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“And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.” ~ John Muir

I went into the woods to forget the worries of this world and to find myself again.

The path was well traveled and each step required strength. The trail was covered in a layer of snow that at the base was wet and slushy. Each step took strategic focus on placement and traction. My eyes intermittently scanned up through the trees and admired the clear blue sky. As I warmed up from the physical movement I tied my coat around my waist and embraced the feeling of crisp yet warm air on my skin. This trail is familiar to me, so I let my mind wander as my feet led the way.

There were several trees along the way that told a story of the day before and what had happened to them. Many had bowed down, and others had completely broke and were laying in various spots along the trail… About a third of the way in there was an old old tree bridged across the trail. It stood out and spoke so loudly of the strength the storm had carried with it. I imagined this tree was like the great-grandmother of the forest and her time had come. As I stood closely and gazed in awe I could read her story of a long life. Her outer rings were fresh and brightly colored with new growth that gave the appearance of strength and vitality, but her core was dark, soft, crumbling and showed of the many years she stood. Oh I wonder how many souls had she felt pass by her over the hundreds of years she stood?? 🤔

I walked gently around her, I observed the twists and knots of her trunk and how they had changed shaped when they gave way and cracked from the forces of weather. It’s was as though I could hear her telling me a story, and I was a captive listener. After a period of great admiration I offered a blessing and continued on my journey.

As I came upon the trailhead I chose for this trip there was an obvious decrease in the number of footsteps along this path. “Sweet” I will take the path less traveled and that will make all the difference. 💚

When you’re in the woods finding yourself, sometimes…..you talk out loud to yourself. 😆😂 and this is when some of the real shift (sh@t) begins and the personal journey inward goes deeper.

This is where I found myself!!!

This is where I found determination!!

This is where I found peace to my core.

This is where I found hope.

This is THE WORK!!!

No medication or anti-depressant will ever come close to what THIS does for the soul.

We ALL have the ability to get outside and embrace the natural wonders of this world. You can Chose to make it happen. Give it a try and then repeat again and again. Some of the BEST things in life happen outdoors.

Sending Loving Energy,

Empowered Elizabeth

Several years ago I bought this light box. I needed it and it has helped me every fall and winter season since.

When I bought this light box it was at a time in my life where it became CLEAR there was a pattern with my mood changing every fall. Every year as the days got shorter and darkness was settling in, my mood would shift to a more negative mindset. I would start sleeping more, but still felt fatigued upon waking. My appetite would change and I’d start eating more carbohydrates, baked goods and larger portions. My level of energy would plummet to near nothing. I’d start drinking more coffee instead of water to try and remedy my fatigue. I would try to get myself outside, but the negative mindset was nearly impossible to to overcome.

“There is a deep link between sunlight exposure and depression. The brain gauges how much sunlight you get each day and it uses that to reset your internal body clock.

As you can imagine without enough light exposure the body clock gets out of sync.

When that happens it throws off certain circadian rhythm’s that regulate energy sleep appetite and hormone levels. The disruption of these internal rhythms can trigger depression

Natural daylight is 100 times better than indoor light and because of that 30 minutes of daylight can reset your internal clock.” The Depression Cure by Stephen S. Ilardi, Ph.D.

I had a repetitive pattern and it was time to do something about it. I had observed it long enough to finally take action and actively do something about it. Taking action to remedy something is not easy when you have the self talk in your head. I was really frustrated and kinda pissed at myself. I felt like I was weak (for not being able to control the changes in my body) and stupid (for not taking action and doing what I knew I had learned would help). I had to empower myself with tools to help combat this Seasonal Mood Change. Some call this Seasonal Affective Disorder aka S.A.D. I came up with a term last evening and will now be calling it the “Fall Funk”.

Now when fall is around the corner I am more mindful and start setting myself up for combatting the FALL FUNK. Below are a list of things that help with S.A.D. And depression.

1: Increase your omega 3 fatty acids daily. Supplements and Food

2. Participate in engaging activities with others

3: Get physical exercise on a regular basis. (Outside is a bonus)

4: Get sunlight exposure at least 30 minutes every day. This needs to be face and forearms exposed. Or you can try light box therapy (research this one).

5: Reach out and maintain social connections : we become more secluded in the winter months and depression gets worse.

6: Enhance your sleep (research good sleep habits)

This particular blog is about the light therapy and how it has been a practice I embrace daily. If I can’t or don’t get outside for my light therapy then this “HappyLight” of mine will help create the shine in my day.

