Zeolite Under Attack From FDA! | Holistic Health Club

Zeolite Under Attack From FDA! | Holistic Health Club

Natural Zeolite Powder | James Cruise - Academia.edu

Natural Zeolite Powder | James Cruise - Academia.edu

Nuclear Radiation Survival Guide | Scienceray

Nuclear Radiation Survival Guide | Scienceray

Stop Arthrits Pain From Ruining Your LifeBest Arthritis Remedy

Stop Arthrits Pain From Ruining Your LifeBest Arthritis Remedy

Hibernation Hints at Dementia Therapy

By Dr. Mercola

When animals hibernate, their body temperatures drop and their metabolism slows significantly (in some cases to just 2 percent of normal). In this state of virtual suspended animation, the animals’ brains show signs of changes akin to early-stage Alzheimer’s, and some even lose their memories.

Specifically, when animals hibernate the cooling induces a loss in synapses, which are the connections between brain cells. Synapses are also lost in the early stages of certain neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer’s disease.

In humans the early loss of synapses typically progresses to the point that whole brain cells begin to die – and memories go along with them. Hibernating mammals may lose up to 30 percent of their brain’s connections during hibernation.

The connections are restored come spring, which has caught the attention of researchers wondering if restoring lost memories in humans might someday be possible.

Cold-Shock Proteins May Help Prevent Memory Loss

A new study published in Nature unraveled more clues about how hibernation might give clues to preventing dementia.1 When mice were artificially cooled, a number of cold-shock proteins, including RNA-binding protein (RBM3), were induced in the brain – a process that also occurs during hibernation.

Cold-shock proteins exist to help your body survive low temperatures (they’re at the other end of the spectrum from heat-shock proteins, which are induced by heat to help protect your body from heat stress).

All of the mice lost synapses during the study, but while older mice were not able to reestablish them when warmed up, young mice with neurodegenerative diseases regained their lost connections.

The difference was attributed to levels of RBM3, which “soared” in the young mice during cooling but not in the older mice. The researchers believe enhancing cold-shock pathways could offer potential protective therapies for neurodegenerative diseases, but they’re looking into ways of doing this other than cooling your body (which wouldn’t be practical for chronic treatment).

Interestingly, rapidly cooling the body has been suggested as a plausible medical treatment for a variety of conditions, from traumatic injuries to preventing brain damage from strokes.

Sleeping May Help You Enhance Your Memory

Research from Harvard indicates that people are 33 percent more likely to infer connections among distantly related ideas after sleeping,2 but few realize that their performance has actually improved.

Sleep is also known to enhance your memories and help you "practice" and improve your performance of challenging skills. In fact, a single night of sleeping only 4 to 6 hours can impact your ability to think clearly the next day.

The process of brain growth, or neuroplasticity, is believed to underlie your brain's capacity to control behavior, including learning and memory. Plasticity occurs when neurons are stimulated by events, or information, from the environment. However, sleep and sleep loss modify the expression of several genes and gene products that may be important for synaptic plasticity.

Furthermore, certain forms of long-term potentiation, a neural process associated with the laying down of learning and memory, can be elicited in sleep, suggesting synaptic connections are strengthened while you slumber.

To be clear, sleeping is not the same as hibernating. Hibernation would be more akin to resting in a coma than sleep, and research shows that animals often show signs of sleep deprivation upon waking from hibernation. As reported by Popular Science:3

“When a mammal is in torpor [a short period of hibernation], it gets less rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and less slow wave sleep, because good sleep involves some physiological processes that require warmer body temperatures. Animals sleep a lot when they emerge from torpor, with brain activity patterns demonstrating signs of sleep deprivation.”

So while hibernation may hold clues to restoring memories related to lost synapses, hibernation does not appear to give the body the benefits of proper sleep, which are separate and equally important.

Naps Help Babies and Adults Retain Memories

There’s a reason why babies nap and, perhaps, why you should, too. Research shows that naps can give a boost to babies' brainpower. Specifically, infants who slept in between learning and testing sessions had a better ability to recognize patterns in new information, which signals an important change in memory that plays an essential role in cognitive development.4

New research also shows that napping for 30 minutes or more within 4 hours of learning a new behavior helps infants retain their memories.5 The results suggest that infants rely on frequent naps to help form long-term memories, and there's reason to believe this holds true for adults, too.

Even among adults, a mid-day nap was found to dramatically boost and restore brainpower.6 Dr. Rubin Naiman -- a clinical psychologist, author, teacher, and the leader in integrative medicine approaches to sleep and dreams – believes that humans are biologically programmed to nap, so if you feel the urge to nod off in the afternoon, don’t fight it.

The “ideal” nap time appears to be around 20 minutes (any longer and you’ll enter the deeper stages of sleep and may feel groggy when you wake up). According to the National Sleep Foundation:7

“Sleeping for a short time can make you more alert and energetic--this might be critical to your work or school productivity, or to your ability to take care of a child during the day. Most people feel refreshed after a nap that lasts approximately 20 minutes.”

At Nighttime You Should Strive for Uninterrupted Sleep

While many animals engage in torpor, which is basically shorter periods of interrupted hibernation, humans need uninterrupted sleep to function properly. It makes sense that interruptions to your sleep would result in much the same damage as lack of sleep, because sleep occurs in phases.

Ideally, you should progress from slow-wave sleep back up to REM sleep in 60- to 90-minute cycles. Any interruptions to this make your body start over in a sense, which means you might never reach the most restorative, deeper phases of sleep. 

You might as well not be sleeping at all, which is likely one reason why lack of sleep and interrupted sleep result in such similar damage. In a healthy night’s sleep, you should progress through the following sleep stages (though not necessarily in this order):8

Stage One, when you’re preparing to drift off Stage Two, during which your brain wave activity becomes rapid and rhythmic while your body temperature drops and heart rate slows Stage Three, when deep slow brain waves emerge (this is a transition from light sleep to deep sleep) Stage Four, also known as delta sleep, this is a deep sleep stage Stage Five, or rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, is when most dreaming occurs

As reported by Psych Central:9

“Sleep does not progress through all of these stages in sequence, however. Sleep begins in Stage One and progresses into stages 2, 3, and 4. Then, after Stage Four sleep, Stages Three, then Two are repeated before going into REM sleep.

Once REM is over, we usually return to Stage Two sleep. Sleep cycles through these stages approximately 4 or 5 times throughout the night. We typically enter REM approximately 90 minutes after falling asleep. The first cycle of REM often lasts only a short amount of time, but each cycle becomes longer.

This is why we need long periods of sleep each night as most of the REM sleep occurs in the hours before awakening. If we get short periods of sleep, we can’t really get through the stages we need to heal and stay healthy. REM can last up to an hour as our sleep progresses. In case you are wondering, if you feel like a dream is taking a long period of time, it really is. Contrary to what was once believed, dreams take as long as they actually seem.”

Keep Your Phone and Tablet Out of Your Bedroom

One of the greatest plights of modern-day sleep is the introduction of light-emitting electronic devices to the bedroom. Research shows that 90 percent of Americans use an electronic device within an hour of going to bed, and this is associated with poor sleep.10 A new study also compared the use of an iPad for 4 hours before bed (for five consecutive nights) to reading a print book for the same period.11 There were significant biological effects of iPad use before bed, including:12

Reduced secretion of melatonin, a hormone that induces sleepiness Delayed circadian rhythm of more than an hour Feeling less sleepy before bedtime Feeling sleepier and less alert the following morning, even after 8 hours of sleep Spending less time in REM sleep

One of the study’s authors noted: "We found the body's natural circadian rhythms were interrupted by the short-wavelength enriched light, otherwise known as blue light, from these electronic devices.” The blue light emitted from electronics such as cell phones, tablets, TVs and computers suppresses your melatonin production, thereby preventing you from feeling sleepy. What you may not realize is that even if you don't feel sleepy, you need sleep. You've simply artificially disrupted your body clock; you have not in any way altered your body's biological needs. Last year I interviewed Dan Pardi on the topic of how to get restorative, health-promoting sleep. 

Pardi is a researcher who works with the Behavioral Sciences Department at Stanford University and the Departments of Neurology and Endocrinology at Leiden University in the Netherlands.In addition to avoiding blue light at night, Pardi recommends getting at least 30-60 minutes of outdoor light exposure during daylight hours in order to "anchor" your master clock rhythm. The ideal time to go outdoors is right around solar noon but any time during daylight hours is useful. Once the sun has set, the converse applies. After sunset you want to avoid light as much as possible in order for your body to secrete melatonin, which helps you feel sleepy.

