“It has been 10 years since the publication of The Biology of Belief, Bruce Lipton’s seminal book on the relationship between mind and body that changed the way we think about our lives, our health and our planet. During that time, research in this field has grown exponentially – Lipton’s ground-breaking experiments have now been endorsed by more than a decade of scientific study.
In this greatly expanded edition, Lipton, a former medical school professor and research scientist, explores his own experiments and those of other leading-edge scientists that have unravelled in ever greater detail how truly connected the mind, body and spirit are. It is now widely recognised that genes and DNA do not control our biology. Instead, they are controlled by signals outside the cell, including energetic messages emanating from our thoughts.
This profoundly hopeful synthesis of the latest and best research in cell biology and quantum physics puts the power to create a healthy, joyous life back in our own hands. When we transform our conscious and subconscious thoughts, we transform our lives, and in the process help humanity evolve to a new level of understanding and peace.
Stuck in a comfortable and safe day-to-day? You wake up at 9ish. Have the same breakfast as always. Go to work. Be bored at work: drink a lot of coffee there to stay awake. Drive back home in the oh-so-familiar-and-so-seen environment. Get a snack or have dinner. And stare aimlessly at the tv, until it’s time to go to sleep at 1am ready to start this cycle all over again. Just waiting it to be Friday already, so the weekend would come.
Wow, even writing most people’s mundane week is exhausting. Sorry to say, but it won’t stop being true!
We people are slaves to our ways; that’s what I’ve heard. All. Of. Us. Without familiarity you wouldn’t know where to stay a night or what to eat. That kind of life actually sounds.. exciting and is chosen, more or less.
Why don’t you try waking up an hour earlier? Have an out-of-the-box breakfast than usually, and snacks, and dinners etc. If your workplace is close, try walking or biking there. If a car-ride away, then rather than driving a polluting car solo, opt for a car-pool or public transportation.
You know, though, that watching the tv is sort of a distraction from life, right? So, rather than having to get distracted, think what you could use that time for? Regard your time precious. This is where the concept of energy comes out to play: think your time as a free energy.
Did you know that by thinking negatively about someone or something is only increasing your own stress and your own negativity? Your formerly positive energy will begin to be replaced by negative flow, and it will consume you faster than positivity ever would. So why would you ever want to be the reason you are feeling negative things? You wouldn’t.
For some reason, it’s negativity that resonates fast, and focusing on positivity seems like hard work sometimes.
In the past two years I’ve leaned in to a more mindful and respectful way of facing others. I also changed the way I think about people. That includes the people I don’t personally know, but might recognize from, for example, the media. I have practiced this by placing a real thought behind it. To practice living loving kind, is to make it happen. That’s it.
Especially for me, the year 2015 was a tremendous shake and a wake up to this method again, because I really at times struggled with connections with the people I cared about, to the point of total break-offs. And only because I hadn’t practiced “loving kindness” in my day to day, but more like pushing through my own way and sitting too much on my ego. Only by returning back to kinder ways of thinking, doing this meditation for example, I started to make these connections work again. I again released the thought of always being right and doing things just my way. Last year was a teaching one for me, and thankfully I did learn.
Everyone can relate to this. There isn’t a person on this planet who hasn’t thought negatively about someone or placed some sort of opinions about celebrities which they seem to know from the gossip news. You know, on that mark, the media does make a person look a certain way by discarding other aspects of their personalities. And there is nothing to add to that. When someone is in the eye of the gossipy lens and people feel or say negative things for it, I feel bad. At the end of the day, we’re all the same, and we’re all vulnerable at times.
The same goes for the people in our lives. I know people who get easily upset or who don’t ever step in another person’s shoes so to say, and start lashing out, which always underlines the same thing: “I am right. What they are saying, or doing, is wrong, and because I’m currently sitting on my ego, everyone should live and think just like I do.” I’ve been like this so many times in my life that I can’t keep count. But nowadays, it’s hard for me to listen to people’s loud egos. Sometimes I feel like I should have a sticker on my forehead that says: Live and let live.
And then there are the people who have it amazingly together. The ones who are so patient with themselves and everyone else, and who won’t say one bad thing about anyone, including themselves. I’m in awe of them. I just recently met one person who is like this. The energy they have around them is welcoming, lacking of any negativity.
If someone is thinking that they don’t need to ever change, fantastic, and good for them. Something like living kind has to be a full-on mental shift, and it takes many fall-outs. However, the results are remarkable: more patience, deeper relationships and more mindfulness.