Listen to my inspiring ending.

light-therapy.m4a

Loving Energy,

Empowered Elizabeth 🍁

#depressionbyempoweredelizabeth #Naturehealsusall🦋 #Treatingdepressionwithnature🌿 #depressionphoenixrising #Dysbiosis #Guthealthaboveall #guthealth #changinglives #Vulnerability #womenshealthbyempoweredelizabeth #Changinglives #Transformation #Gogiver #TransformingMe🐛🦋 #EmpoweredElizabeth #Womenarepowerful

#WomensHealthbyEmpoweredElizabeth

I used to have Metabolic Syndrome!! 🙉🙊

I’m also proud to say I reversed it a couple years ago. Bam!!💥

Metabolic Syndrome is diagnosed when you typically have 3 out of these 5 symptoms.

Diagnosis

The National Institutes of Health guidelines define metabolic syndrome as having three or more of the following traits, including traits you’re taking medication to control:

• Large waist — A waistline that measures at least 35 inches (89 centimeters) for women and 40 inches (102 centimeters) for men

• High triglyceride level — 150 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL), or 1.7 millimoles per liter (mmol/L), or higher of this type of fat found in blood

• Reduced “good” or HDL cholesterol — Less than 40 mg/dL (1.04 mmol/L) in men or less than 50 mg/dL (1.3 mmol/L) in women of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol

• Increased blood pressure — 130/85 millimeters of mercury (mm Hg) or higher

• Elevated fasting blood sugar — 100 mg/dL (5.6 mmol/L) or higher

This was me, my triglycerides were 224 my Hdl was less then 40 and my waist was definitely more than 35 inches 🙊 and because of this I was worried about long term affects of this disease process. Being a single mom raising two girls I wanted to avoid health risks that would shorten my life span. “Who wouldn’t want this?”

Following are notes I took from a podcast I listened to a couple days ago. Dr Christine Northrup interviewed Dr Jason Fung a nephrologist about metabolic syndrome. I wish I knew about this information 10 years ago.

Metabolic Syndrome is reversible and so is Type 2 Diabetes. Read on and I’ll share the podcast link at the end of my blog if you want to hear the whole interview.

Notes:

The treatment for Type 2 diabetes in Theory has been to lower blood glucose with insulin and medications. This in turn would prevent heart attacks, stroke, dialysis and further damage. However in 2008-2009 different studies showed that heart attacks, stroke, dialysis and more didn’t get better and in some studies it actually got worse. Why???

Because modern medicine is only treating the “Blood Glucose” and not the underlying disease. Elevated blood glucose is a “symptom” of the disease and lowering the blood glucose isn’t treating the disease. Over time medications and insulin can continue to increase to control your blood glucose, but it’s not healing the disease.

To get rid of diabetes you need to get rid of obesity, AND its not just cutting calories, because your body doesn’t have a mechanism to know how many calories youre taking in….so why would cutting calories work? In other words when we decrease caloric intake to say 1500 calories a day, then eventually your body adjusts the amount of energy it burns (energy expenditure) to that or less ie: 1450 calories. Your body will adapt to what you’re taking in and that is why just cutting calories works for a while then you reach a plateau and stop losing weight.

The underlying cause of weight gain ISN’T CALORIES, it’s the hormone insulin. When you eat your insulin goes up, which tells your body to store fat, and when you don’t eat (fasting) your body pulls energy back out from the liver and body fat. This is what happens at night when we sleep, and we don’t die in our sleep from lack of food. 😆 That’s how the body is made…to store fat for when we fast.

When you let your insulin levels fall (while fasting) 0 calories in, then your body will switch tracks and switch to fat burning mode and eventually feel great and produce more energy by burning fat.

Did you know that 1lb of fat = 3500 calories!! 😳😳😳

It would take about 2-3 days of fasting to lose 1 lb of fat..

How do we get so much fat stored and why?

Our body at a cellular level can utilize glucose, because all the cells in your body know how to use it. Glucose equals energy. However none of our cells know how to use fructose, which is found in table sugar. Table sugar is equal amounts of glucose and fructose and fructose is metabolized ONLY IN THE LIVER.

If you had 1/2 lb glucose and 1/2 lb of fructose all the fructose goes to the liver and turns to fat…which results in Fatty Liver!! . The glucose can go everywhere throughout the body to be used as energy because all of our cells recognize it.