Download Interview Transcript

You Probably Need to Go to Bed Earlier Than You Think

You may be surprised at how little sleep you’re actually getting. If you go to bed at 10 pm and get out of bed at 7 am, you might say you’ve slept for nine hours. In reality, you probably spent at least 15-30 minutes falling asleep and may have woken during the night one or more times. With the advent of fitness-tracking wristbands such as Jawbone’s UP, however, it’s now possible to track your actual sleep time. When I first started using a fitness tracker, I was striving to get 8 hours of sleep, but my Jawbone UP typically recorded me at 7.5 to 7.75.

I have been using an UP tracker for the last six months and just the last month have finally been able to restructure my schedule so that I am getting close to 9 hours of sleep. Quite a contrast from when I was seeing patients, as it would typically be far closer to an unhealthy 5 hours or less. I have since increased my sleep time, not just time in bed, but total sleep time to over 8 hours per day. The fitness tracker helped me realize that unless I am asleep, not just in bed, but asleep by 10 pm I won’t get my 8 hours. Gradually I have been able to get this down to 9:30 pm.

The tracker also differentiates between sound and light sleep, and through trial and error, I was able to use the device to figure out I can get 6 hours of deep sleep if I maintain my air temperature around 66-68 degrees F with only a light sheet on. If it is much warmer or I use a blanket, my sound sleep can drop to 2-3. Pardi recently shared how having a baby has helped to improve his overall sleep because it got him in the habit of going to sleep earlier, and importantly, getting into bed prior to feeling sleepy. He explains:13

“Yes, having a baby has improved my overall sleep practice. Because of my son, we wind our evening down earlier than normal in order to get him to bed at a good time for him. Since we must initiate these activities earlier than what we would do for ourselves, it has gotten us into the habit of thinking of sleep earlier than normal.

Specifically, I get into bed earlier than I used to. Now, I will read my kindle, with dim backlight, in a room with amber-toned environmental light, and as soon as the urge for sleep strikes, all I have to do is put down the book. Most people, on the other hand, initiate their going-to-bed ‘program’ once they start to feel sleepy.

So, instead of being able to actually allow sleep to happen at this instance, you need to do a list of things – like brush your teeth, move yourself into bed, etc. – before you’re able to close your eyes. Because you’re sleepy, you’re likely to move slowly to accomplish this list, and it’s easy to see how maintaining this latter pattern cuts into total sleep time; even 30 minutes of less sleep per night on a regular basis matters!  You don’t have to have a young child to benefit from this lesson: get into bed prior to when you want to be sleeping so you can give into the impulse as soon as it hits.”

Longing for a Good Night’s Sleep? Try These Tips

To achieve more restful, restorative sleep, I suggest you read through my full set of 33 healthy sleep guidelines for all of the details, but to start, consider implementing the following changes:

Avoid watching TV or using your computer in the evening, at least an hour or so before going to bed. These devices emit blue light, which tricks your brain into thinking it's still daytime. Normally, your brain starts secreting melatonin between 9 pm and 10 pm, and these devices emit light that may stifle that process.

Even the American Medical Association now states:14  “…nighttime electric light can disrupt circadian rhythms in humans and documents the rapidly advancing understanding from basic science of how disruption of circadian rhythmicity affects aspects of physiology with direct links to human health, such as cell cycle regulation, DNA damage response, and metabolism.”

Make sure you get BRIGHT sun exposure regularly. Your pineal gland produces melatonin roughly in approximation to the contrast of bright sun exposure in the day and complete darkness at night. If you are in darkness all day long, it can't appreciate the difference and will not optimize your melatonin production. Sleep in complete darkness, or as close to it as possible. The slightest bit of light in your bedroom can disrupt your body’s clock and your pineal gland's melatonin production. Even the tiniest glow from your clock radio could be interfering with your sleep, so cover your radio up at night or get rid of it altogether. Move all electrical devices at least three feet away from your bed. You may want to cover your windows with drapes or blackout shades. If this isn’t possible, wear an eye mask. Install a low-wattage yellow, orange, or red light bulb if you need a source of light for navigation at night. Light in these bandwidths does not shut down melatonin production in the way that white and blue bandwidth light does. Salt lamps are handy for this purpose. You can also download a free application called F.lux that automatically dims your monitor or screens.15 Keep the temperature in your bedroom no higher than 70 degrees F. Many people keep their homes too warm (particularly their upstairs bedrooms). Studies show that the optimal room temperature for sleep is between 60 to 68 degrees F. Take a hot bath 90 to 120 minutes before bedtime. This increases your core body temperature, and when you get out of the bath it abruptly drops, signaling your body that you are ready to sleep. Avoid using loud alarm clocks. Being jolted awake each morning can be very stressful. If you are regularly getting enough sleep, you might not even need an alarm. Get some sun in the morning, if possible. Your circadian system needs bright light to reset itself. Ten to 15 minutes of morning sunlight will send a strong message to your internal clock that day has arrived, making it less likely to be confused by weaker light signals during the night. More sunlight exposure is required as you age. Be mindful of electromagnetic fields (EMFs) in your bedroom. EMFs can disrupt your pineal gland and its melatonin production, and may have other negative biological effects as well. A gauss meter is required if you want to measure EMF levels in various areas of your home. Ideally, you should turn off any wireless router while you are sleeping. You don’t need the Internet on when you are asleep. ]]>

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A Nation Running from Pain: What Can Be Done About It

By Dr. Mercola

According to the most recent statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), lethal heroin overdoses nearly quadrupled between 2000 and 2013 in the US, escalating from 0.7 to 2.7 deaths per 100,000 during this timeframe.

Heroin-related deaths were nearly four times more prevalent among men than women in 2013, and lethal overdoses were highest among Caucasians between the ages of 25 and 44. The greatest increase in heroin-related deaths was seen after 2010.

As noted by Medical News Today:1

"During the period investigated, the researchers found an average increase in heroin-related drug-poisoning deaths of six percent per year from 2000 through to 2010.

From 2010 through 2013, the average increase was a staggering 37 percent per year..."

Prescription Painkillers Are the New Gateway Drugs

What many fail to realize is that this trend is actually fueled by legal drug addiction. The reason for the resurgence of heroin is in large part due to it being less expensive than its prescription counterparts.

Addictive prescription drugs such as Vicodin, OxyContin, Percocet, codeine, and Fentora, all of which are opioids (derivatives of opium) are widely overprescribed for pain.

Many painkiller addicts also turn to heroin when their tolerance level surpasses their allotted prescription dosage, or when they're no longer allowed to refill their prescription.

According to previous statistics, prescriptions for opioid painkillers have risen by a staggering 300 percent over the past decade.2 As of 2012, 259 million prescriptions for opioids and other narcotic painkillers were written3 in the US, and these drugs actually claim far more lives than heroin does.

In 2010, prescription painkillers were responsible for 16,600 deaths; heroin was involved in about 3,000.4 By 2013, the number of heroin deaths had increased to 8,257,5 but as noted in the featured article:6

"Although heroin-related drug-poisoning deaths have increased sharply in recent years, the overall rate is still considerably lower than that for opioid analgesics.

In addition, NIDA [National Institute on Drug Abuse] suggest that the abuse of prescription opioids such as Oxycontin and Vicodin could be the first step toward heroin abuse for many people."

Dr. Andrew Kolodny, chief medical officer at a drug treatment center called Phoenix House has also previously spoken out on this issue, noting that:7

"Heroin use is increasing because we have an epidemic of opioid addiction (caused by overexposure of our population to painkillers) and not enough has been done to expand access to treatment in communities hit hardest."

Financial Conflicts of Interest Fuel Narcotic Prescription Rates

Despite dramatic increases in prescriptions, two recent papers assert that no solid evidence can be found in the medical literature supporting the long-term safety and effectiveness of narcotic painkillers.

Many suffering from chronic pain end up using painkillers for years on end, yet there are no studies longer than one year on record. Most trials do not go past six weeks.

There's also a lack of standardized trials evaluating the side effects of opioid use, which is the "golden standard" of medical science-based evidence.  With such blatant lack of safety and effectiveness backing their use, why are so many people getting prescriptions for narcotic painkillers?

Even pregnant women are being prescribed these highly addictive and dangerous drugs!  According to one recent study8,9 more than 14 percent of pregnant women were prescribed opioid drugs during their pregnancy, despite the risks for birth defects and other pregnancy-related problems.10

Not surprisingly, financial conflicts of interest appear to be part of the answer. As reported by Reading Eagle:11

"The two papers,12,13 published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, highlight a key issue in one of the major medical controversies of the last decade: how America got thrust into an opioid epidemic...

