How many of you have ever felt paralyzed by the 65,337 things to do when it comes to elevating your health that you end up doing nothing at all?

Go keto

Intermittent fast

Cleanse every quarter

Try this latest greatest groundbreaking supplement

This resonates with me big time.

There is so much to do, so much to try, so much new information out there to integrate and try on, that it can get very overwhelming very quickly.

But I’m a fan of dialing it back a little and refocusing on the fundamentals that are always going to be the foundation from which your epic health grows. You can't build a house without a strong foundation in place, can you? Health is the same way.

As Rose Lindsay from Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s Dead says, “Don’t get overwhelmed. Just do one thing at a time.”

Healing is not complicated. It doesn’t have to be outrageously expensive either.

When you’re not sure what to do or where to go with your health, start here.

The Basics of Awesome Health

Eat

Eat beautiful, life-giving, whole foods as close to the source as possible. Eat organic when possible. Food is foundational. It’s the fuel your body needs to operate efficiently. Eat every 3-4 hours, eat nutrient dense whole foods, and eat some combination of fats, protein and carbohydrates at every meal. Don’t worry about calories or portions. Eat when you’re hungry. Stop when you’re full.

Drink

Drink half your weight in ounces of filtered, mineralized water. In the perfect world, we’re all drinking pristine, spring water that has run over mountain rocks, picking up minerals along the way, but its more likely that we have access to a tap. Tap water is contaminated with lots of naughty things like fluoride, chlorine, pharmaceutical by-products and heavy metals. Clean water is also foundational, so invest in a water filtration system like the Live Pristine (this is the one I’m saving up for!) or get a Berkey. Then you’ll want to add minerals back into your water. I like Concentrace by Trace Minerals. Or you can re-mineralize with some good pink sea salt.

Move

Movement is so natural and good for the body. Again, don’t over-complicate it here: simple walking and weights a few times a week is all you need. You can get fancy if you want to, but it’s not necessary. Jazz up your walk with ankle weights or do a jog walk combo. 30 minutes daily. Simple, effective, gets the job done, no hassle and no need to pay for parking at the gym.

Rest

Resting is just as important as the movement and the food piece! Sleep at night is when we integrate everything from the day, when our cells renew, when our liver’s go through their detox, and when our body’s reset. Even the simple act of resting during the day, like taking a quick power nap or lying down in silence for an hour, does wonders for our minds and our bodies. We live in a world that greatly values hustle culture, but tbh I’m so bored with that concept. Why do we have to always be hustling? What if we worked hard when its time to work hard AND we rested when our body tells us to rest? Rest is just as important. Consider your rest time as necessary as your food, water, and movement.

Sunlight

Sunshine is energy. It is life. It literally gives life to what it touches. It so underestimated as a powerful wellness tool. Probably because it’s completely free. Get outside for as little as 10 minutes every day for direct sunlight on your skin and in your eyes. The sun provides energy, it helps your skin synthesize the all important vitamin D, and it helps reset your circadian rhythm which is beneficial to your adrenals, helpful for melatonin production at night, and very important if you’re hoping to conceive as it helps to regulate ovulation. Read the blog post I wrote about the positive effects of sunlight here.

Gratitude

This one really should be first because it’s that powerful. It’s also very free haha. Get into the habit of starting out every single day and ending every single day with 3 things you are grateful for. You can think them or write them down (bonus points if you write them down), and whichever way you choose to acknowledge the things in your life that you are grateful for, know that this practice will change your life for the better and it will bring in more things for you to be grateful for. That’s how the universe works: it brings you more of what you put your attention towards.

Limit toxins

The world is a very toxic place nowadays, from the pesticides on our food to the chemicals in our water, to the chemicals and poisons in the air we breathe, to the endocrine disruptors in our beauty care products. The best thing you can do here is be a conscious consumer, do a little research, and know where the poisons lurk. Check out this blog post that I wrote on some of the prominent chemicals found in your beauty care products. Don’t use products with these toxins in them. Get a water filter. Eat organic food. Facilitate your daily detox with TRS, my favorite heavy metal detox product. Check out this post on other ways to detoxify. It’s hard to get well if you’re constantly being bombarded with chemicals.

Get quiet

Spend time in stillness every day, whether that’s in a daily meditation, a guided visualization, or a walk in nature without your earbuds in. Sometimes I'll set a timer on my phone for 5 or 10 minutes (depending on what I have time for that day) and I'll just lie by my salt lamp and let my brain do what it needs to do. It's not the same as meditation, rather its just a short period of time for me to get still and quiet and heed the messages from my heart. Our soul and our wisdom are always speaking to us, but it’s up to us to listen.

Give screens a break

This one is going to be the hardest for many people, because soooo many are addicted to their phones, to the pings from their notifications, and to the likes and the loves and the comments that come through on their social platforms. I notice an instant lifting of my energy when I put.the.phone.away. Its an energy suck for me most of the time, so I make a very concerted effort every day to limit my social use, and to limit the amount of time I’m actually using my phone. I always turn the phone off in the evening, and we try to read most evenings rather than watching a show or a movie. Too much screen time suppresses melatonin, disrupts your circadian rhythm, promotes a sedentary lifestyle, and can be disrupting to your emotions. My general policy is this: did it make me feel good? Did the time I just spent scrolling give me energy? Or did it take from my energy? More often than not, it takes my energy. And this is how I know I need to step away from the screens for awhile.

When you don't know what to do for your health, do these. Shift your focus back to the basics of ground-up health. Focus on your foundation. A healthy, balanced diet, clean water, daily movement, sunlight, stillness, limiting toxic exposure, and gratitude are all foundational for a healthy life.

Yes there is a time and a place for the supplements and the programs and the cleansing and the resets. But it's so important to have the foundation in place before you go adding in all the extras.

Keep it simple. Focus on your foundation. And don't get overwhelmed, just do one thing at a time!

Which of these are you going to focus on this week? Tell me in the comments below!

Yours In Abundant Health,

Xoxo,

Emily 😊