"Let Your Heart Speak to Other's Hearts" | THF Women's Health Retreat

Thank You to All Involved in The Healing Farm's Women's Health Retreat!

"Let your heart speak to other's hearts." Found on a yogi tea bag, yes. But it's one I saved for a couple of years and had posted on my magnet board in my office. After the women's health retreat I truly found out what that meant to me in my quest to find myself and my new career journey. Obviously it spoke to me in my time of great change and I felt moved to to keep it. As I watched several women working diligently on their "manifestation" boards at the retreat and then thrilled at the results, I realized I wanted to do one too. I didn't get a chance to complete it (I barely started going through magazines when I had to run off to set something up for the next scheduled activity - or three!) so when I took my "staycation" the week after the retreat ended, I had a chance to work on this worthwhile exercise. The yogi tea bag quote finally found its place. So did the fortune cookie fortune that's been taped to my refrigerator door for a couple of years ("Your talents will be recognized and suitably rewarded.").

What the incredible group of women at the retreat showed me is that I truly do want "my heart to speak to other's hearts". On day one of the retreat when I was introducing myself and the team, I mentioned that I am not a specialist. I'm a generalist. That some of the women at the retreat would surely know more than me about health and nutrition, but what's becoming increasingly clear is that I like bringing people together. I want to bring educators and practitioners together in a beautiful setting to teach natural health solutions participants can build into their everyday lives. I want to share the joy and healing journey in my heart with anyone who will join me and I realized that I could actually do that in this new career journey. I learned as much from the women at this retreat as they learned from the talented educators and practitioners I brought together in the beautiful place that is Mayacamas Ranch. So at long last, I want to share my absolute gratitude to the participants, the team and Mayacamas Ranch!

The Participants

Thirty beautiful women and five team members. I was blown away by the enthusiasm, sharing, encouragement, breakthroughs and loveliness of the group of women who came together for this retreat. We welcomed women of all ages even though the retreat was focussing on menopause and indeed we had a wide range of ages. My guess? Maybe from early 30s to early 70s. What a wealth of knowledge coming from these wise and wonderful women. Old friendships were deepened, new friendships were forged. We ate, we hiked, we laughed and we cried. We had mothers of young children who weren't even close to menopause but who wanted to sincerely learn how they could best prepare their bodies for big changes (or who just needed to rest with clean food, exercise, fresh air and a digital detox). We had mothers of young children who were getting close to menopause, we had women who had never had children, we had grandmothers. We had cross-generational inspiration, we learned together and we had fun! We were all already talking about the next retreat so I need to get one on the calendar!

If you want to read a participant's take on the retreat, I was overwhelmed with gratitude and emotion when I read Sarah Kay Hoffman's blog post. She wrote it the day after the retreat (even with THREE kids to tend to at home!). You can read it here:

Dr. Amy Nett, M.D., Functional Medicine Practitioner and One of the Smartest People I've Ever Met

Geez this woman knows her stuff. Of course I shouldn't have been surprised that one of Chris Kresser's staff clinicians at The California Center for Functional Medicine would be so knowledgeable. At last year's retreat we had the brilliant and passionate Chris Kresser himself as our keynote speaker and were all blown away by how knowledgeable his staff nutritionist Kelsey Kinney of "Healthy Gut, Healthy Life" was. How fortunate were we this time around to listen to two well-planned and informative lectures by Dr. Nett about what you can do to best prepare your body for menopause through nutrition and also about hormone balance. I wasn't surprised that Dr. Nett added several new patients to her calendar during and after the retreat! THANK YOU Dr. Nett!

Emily Boorstein: Life Coach and Creator of the "Inner Fitness" Program

Life Coach Emily Boorstein of the Inner Fitness Program

This was Emily's second time speaking at a THF retreat and there's a good reason for it. I recognized through my own journey through midlife that it wasn't just my body going through major changes. I felt like in addition to Dr. Nett's contributions about the physical aspect, we needed to also cover the emotional experience of midlife. Emily graciously covered life-lessons learned through motherhood for all the mothers in the audience, but all of those lessons learned early on through her own personal growth translated well into how to gracefully and solidly tackle the emotional roller coaster that is midlife and menopause. Every time I hear Coach Emily speak, I pick up little nuggets of information that later on end up applying to (pick one or all): a wake up in the middle of the night panic attack (something I never experienced before menopause), a stewing in the shower about something my husband said that made me mad, a sitting in traffic and wanting to flip someone off or even an emotional transition to a new president. My favorite tip from Emily that I use all the time in my life is how to not panic. If I feel some kind of emotional turmoil coming on and want to react, I can now reach into my "Coach Emily toolbox", step back and consider whether this is something that is going to end the world or if it's something I can truly tackle without false emotion. I will forever be grateful to Coach Emily for her support, enthusiasm and contributions. She helped me through my true midlife crisis when I realized I was never going to be a mother and she will always be in my heart for opening hers.