The stories... revealed that behind that surge in opioid prescribing was a network of pain organizations, doctors, and researchers that pushed for expanded use of the drugs while taking in millions of dollars from the companies that made them."

Antidepressants Are Also Widely Overprescribed

A recent article in The New York Times14 penned by Psychiatrist Julie Holland highlights another disturbing trend, namely that of medicating away our emotional pain. While men tend to be more prone to get hooked on painkillers, women are more apt to fall into the antidepressant drug trap. Dr. Holland writes:

"Sales of antidepressants and antianxiety meds have been booming in the past two decades, and they've recently been outpaced by an antipsychotic, Abilify, that is the No. 1 seller among all drugs in the United States, not just psychiatric ones. As a psychiatrist practicing for 20 years, I must tell you, this is insane..."

According to Dr. Holland, one in four American women is on a psychiatric drug, as is one in seven men. And, while some are helped by these drugs, many are not. In fact, most simply do not need them, and are needlessly placing their health at risk, as these drugs come with a laundry list of serious side effects.

It's also well worth noting that researchers have concluded there is very little evidence that selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs, such as Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, and others) have any benefit to people with mild to moderate depression, and that they actually do not work any better than a placebo.

"People who don't really need these drugs are trying to medicate a normal reaction to an unnatural set of stressors: lives without nearly enough sleep, sunshine, nutrients, movement and eye contact, which is crucial to us as social primates..." Dr. Holland writes.

The new, medicated normal is at odds with women's dynamic biology; brain and body chemicals are meant to be in flux. To simplify things, think of serotonin as the 'it's all good' brain chemical. Too high and you don't care much about anything; too low and everything seems like a problem to be fixed.

In the days leading up to menstruation, when emotional sensitivity is heightened, women may feel less insulated, more irritable, or dissatisfied. I tell my patients that the thoughts and feelings that come up during this phase are genuine, and perhaps it's best to re-evaluate what they put up with the rest of the month, when their hormone and neurotransmitter levels are more likely programmed to prompt them to be accommodating to others' demands and needs."

Being Emotionally Numb Is Hardly Healthy...

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) enhance serotonin transmission in your brain, but as Dr. Holland notes, higher serotonin levels does not necessarily equate to improved emotional health... While SSRIs can remove feelings of anxiety, they can also numb you both emotionally and physically—in fact, reduced libido is a common side effect. Also, antidepressants do not actually boost positive emotions; they merely blunt the negative ones. At first glance, this may sound appealing, but there's a price to pay for numbing your emotional repertoire across the board. As noted by Dr. Holland:

"Some people on SSRIs have also reported less of many other human traits: empathy, irritation, sadness, erotic dreaming, creativity, anger, expression of their feelings, mourning, and worry... At higher doses, SSRI's make it difficult to cry. They can also promote apathy and indifference... If the serotonin levels of women are constantly, artificially high, they are at risk of losing their emotional sensitivity with its natural fluctuations...

Change comes from the discomfort and awareness that something is wrong; we know what's right only when we feel it. If medicated means complacent, it helps no one. When we are overmedicated, our emotions become synthetic. For personal growth, for a satisfying marriage, and for a more peaceful world, what we need is more empathy, compassion, receptivity, emotionality, and vulnerability, not less. We need to stop labeling our sadness and anxiety as uncomfortable symptoms, and to appreciate them as a healthy, adaptive part of our biology." [Emphasis mine]

Spike in Suicide Rate Blamed on Recession

Suicide rates among middle-aged Americans have also risen sharply over the past few years. According to a recent paper15,16 published in of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, stress from job, financial, and/or legal problems played a role in nearly 38 percent of suicides committed by middle-aged Americans in 2010. According to lead author Katherine Hempstead,17 director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Center for State Health Policy at Rutgers University in Princeton:

"The middle-aged bear the brunt of economic stress associated with a downturn. They're the bread-winner groups who are raising kids, paying for college, planning for their retirement, and supporting their elderly parents."

The study urges employers to become more aware of the impact layoffs can have on their employees, particularly middle-aged employees who do not have very many years left in the job market. As noted by MedicineNet.com:

"Human resources departments and managers should be aware that layoffs can trigger suicides, and be prepared to get people the help they need. 'When somebody is facing termination from their job, that would be a key time to understand those individuals may be at risk for suicide,' [Dr. Christine Moutier, chief medical officer of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention] said. Friends and family of a person undergoing financial problems should also be on the lookout for warning signs of suicide -- talking about suicide, giving away prized possessions, withdrawal and isolation -- and reach out if they believe the person needs help..."

Red Flags: Is Someone You Know Suicidal?

If someone close to you has recently endured a hardship, or you have noticed a change in their behavior, how can you tell when ordinary stress or sadness has progressed to a potentially suicidal level? Besides straightforward or "sideways" comments about not wanting to live any longer, some of the red flags that a person has a high risk for self-harm include:

Acquiring a weapon Hoarding medicationNo plan for the future Putting affairs in orderMaking or changing a willGiving away personal belongings Mending grievancesChecking on insurance policiesWithdrawing from people

If you think someone is suicidal, do not leave him or her alone. A person who appears suicidal needs immediate professional help. Help the person to seek immediate assistance from their doctor or the nearest hospital emergency room, or call 911. Eliminate access to firearms or other potential suicide aids, including unsupervised access to medications.

If you are feeling desperate or have any thoughts of suicide, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, a toll-free number 1-800-273-TALK (8255), or call 911, or simply go to your nearest Hospital Emergency Department.

A Nation Running from Pain...

When you start looking at the big picture, it becomes rather evident that Americans are running from pain—both emotional and physical—and have bought the lie that happiness and comfort can be induced by chemical substances... All of the statistics covered in this article point to the fact that the US is a nation in crisis, and we're looking for solutions in the wrong places. Instead of facing our pains and dissatisfactions head on, we're suppressing them in order to keep going "as usual." The only ones getting ahead right now is the drug companies. Most everyone else is getting a raw deal...

Depression and physical pain often go hand in hand; the good news is that by addressing depression, you can oftentimes achieve pain reduction as well, and vice versa (if you happen to suffer from both). Another piece of good news is that there are many non-drug alternatives out there that are far safer, and often as or more effective than drugs, and this applies both to pain reduction and depression. For a list of non-drug alternatives specifically for pain relief, please see my previous article, "For Back Pain or Headache, Painkillers Do More Harm Than Good." I'll also close with a brief section on medical cannabis, below, which is a viable option for increasing numbers of people these days, in states that have legalized its use. Following is a list of mind-body techniques that can help ease both pain and depression.

Diet Foods have an immense impact on your body and your brain, and eating whole foods as described in my optimized nutrition plan will best support your mental and physical health. Avoiding sugar (particularly processed fructose) will help normalize your insulin and leptin levels, which is another important aspect of depression. Sugar causes chronic inflammation, which disrupts your body's normal immune function and can wreak havoc on your brain.

Sugar also suppresses a key growth hormone called BDNF (brain derived neurotrophic factor), which promotes healthy brain neurons. BDNF levels are critically low in people with depression, which animal models suggest may actually be causative.

