Restore Balance and Prevent Disease: Start Right Now!

It’s certainly disturbing that chronic inflammation is at the root of nearly every modern disease on the rise today. But the good news is that we also have the opportunity to make everyday choices to profoundly lessen our chances of getting chronically ill or manage our existing illnesses with the minimum use of allopathic medication. Simply being aware of inflammation is a great start. If we start reducing chronic inflammation right now, we can improve our health and start feeling more energetic and connected to our body, mind and spirit.

Nine Things You Can Do Right Now To Reduce Chronic Inflammation

1. Eat smart. One of the most powerful tools at our disposal to fight inflammation is our diet. Each time we sit down to a meal, we can make food choices that either raise or lower the level of inflammation in our body.

2. Add high quality supplements if you are not getting a sufficiently healthy diet. There is an extensive and growing body of evidence natural supplements and remedies play a vital role in treating and preventing a range of debilitating chronic illnesses

3. Give yourself the gift of sleep. Sleep is underrated. When life gets hectic, sleep is usually the first thing to go, because we know we can “get by” on fewer hours than our bodies would like. Research shows that getting less than six or seven hours of uninterrupted sleep a night increases our risk of all kinds of diseases, including cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and obesity.

4. Get moving. New research shows that exercise reduces the amount of inflammation in our body. A number of studies comparing athletes to an inactive lifestyle, have found that people who exercise regularly have lower blood levels of CRP (indicator of body-wide inflammation) than people who are inactive. When inactive people start to exercise, their CRP levels go down within weeks.

5. Get regular massages. Exercising keeps everything flowing in our body – our blood, lymphatic fluids, and vital life energy (“chi’). Massage has similar benefits. It is wonderful for getting rid of knots and tension, but it also increases blood and lymphatic circulation. Additionally, a good massage will help move toxins out of the areas where they usually congregate (buttocks, belly and back muscles), whether it is every week, every two weeks, or every three weeks.

6. Detoxify your body. A detox program aims to remove the cause of disease before it makes us ill. It’s a time-honored way to keep immune response high, elimination regular, circulation sound and stress under control, so our body can handle the toxicity it encounters.

7. Meditate. Meditation is very simple. It is just sitting/lying quietly and reconnecting with the wisdom of our body. When we sit in silence, and turn our attention away from our thoughts and toward our body, we learn how to listen to what it’s telling us. We may notice tension in our neck and shoulders, our heartbeat is anxious or erratic, and/or our breathing is shallow. All of these are important messages from our body, telling us to stretch, or to do something relaxing, or to breathe deeply. If we listen quietly, all the answers are within us!

8. Change your mind. Whether we view the glass half empty or half full is a profound impact on our health. Optimists are 23 percent less likely to die of heart failure than pessimists – and 55 percent less likely to die from cancer, diabetes, etc. It is a perfect example of the mind-body connection, negative feelings, such as depression, anxiety, hostility, and stress can cause our body to release a slew of inflammatory chemicals that put us at risk for disease.

9. Give back. One of the keys to happiness is serving something larger than ourselves, and as we already know, happy people have lower levels of inflammation. Find a cause we are interested in helping and volunteer. There is tremendous peace and satisfaction that can be gained from transcending the small details of our life in order to make the world a better place. As the saying goes, “What we give back, we get back many folds”.

Advertisement