Amanda Crutcher: Yoga Instructor/Yoga Therapy/Meditator Extraordinaire

Amanda Crutcher knows anatomy and ohhhh how to work with those yoga therapy balls! She cares so deeply about her participant's safety and bodies. Probably because of her Iyengar yoga background, Amanda really focusses on the physical aspect of yoga making sure her participants understand the postures and the anatomy behind them. It's really good training - especially for beginners and to prevent injury. She also brought out yoga therapy balls at her last class. From a practicality standpoint, using the balls at home (safely) is great. It's like being able to give yourself a massage and is great for deeply loosening those knots. I learned this technique at Rancho La Puerta with tennis balls, but the various sized yoga therapy balls were even better. Amanda also graciously opened up her one hour twice daily meditation practice to all the attendees. This is where her deep spirituality came out. Her calm presence and grace surely comes from her deep meditation practice. Something I hope to explore with her in the future.

Diane Gibbs: Massage Therapy and Feldenkrais

This was Diane's second THF retreat as well. Her talented hands were in great demand. Who wouldn't want a glorious massage by well-trained hands while on a retreat? Diane ended up completely booking up, so I was thrilled to bring on my dear friend (and someone who has done massage on me countless times) Angela Bausch. Thanks so much to Angela for bringing her experienced hands to our retreat!

Diane also brought her love for and practice of Feldenkrais to this retreat. As at the last retreat, a lot of the participants had never heard of Feldenkrais, but most experienced beneficial effects through this gentle movement practice. 

Mayacamas Ranch!

Once again I can't thank the staff at Mayacamas Ranch enough. Miguel once again knocked the paleo ball out of the park with his cooking, the rest of the staff was warm and welcoming and the property - even in the wintertime - was as peaceful and beautiful as ever. Seeing the milky way in the clear winter night sky, the fog in the valley on our early morning hike, the steam coming off of the pond, hearing those funny frogs loud and clear every night when going to bed - and that cozy bed! You can't go wrong with Mayacamas Ranch as your home base for a retreat!

And Then There was Karma.....

Karma Moffit and his Tibetan Bowls

How do you top off what you know may be an enlightening weekend for your participants? I always say I don't want The Healing Farm to be too hippie dippy or new age and then I bring in a man named Karma. But, I've been going deeper into my own meditation practice as I move through this midlife of mine and all its changes and have been inspired by the crystal bowls meditations I've experienced at Rancho La Puerta. Since I was introducing various forms of meditation into this women's retreat I thought it might be nice to top off the last night with a crystal bowls meditation. My intention was to have Danielle Hall of Sound Embrace perform, but she ended up being unavailable. Through other contacts I found this man named "Karma" who plays tibetan bowls. He performs all over the world and had even performed at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco for a labyrinth meditation a few nights before the retreat. Now this is a man who has lived life and he didn't hesitate to tell us all about it. I love great characters who embrace life and whatever comes their way and although I might have been able to do without the high pitched conch shell blowing, it was great to be in a room surrounded by women I brought together, surrounded by deep vibrating sounds delivered by someone who has so obviously embraced life fully and taken the less-traveled path. Karma's heart truly speaks to other's hearts. I was so grateful he joined us to top off the retreat.

So what did I get out of The Healing Farm's Women's retreat? Hope and especially ENCOURAGEMENT for the future of The Healing Farm AND This Manifestation Board Illustrating my Hope for My Future and the Future of The Healing Farm.

I think it's no coincidence that this board came out of me on inauguration day, 2017. My hope is for a bright, inclusive and healthy future for all.

As many times as I've muttered "Namaste" at the end of a yoga class, I've never known what it meant and never bothered to take the time to look it up. Coach Emily taught us that one of the translations is "The light in me sees the light in you."  I feel like we all experienced this at the women's retreat. I certainly experienced sharing my heart and felt like my guests shared theirs with me. I think I'm ready now to take the next steps with The Healing Farm. It's still scary and I still have doubts but when a dear friend sends you a link to Sia's "The Greatest" when you express fear of the next step you listen to her heart speak to your heart and so it goes and so it goes. Let your own midlife be a midlife renaissance no matter how scary it might be. Moving beyond your fears and your comfort zone will help you breakthrough to be your "greatest". 

See you all at the next retreat! 

All of my love and heart - Julie

The Healing Farm - Cultivating Practical Wellness!

Happy New Year and Remember to be Dreamy and Change Your Life if You Need to!

I was floating on my back in the Villas Pool at Rancho La Puerta the last time I was there for a photo shoot and it was such a dreamy experience. The pool had been heated for watsu massages that week since the watsu pool was under construction. I happened to go up there when there was no massage happening and have recently discovered how much I love being in water - especially warm water (in the 90s). For years I would say that I would like to learn to swim properly because I know it would be a great form of exercise for my aging body (low impact, great cardio and meditative too), but I have long thick hair that I only wash once a week so it would be a big pain to become a regular swimmer. Because of my hair! I've told a few swimmers over the years and they understandably roll their eyes. What I realized recently is that I like being in water so much that I think it might be worth dealing with washing my hair more than once a week.

This comes with many realizations lately that if I want to change my life and be the person I truly want to be, it's going to take some great lifestyle changes and as scary as it is, I may be ready to really take them on and get out of this comfort zone I've been in for such a long time.