I also recommend taking a high-quality, animal-based omega-3 fat, like krill oil. This may be the single most important nutrient for optimal brain function, thereby preventing depression. Exercise Getting regular exercise is one of the "secret weapons" to overcoming depression. It works by helping to normalize your insulin levels while boosting the "feel good" hormones such as serotonin and endorphins in your brain. Optimize your vitamin D Getting safe sun exposure, which allows your body to produce vitamin D, is great for your mood. One study even found that people with the lowest levels of vitamin D were 11 times more prone to depression than those who received adequate vitamin D. The Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) EFT is a form of psychological acupressure. Gentle tapping with the fingertips is used to transfer kinetic energy onto specific meridians on your head and chest while you think about your specific problem and voice positive affirmations. This works to clear the "short-circuit"—the emotional block—from your body's bioenergy system, thus restoring your mind and body's balance, which is essential for optimal health and healing. Massage Massage affects your nervous system through nerve endings in your skin, stimulating the release of endorphins, which are natural "feel-good" chemicals. Getting a massage has been shown to relieve pain from migraines, labor, fibromyalgia and even cancer; reduce stress, anxiety, and depression; decrease symptoms of PMS; and can provide arthritis relief by increasing joint flexibility. Mindfulness and other forms of meditation Practicing "mindfulness" means that you're actively paying attention to the moment you're in right now. Mindfulness training has been found to reduce levels of stress-induced inflammation, which could benefit people suffering from chronic inflammatory conditions like rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, and asthma. Practicing mindfulness meditation for just four days can decrease pain responses in your brain. Biofeedback Biofeedback allows you to monitor your biological changes, thereby helping you achieve a deeper state of relaxation and teaching you to control your heart rate, blood pressure, and muscle tension through your mind. Biofeedback is often used for stress-related conditions, such as migraines and tension-type headaches, fibromyalgia, back pain, depression, and anxiety. Progressive muscle relaxation Progressive muscle relaxation (PMR) is achieved by tensing and relaxing all the major muscle groups, one at a time, from head to toe. By learning to feel the difference between tension and relaxation, you can more actively disengage your body's fight-or-flight response, which underlies most pain, depression, and stress. Tai Chi While practicing tai chi, your mind is meant to stay focused on your movements, relaxation and deep breathing, while distracting thoughts are ignored. Part of the allure is that it's so gentle, it's an ideal form of activity for people with pain or other conditions that prevent more vigorous exercise. You can even do tai chi if you're confined to a wheelchair. The medical literature shows tai chi helps reduce depression, anxiety, and stress. Breathing techniques Deep breathing activates your parasympathetic nervous system, which induces the relaxation response. Dr. Weil's 4, 7, 8 breathing technique works as a natural tranquilizer for your nervous system. The Buteyko Breathing Method helps improve oxygenation of your tissues and organs, including your brain, and can be particularly helpful to quell a panic attack or control anxiety. Hypnosis Hypnosis, which is a trance-like state in which you experience heightened focus and concentration, can help decrease pain by altering your emotional responses to your body's pain signals and your thoughts about the pain. Contrary to popular belief, you do not relinquish control over your behavior while under hypnosis, but it does render you more open to suggestions from the hypnotherapist. In addition to managing pain, cognitive hypnotherapy has been shown to lessen depression and anxiety better than cognitive behavioral therapy. Music therapy Music triggers activity in the nucleus accumbens, a part of your brain that releases the feel-good chemical dopamine and is involved in forming expectations. At the same time, the amygdala, which is involved in processing emotion, and the prefrontal cortex, which makes possible abstract decision-making, are also activated. Studies18,19 reveal listening to music results in less anxiety and lower cortisol levels among patients about to undergo surgery than taking anti-anxiety drugs. Yoga Yoga has been proven to be particularly beneficial if you suffer with back pain, and can also be of tremendous benefit for your mental health.20 According to recent findings, yoga appears to have a positive effect on mild depression, sleep problems, schizophrenia (among patients using medication), and ADHD (among patients using medication). Some studies21,22 suggest yoga can have a similar effect to antidepressants and psychotherapy, by influencing neurotransmitters and boosting serotonin. Visualization and guided imagery Visualization techniques or guided imagery can serve as an important tool to combat both physical pain and depression by imagining being in "a better place" and promoting a state of relaxation. Ideally, you'll want to immerse yourself as fully as you possibly into your visualization, using all your senses: seeing, smelling, tasting, hearing, and feeling, as using all your senses changes levels of brain chemicals, such as serotonin, epinephrine, and endorphins. Mantra The repeated incantation of a mantra—a soothing or uplifting word or phrase of your choice—in a rhythmic fashion can help you relax in a similar way as mindfulness training. The focused repetition, also called autogenic training, helps keep your mind from wandering and worrying, and engages your body's relaxation response. In one study, migraine sufferers were able to decrease the frequency and intensity of their headaches using autogenic training. Other research suggests it may provide helpful longer-term effects on symptoms of depression. Neurostructural Integration Technique (NST) Using a series of gentle moves on specific muscles or at precise points on your body creates an energy flow and vibrations between these points. This allows your body to rebalance itself. The main objective is to remove pain and dysfunctional physiological conditions by restoring the structural integrity of the body. In essence, NST provides the body with an opportunity to reintegrate on many levels, and thus return to and maintain normal homeostatic limits on a daily basis. Medical Cannabis—Another Option for Pain Relief

Certain forms of cannabis are potent medicine with few or no psychoactive effects. Even the US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy has spoken out about its potential benefits, saying: "We have some preliminary data showing that for certain medical conditions and symptoms, marijuana can be helpful." His statement echoes a growing sentiment in the medical and scientific communities that the health benefits of marijuana should no longer be ignored. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has also given strong support for research and development as well as a "review of policies promoting research on the medical use of these compounds."

At present, 23 states have legalized medical marijuana.23 Another 11 states have pending legislation for 2015.24 On a federal level, however, the herb is still considered a Schedule 1 controlled substance (other Schedule 1 drugs include heroin, LSD, ecstasy, methaqualone, and peyote). Ironically, oxycodone, fentanyl, and meperidine (Demerol), which are among the most commonly abused opioids and leading causes of opioid overdose deaths, are Schedule II drugs, meaning they should technically be less dangerous than marijuana. Meanwhile, until recently certain opioid prescription drugs such as Vicodin were classified as Schedule III substances, which are defined as "drugs with a moderate to low potential for physical and psychological dependence."

A wealth of research shows marijuana does have outstanding promise as a medicinal plant, largely due to its cannabidiol (CBD) content. Cannabinoids interact with your body by way of naturally occurring cannabinoid receptors embedded in cell membranes throughout your body. There are cannabinoid receptors in your brain, lungs, liver, kidneys, immune system, and more. Both the therapeutic and psychoactive properties of marijuana occur when a cannabinoid activates a cannabinoid receptor.

Research is still ongoing on just how extensive their impact is on our health, but to date it's known that cannabinoid receptors play an important role in many body processes, including metabolic regulation, cravings, pain, anxiety, bone growth, and immune function. To learn more about the legal parameters of using medical cannabis in your state, check out ProCon.org's website.25 I also recommend listening to my interview with Dr. Allan Frankel, a board-certified internist in California, who has treated patients with medical cannabis for the past eight years.

Download Interview Transcript

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Inside the Garbage of the World

By Dr. Mercola

While you may not directly feel the impact of garbage while going about your day to day life, it's quite literally choking the life out of our ecosystem, and the situation is getting worse with each passing day.

Eventually, we will all suffer the very real consequences as the world dies around us. As stated in the featured documentary, Inside the Garbage of the World, "we're going to create an environmental catastrophe that we may not be able to recover from."

Many take for granted that their garbage "magically disappears" once it's picked up by the garbage truck, but nothing could be further from the truth. Most garbage does not disappear. It's simply relocated to a landfill or a recycling center. Trash also makes its way down storm drains and into nearby waterways.

The Abomination That Is Plastic...

Our throwaway mentality has created a pollution problem that now threatens the future of humanity itself. Plastic trash is of particular concern, as bits and pieces of plastic are mistaken for food by birds and sea animals.

Debris in the ocean also blocks sunlight from which plankton and algae sustain themselves, and this has negative implications on up the food chain as it eventually becomes micronized and winds up in some of the seafood you eat.

Also, once in the waterways, plastic particles also act like sponges for waterborne contaminants such as PCBs, pesticides like DDT, herbicides, PAHs, and other persistent organic pollutants.

This phenomenon makes plastics far from benign, and scientists have yet to determine the full extent of the dangers posed by their consumption, or the effects higher up the food chain—which is where you are.

Plastic pollution is an enormous problem, worldwide. According to the documentary, an estimated 4.7 million tons of plastic ends up in our oceans each year, where wave action turns them into a plastic soup that damages sea life and marine ecosystems.

Eighty percent of this plastic comes from land; the rest is litter from ships, boats, and industrial platforms.

Rivers and streams are equally affected by plastic trash. For example, as noted by Dan Glaser with the Surfrider Foundation, 30-75 percent of all pollution found in the Ventura River in California is plastic.

In Hawaii, there are remote beaches where you cannot even see the sand for all the plastic washed ashore. An estimated 17 tons of debris is collected on Kamilo Point and adjacent beaches each year.

Out of Sight, Out of Mind—Oceans Turning into Landfills

Plastics such as polycarbonate, polystyrene, and PETE sink to the bottom, where they smother and kill marine life on the ocean floor. Other plastics such as LDPE, HDPE, polypropylene and foamed plastics float.

Partially broken down plastic particulate also fills the water column between the ocean floor and the surface. The largest landfill in the world is in fact not located on land but in the Pacific Ocean, in the North Pacific Gyre. Ninety percent of the trash making up this "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" is plastic.