Even if it’s tuning your thoughts back every day to ‘how am I feeling about this and that?’ and ‘how should I really react to this person, and not add more negativity in this situation?’. I assure you guys, you will start to gain these great mindful tools once you start this practice.
I wish you are going to try this Loving-kindness meditation with me. And I have to say, I don’t usually like to meditate, because I think I’m too “on the go” of a person to focus through all the thoughts that pile up and clutter the mind, with the basic practice of silent meditation. But I will try to implement that in my life this year. However, I do like Loving-kindness, because it gives your mind these tasks to do through the meditation, so I think it’s both fun and heart-opening as well as helpful for focusing.
Shailene Woodley, an actress you probably know from The Divergent series, Fault in our Stars and The Descendants to mention a few, is far from the typical Californian Hollywood-actress type. She forages her own food, makes her own toothpaste and drinks clay.
Shailene (Shai for short) uses natural remedies like no one else – at least it’s safe to say that when it comes to young actresses in Hollywood, she is one of a kind. Even her interviews and articles radiate fairy princess -like, wood nymphish glow. If it was broadcasted that Ms. Woodley now knows how to talk to animals while she gets her own water from natural springs, I would believe it in a heartbeat.
STEPPING IN SHAI’S SHOES
Though I’m already living an alternative lifestyle of my own, these Shailene days will be fun. In these two weeks, I’m going to focus even more than regular on the whole Earth goddess thing that she has got going on and on more natural ways of taking care of myself. The timing for the Woodley weeks is beyond great right now as my cellphone got broken on Sunday, just a day before starting this, and when I think about it, I don’t want a new one. So, off the grid I go; just like Shailene! Then comes Monday, the start of a week. Coincidence, I think. It begins, stepping in Shailene’s shoes. Or better yet, stepping in Shai’s Vibram FiveFingers that she is said to love. I’m trying to live quite similarly to Shailene for 14 days and write my thoughts down every day. Here are a few random days from my journals. Starting with Day One and going on to Week Two.
MONDAY, DAY 1
9 am – I wake up. I know about Shailene’s ways of waking up to a new morning, and I will definitely try them later. I drink a cup of Chaga coffee with butter and coconut oil. Shai drinks her coffee Bulletproof style. Hello energies! I catch up on some articles and interviews of Shailene Woodley. This girl is amazing!
1 pm – I go to a whole foods store to get a natural toothpaste by Urtekram. Shailene makes her own toothpaste with clay, but I decided to skip this part of her lifestyle and go with a ready-made-one. And now that I’ve read all about oil pulling and how Shailene does it, I’m really fascinated with the whole process and excited to see if it works. I’m going with an unrefined, organic sesame oil bottle and Instant Chaga powder from Four Sigma Foods. Hurray! Natural goodies. It always makes me ten times happier to buy something from a whole foods store than from a regular market, because I know that the products are ten times better than the others. I bet Shai thinks this way too, if she is not making or collecting products on her own.
2 pm – One with the nature and earthlings and out with the two canines. As I am in Finland at the moment, the weather is not ideal for something Shailene would perhaps do: yoga in the park or getting Vitamin D in the sunshine or walking barefoot on Californian soil. Instead, the weather is cold and grey and I’m just lucky it isn’t hailing.
5 pm – Astanga yoga for an hour. Shai does yoga, so do I.
11 pm – Oil-pulling time is upon me. As I read, dental plaque is fat-soluble, not water-soluble, so the old-as-time Ayurvedic oil-pulling technique should get rid of the dental plaque and make your teeth whiter. Ok, let’s try this. One spoonful of sesame oil feels weird, really oily, but I like the taste of sesame. I swish swash the oil through the teeth, really well and not lazily. You could do this with olive and coconut oil as well I guess, but Shailene’s favorite is sesame. Into one minute I’m thinking I won’t make it to ten, but I do somehow. Then I brush my teeth normally with the Urtekram toothpaste that is based on chalk. My teeth feel amazingly clean! This really works. How come I haven’t tried this before, I wonder.
11.15 pm – Shailene’s evening rituals are all about winding down after a day of urgency, which is not a huge strech for me. Shai says she has a cup of tea, does yoga and reads. Her favorite authors include Anais Nin. I read some quotes and relax with easy yoga asanas.
FRIDAY, DAY 5
9 am – As I’m waking up, I recall Shai’s way of starting every morning; being thankful, shouting and singing “Good morning, good morning!” from Singin’ in the rain, which she continues with shouting the words “Exciting day! Exciting day!”. Maybe I should start doing this. Because, why not?