The life coach (Coach Emily) who speaks regularly at Rancho La Puerta and is speaking at my upcoming women's health retreat (MLK weekend) often asks her audience to picture who they would like to be 5, 10 or 15 years from that moment. She asks that you visualize what you look like, where you are and what you're doing. The last time I saw her speak, she asked the crowd after the exercise how many people pictured themselves skinny. Well, count me in on those that raised their hand. But I also pictured myself (and I've done this several times now in the past few years) as a confident aging woman with long gray hair (yes! I'm going gray) strolling through The Healing Farm property greeting guests and helping others learn about healing in an affordable way. Possibly changing the health care industry to make preventable measures more common and natural and living on the property preparing for retirement. And yes. slim, glowing, healthy and swimming almost daily.

There was an opinion article written in The New York Times this past weekend about New Year's resolutions. The title was "Try a New Year's Resolution" and it was written by Jennifer Weiner. What I liked about this article is that Ms. Weiner talks about why new year's resolutions generally don't work and most importantly that if you truly want change, you need to actually change your life or lifestyle. This resonated so much with what I had been thinking the past few months. I had already changed my diet to reduce inflammation in my body and naturally heal (for the most part) all of my chronic conditions and I had already started on the path to changing my career, but what I keep failing to do is understand and put into action a plan that will actually put me in a place where the career change will be not only be truly possible, but also complete. To do that, I need to gain confidence in myself. To do that, I need to become that woman I picture when I close my eyes. I know some may be screaming "Don't worry about your body image"! You're lovely as you are"! But I know that when I put weight on I don't feel as good physically. My back pain creeps up, my joint pain acts up and although I'm perfectly comfortable feeling sexy for my husband and he views me as incredibly sexy, I want to really look great for him (and myself) for years to come. 

All this is to say, that I need to let go of thinking swimming will be a great pain in the neck. That if I don't truly change my lifestyle I may not ever be that person I visualize when I close my eyes. It's not just about doing the Whole 30 in January and vowing that I WILL lose that 20 pounds. It's really that I actually want a different lifestyle and version of myself that I haven't quite reached yet. As much as I love myself and my life as it is and I am and feel fortunate every day that I've been given the life I've been given, I can't help but feel that I haven't yet reached my true potential. Hair be damned, the feeling I get when I'm swimming in warm water and floating on my back and feeling weightless and free is astounding to me. I also need to seriously start thinking of how to finally shed my photography career and move on to living a life in service to others. Helping to heal while healing myself. Being surrounded by beauty and nature and living the life I've dreamed of. 

Some of my retreat participants have asked for homework assignments for next weekend's women's retreat and I've already asked them to list what in their life right now (in midlife) feels like it is in a state of flux and what feels stable and secure. I recently had a conversation with a friend about a visualization/manifestation board and think that also might be a fun assignment that can be added to the art meditation at the retreat. I invite anyone who reads this to cut out pictures of anything that they want to realize in the next few years - wether it's a new career, a new look, a new spouse, a baby (this was my friends and it worked for her!), a new home - whatever you really dream of - and then think about how you need to change your life beyond your new year's resolution to make it happen. It could be a very strong exercise! If you are coming to the women's retreat, please bring some magazines that we can share to work on this project during the art meditation. I will bring glue and boards and a few scissors. If you remember to bring a pair of scissors, that would be great!

Dare to dream and be dreamy!

State of Flux - A Little Prep Work for the January Women's Retreat!

So why do I have pictures of a guy scrolling for the women's retreat prep work? Because my husband is the one thing I can say is NOT in a state of flux during my middle years. Here's what is:

• Changing career
• Parents aging
• My body
• Living location

Life is always full of uncertainty and change. It's part of how we grow and mature but as I reached middle age I realized that there were a LOT of things that were starting to change in addition to my body. With peri-menopause came all sorts of physical and emotional changes. Weight gain, hot flashes, mood swings, panic attacks, acne. What I realized was that I was getting my physical attributes (except for the weight gain) under control when I would stick to my gluten free/dairy free eating plan. If I went off-course (especially adding wine into the mix), those physical attributes of menopause would kick right up again. OK. so for now, during peri-menopause, I have figured out what works for me to control my physical health (for the most part). 

But what about those panic attacks during the night that I've never experienced before? What about the heightened PMS symptoms (mood swings) which I never know when to expect because with peri-menopause your cycle is hard to predict? That's when I started thinking about the emotional component to menopause. How many women (not just me) are going through some major life shifts during their middle years:

• Becoming empty nesters (sending their babies out into the world!).
• Contemplating getting back into the work force after full-time mothering.
• Contemplating a career shift (like me) because our bodies either can't hack the physical attributes of our work anymore or the stress level or just the simple fact that we've realized what we're doing is not what we want to do for the next 20-30 years of work.
• Caring for or being away from our aging parents. How hard is it to watch our parents age, get diagnosed and eventually die? We are losing our childhood. We are saying goodbye to those we trusted and loved most in the world and for some of us, we are also caretakers. Or for some of us there's the guilt of living halfway across the country while our siblings bear most of the responsibility.
• We start thinking about our legacies.
• We start thinking about our mates and out commitments to them.

So there we are. We're in a constant state of flux during the hardest shift in our bodies since puberty.