The North Pacific gyre contains two sub-gyres (Eastern and Western) where trash collects as a result of rotating currents. The Eastern Garbage Patch covers an area equal to half the size of the continental United States, and the Western Garbage Patch is somewhat smaller.

Contrary to the image publicized by the media, these are not solid floating "islands" of trash. The pollution is dispersed; not only on the surface, but also throughout the water column and across the ocean floor, but the rotating currents do gather and concentrate the trash into these great swaths of ocean covering thousands of miles.

As noted by Anna Cummins, co-founder of 5 Gyres Institute:1

"If it were an island of garbage, it would actually be a better thing, because we'd be able to really, truly communicate this issue to the public.

One of the difficulties with this plastic issue is that it's so hard to engage the public in feeling the urgency... People want to see an island of garbage, and when they see images of blue waters, they think that it's not really a big deal.

The reality... is that it's more like a plastic soup... It's this plastic soup of "confetti" that is very diffuse. The difficulty is that it covers so much ground..."

Plastic Particles Outnumber Plankton 36 to 1

According to one United Nations report,2 there are 46,000 pieces of plastic in every square mile of ocean. But larger pieces of plastic do not remain intact. It breaks up into increasingly smaller pieces, which make their way into the food chain.  

An estimated 300,000 animals die each year either from ingested plastic, or getting tangled in plastic. One young sperm whale that washed ashore dead in California was found to have 400 pounds of plastic in its stomach.

In Midway Island, where 20 tons of plastic wash ashore each year, deceased albatrosses have been found with lighters, bottle caps and other chunks of plastic in their bellies. Ditto for birds, turtles, dolphins, seals, fish, and more.

Disturbingly, the plastic to plankton ratio in the North Pacific is increasing rapidly and exponentially. Tests in 1999 found a plastic to plankton ratio of six to one. By 2007, that ratio had jumped to 36 to one! So it got six times worse in a matter of about eight years.

Now another eight years have gone by, so that ratio is undoubtedly even higher today, and will continue to rise until we change our ways... The question is how long will our oceans continue to sustain life at this pace?

Research3 shows that biodegradable plastics aren’t all they’re cracked up to be either. Biodegradable plastics are treated with additives that are supposed to help the plastic break down faster. But a recent study found that biodegradable plastics degraded no faster than untreated, non-biodegradable plastic, so this really isn’t a viable alternative either.

ALL of the World's Oceans Are Clogging Up with Plastic

There are a total of five subtropical gyres: the Indian, North and South Atlantic, and North and South Pacific. All of them trap and collect trash in their rotating currents, and as noted by Anna Cummins, whose 5 Gyres Institute has now collected water samples from all five gyres, mankind has altered the constitution of our oceans on a global scale.

All but two of the 500 water samples the Institute has gathered contained plastic. The two that did not were collected in an area off of Chile. Plastic chemicals are an added concern. The potential for catastrophic biological consequences for every species on the planet is growing with every discarded bottle and bag.

Plasticizing chemicals like BPA disrupt embryonic development in both animals and humans, and are linked to heart disease and cancer. As reported in this film, one seafood test done in Singapore revealed BPA in every single seafood sampled. This is a real concern—the fish are eating plastic and swimming in plastic chemicals, and we're at the top of the food chain eating them...

Phthalates—another plastic chemical—dysregulate gene expression and cause genital anomalies, especially in baby boys, that may pass down several generations. Prenatal phthalate exposure has also been linked to reduced IQ in children, and DEHP may lead to multiple organ damage.

By altering the composition of our oceans with plastic, we're ruining the building blocks of life, including carbon, oxygen, and food production. So, whether you look at environmental or biological effects, our careless use of plastics has created a rapidly encroaching nightmare.

We Can No Longer Afford the Price of Convenience

At the heart of the waste problem is a materialistic society that encourages buying more and more "stuff." Acquiring things you don't really need can take a massive toll on the environment, in more ways than you may realize. The Western penchant for single-use items is particularly destructive. If you have not seen it yet, I highly recommend you watch The Story of Stuff, as it does a phenomenal job of illustrating the real effects of over-consumption and over-production.

All of this "stuff" -- the electronics, the toys, the single-use conveniences, the clothes and all the other material goods that we use to express our status and "personal value" -- carry a hefty price tag, not just for your wallet but also for the planet and the people who live on it. The Story of Stuff details what goes into the making of all these products; the processes of extraction (trashing the planet), production (adding in toxic chemicals), distribution, consumption, and ultimately disposal. The impact all of this has on communities at home and abroad are hidden from your view, yet it is immense.

Adding to the problem is planned obsolescence, on a functional, design, and even aesthetic level, which makes perfectly good products obsolete or just plain "undesirable." It is because of built-in obsolescence that you've probably traded in your perfectly good computer or smartphone just to get a newer model. It's also the reason why certain products break after a number of uses and have to be repeatedly replaced.

How to Cut Down on Your Waste

Bottled water is perhaps one of the most environmentally unfriendly industries there is. Americans alone go through and ultimately discard about half a billion bottles of water every week. The environmental ramifications of this practice are enormous, so becoming more responsible about what we buy and how we discard our waste is not just a "nice idea." I believe it is an absolute necessity.

Recycling responsibly is one step in the right direction, but I believe it's even more important to reduce and reuse what we have first, as much as possible. It's worth remembering that mankind had a zero waste lifestyle up until about 100 years ago. There were no plastic wraps around the foods and items you bought, and virtually every scrap, be it fabric, paper, wood, or metal, was repeatedly reused; creatively refashioned into new products.

We need to rethink our throwaway culture and become more sustainably creative. Ideally, seek to purchase products that are not made from or packaged in plastic. Another important point is to choose reusable over single-use, which is possible in most instances. Here are a few ideas:

Use reusable shopping bags for groceries Take your own leftovers container to restaurants Bring your own mug for coffee, and bring drinking water from home in glass water bottles instead of buying bottled water Request no plastic wrap on your newspaper and dry cleaning Store foods in glass containers or mason jars rather than plastic containers and plastic freezer bags Avoid disposable utensils and buy foods in bulk when you can Opt for non-disposable razors, washable feminine hygiene products for women, cloth diapers, handkerchiefs instead of paper tissues, rags in lieu of paper towels, and infant toys made of wood rather than plastic Avoid processed foods (which are stored in plastic bags with chemicals). Buy fresh produce instead, and forgo the plastic bags Where Will Your Descendants Live, if Not on Earth?

These are just a few ideas — I'm sure you can think of many more. Please do take care to recycle and repurpose products whenever possible, especially ones that are not available in anything other than plastic. This includes giving your clothes or gently used household items to charities, and frequenting second-hand stores instead of buying new. Make use of online sites like Freecycle.org that allow you to give products you no longer need away to others instead of throwing them away.

In general, purchasing locally sourced and locally crafted goods will be best for the environment and your local economy. You may need to pay more for such items, but chances are they'll far outlast mass-produced versions, which means you won't need to throw it away and acquire a new one. For items you cannot get made locally, seek out responsible companies that do not exploit people or the environment to make your purchases from.

Last but not least, consider asking yourself more often: "Do I really need this?" Overconsumption in general is an issue for most people in Western societies; the problem is, all this buying and throwing items away is like borrowing life from our children that we can never pay back. Once the Earth is too clogged with plastic to sustain life, where will our children and grandchildren live?

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How Apple Cider Vinegar Can Change Your Life

By Dr. Mercola

Vinegar is said to have been discovered around 5000 BC, when unattended grape juice turned into wine and then vinegar. Originally used as a food preservative, vinegar’s medicinal uses soon came to light.

Hippocrates used vinegar to manage wounds, while medical practitioners in the 1700s used it to treat everything from poison ivy and croup to stomach aches. Vinegar was even used to treat diabetes.1

Vinegar, which means “sour wine” in French, can be made from virtually any carbohydrate that can be fermented, including grapes, dates, coconut, potatoes, beets, and, of course, apples.

Traditionally, vinegar is made through a long, slow fermentation process, leaving it rich in bioactive components like acetic acid, gallic acid, catechin, epicatechin, caffeic acid, and more, giving it potent antioxidant, antimicrobial, and many other beneficial properties.

As reported in Medscape General Medicine:2

“The slow methods are generally used for the production of the traditional wine vinegars, and the culture of acetic acid bacteria grows on the surface of the liquid and fermentation proceeds slowly over the course of weeks or months.

The longer fermentation period allows for the accumulation of a non-toxic slime composed of yeast and acetic acid bacteria, known as the mother of vinegar.”

