I have had many patients experience and tell me that they were able to improve their love relationships (and work as well) when they stopped running away from the conflicts they encountered in their personal lives. They tended to reach the same impasse with each relationship. Until they took a break and worked out these very intimate and personal issues they have about intimacy and personal relationships, they couldn’t meet and be close with the right person for them. At least, this is the ‘more right’ person, since with every relationship there are some issues and growth to experience.

4. The way we eat is crucial to health or illness. Much disease comes from poor food choices, mostly over decades, but also in the short term. That is why establishing the foundation of healthy eating should start in childhood. And if we’re parents, we need to follow the Number One rule for feeding kids right, and that’s “Set a Good Example!” This is where Nature comes in and eating foods closer to the source, which is our Earth Mother. She blesses us every season with foods that are best for us—fresh greens in the Spring, cooling fruits and vegetables in the Summer, lots of richer foods like grains, beans, nuts and seeds, plus many veggies in Autumn to help us last through the cold or wet Winter. Connect with this and minimize all the processed and junk foods and chemicals so readily available everywhere in our modern societies. This one area can help protect your health and keep you well throughout your years.

What about NURTURANCE? Nourishing ourselves with care, food from loving cooking, friendship is investing in self, and this investment can comfort and heal us. Being sensitive to our own needs, truly caring for ourselves, nurturing our own being by knowing what will nourish us and our spirit, we can learn the uniqueness of our being, as every human is different.

5. Exercise activity is crucial to staying healthy and vital, as well as to good circulation and a strong immune system. A balanced daily and long-term program that includes stretching for flexibility, aerobic activity for endurance, and weight work for strength. This all leads to better relaxation and getting our minds out of the way so that healing can happen more easily in our bodies. A vital body rarely gets sick. Yoga and other flexibility-enhancing movements are helpful at keeping us youthful. “We are as young as our spine is flexible.” So, stay young and healthy with regular exercise.

6. Nutritional supplements support balance and healing. They nourish our cells and tissues, and support optimal function to allow healing to happen biochemically and physiologically. Deficiency symptoms such as fatigue and coldness may require nutrients and hormonal balance (and a more nourishing diet) while congestion and toxicity problems like headaches, allergies, aches and pains, and digestive maladies can be helped by detoxification with herbs (and with a more cleansing diet) and nutritional support. Make sure you or your guide knows what they are doing, and don’t overdo it. We can find the right program for each of us if we listen to both our inner guidance as well as outside wisdom and experience.

7. Avoid the victim and blame game, the name game. Most of us get into trouble because of the way we think and the judgments we make, both for others and ourselves. When we say things to others out of anger and with an attempt to hurt them, as we may feel hurt, we generate a war of words and feelings. That is not a healing feeling and creates separation. Separation and upset emotions generate dis-ease while love and connection/cooperation toward unity help us heal. Many people have bad habits, self-destructive behavior because they feel victimized by life and don’t feel deserving of love, health, good food, and other ways of nurturing and pleasuring themselves. Sometimes, the number one thing we can do is to heal our attitude towards self and life. I encourage my patients to adopt the philosophy that ‘this is the only body I have, and I want to treat it in a loving and respectful way.” Then, if we can really feel and believe this, we will begin to eat better, exercise more, learn to handle our stresses, and have a new and different approach to life. Wow!