Here was a revelation for me. What in my life is NOT in a state of flux? This came to me while I was camping alone for five days in Joshua Tree a few years ago. I had just started contemplating a career change and The Healing Farm and I had just started experiencing the first symptoms of peri-menopause. I was panicked because I had never had a child. Pretty big stuff. So there I was out in the desert by myself and one evening by the campfire a song came on that reminded me of my husband. It's by one of his favorite bands and it's a great song. It ends with the repetition of the line "I'm in love with you. So in love." And I realized that despite everything else swirling around me during this crazy time, the one thing that is for sure is my relationship and my love for my husband. Do we have a perfect marriage? Far from it! But what we do have is mutual respect for each other and an ever increasingly exciting sex life. Now let me tell you. You can go pretty far in the contentment category with that!

So what I realized is that as everything else swirls. As my body changes. As my parents age. As my husband and I both figure out our future career paths and home, the one constant is that love for my husband and the loyalty we have for each other.

So the assignment? List what IS in flux during your middle years and then list (even if it's just one thing) that isn't in flux: the one or two or three constants in your life that you can cling to when everything else seems to be a tornado of emotions and changes around you. It could be your job. It could be your pet. It could be your new grandchild or your young child you are rearing late in life. It could be your faith. It could be a dear friend or sibling. There's something in your life that's not in flux so think about it. Meditate on it and when you feel yourself reeling come back to that.

I would love to discuss either in a group at the retreat or one-on-one your flux list and your constant list so either share here, share on the retreat facebook group or let's set up a time to share at the retreat. This is a time of great change in our lives so let's try not to get too freaked out. Let's try to embrace and make it our mid-life renaissance!

Something YOU can Control in Many Cases - Your Health!

From the Washington Post

As someone who may be effected by possible upcoming changes in our healthcare system, the Washington Post article in my Google newsfeed today caught my eye. It's really not just that the new administration may make changes that could effect millions of people that made me look at this article, but also that I'm trying to start a business that will help us all realize that we don't have to be so dependent on our current healthcare and insurance industries to relieve some of our chronic conditions. I suppose that might be what the new administration is trying to say by dumping the Affordable Care Act, but alas, they are not talking about prevention to avoid high healthcare and insurance costs or programs which teach people how to avoid those costs to begin with.

This Washington Post article is such an eye opener about just how much we are spending in the industry on health conditions that CAN be preventable and in many cases managed through diet and exercise. The thing is that having someone else do the work for us (procedures, surgeries, pharmaceuticals, etc) is WAY easier than doing the hard work ourselves and if someone else is paying for it - all the better, right? But the thing is we're ALL paying for it, whether through government programs OR through our escalating coverage costs through private work plans. I remember when I was in my mid-twenties and some of my chronic conditions started rearing their ugly heads. I had really good insurance through my employer. I thought nothing of going to the doctor every couple of months (thinking that I really wasn't paying for it). Getting tested for this and tested for that. Getting this prescription and that prescription...fast forward twenty-something years and I'm self employed with terrible health insurance. I had to re-think my approach to dealing with all of my chronic conditions (which seemed to be multiplying with age). 

In walks functional medicine. Digging deep with a practitioner to figure out the core issues that might have been causing all my misery over the years was the easy part (and the most expensive but still far less than what I've spent over the last twenty years). Doing the work to naturally rid myself of these conditions was the hard part. But considering I came out the other side of the treatment and commitment almost 100% chronic pain and condition free has inspired me to re-think our healthcare industry. For sure there are treatments and meds that save lives and relieve pain - if I hadn't gotten an appendectomy several years ago, I would not be typing here today! But in reading the Washington Post article it's right there in black and white that we really CAN be controlling these out of control healthcare costs if we are actually willing to bite the bullet and do the hard work. To lose the weight, to become more fit and to alleviate some of those chronic conditions naturally and ultimately at a much lower cost AND to not be so dependent on treatments and prescriptions can save all of us literally TRILLIONS of dollars.

The Healing Farm and The Healing Farm | Retreats concept is all about prevention. I want to inspire other people struggling with one, two or multiple chronic conditions, auto-immune diseases, obesity and all that comes with it, to try the preventative route. Start with an elimination diet to reduce inflammation in your body. This may help with not just your physical chronic conditions, but also your emotional state as well. Two books that I used and will always recommend are: "The Paleo Cure" by Chris Kresser (what my Healing Farm Retreat's meal plan and concept is based on) and Dr. Kelly Brogan's book "A Mind of your Own". If you are still suffering after your elimination diet, then it might be time to see a functional medicine practitioner to get some blood work done. This is the expensive part and is probably not covered in your insurance plan (something that needs to change!), but if it reveals a host of underlying issues (in my case a parasite living in my system and deficiencies in some key vitamins) think of how much money in co-pays and prescription costs you may save in the long term by figuring it out in one fell swoop and then tackling the cures naturally!

As I said, we've gotten so used to depending on our healthcare and insurance system to cure our multiple ills - but it's at a huge cost for our country. Envision healing centers throughout the country that are affordable and all about preventative measures and natural healing. It could do us all a world of good both in our bodies and in our pocketbooks!