“Mother” of vinegar, a cobweb-like amino acid-based substance found in unprocessed, unfiltered vinegar, indicates your vinegar is of the best quality. Most manufacturers pasteurize and filter their vinegar to prevent the mother from forming, but the “murky” kind is best, especially if you’re planning to consume it.

Vinegar is not only useful for cooking, it’s useful for health purposes, cleaning, garden care, hygiene, and much more. In fact, a jug of vinegar is easily one of the most economical and versatile remedies around. I recommend keeping it in your home at all times…

Health Uses for Apple Cider Vinegar

There are no official guidelines concerning taking vinegar internally. Some people take one to two teaspoons a day, mixed in a glass of water, before meals or in the morning, and report benefits from doing so. The risk of taking small amounts of vinegar is low, and research suggests it may have some real health benefits.

Diabetes

Vinegar is said to be anti-glycemic and has a beneficial effect on blood sugar levels. It’s thought that the acetic acid in vinegar may lower blood sugar by preventing the complete digestion of complex carbohydrates, which is accomplished either by accelerating gastric emptying or increasing the uptake of glucose by bodily tissues.3

One theory is that vinegar might inactivate some of the digestive enzymes that break down carbohydrates into sugar, thus slowing the conversion of complex carbohydrate into sugar from a meal into your bloodstream.

This gives your body more time to pull sugar out of your blood, preventing your sugar levels from spiking.  Quite a bit of research supports the use of vinegar as a diabetic treatment as well.

One study found that vinegar treatment improved insulin sensitivity in 19 percent of individuals with type 2 diabetes and 34 percent of those with pre-diabetes.4

Yet another study found taking two tablespoons of apple cider vinegar before bed lowered blood sugar levels in people with type 2 diabetes by up to 6 percent by the morning.5

Heart Health

Vinegar supports heart health in multiple ways. As explained in the Journal of Food Science:6

“Polyphenols such as chlorogenic acid, which is present in high levels in apple cider vinegar, could inhibit oxidation of LDLs and improve health by preventing cardiovascular diseases.”

One study showed that vinegar could lower cholesterol in laboratory rats,7 while another study on rats found their blood pressure could be lowered by the acetic acid in vinegar.8

Vinegar has also been found to decrease triglyceride levels and VLDL levels (the damaging form of cholesterol) in animal studies.9

Weight Loss

Vinegar may help you lose weight, as it appears to have an anti-obesity effect by increasing satiety and reducing the total amount of food consumed.

For instance, when volunteers consumed a small amount of vinegar along with a high-carb meal (a bagel and juice) they consumed less food for the remainder of the day. The reduction equated to about 200 to 275 calories a day – an amount that would result in a monthly weight loss of up to 1.5 pounds.10

In addition, separate research found taking vinegar along with bread not only lowered glucose and insulin responses, but also increased levels of satiety. The rating of satiety was directly related to the acetic acid level in the vinegar.11

Sinus Congestion

Apple cider vinegar helps to break up and reduce mucous in your body, helping to clear your sinuses. It also has antibacterial properties, making it useful for infections.

Sore Throat

The antibacterial properties in apple cider vinegar may be useful for sore throats as well. Gargle with a mixture of about one-third cup of apple cider vinegar mixed with warm water as needed.

Digestion and Acid Reflux

Acid reflux typically results from having too little acid in your stomach. You can easily improve the acid content of your stomach by taking one tablespoon of raw unfiltered apple cider vinegar in a large glass of water daily. The pectin in apple cider vinegar may also help to soothe intestinal spasms.

Skin Irritations

Apple cider vinegar works for a variety of skin ailments, from bug bites to poison ivy to sunburn. You can either apply it directly to the irritated area or try soaking in a bath with about one cup of vinegar added.

Warts

Topical application of apple cider vinegar may help remove warts, likely because of the high levels of acetic acid it contains.12 You can try soaking a cotton ball in vinegar and applying it to the wart, covered, overnight.

Energy Boost

Apple cider vinegar contains potassium and enzymes to help banish fatigue. Plus, its amino acids may help prevent the buildup of lactic acid in your body, further preventing fatigue.13

Apple Cider Vinegar Around Your Home

Generally, you can use distilled white vinegar for household use and the cider vinegars, made from fermenting fruits such as apples, for consumption. However, if you prefer you can use apple cider vinegar around your home as well.

Natural Cleaning

Vinegar is one of the best natural cleaning agents there is, and this is largely due to its antimicrobial properties. When added to food, the organic acids in vinegar (especially the acetic acid) pass into cell membranes to kill bacteria.  Foods fermented with vinegar have a natural arsenal of antimicrobial organic acids, including acetic, lactic, ascorbic, citric, malic, propionic, succinic, and tartaric acids. One study found acetic acid to be lethal to even E. coli O157:H7, while other research has shown substances such as acetic acid, lemon juice, or a combination of lemon juice and vinegar to be effective against salmonella.14

Weed Killer

Vinegar is very effective to control weeds in your garden. Howard Garrett, also known as The Dirt Doctor, shared his recipe for vinegar-based herbicide (this spray will injure any plant it touches, so use it only on those you want to remove):

Herbicide Formula

1 gallon of 10 percent (100 grain) vinegar Add 1 ounce orange oil or d-limonene Add 1 tablespoon molasses (optional - some say it doesn't help) 1 teaspoon liquid soap or other surfactant (such as Bio Wash) Do not add water

Neutralize Odors

Apple cider vinegar in a bowl will help to neutralize odors in your home.

Fruit and Veggie Wash

Vinegar is one of the best natural agents for removing certain pesticides and bacteria from your fresh produce. Try a solution of 10 percent vinegar to 90 percent water as a bath to briefly soak produce. Just place your veggies or fruit in the solution, swish them around, and rinse thoroughly (don’t use this process on fragile fruits like berries since they could be damaged in the process or soak up too much vinegar through their porous skins).

Hygiene and Beauty

You might even want to keep some apple cider vinegar in your bathroom cabinet…

Hair Rinse

Apple cider vinegar helps remove product build-up and balance your scalp’s pH level. Try a weekly rinse of one-third cup of vinegar mixed with four cups of water. For dandruff, try spraying your scalp with equal parts vinegar and water (mixed), wrapping a towel around your head, and leaving it to sit for an hour. Then, wash out and repeat up to twice a week.15

Facial Toner

Diluted apple cider vinegar on a cotton ball makes a simple facial toner and cleanser to help prevent breakouts. It might even help bruises to fade faster.

Deodorant

Apple cider vinegar helps kill odor-causing bacteria, so dab a bit under your arms for a natural deodorant.

Oral Health

Gargling with diluted apple cider vinegar can help to eliminate bad breath and whiten teeth. Keep in mind, however, that apple cider vinegar is highly acidic. The main ingredient is acetic acid, which is quite harsh, so you should always dilute it with water before swallowing. Pure, straight apple cider vinegar could damage your tooth enamel or the tissues of your mouth and throat. (There is, in fact, one reported incident of long-term esophageal damage to a woman who got an apple cider vinegar supplement capsule stuck in her throat.)

Foot Odor

Wiping your feet down with apple cider vinegar can help to eliminate odor-causing bacteria and smells from your feet.

How to Use Apple Cider Vinegar in Your Cooking

There are many creative ways to use apple cider in cooking. Try it in homemade marinades and sauces, soups, or even smoothies. You can even add it to baked goods (it will add extra lift) and, of course, use it in salad dressing (try it mixed with olive oil, garlic, and mustard, for instance).16 Vinegar is good on fish as well and serves as a great tenderizing marinade for meat, giving it a good bit of zing. And it’s tasty drizzled over cooked greens or as a base for a cucumber salad. You can also try your hand at pickled vegetables using vinegar.

Vinegar is also a vital addition to homemade bone broth. When it comes to making broth, the vinegar helps leech all those valuable minerals from the bones into the stockpot water, which is ultimately what you'll be eating. The goal is to extract as many minerals as possible out of the bones into the broth water. Bragg's raw apple cider vinegar is a good choice, as it's unfiltered and unpasteurized. If you’re consuming vinegar for therapeutic reasons but don’t enjoy the flavor, you can alternatively consume other fermented foods to get the beneficial acids. This will then also help to recolonize your gut with beneficial bacteria. However, vinegar is easier and certainly safe to use, so you can certainly include it in your diet if you enjoy it.

