THE MOVING TARGET OF A HAPPY HEALTHY LIFE

The Moving Target of a Happy Healthy Life

Who isn’t looking for a happy healthy life?  In a UK health and happiness Survey 2000 men and women throughout the UK  were interviewed, it was found that men consider themselves happier and healthier than women. Men were less stressed or depressed, had less trouble sleeping and didn’t suffer so much from headaches or digestive issues.

5 Tips for a Happy Healthy Life

ONE: Friendly Bacteria

Did you know that most of the body's serotonin (often referred to as the “feel good” hormone) is found in the tummy? The beneficial micro-organisms that naturally occur in the digestive tract have an influence on serotonin production, meaning that, changes to the digestive environment can have a direct impact on serotonin levels and therefore your mood.

TWO: Deal With Inflammation

What leads to inflammation? A poor diet, stress, an imbalance of good and bad bacteria (dysbiosis), illness, medication, and other lifestyle factors.

Inflammation has long been the focus of many holistic health practitioners, who promote an alkaline blood pH for health, longevity, and vitality. More recently, scientific research has offered support for this approach, suggesting that too much inflammation in the body can contribute not only to illness but also to low mood and depression.

Adopting an alkaline diet, by reducing your intake of acid-forming food and drink (such as meat, dairy, sugar, alcohol, and caffeine), can help to control inflammation levels.

THREE: Strengthen Your Immune System

The strength of your immune system can have a direct impact on how you feel - both physically and mentally. For instance, research suggests that there is a higher rate of depression among people with compromised immune function.  

70% of all antibody-producing cells are in the GALT and they work hard to prevent unwanted microorganisms from entering our bodies, including harmful bacteria, fungi, parasites, and yeast.

So, take proactive steps to boost your immunity by supporting digestive health and ensuring that you have access to a broad spectrum of vitamins, minerals and protective nutrients in your daily diet. In this way, you will be indirectly supporting your emotional well-being too!

FOUR: Eat a Well-Balanced Diet

It also promotes emotional health, stable moods and mental calmness. This is because diet and nutrient intake have a direct effect on physiological factors like hormonal balance – remove link, immunity and brain function. Nutrients such as iron, zinc, essential fatty acids – remove link and B vitamins, for example, play a central role in mood stability. Emotions can impact the gut, but diet can also affect the brain.   

Therefore, support both a happy gut and a happy mind by eating a diet that is packed with nutrient-dense plants, fruit, vegetables, and other natural whole foods, that will provide high levels of enzymes, as well as other cleansing and protective nutrients (like dietary, antioxidants and phytochemicals).

FIVE: Power of Meditation

Lust For Life lists 20 reasons why meditation is the best thing you could do right now, to keep the list short, we picked the following 5 reasons:

• It makes you smarter by increasing your memory, attention, self-awareness, and self-control 
  
  
• Reduces cortisol production, a stress-induced hormone that suppresses the immune system and can make you feel anxious nervous and unsettled
  
  
• Reduces blood pressure and heart rate
  
  
•  Increases neuroplasticity - the brain's ability to organize itself, adapt to demands and enables you to become more efficient in the learning process
  
  
• Slows down the aging process. Meditation significantly increases melatonin and DHEA and decreases cortisol, which has a significant impact on slowing the aging process down

Deep Breathing Benefits Brain!

Did you know that deep breathing benefits brain? There is a very real connection between our emotions and our guts (your second brain).  Do you know how we know that?  We have butterflies in our tummies during a nerve-wracking situation, we experience bloating when we’re stressed -remove link and feel our abdomens drop after getting some bad news.

Clearly, the relationship between emotional state and digestive health cannot be ignored. The relationship is so strong, it could have a significant impact on anything from immunity remove link and nutrient absorption, to levels of inflammation, digestive efficiency, and regularity.

It is not a coincidence that we have sayings like "gut instinct", "gut-wrenching" and "go with your gut".  Stress, nerves and other strong emotions could trigger discomfort and unpleasant digestive feelings - including, bloating, loss of appetite, cramping, nausea, irritable bowel, and spasms.

Chew it!

Most of us don’t know (depending on the kind of food) that we need to chew our food at least 30 times before we finally swallow.  According to Healthline chewing your food at least 30 times before you swallow it seems to be the magic number.

Saliva contains digestive enzymes, while chewing digestive enzymes start breaking down the food. This stage is particularly important for carbohydrate digestion - you are missing out on an important step in the digestive process if food is not being chewed thoroughly because you are bolting it down in a rush.

All too often people eat when they are distracted because they are in a hurry, are stressed or their mind is engaged elsewhere. How often do you eat at your desk or while watching TV?  

Similarly, hydrochloric acid and enzymes are secreted in the stomach to digest protein. Stress inhibits all enzyme secretion - meaning that eating while feeling stressed could result in food that is incompletely digested, often followed by bloating, reflux and abdominal pain.

Partially digested food is bad news for gut health. It can result in fermentation in the stomach and small intestine, and then putrefaction in the colon - basically, food rotting in the gut! This, in turn, results in increased bacterial activity and the production and the associated release of toxins. These toxins are then able to enter the bloodstream, through the colon, slowly poisoning the body over time.

Specific Activity of Enzymes

The digestive system requires a high level of enzyme activity to extract nutrients from food and put these into action around the body. It follows that it is sensible to put the least possible strain on the digestive system, which includes eating while calm and relaxed (to promote maximum enzyme secretion) and eating foods that are naturally rich in their own digestive enzymes (such as 'living foods', sprouted foods, fermented foods, fruit, vegetables and other whole foods). Wheat-grass is a great example.

Keep in mind, that there is a limited number of enzyme activity in everyone; as we age, when we come under stress, when we are ill and when we eat 'empty' processed foods, for example, our pool of enzymes is further depleted. It is therefore important to rely less on your own reserves and instead choose foods that supply enzymes. Supplementing can also be useful in this respect.

Your Gut is Your “Second Brain”

Studies show that stress and emotions impact digestion. The digestive tract contains over 100 million neurons and the largest collection of neural tissue in the body, after the brain. This has led to the gut often being referred to as the 'second brain'.

Known as the enteric nervous system, this complex system of tissues in the gut detects emotional signals from the brain. Interestingly, it also works the other way - an unhappy, unhealthy gut sends signals back to the brain.  So, look after your digestive system to promote a feeling of wellbeing and happiness.