The Healing Farm - Cultivating Practical Health!

Retreat Client Testimonial!

I feel so fortunate that I had such a lovely group at my first multi-day retreat last April at Mayacamas Ranch and ended up loving everyone so! Suzanne has now been to TWO of my retreats including the Paleo reset last April and is now set to join me again at the Women's Health Detox and Hormone Balance Retreat which is set for MLK weekend - the 13th through the 16th of January. There are still about eight spots left to fill, so please join us. I would love to see you "on the list"! Says Suzanne of the last retreat and in joining this one:

"How much I wish I'd had a retreat like your last one when I was starting peri menopause. All the valuable information and collection of superb folks you bring together! The speakers and classes - all professional and exceptional as well as the beautiful, rustic, chic setting of Mayacamas Ranch made it just perfecto-o! Loved everything about your retreat(s) including your generosity and beautiful attention to detail, but especially the people you bring together. Simply perfect!"

I'm so looking forward to seeing Suzanne at the upcoming retreat and hope to meet you there as well!

Women's Health Topics This M.D. is Not Shy to Talk About!

Dryness? Low libido? "Urgency"? And we thought hot flashes, weight gain and emotional ups and downs were difficult enough to encounter during peri menopause and menopause!

Since I am lucky enough to do marketing photography for Rancho La Puerta (the #1 destination spa in the world according to Travel and Leisure readers for four out of the past six years), I was at "The Ranch" (as it's lovingly called by its many repeat guests) last week. Given that I'm producing a women's health retreat in January, I was thrilled to learn that there was a gynecologist on site who was to be speaking about women's health issues that are not so easy to discuss. Even with your gynecologist! 

Dr. Lauren Streicher, M.D. practices in my original hometown of Chicago and was NOT shy about discussing "uncomfortable" women's health issues. In fact she was downright funny which is why she makes these topics so approachable. It's no wonder she's been a guest on Oprah!, Dr. Oz and Good Morning America (among others).

I'll be ordering her book and will have it on hand at The Healing Farm's Women's Hormone Balance and Detox Health Retreat January 13th - the 16th at Mayacamas Ranch (a few spots left!) since she does talk a bit about natural solutions for many issues. Among my favorites......

Why not combine a solution for the three issues I mention above? Vaginal dryness (about 50% of women experience during and post-menopause), Low Libido (can be partially due to discomfort due to the following AND preceding issues) and urinary incontinence (about 30-40% of women in middle age experience stress incontinence). 

Did you know that the more you have sex, the more maintained lubrication is? Did you know that strengthening the pelvic floor (yes, kegel exercises) will intensify your orgasms and also help with urinary urgency (the stress kind). Keeping up with maintenance "down there" is the number one way you can naturally keep these issues at bay during your middle years! 

Dr. Streicher speaks in WAY more detail about all of these issues both during her talks and presumably in her book, but my favorite (and based on the discussion at dinner that night and breakfast in the morning - everyone else's too) is a device called "intensity" created by a company called "Pour Moi". Apparently most women who try to do kegel exercises are not doing them correctly and not only that, don't keep up with them long enough to properly strengthen the pelvic floor in order to alleviate these chronic midlife health issues. 

Believe it or not, you can see a certified pelvic physical therapist who can properly help you strengthen your pelvic floor (and in some cases, Dr. Streicher does refer patients to them), but the original Pour Moi device that was created helps you strengthen your pelvic floor for a lot less money AND in the comfort of your own home. The device vibrates when you are doing your kegels properly and after 4-6 weeks (4-6 days a week for ten minutes a day) your pelvic floor will be sufficiently strengthened and in most cases, the stress urgency will be gone. PLUS, you should be experiencing more intense orgasms which presumably will make you want to have more sex, which then helps keep everything healthy and lubricated. Voila!

But wait - it wasn't the original Pour Moi device that had everyone talking. Ahhh. Then Dr. Streicher showed us a picture of the "intensity" version. The company got smart and realized they could help women get into more of a routine by making it more fun. Why not add some external stimulation and add an orgasm to the exercise plan? Ha! Brilliant. Not only would you remember to do (and look forward to doing) your exercises, but you can also have fun while doing them AND help keep it all lubed up down there. Now this made everyone giggle and then seriously discuss!

According to Dr. Streicher, in most cases, there's no reason for 50% or more women to experience these common symptoms of aging and there's REALLY no reason we should feel uncomfortable discussing these issues. ESPECIALLY with our gynecologist! This is one of the reasons I wanted to create a women's retreat. I want us to come together and discuss these issues that so many of us experience in a comfortable setting amongst other women so that we can bring that discussion openly out to other women. Let's not be shy about these things!

I hope you can join us in January to hear Dr. Amy Nett talk about an ancestral functional medicine approach to natural solutions for women's health issues during middle age.

The Healing Farm - Cultivating Practical Wellness!

"If" by Rudyard Kipling

"If" by Rudyard Kipling

I am far from a poetry buff and in fact I'm pretty intimidated by poetry. Most of the time I don't get it and feel guilty about that. It's probably because I'm somewhat A.D.D. and have never been able to concentrate long enough to really take a poem in. That's why it's a surprise for me to be writing about a poem. But this poem now has great meaning for me and it's just from one evening. Let me explain.