9.10 am – Oil-pulling was horrible again for the first five minutes, but after that, I could have gone on for twenty. It was still the regular ten minutes. My teeth are very clean, soft and altogether nice.
9.20am – Morning Chaga coffee with coconut oil to drink and for breakfast rye bread, a banana, carrots and an orange. It’s still winter time in Finland, and unlike for a Californian girl in the sun, my choices for absolutely fresh products from street markets are not that vast.
11 am – Out in the ‘Twilight weather’ shopping for good stuff. I have my mason jar with me (mason jars are a big thing for Shai) filled with beet root juice. I’m on the hunt for a good thermos mug and also some natural beauty products from Dr. Hauschka. The whole foods store I visit informs me that my clay order has arrived. I am not finishing with my Shailene days until I drink my clay!
1 pm – Hanging with the dogs for several hours, a real tail-wagging day today. Fur-energy! I still do not own a phone, and I will not own one until the Shai-days are done. Although, at this point I’m beginning to wonder if I even want a cellphone ever again. I’m beginning to love this freedom of not being dependent on a thing, as does Shailene apparently, because she only is said to have gotten a phone when her publicist begged her to have one. Yeah, Shailene. We got this!
3 pm – The clay has arrived. So, this is what it has come down to; drinking clay. I mean, I drink mushrooms and spirulina, but this is something to think about even for me. I put a tablespoon full of clay powder in the glass and pour water over it, then mix the earth colored drink and let it settle for ten minutes. When the clay has sunk to the bottom, I drink the grey water that smells of ground. Shailene is a huge believer of drinking clay, it is said to purify our internal systems. It actually tastes a lot better than spirulina ever has, I conclude to myself as I’m gulping down the mineral-infused clay water. Nice.
7 pm – Off to the movies with my friend. I greet her, and everyone else for that matter (the people I know) with a hug. Shailene hugs everyone with a double-hug: one to the left, one to the right, to the heart. She says it is heart to heart greeting: hey, I’m real, you’re real, let’s hug it out!
7.15 pm – I’ve got my new thermos mug filled with Chaga, which I offer to my friend. She happily accepts. Ms. Woodley is an avid drinker of chaga, as am I. Shai says it tastes like dirt, but she likes the taste of dirt.
9 pm – Having cups of tea after the movie. It’s wonderful to not even check your phone, as everyone usually does when out socializing, and I don’t even have to remind myself anymore of the fact that the notifications are not there to be checked.
10 pm – Winding down this evening with a hot shower, healthy food, and some raw chocolate and tea. Instead of reading something mindful I’m writing something mindful. Reminding myself what I still need to accomplish what Shai does. I have to go forage something that is foragable in this weather. Shailene goes out into the nature to collect her own herbs and spring water. I’m thinking of going to forage some pine needles, because there are no natural springs anywhere close to where I am. It would be fantastic, if I found something like mugwort, but the chances are slim. Woodley drinks mugwort tea to have more lucid dreams á la Native American tradition, which sounds more than fun. Instead of mugwort I sleep beside my rose quartz. I do sleep better.
THURSDAY, DAY 11
9 am – Good morning with little morning mantras! Exciting day! This is definitely a more brighter way of greeting mornings than just rolling out of bed.
9.05 am – Washing and cleaning my face thoroughly with all of my Hauschka products. Amazing as always! I am using Dr. Hauschka products, which I imagine come close to Shai’s favorite brand Living Libations (Seabuckthorn Best Skin Ever is her ultimate favorite, I hear).
9.10 am – Oil-pulling is like “I could do this all day son, all day!” hearing Schmidt’s voice from New Girl, during week two as I swish and swash the oil for twenty minutes with ease. My jaws have really become stronger for this.
9.30 am – Drinking coffee Bulletproof style. I’m remembering the lucid dreams I had last night (even without the mugwort) of riding trains in the vast spaces of unknown land. The sun is out today and the sky is clear. What a beautiful morning! I remember Shailene’s morning ritual: “Exciting day! Exciting day!”, and try to run with that thought.
1 pm – Taking the canines for a small walk in the sun and under the Vitamin D blasts. I visit a nearby forest, because I have a bag with me to forage some pine needles and pine cones. I take pictures of nature with my old digital camera. It takes a lot of more room in my pocket than a phone would. But it’s all good.
