right away.  Toward the end of the meeting, my phone signaled silently that my neighbors were ready for me to come by; I took the call, dashing out of the meeting room to start talking.  I told them I could come by in about 45 minutes.  I gave thanks repeatedly, for the goodness of the meeting, and for the new registrant, all the way home.  The repetition of the Thank You was very calming.

Photo by Fotolia

At home, I changed into jeans and went to help the neighbors move.  They gifted me with a carload of garden pots and décor.  I was exhausted from lifting and carrying.  Heading back to my door, I saw the plumbing van.  Within a half hour, I was in full swing as Immediate Past President of the HOA, negotiating settlement of a sewer overflow issue, hiring remediation, planning a hotel for the resident, signing a contract.  I called my husband and asked if, by chance, he would like to go out for dinner?  I was too exhausted for stand and cook—although  I love my own cooking—and I still had writing to do in the evening.  We had a lovely quick dinner nearby, and we toasted to Us with margaritas.

Whew!  So when you have a really full day, loaded with changes, what can you do to manage your stress and not just SCREAM?

1.  Actually, screaming would be good, if you had a pillow and a bathroom to retreat to.  You can actually scream into a pillow and discharge a lot of stress.  Unless someone hears you.  They worry!
2. Keep alert for things you can drop.  I dropped the manicure and just quickly filed my nail tips.  That bought me 40 minutes that I dearly needed.
3. Have a long, slow exhale to the end of your breath.  Imagine any negative rolling right out of you, with your breath.  Then take several slow breaths.  This will shift your metabolism to alkaline, due to the new balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide, relaxing you within 60 seconds.  Cool, huh?
4. Wherever you are, roll those shoulders in a stretching movement, in any direction.  Notice the warmth in your feet?
5. If some of your stress is FEAR of something, gently massage your forefinger.  Notice how your fears seem less urgent.

Do any of these things, and you can beat that sensation of “crazy” on a busy day with a lot of changes.  And scream privately!  It helps.

———————————————————–

● If you enjoy this post, please click “like” in the FB widget in the right hand column.  You’ll have our undying gratitude plus a huge rise in your Good Karma.

 

● Kebba Buckley Button is a Master’s Degree scientist, a minister, and the award-winning author of  the 2012 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (http://tinyurl.com/abd47jr), and also Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br).  She also has a natural healing and stress management practice and is a celebrated public speaker.

 

● Your comments are welcome!

 

● Get these articles by email– just click the Subscribe Free option in the right column.

 

● Reach the writer at kebba@kebba.com .

UpBeat Living: The UpBeat Living Energy Equation(sm)

Tags

at choice, Effective living, energy, exhausted, Feeling energized, Health, Kebba, Negative stress, Positive stress, stress, Stress Management

© 2013 Kebba Buckley Button.  World Rights Reserved.

Photo by Microsoft

Today, there are two take-home messages:  using the word “stress” to mean “focus”, and using the UpBeat Living Energy Equation(sm).  Enjoy!

1.  Use the Word “Stress” for Focus

When people talk about “having stress,” sometimes they mean causes and sometimes they mean effects. For example: people say they “have stress” when they mean they have too much to do.  Other people say they “have stress” when they mean they have headaches or other physical results of their reactions to having too much to do.  So, some people are telling you about conditions that could cause stress, and some people are describing the symptoms in their bodies. It’s certainly valid to say you have too much to do, or any other situation you don’t like.  However, it adds to your confusion and therefore to your stress, to throw causes, choices,and results all into the mental bucket labelled “stress.” I want you to clear your mind by changing the way you use this word “stress” now. Think of what you want to  “stress,” emphasize, or “focus on,” in your life. Think of people saying, “The Mayor gave a speech today, and he stressed how important it is that we improve the quality of  downtown lifestyle.” In this example, the Mayor put emphasis on a topic.  He made it important.

So how can you imitate that?  What do you want to make important?  How do you want your life to be? Do you want to spend your life responding to annoyances? To Discover The Secret Energized You, it is vital that you become an Energy Manager in your life instead of managing the stress around you.

2.  Live By the UpBeat Living Energy Equation^sm

Now that you are focusing and emphasizing, you’ll find The UpBeat Living Energy Formula is simple yet powerful:   ADD POSITIVE STRESS TO GET MORE ENERGY, AND ADD NEGATIVE STRESS TO GET LESS ENERGY.  We have less overall energy with more negatives in our day and more overall energy by adding positives to our days and our lives. Negative stress makes us tired, and positive stress gives us energy.  So: what are some positives you could add to your life?

If you aren’t convinced yet, that stress can create either disease or wellness, here are some of the many potential negative health effects of negative stress, if it is allowed to go uncontrolled for too long:  mental distress,loss of concentration, depression, crabbiness, emotional outbursts, physical pains, illnesses, aging, shorter lifespan, and even death.

One emotion that has been proven seriously damaging to our health is anger. In biomedical studies announced in 1995, The Heartmath Institute learned that persons who hold an angry thought of their choosing for only five minutes have seven nervous system factors depressed for six hours. The factors are functions of a part of the nervous system which controls the body’s immune system. Therefore, we know anger damages the immune system. And how many of us, when we have a really hot, angry thought going, limit ourselves to only five minutes?

It is vital that we learn to see things differently and respond differently, or learn to discharge anger. Some simple discharge techniques will be covered later in this series.  You may be surprised at how enjoyable these methods can be.

Consider journalling out your thoughts about the types of stress causes and effects you have in your life.  What’s going on for you, and what are you focusing on?   It’s your life.

———————————————

● Kebba Buckley Button is a corporate stress management trainer and the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You, and the 2012 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core.  She also has a natural healing practice and is an ordained minister.

● Your comments are welcome!

● Get these articles by email– just click the Subscribe Free option in the right column.

● Reach the writer at kebba@kebba.com .