When we sat down for Thanksgiving dinner this year, our host (who is known for writing witty poems for everyone in his life and had just written one for my 50th birthday) announced that he was going to read a poem before we started dinner. He mentioned his love for poetry and his first grandson's new appreciation for poetry. His grandson is about 10 year's old (my guess) and you could tell Grandpa was proud and thrilled that his Grandson had a new appreciation for poetry. Our host is also politically active and opinionated and had strong opinions about our recent presidential election as does a great deal of this country (including myself). These are some times of great change in this country, this world and on this great earth and I think this Grandfather recognized that the future may be challenging for his grandson and he wanted to express how he felt to his grandson through this poem that has obviously inspired himself throughout his life. So he read Rudyard Kipling's poem "If". Being a witness to this interchange was truly an honor.

BUT, the A.D.D. intimidated by poetry person in me came out and I could hardly understand the poem as it was being read because I was so distracted by wanting so badly to listen and understand. Ah the dilemma of the constantly distracted! Therefore when our host finished reading the poem I almost dropped my jaw when my quiet and somewhat anti-social husband had something to say. He actually recited a line from the poem and mentioned that he set a Dennis Hopper reading of the poem to music several years ago and this version was living on his Soundcloud page. You could not have surprised me more that my husband knew this poem. I know from being married to him that he thinks WAY more deeply than most people including myself and that one would never know it unless they truly got to know him one on one, but this was something that completely bowled me over and impressed me.

When we got home, I asked him to play this edited version of Dennis Hopper's reading of "IF" and then asked him to repeat it four times. It's gorgeous and it hit me like a ton of bricks why this Grandfather wanted to read this poem to his Grandson on the heels of this election and on Thanksgiving. Everyone should understand this poem and the humility in living a life that it expresses - especially our president elect.

So here is a real treat. Brennan's remix of Dennis Hopper's reading of "If" by Rudyard Kipling:

https://soundcloud.com/brensbeats/if-dennis-hopper-tribute

Tremendous. I'm so thankful that my husband is such a deep and thoughtful thinker. Most people wouldn't know it but he's a pretty special human being and I would say lives a lot by the poem "If".

Gratitude Reduces Inflammation!???

We all have probably read something like this by now, but do we truly practice it? I read this yesterday in the New York Post:

"Emmons also has compiled a list of health data points from his and others’ studies on gratitude that show there are many emotional and physical health benefits of being consciously thankful. For example, practicing gratitude is related to 23 percent lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol and led to a 7 percent reduction in biomarkers of inflammation in patients with congestive heart failure. There are studies that suggest gratitude led to reductions in depression and blood pressure and improvement in sleep quality among those with chronic pain and insomnia. In one study, 88 percent of suicidal patients reported feeling less hopeless after writing a letter of gratitude." 

This is research done by Robert Emmons of the University of California at Davis and Michael McCullough of the University of Miami.

Practicing gratitude is scientifically proven to reduce inflammation and it feels so good so why don't we practice it regularly? I have actually naturally built a gratitude practice into my daily routine pretty easily and have been doing so for about a year. It started last fall when I was truly going through a hard time. When everything seemed to be falling apart and I was having trouble getting myself out of bed in the morning, I would look out the window behind my head and stare a little bit into the camellia tree that's right outside and first I would say thanks for the trees, then it moved into nature in general, then my family and friends and then the life that I've been given. Just this simple act would make me feel good enough that I would get myself out of bed and start my morning routine. Compared to millions of people on this earth, I've been given one of the best lives I could have been given and believe me, compared to some of the people I know I struggle with a lot of things despite this blessed life I've been given!

Although I still look out this same window almost daily and give thanks before I start the day, I've since also started building a gratitude practice into my meditation routine. I really only meditate ten minutes a day, but once I'm done with that ten minutes I continue with a breathing meditation that I read about in Kelly Brogan's book: "A Mind of your Own". First I do alternate nostril breath and then I switch to in and out breaths in my left nostril (which is supposed to create a sense of calm and peace) and on the in and out breaths I go through the very basics of what I'm grateful for in my life:

• The life I've been given, this earth I live on and the gorgeous mysterious universe
• My husband
• My parents
• My family
• My friends
• My talents and creativity

If you had told me a few years ago that I would have a regular practice of nostril breathing I would have looked at you like you had two heads, but a few years ago I wasn't taking the risks I'm taking now in my life to move forward with what I hope will be a more productive and meaningful path in my life. Its important to me to give this career change and The Healing Farm my best shot and I need all the help I can get to take the kinds of risks I'm taking and to put myself out there despite my fear and doubt. Practicing gratitude every day has been a great way to recognize what I already have in my life and all that I've achieved thus far (strong relationships with friends and family is more than I could have hoped for in my life and that's already achieved) and if practicing gratitude can also help reduce inflammation in my body? Well, then that's just the icing on the GF cake!

So THANK YOU to all of those who may be reading this and especially to all of my past retreat clients and upcoming retreat clients for helping me make my dream come true! If anyone has taken the time to read this, feel free to announce what you are grateful for in the comments section!