What’s wrong with a FATTY LIVER? Besides the fact that it doesn’t even sound right, Fatty liver effects your liver functions and it doesn’t work as optimally. We need our Liver to be healthy. Upwards of 50% of people in the US have either fatty liver or evidence of fatty liver starting. Its predicted to be the most common liver disease in North America and it’s only just come about in the last 50 years. Coincidently, in the history of sugar it only became more abundant approximately in the 1950’s. “Sugar used to only be for the rich” In Summary Fatty Liver ➡️ Insulin resistance ➡️ High insulin levels ➡️ Obesity by keeping your body from burning fat.

Liver tries to send the concentrated fat out to the body and it causes fatty organ infiltration in areas like the muscles, and pancreas (fatty pancreas). A fatty pancreas can get clogged then it can’t produce insulin then glucose levels in the blood stream rise.

End result is we have too much sugar in our body, NOT JUST OUR BLOOD STREAM. We have too much sugar stored in fat cells everywhere throughout out body, including organs and it’s needs to be tapped into and burned to lose weight and get control of your glucose.

In the interview they talk more about #fasting and how that is reversing diabetes with patients in treatment. Its a fairly new phenomenon, but I highly recommend you do your research and consider trying this for your lifestyle. I know it has helped me tremendously, and when I was fasting on #bonebroth last year for a few days, my morning blood glucose was an amazing 78 💥 Typicallly it was in the 90’s to as high as 110!!! You’re recommended fasting blood sugar should be close to 80 as you can get it. WOW 😮

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dr-christiane-northrup-what-you-need-to-know-about/id988176687?i=1000386608809

Life is like Chinese checkers. You 👇 and I are the marbles making a journey across the board of life. When playing Chinese checkers the objective is to get your colored marbles to the other side of the board before your opponent. While doing so you can use each other for jumping over and advance forward faster. You can also use your own marbles to help yourself along. There are a variety of paths to choose and we make that decision based on how we want to move forward. Well……..sometimes along this journey of life, we need the help of others/marbles. It may be family, a friend, a co-worker or even a complete stranger. We all at some point in our lives need someone. Someone we can jump over, someone to help us along the path. Do you remember a time when you had that someone? ❤️ On the flipside of this, we may be THAT person, helping someone else along. You may be set in someone’s path to help them. It’s up to you to decide if you’re going to move your marble and skirt around helping others or are you going to stay where you are and help them along. So yes life is like Chinese Checkers: As we make our moves/jumps through life sometimes there are others there to help us and other times we are on our own and that’s ok . 👍 The next time you are on your own, then by all means Help yourself!! Use your resources/marbles and figure it out. Think about the steps/moves you need to make and strategically align yourself for success. 😁 I believe we all have roles in this life of Chinese checkers 😆 and we are all playing our roles perfectly (good, bad, or indifferent). My vision for helping others is becoming clear as I write and my dreams are big. I hope to be that marble in your path to help you along. 😉😊

When I had a coaching call last month with Todd Mosher we talked about future trips hiking and he asked me some very thought provoking questions.

The answer I found to those questions came easily and yet I had to wait for the right moment to take action.

Well, last week was the right moment as Justin and I headed out on a three day camping and hiking trip. We stopped over in Ellsworth at a sporting good store to peruse clothing & shoe sales. That store didn’t have what I was searching for so we traveled down the road a bit and explored the LL Bean outlet store.

While there I found several style hiking shoes in “my size” and as any of you know that have visited an outlet store, it’s hit or miss with what you’re going to find.

That day the laws of the universe were aligned and I found a high-quality hiking shoe that provides support for my ankles as well as comfort.

Some of you reading this short story may say it was Luck. Luck Smuck 😜 I say it’s the law of attraction and the energy that you put out to the universe is what it will get back to you.

SO do a SELF CHECK today!!

What sort of energy are you putting out into your surroundings??

#Happieroutside #Hiking #Girlmom

#Empoweredwoman

Life is a journey!

A time for self care blended into my busy day. A walk in nature that was mixed with jogging and station work outs. It was a time of deep reflection on my health and how far I have come with the healing from my ankle injury. Euphoric feelings as I gently jogged up a grassy hill and became happily winded.

I carried small pine cones in my pocket that reminded me a flowers with petals opening. I smelled the pine in the air from the wood chips as well as the trees. I heard birds and water throughout various places along the way.

In one spot I stopped on a man made bring to enjoy the stream the flowed underneath. The same stream yet different on both sides. Standing on a bridge, allowing my eyes to take in the surroundings. To my left there is a rippling stream flowing smoothly and spanning further than a human can leap.

Naturally I turn to the right following the path of this stream and it immediately tapered to a small narrow path that I could easily step over.

What’s the difference between the two?

What sort of barriers and obstacles did this stream come up against that changed its appearance, size and outcome?

