By now everybody out there is aware that meditation has a wide range of positive benefits for our health. A consistent mediation practice helps us reduce stress, slow down the ageing process, as well as improve concentration, sleep, our self-awareness, and acceptance. Because the process of meditation improves parasympathetic tone (induces relaxation), it does promote cardiovascular health and it also encourages the immune system to work correctly (super helpful for anyone with autoimmunity). But that is the thing. The main key word in this entire paragraph is CONSISTENT.

The effects of meditation are cumulative and even though many people appreciate that, how many people do you know who have a consistent meditation practice? The truth is that you will enjoy the benefits with as little as 15 minutes per day (although more in this case is better), yet how many of us do it regularly? When I quiz my clients on this, most of them will say: “I know it is super beneficial and I...

There is no one thing that is going to make your system virus-proof. It is really a combination of strategies that is going to do it. Again, what I am sharing here is worth saving for reference purposes because one thing I can guarantee is that Covid -19 is not the last health crisis we are going to see.

None of what I am sharing here is a direct recommendation or is designed to replace medical advice of any kind. I am sharing with you what I do and how I approach my own and my family's immunity based on my 20+ years of study and experience of natural medicine. You have to decide for yourself if this is right for you or not.

Before I even go any further, please remember that the more fear and stress you introduce into the equation, the more suppression you cause within your immune system, which makes you more defenseless should you get infected. This is simple psychoneuroimmunology. So keeping calm and trusting your body knows how to deal with a virus (or any other infection) is...

You can read part 1 of this article here.

Foods, supplements and botanicals that can help you make your body a hostile environment for viruses include:  

Antiviral foods – raw garlic, onion, leek, ginger, broccoli sprouts, reishi and shiitake mushrooms, green tea, cinnamon, clove, oregano, thyme, bitter melon, stevia.

Botanicals (I recommend taking a mix of 2 or 3 of these preventatively and rotating every 4-6 weeks) - cistus (Cistus incanus), olive leaf (Olea europea), echinacea (Echinacea purpurea), goldenseal (Hydrastis canadensis), elderberry (Sambucus nigra), Japanese honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica), astragalus (Astragalus membranaceus), cat’s claw (Uncaria tomentosa), mullein (Verbascum thapsus), Chinese skullcup (Scutellaria barbata), Pau d’arco (Tabebuia impetiginosa), St John’s Wort (Hypericum perforatum), Stinging Nettle (Urtica dioica).

Vitamins, minerals and other supplements – vitamin C (liposomal or at least whole food), methylated B...

Nowadays it is well-accepted that our psychological/emotional state affects our immune system, which of course has massive implications for autoimmunity. Negative emotional activation (stress response) can result in increased susceptibility to bacterial, viral and fungal infections, as well as parasite infestations.

Likewise, we can improve our immune function when we switch from stress response to the relaxation response, which is why meditation and other similar tools have been shown to have a profound positive effect not only on our mental health but our physical health as well. Even looking at a flower creates a physiological response involving millions of nerve cells that can in turn create a positive or negative change in our immune function (depending how we feel about the flower)!

Psycho what?

This phenomenon is a result of interactions between our hypothalamus, our pituitary gland and our adrenal glands (the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal or HPA axis). The science that aims...

I understand that not everyone is able to spend an hour each day meditating (although if you did, you would transform your health and your life!) but there is no excuse not to make a 10-minute per day commitment to breathing practice.

Breathing is one of these clever biological processes our body is programmed to do automatically, even when we are not aware of it. In fact, it is one of the primary functions of the body is to supply our cells with oxygen. It has to be automated (subconscious) because we would be in a lot of trouble if we had to think about it all the time. But we can also control our breathing if we choose to, and when we do it in the right way, we can influence our emotions, and of course our immune system and therefore our physical well-being.

You can control your nervous system response by controlling your breathing

I have many fantastic mind-transforming modalities at my disposal that I use for myself and working with clients but I always teach my clients...