Amanda Crutcher Joins the Women's Health Retreat Team as our Yoga Instructor!

I'm so excited to announce that Amanda Crutcher will be joining our January Women's Retreat team as our daily yoga instructor! 

Amanda contacted me a few weeks ago because she was passionate about my vision for The Healing Farm and recognized in my mission that I was truly filling a void in the retreat industry: A yoga retreat with meat? A paleo themed retreat that didn't feature killer exercise programs but focused more on an elimination diet to teach folks who are struggling with chronic health issues ideas about functional medicine and natural healing? I hear this from a lot of people and am trying to fill that niche! 

We met soon after our initial contact at my 50th birthday party. I asked if she would jump in to teach a short yoga class at Slide Ranch to kick off my birthday festivities. Driving all the way from Sebastopol to Slide Ranch to teach in the chill of the coastal fog, I instantly loved her passion and her warmth and sincerity. We met for lunch a couple of weeks later and again felt a great connection and I invited her to join the women's retreat team.

Amanda has a diverse background in the healing arts and as a dedicated twice daily meditator will open up her meditation time to allow our retreat participants to join her. If you saw my previous blog post about meditation you know that I only meditate ten minutes a day so when Amanda told me she meditates twice a day for an hour each "sit" I couldn't believe her dedication!  We will provide a spot for her twice daily meditations and she will discuss "dropping" in during her restorative yoga session on the first day of the retreat. Don't be intimidated! She stresses that you can pop in any time within the hour and meditate for as long as you like. Plus if you're new to mediation, Dr. Nett and I will will be offering a couple of short guided meditation sessions too!

Amanda says about joining the team:

"I am very excited to be joining the staff of The Healing Farm for the January 2017 Women’s Health Detox and Hormone Balance Retreat, where I will be teaching the daily Yoga classes, and offering private Yoga sessions. There are few places that I would rather be than on a retreat immersed in healing practices, people and foods!

The Healing Farm’s mission to merge agriculture, evolutionary health, and mindful wellness practices resonated with me like a load clear deep Burmese gong! My life’s journey is about vibrant health. As a child I was blessed to be mentored in nature connection while living in the west village of NYC. From age 6 to 9 my schooling focused on studying the local ecosystem in western NJ, raising ducks from eggs, tapping maple trees, dying wool with plant dyes to weave, digging clay to make pots, while learning to read, write, and look at the world mathematically. This gift of loving the outdoors inspired me to ski, cycle, rock climb, backpack, sail, play and swim.

My other childhood love was the circus, my British Mom gave me the book, “Mr. Galiano’s Circus” and my world was changed. I juggled, tumbled, rode a unicycle, jumped and flipped endlessly on the trampoline, and even attended circus school on the Bowrey in NYC. My determination to build the strength to take it to another level wasn’t there, and instead my embodied way of being got channeled into college level competitive Ultimate Disc, dance and mid-distance running.

My work in college focused on studying biology; my thesis was on inflammation and nutrition. I continued my studies at the New England School of Acupuncture, where I became a licensed acupuncturist in Massachusetts. Currently I am pursuing a masters degree in Human Nutrition and Functional Medicine, continuing the exploration of inflammation, natural cures and traditional healing ways.

Finding Yoga in college was coming home to a place I had missed. I love the challenges Yoga offers, such as, balancing in handstands, or simply breathing and being present; deepening my abilities to be aware, balance, feel, and strengthen. Now the magic of Yoga is most powerful in calming my nervous system in the throws of our modern wired life. In this pursuit I have also devoted myself to the practice of Vipassana meditation as taught by Sayagi U Ba Khin and SN Goenka. I am grateful for the valuable guidance I have been given. My Yoga asana practice has been inspired by the teachings of BKS Iyengar and his many students, as well as Patabhi Jois. Currently my Yoga teacher is Jill Miller, the founder of Yoga Tune Up.

Jill has synthesized the teachings of the masters, within the context of modern humans. Integrating ancient wisdom with innovative props, Yoga therapy balls, and addressing current global human movement issues.

My teaching is inspired by practice, both on my cushion, on my Yoga mat and in life. I am delighted to bring this training to the January retreat, to share tools to gain a calm, balanced, strong, flexible and healthy body. It starts with nourishment from the earth; It is then our loving attention that transforms that food prana into connection with our hearts, each other, and back to the earth. May we each find that gracefully! May we help make peace prevail inside and everywhere."

Welcome Amanda!!!

"Not too Hippie Dippy" but Offering Meditation and Yoga at the THF Retreats? Disconnect or Smart?

When I first started dreaming of The Healing Farm retreat property and wellness ranch concept I always said that I wanted to offer "tasteful and affordable" retreats. Not too high-end where they become unaffordable to most people, but I also wanted to build a property that is lovely and austere offering programs that aren't too "hippie dippy" and intimidating. I've been told that using the term "hippie dippy" might insult some people. It's kind of like referring to myself as being "efficient" because of the German in me. I can say it because I'm German! And I feel like I can poke fun of the hippie dippy culture because - well - I'm a little hippie dippy myself!