What are the barriers in your life?

What sort of obstacles have you come up against, and how do you handle those challenges?

Do you plow right through them head on like a bull?

Will you slowly navigate your way around them assessing your strategy as you go?

Will you JUMP over them and completely avoid touching the obstacle?

Or will you allow them to block you and your energy and narrow your path in life?

Every obstacle and every barrier we meet in life will be different, and how we react to them may also be different.

I have met many barriers and obstacles in my life and each and everyone of them I’ve handled in a slightly different manner. When I reflect back on all of my victories I realize whether they were negative or positive they were all victories. However I faced is challenging life good or bad I came out the other end of it empowered and confident in my decision making. Be confident, trust your choices and know that there will be obstacles and barriers in your life that I meant for you to learn from. 

Choose your path mindfully and take control of your life journey!!

LOVING ENERGY,

ELIZABETH

LOOK at this photo! Really……look at this photo and imagine for a minute……………………. What if each one of those balloons signified a step in your life?  What if each one stood for a choice you made to change something about yourself or your day? What if each balloon represented an event in your life that changed you and molded you into who you are today?

THEN…….imagine this!

When you add up all those balloons and you put all those life events and decisions together, YOU can change your life from this day forward!! All those little balloons can lift a house, what can you do from this day forward when you make your next decision?

Dare to DREAM big!! Allow yourself to dream limitlessly like you did when you were a small child. Allow yourself to imagine and place NO limitations on the size and value of your dreams.

WHAT IF???

 

Loving Energy,

Elizabeth

He was standing there looking over the labels on the coffee carafes, reading each one and it’s description.  Making a decision, with cup in hand the process of filling began.

Disappointment……

The carafe provided just enough coffee to wet the cup and then came to an end.  Pause.  A moment of contemplation, what’s he thinking. “Do I try the other kind? Do I ask for more coffee?”

Decision………

The left hand slowly drops the cup, that holds just enough coffee to wet the bottom, into the garbage!  A moment in time, a decision made with resignation.

I felt disappointed for him and instantly wanted to give him hope.  So I spoke up and simply said, “There is more over there” as I turned my head and looked to the left. The response was a positive, “Yeah, I guess I should go get that, because that was what I wanted.”

Without hesitation he walked to my left, with empty carafe in hand and proceeded to find his coffee of choice.  Success!!!  A full carafe was awaiting him just under the brewing machine.  An employee approached and assisted with placing the carafe on the counter. He returned to his original spot with a new cup in hand and proceeded to pour a fresh cup of hot coffee.  His first choice of flavor and the one he had decided on by listening to his inner voice, instinct or gut (whatever you may call it).

As I watched him pour his coffee and prepare it to his liking, I spoke these words, “If there’s anything I’ve learned in the last few years of my life, it is to trust your instinct, listen and go with your first choice. You’re body will never steer you wrong!”

I then proceeded to walk away and he spoke, “Thank you.” I turned my head to acknowledge his words out of politeness and good manners. What I saw in that gentleman’s eyes struck me to my CORE.

His eyes spoke of the depth that my words had reached in him. He looked at me with a combination of sincere thanks and complete AWE, as if I had awakened him. I saw an awareness in him that he did not have when he first approached that coffee counter! It was a pivotal moment for both involved.

As I turned and walked to checkout my mind began to process that interaction. I felt such a deep feeling of pride and satisfaction for making a positive impact on someone’s life. I knew from that moment forward he was changed and so was I.

I knew that was a pivotal moment for him and the beginning of his day! I walked away with a feeling of fullness in my chest and goosebumps covered my arms.

I had just changed someone’s life and at the same time nurtured my own.

Live every day with intention and GIVE to others whatever you may have, because we all have something.

Loving Energy to You,

Elizabeth

 

Do you remember when you took your first dive into the deep end of the pool, Or the deep waters of a lake or ocean?

Do you remember being scared?  I remember being afraid of hitting the bottom.  It was such a “real” and very strong fear the stirred a physical response. Yet once I mustered up the nerve and took that first dive, I didn’t hit bottom. I rose to the surface with an overwhelming feeling of pride and the fear was NEVER the same.

Life is like that moment of diving into the deep end. You have to make decisions in life and many times you will be afraid.  Don’t limit your options in life by always swimming in the shallow end because it feels safe. Be brave and dare to dive in the deep end! Don’t be afraid to hit the bottom and failing! Do it DIVE!

Imagine, the end result may just be the life dream you have been reaching to achieve.  As Brene Brown stated, “I will choose how the story ends.”

Loving Energy,

Elizabeth