2 pm – I’m trying to make a cup of freshly picked pine needle tea á la me for the first time. I clean out the needles and boil the water. Even the smell of the brewing pine needle tea reminds me of the woods.
2.15 pm – If something tastes like forest, it’s pine needle tea. I am hoping to get the mega amounts of Vitamin C.
4 pm – I am getting ready for a ballet class. Ms. Woodley likes to do yoga, but as I practice it already, I thought I’d try something else. I put on ‘beet root lipstick’ which is one of Shai’s inventions, and I have to say a genius one. I slice a piece of beet root and dabble it on my lips. A hundred per cent natural and gives a lovely tint. I guess I could use any foods with red tint. If she wore this beet root lipstick for the Golden Globes, I bet it will do just fine for me on a regular Thursday.
9.15 pm – After the ballet class my legs are feeling the post-class tiredness. Holy moly, barre-work for over an hour, my body is saying ‘thank you ballet’ at this point in the evening. If Shailene doesn’t go to ballet classes, maybe I could recommend that to her.
9.30 pm – I make a huge salad with something new to my diet that Ms. Woodley eats herself; sauerkraut. She believes in eating something fermented on every meal. It tastes good. I also add artichoke hearts and sundried tomatoes to give it a wonderful taste.
10 pm – How is ballet still making me thirsty? All I could do is drink water. Time for a relaxing evening. I make my own body scrub with sesame oil, honey and sugar. Wow, amazing. I’m starting to use more of DIY stuff.
11 pm – I start to reflect these past days a little. Shailene doesn’t own a home, she likes to couch surf at her friends’ and drive around from place to place and travel. Shai has said that she doesn’t know where she would want to live, so until she does, she’ll drift a bit. I find similarities with her, for I haven’t had my own place with my own things in four years. As Shailene fits her life in one suitcase, I feel like I do too. It is wonderfully rewarding and teaching to live somewhat alternatively.
I end my Shailene Woodley weeks feeling a lot more grounded and mindful, not so busy and hurried. This is the right place to continue on with the rest of the year and start the next with. Only one thing is different: I do own a phone now. How uncool of me.
Welcome Leena Vihavainen-Müller! I met Leena for the first time over a year ago and we talked hours about healthy lifestyle (or I listened mostly) and we drank organic tea. Meeting Leena was a powerful experience: her stable and strong presence works as an inspiration to a lot of people. She is a yoga-teacher and a yoga-therapist (etc.) plus studied medicine in Germany for couple years. Now I can’t wait for you to guys to read and hear Leena’s wisdom. And because there is so much material, we will spread them out in different posts and in sounds on Soundcloud (Leena’s interviews years ago when the author worked at Yle when there was 1 day that she got to actually decide a subject, only in Finnish). X Johanna
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“I’m Leena Vihavainen-Müller. I’ve lived abroad for 43 years, and I now live in lake scenery and enjoy the beauty of Finnish nature on my walks.
I am a yoga teacher and yoga therapist; studied both in Finland and in India. I’ve tought yoga in different countries for years, and I still teach it in Finland. I studied energetic horse osteopathy in Germany. I am also studying French, and stress management and self development in French. This year I started to study Chromotherapy in Germany.
Through practicing yoga I have learned to be conscious and present. Yoga practice is everyday present in my life. When my horse got ill I wanted to know how I could help him get better, what had gone wrong in his life. I got interested in energetic horse osteopathy, which I studied in Germany. My horse was the best yoga teacher I had. I learned to appreciate and value life, patience, trust and love, and I am truly grateful for that part of my life.
“Respect and value your body and see to it that the body is doing well.. Then the mind is doing well. If you feel good then you radiate good energy around you, and you can make others feel good as well.” Yoga is a lifestyle that includes more things than just doing the yoga practice.
“”In every situation I try to consider how I am standing, how I am breathing, what am I thinking, am I in the moment.. Am I in this moment or am I here, but my thoughts are somewhere else.””
Johanna: Before going to more mindful things let’s talk about nutrition, lymph circulation, yoga breathing etc.
“Mental speed is stress. Get moving, that takes some stress away. Not so much protein, not so much carbohydrates. And drinking water is the most important thing.”
Did you know, that about 60 per cent of the chemicals in all the products you use absorb through the skin? Hello fragrances! Welcome parabens! Hi to you, toxins! I have always said to my friends, (always meaning: always I’ve lived in the know..years that is), and it’s like I have been on an autopilot on this, learn to know what you use. Whether it’s the food you’re eating, or the lotions, and the makeup you put on yourself, be as mindful as it gets. You really are serving yourself, and it doesn’t take that much of an effort or time.