I've not been to Spirit Rock Meditation Center mostly because I've not had a meditation practice in the past (pretty good reason), but even as I've started dipping my toe into meditation, I figured I would be intimidated and not feel like I belong because I don't have a long history of meditation in my life or even at this point a deep and regular practice. But as I've moved in the past couple of years into starting this new business called The Healing Farm and The Healing Farm | Retreats, I've also been introduced to the challenges of midlife and peri-menopause. As I mentioned in my post about turing 50, this is not an easy time to be making big changes!

As I was approaching my last multi-day retreat; planning/facilitating, putting myself out there and doing something I've never done before, I was met with some great challenges. Two things happened during this time:

1) I had a photo assignment at Rancho La Puerta (I photograph there once a year or so for their marketing materials) and brought my cousin Annie as my guest. Annie has a regular meditation practice and while we were there I decided I should check out RLP's introduction to meditation. One of my fave instructors (JayDee!) was teaching that day and he taught me some very important lessons about meditation:

• That there will ALWAYS be thoughts moving in and out of your brain. It's constant, but what we're trying to do with meditation is learn to look at those thoughts in a detached way without judgement, without letting our emotions get in the way and simply observing them and then letting them go. This made me feel like I wasn't failing every time I've tried meditating in the past. It's normal to continue to have thoughts pass through your mind when you're meditating and that simply learning to let them go by returning to your breath (or chant or prayer or whatever you decide to use) is the key to living more in the present and not allowing your thoughts to consume you.
• He admitted straight away that he's a type A personality (and if you've ever met JayDee you could figure that out in an instant) and that if he can teach himself to meditate and to have a regular practice, just about anyone can! Although I'm not a type A personality (far from it) this also made me feel a bit less intimidated about the fact that I felt like I couldn't control the constant flow of thoughts in my head.
• He taught us tricks to bring your mind back into the present and to the breath. One of the practices that I still use regularly is counting to ten (repeating the number with both your in breath and your out breath). This practice helps me so much as my mind drifts to realize that maybe I'm at 11 and oh! that means my mind has drifted and I need to come back to my breath and my one through ten numbers).

2) At the end of our week together at Rancho La Puerta, Annie and I went to the "Oak Tree" space and meditated together for twenty minutes. It was such a lovely experience and such a nice way to end our week together. Annie then sent me a book that I have found incredibly helpful in teaching myself meditation: Thich Nhat Hanh's "The Miracle of Mindfulness" (an introduction to the practice of meditation). This book was key in starting my practice. Another book that has helped me get a little further into my practice is Pema Chodron's "When Things Fall Apart".

I still consider myself a "beginner" in my practice since I really only meditate 10 minutes a day (15 if I add in my deep breathing practice) and usually only about four days a week. This is fine for me right now and even with that tiny bit of practice, very early on I realized that when I woke up during the night in a panic (this was a combination of peri-menopause and planning that first big retreat) I could calm myself down and soothe myself back into sleep by practicing my one to ten counting meditation. It was amazing to me how quickly this worked for me and I still do it every time I wake up in the night. Panic is not part of my nights anymore because I now know how to tame my thoughts, put them aside and not let them consume me.

So to celebrate the end of my wedding photography season, also a private (me only!) celebration of turing 50 AND as a start to visiting retreat centers as I dive into learning more about existing retreat centers and various programs out there, I decided to be brave and signed up for a one day women's retreat at Spirit Rock. It was called "Women, Wisdom and Meditation" and our leader was Grace Fisher. One of the first things Grace said to us was that she was attending a retreat at Spirit Rock last year and she felt a sense of not "belonging". She then told us that this was despite the fact that she has been teaching at Spirit Rock for 17 years! For someone who was at her first retreat at Spirit Rock and who was feeling like a little bit of a "meditation impostor" this shocked me but as I continued to listen to her talk, I realized that many women feel this sense of not belonging and thus we started our retreat day understanding that we all belong. As human beings living on this earth and in this universe we are ALL connected and we should ALL feel like we belong. 

I've recognized that meditation and prayer have been practiced for more than a couple of millennia for good reason. It calms us. It reminds us that there is something greater than all the thousands of thoughts that go through our heads constantly and that we really ARE all connected on this earth and in this universe. Meditation isn't just for the hippie dippie and prayer isn't just for the practicing religious. They both can be a great source of calm and comfort in lives that aren't perfect, that include lots of stress, emotion and difficult times. Therefore, I decided in planning this upcoming multi-day retreat that including meditation, both guided and long "sits" would be an important addition to the program. In navigating this midlife transition not only do we need to learn how to manage our physical self but we also need to learn how to manage our emotional self too.

In my next post, I'll be introducing the yoga instructor (Amanda Crutcher!) who will be joining us for the upcoming Women's Health Retreat which will feature lectures by Dr. Amy Nett, M.D. (one of Chris Kresser's first clinicians). Dr. Nett will teach us natural and functional medicine practices for navigating mid-life and menopause. We will also be hearing from Coach Emily Boorstein on navigating the emotional side (I just bought Emily's mother's book at Spirit Rock: "It's Easier Than You Think" by Sylvia Boorstein) and I will talk a little bit more in the next post about how we will build meditation into this retreat. I hope you will join us in January!