Choose Your Vinegar Wisely: Avoid Distilled Vinegar

Distilled white vinegar is excellent for cleaning and laundry, but for health purposes you’ll want to avoid the perfectly clear, “sparkling clean” varieties you commonly see on grocery store shelves. Instead, you want organic, unfiltered, unprocessed vinegar, which is murky. As mentioned, that murkiness is caused by a cobweb-like substance called the “mother,” and it is indicative of a high-quality product. Finally, if you are considering taking apple cider vinegar medicinally, long-term excessive use could conceivably cause low potassium levels and can adversely affect your bone density – so moderation is important.

In addition, apple cider vinegar could theoretically interact with diuretics, laxatives, and medicines for diabetes and heart disease. If you are under the care of a physician and you want to try a course of apple cider vinegar, talk to your physician first to make sure it won’t interfere with any of the medications you are currently taking.

Advanced Added Bonus for Even MORE Benefits

You can consider using fermented vegetables. Like vinegar, it is a mild acid but instead of acetic acid like vinegar, it has lactic acid. In addition to being useful for many of the items above, properly fermented vegetables will provide you with two major benefits, they will help to replenish and improve your gut microbiome, and if a high vitamin K2 starter culture is used they will also provide you with useful doses of vitamin K2, which is every bit as important as vitamin D and works synergistically with vitamin D.

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The Healing Power of Light

By Dr. Mercola

By now you’re probably aware of the importance of vitamin D. Ideally, it’s best to get it from the sun, because sunlight provides a number of other benefits as well, over and beyond vitamin D synthesis, that you simply cannot get from food or a supplement.

Alexander Wunsch is a German physician of holistic medicine and photobiology. He’s also the CEO of Medical Light Consulting in Heidelberg, Germany. He believes, like I do, that the sun is a great healer.

He believes that it’s the unity of biophysics and biochemistry that allows for life, and provides the human body with the essential ingredients for optimal health.

Earlier in his career, he invented a cranial electrotherapy stimulation (CES) device, which helps you to optimize your brain function and beneficially influence your nervous system and hormone system.

“It was called Brainman and was in the early ‘90s. [Then] I got interested in other frequency ranges; not only the brainwave frequencies but the frequencies we can capture with our ears and detect with our eyes,” he says.

I got interested in the method called chromotherapy... which is the treatment of the body with colored light...

For example, green initiates a chain reaction in your system, which tends to balance your autonomous reactions. The blue light of the sky induces other specific reactions. I found out that I could use this quite successfully to alter biological functions.”

The Importance of Heliotherapy for Optimal Health

After working with the visible part of the color spectrum, Alexander began investigating the effects of near-infrared, which is the frequency range coming after visible red, at the end of the rainbow color spectrum. Near-infrared is a very important radiation, and more than 40 percent of visible light is near-infrared.

“In nature, it’s a very important spectral portion of the whole spectrum we are given by the sun,” he says. “Finally, I got interested in the effects of ultraviolet light.

I knew from my medical studies that we have to be careful with ultraviolet light. I started to collect old textbooks on light therapy, light biology, or photobiology. What I learned from these books was quite amazing.

Most of them were written in the times before the era of antibiotics. The doctors, the physicians, had to be very diligent using sunlight and also using ultraviolet light sources for artificial application of ultraviolet radiation. Finally, I came to the conclusion that we are perfectly adapted to the radiation of our sun.”

Heliotherapy, or sun therapy, is when you use sunlight directly without removing or altering any part of the light spectrum. Early examples of heliotherapy include the use of sunlight to treat tuberculosis prior to the discovery of antibiotics, and they did that quite successfully.

Sunlight was also used to treat rickets and other diseases associated with light deficiency (which we now know as vitamin D deficiency). According to Alexander humans are adapted to sunlight as a complex stimulus, and when you remove that stimulus (sunlight), you end up with problems.

“We need the stimulus at a certain dosage to keep our system running,” he says. “Sunlight exposure is definitely much more than tanning. Tanning is just what you see, what is visible on your skin...

This is one very important part: if your skin is exposed to sunlight, you will experience some invisible changes in your circulatory system. The capillaries, for example, will be modified under the influence of sunlight.

The skin is closely linked to the autonomic nervous system (ANS). It’s a kind of an external organ of the vegetative system in your body. For example, when you live under summer conditions, we need much more water in our system in order to produce enough sweat, in order to cool down our body.

This means that sunlight not only influences the skin, but it influences all the inner organs as well. It’s a kind of concert, which is started by the stimulus of sunlight.”

Vitamin D: A Chronobiological Stress Hormone

Wunsch views vitamin D as a kind of “seasonal stress hormone,” explaining that chronobiological stress hormones such as adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH), and adrenaline-cortisol hormone blends are what enable you to get up in the morning, and help regulate the blood sugar concentration in your body, just to name a couple of their functions. 

“When you think about the different tasks between summer and winter, it’s like reprogramming your heating system in your house, because in summer, the main focus is cooling down the system.

You have an intake of 1.5 kilowatts on the square meter, which means if you stay naked out in the sun, your body has to digest a lot of energy, which in the end, is transformed into thermal energy.

Cooling is the main task during the summertime and heating is the main task during winter time. This is linked to, for example, the circulatory system. It’s linked to our digestive system and so on,” he explains.

When we talk about sun exposure to optimize vitamin D production, we’re really only looking at a small portion of the action spectrum of light, because ultraviolet B radiation is the only portion able to photosynthesize vitamin D in your skin.

“As a consequence, when you think vitamin D is the only benefit you can get from sunlight, you will automatically focus on the ultraviolet B radiation [while ignoring all other portions of the light spectrum],” he notes.

But the health effects and benefits of sunlight are not restricted to ultraviolet B. Swiss specialist Dr. Auguste Rollier, who has written text books on heliotherapy, emphasized that the composition of the different parts of the light spectrum are of crucial importance to achieve all of the benefits you can get from the sun.

“For example, when you look at the cellular effects of ultraviolet B and ultraviolet A, it really depends on the dose if the radiation is beneficial to your system, or if the radiation unfolds odd reactions or effects as well. What we can say is that ultraviolet radiation photosynthesizes vitamin D on one hand, but on the other hand, it’s able to seriously damage cells. Ultraviolet B can alter the DNA structure. Ultraviolet A can produce and photosynthesize the reactive oxygen species in the tissue.

To cope with these side effects, your skin needs other parts in the spectrum. For example, the near-infrared and the red light, which we find in sunlight in a pretty large amount, provide metabolic power to the cells...I’m convinced that the full blend of specific wavelengths we have under the sun enables our body to react in the best way,” Mr. Wunsch says.

The Drawbacks of Windows and Artificial Lighting

It’s important to realize that when we’re talking about sunlight exposure, the light spectrum you’re exposed to when sitting by a window is not the same as the spectrum you’re exposed to outdoors. Sunlight filtering through a window is actually more akin to poor quality artificial light, due to the fact that parts of the light spectrum are being filtered out. In order to be energy efficient, modern windows filter near-infrared light, and as mentioned, this range actually helps counteract some of the harmful effects of ultraviolet light.

“We face a common problem in the artificial light area and in the use of window glass. Both are factors which eliminate important parts of the spectrum,” Wunsch says. “For that reason, we have to be careful with windows and artificial light. Let’s say, you sit in your office and your eyes signal, “There is enough light around me.” Your intrinsic hunger for light may be satisfied by the light you perceive through your eyes. But there is an expression called “biological darkness.” This is what most of us might experience when we are indoors, sitting behind windows under artificial light sources.”

One of the ways you can avoid that, when the weather cooperates, is to open up your windows to get unfiltered sunlight exposure. Alternatively, take a walk outside, wearing minimal clothing. Interestingly, and contrary to what most of us have been told elsewhere, Wunsch notes that the only artificial light source that provides natural full-spectrum light is the incandescent lamp, which is currently being phased out and replaced with energy-saving bulbs like LEDs.

“You have all the different wavelengths contained in the spectrum [in the incandescent bulb]. There is a cut in the emission by the glass tube in the short wavelength part, but in the visible part and in the near-infrared part, the incandescent lamp is pretty active. The incandescent lamp is the only artificial light source with a natural spectrum, with a natural spectral distribution,” he says.

“I have a distinction regarding artificial light: 1) artificial light with natural spectrum represented by incandescent lamps and halogen lamps, and 2) artificial light with the synthetic spectrum, which produces a kind of light surrogate. It’s a low-quality replacement of what your body expects from light. In nature, there is a natural alliance between luminance on one hand and warmth or heat on the other. All natural light sources represent this alliance of heat and luminosity. This is what your body expects and this is what your body needs...