Kind beauty is dedicated to pure and clean products, no nastiness. We don’t use that many nasty products anymore and think that neither should you. I have read a lot on what chemicals can do to us. And they are everywhere, that is scary! Remember this you guys, ecological doesn’t mean hippie. It means that you are in the know and that you pay attention!
For me, it is all about minimazing the bad stuff to maximum in my life and really enjoy the pure and kind products, as they give a lift up and they make me super happy, because they do give a different effect on you. A kinder aura. They even smell better, because of the lack of the chemicals.
And not to mention, ecological makeup products are not only better for you, but for the animals. You’ve heard about animal testing, right? Have you seen any photos of it, of the animals in the labs? Have you ever gotten a red eye or an irritation on the skin because of some cheap and well-advertised mascara got into your eye, or that well-known and expensive lotion wasn’t that great on you? Then just think about what the poor bunnies or rats or whatnot had to go through for your product development.
Being mindful of makeup, as well as what you put into your body, is a win win situation affecting positively on all our lives.
And also, like for so many more other things relating this, advertising a product doesn’t mean that it is everything that some celebrity on the ad is saying. It is like, have you seen these amazing TV ads for quinoa? I haven’t but quinoa is the bomb! Or, have you seen these amazing TV ads for McDonald’s? I have, and their food is as mean as it gets. Choose wisely, folks, and you’ve got to see through what is being shown to you.
So, this post was more about the realization of what is out there and maybe expanding your horizons at a makeup section that you normally go to (to perhaps an organic online store?).
You wouldn’t believe how satisfying this shift is. It’s like Emm said: “I was like a kid in a candy store sometimes.” Wait for the moment when you reach to the point, where you want to try everything that is new, and everything that is kind for you and for the planet. That’s a great place!
And, on the very last note on this eco bandwagon, your skin will glow once it gets nourished by the natural lotions and makeup.
A holding pattern means that an airplane is on a specific holding course before landing. To sum up. At least that’s what I read, because I’m definitely not a pilot.
So, I have no idea how the words came to me and kept repeating at the back of my mind for a week or so: “Holding patterns”, “You are on a holding pattern.” I felt growing tiredness, lack of interest in the things I had been raging about before, and I couldn’t listen to my ‘recently listened’ list on Spotify anymore. So I Googled the words and sure enough, the wise web dictionary stated my missing one-sentence explanation for the feelings of it.
A holding pattern is “a state of waiting or suspended activity or progress” [merriam-webster]. While ‘holding pattern‘ could mean different things to different people, for me that meant being stuck on the things that worked for me a month ago and still trying to implement them to a new month and new energies.
You know, every day is different for you, every month certainly is different, as are years. We have to change according to them. That’s what my holding pattern was about. I’m sure I, and others, have multiple similar patterns that might be outdated but go unnoticed.
All the things that worked well, fine and super in January, and I got tons of energy from, started latently pulling me backwards. Weeks went by, until I was so tired and over-emotional, still running on my January feelings in the middle of February, that only a full stop: a sit-down and a meditation could break. And I released my former patterns, and started focusing on new ones. A blank page. Or as Taylor would say: a Blank Space. Either way, they are both very creative.
As we become more mindful and focused in our lives and the energies around us, it’s easier to spot any imbalances. I’m still learning to be mindful and I don’t think the process ever ends. It wouldn’t have been a huge disaster if I’d kept my blinders on for this. But as I felt a growing disconnection with all the tasks I had been doing in the past four weeks, I really set myself up to energetically brighter and more focused days, and weeks ahead by visiting ground zero. Well, until the next shake to change things around. But hopefully that will be with the flow of life, not holding onto what has happened and trying to carry it into the future.
I hope this makes sense to you somehow. Of course, you will take it as only you would and shape it to your own life. I have loved and related to this Heraclitus quote: “The only thing that is consistent is change.”
To all my amazing and dear friends who are stuck in their beloved patterns and actually really enjoying them, Heraclitus is right. In the end, change is inevitable, and if we can get over that fact, it becomes easier to change things up constantly in our lives. Welcome new people, new energy, new clothes, new music, new places, new books, new things to look forward to, new destinations, new plans, new surroundings, new things to focus on and accept them gladly. I decided, kind of intuitively that at least every few weeks I’ll start looking for old patterns or feelings that should go. Especially now as we’re entering spring, which is all about awakening and renewing. What a perfect time.
GEM 