All the spectra, which are produced in the way that you have light and heat in combination, lies between the color temperature of a candle with 2,000 kelvin and the color temperature of sunlight with 6,500 or 6,000 kelvin. In between we have the incandescent lamp with 2,700 kelvin, which gives you as well 100 percent or CRI 99 to 100 color rendition. This already demonstrates that our eye seems to be closely adapted to the natural way to produce light. This is thermal light...

Our eyes are very intelligent sensors, which make a kind of white balance automatically. When you measure or even when you look at colors under candlelight, and this is the only light source around, you will have a full-color rendering. You have the full-color rendering with incandescent lamp, halogen lamp, and you have it with sunlight as well. I measured it personally. I do not believe what I’m told. I always try to get direct proof. I measured it, and it’s true. Our eye is able to adapt to the color temperature of the light as long as the light follows the natural laws, which are represented by the natural light sources – sunlight and fire.”

Disregarding Biological Adaptations Tend to Promote Poor Health

Your body is adapted to very specific lighting conditions: bright unfiltered daylight during the day, and low level fire-light in the evening followed by darkness. This rhythm of light and dark is what drives your circadian clock. This is discussed in much greater depth in my interview with Dan Pardi. Modern life, however, has inverted these natural conditions, leading to light deficiency during the day, and light excess at night. To correct the situation, you need to make sure you receive a healthy dose of sunlight ideally around high noon, and at night, try to reduce the levels of light you’re exposed to. I recommend getting an hour or more of sunlight during the middle of the day if you can, but 30 minutes may suffice.

To avoid skin damage from overexposure, start out with just a few minutes in early spring, and note how your skin reacts over the next two to four hours. If you notice your skin taking on a pinkish tint, stop the exposure and go inside. This is admittedly hard to do if you have darker skin, but you should still be able to notice a slight reddishness. Staying out beyond this phase is not going to provide you with any benefit, only potential skin damage, so do pay attention and avoid overexposure. That said, your body is intrinsically able to quickly adapt to sun exposure, Alexander says, provided you train it in a gradual manner.

“Start, for example, with five minutes. The next day you can expose yourself for 10 minutes. You just double the exposure time looking at your individual reaction in the afternoon or at night, because there is a delay in our skin reactions. There is a delay time of two to four hours... [Also, when] you go out into the sun, my recommendation would be to expose those parts of your body which normally are covered by clothes, and cover those parts of the body which normally are exposed. It means it’s advisable to wear, for example, a hat with a large rim in order to protect your head and your face from overexposure.”

On cloudy days, the benefit you will receive is clearly going to be reduced. However, Mr. Wunsch believes that being outside is a good idea regardless, because the heat or cold on your skin brings your skin into a reaction flow. He describes the skin is an organ that responds to environmental factors such as light and temperature, and these environmental factors allow your skin to cleanse and perform a number of adaptive functions. For example, your skin becomes thinner during the winter and thicker during the summer—provided you expose your skin in a diligent way to natural sunlight. So do go outside and expose yourself to whatever climate conditions you find yourself in.

I believe this is all sage advice worth applying. Because the more I study natural medicine, the simpler it becomes. The ultimate strategy is to replicate the practices of our ancient ancestors as closely as possible; by our lifestyle, our exposure to sun, our contact with the earth, the food that we eat and the water we drink. The further you veer off from your ancestral adaptations, exposing yourself to newer strategies and toxic chemicals, the more likely you are to contract disease, because your body is not adapted to those exposures.

Scientific Evidence of Biophotons

Dr. Fritz-Albert Popp was a pioneer of biophoton research, which is still widely disregarded in the US, despite the scientific evidence for their existence. As Mr. Wunsch notes, you can measure biophotons, and basic chemistry tells you that every chemical reaction goes along with an exchange of photonic energy. In the past, I suggested that elevated biophoton levels might be one of the benefits of eating raw food.  He agrees that biophotons are surrogate markers for the “liveliness” of food, adding:

“In each of single cell [of your body], in every second, you have around 100,000 chemical reactions going on in order to maintain the processes of life, the biological functions [of the cell]. There are some methods to measure if there is light coming from a living cell. In fact there is light coming from it. These biophotons, which are produced by biochemical reactions, you cannot say they do not exist because you can measure them.

But most scientists are unwilling to believe that these biophotons have anything to do with the regulation of the chemical processes. This is kind of strange because, as a scientist, you should not go into ‘believe’ or ‘not believing’ things. If you only look at biochemistry, you only look at 50 percent of the truth. The process of life is only understandable when you take biophysical and biochemical processes into account at a portion of 50 percent each. The biophysical part is fairly covered by the biophoton theory.”

More Information

The majority of Alexander Wunsch's work is published in German, but his blog, PhotonBlog.de, is bilingual, and does contain some English material. His website, SpectroChrome.de, has both English and German language options, and provides basic information on how to use colored light in your home to improve your personal health. General awareness about the health benefits and importance of sunlight may still be lacking, but there are changes afoot. The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has declared 2015 The International Year of Light,1 for the purpose of raising public awareness about the importance of light on human health.

“We all should be aware of the fact that when the sun were to stop shining, nothing would be alive in two or three days on this planet,” Wunsch says. “When we are eating, we are eating transformed light. We can prove this scientifically, as you know. I think even if we are not able to estimate the influence light has on our biological system as a whole, it starts on the single cell [level] and it ends in our consciousness, in our mental functions. Light is a symbol in our culture, which will always be our companion.”

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Avocado Super Smoothie Recipe

By Dr. Mercola

Smoothies are an easy way to add valuable nutrition to your diet when you’re short on time. But even if you have all the time in the world, smoothies are still an excellent choice, as you can throw together a complete balanced meal brimming with antioxidants, vitamins, minerals and, if you try the recipe that follows, even healthy fats.

This avocado super smoothie recipe, which is adapted from one posted by the Little Epicurean,1 works great for breakfast (and is a far healthier choice than cereal, bagels, or pancakes). It can also fill in as a light lunch or a snack – the kind that will actually give you energy and “stick to your ribs” (not your hips), so you’re left satiated instead of starving five minutes later.

Perhaps best of all, every ingredient in this smoothie serves an important purpose nutritionally and, when you blend them all together, it’s absolutely delicious!

Avocado Super Smoothie

Ingredients:

1 whole avocado 1 cup of torn kale leaves, no stem ½ cup organic blueberries ½ cup fresh pineapple 1 cup of organic baby spinach ½ sliced cucumber 1 cup unsweetened coconut water

Method:

Pour coconut water into blender. Add the avocado, kale, blueberries, pineapple, spinach, and cucumber. Cover with lid and blend until smooth. Pour into two glasses and serve immediately.

What Makes the Avocado Super Smoothie So Healthy?

Avocado

Avocados, which are actually classified as a fruit, are low in fructose and rich in healthy monounsaturated fat (which is easily burned for energy), and research has confirmed the avocado's ability to benefit vascular function and heart health.

Avocados are also very high in potassium (more than twice the amount found in a banana) and will help balance your vitally important potassium-to-sodium ratio. Avocados also provide close to 20 essential health-boosting nutrients, including fiber, vitamin E, B-vitamins, and folic acid. Besides eating them raw, you can use avocado as a fat substitute in recipes calling for butter or other oils.

Research has also found that avocados are helpful for regulating your blood sugar levels,2 and they might help improve lipid profiles, both in healthy individuals and in those with mild hypercholesterolemia (elevated cholesterol levels).3

Plus, by adding an avocado to your smoothie there’s a good chance it will help you absorb more of the antioxidants it contains. Due to avocados’ beneficial raw fat content, avocado enables your body to more efficiently absorb fat-soluble nutrients (such as alpha- and beta-carotene and lutein) in other foods eaten in conjunction.

One 2005 study found that adding avocado to salad allowed the volunteers to absorb three to five times more carotenoid antioxidant molecules.4

Another boon of avocados—they're one of the safest fruits you can buy conventionally grown, so you don't need to spend more for organic ones. Their thick skin protects the inner fruit from pesticides. Personally, I eat a whole avocado virtually every day.

Kale

Just one cup of kale will flood your body with disease-fighting vitamins K, A, and C, along with respectable amounts of manganese, copper, B vitamins, fiber, calcium, and potassium. With each serving of kale, you’ll also find more than 45 unique flavonoids, which have both antioxidant and anti-inflammatory benefits.5

Kale is also a good source of cancer-fighting sulforaphane and indole-3-carbinol. To date, kale has been found to lower the risk of at least five types of cancer, including bladder, breast, colon, ovary, and prostate.6 The glucosinolates in kale and other cruciferous vegetables break down into products that help protect DNA from damage.7

Blueberries

Blueberries exert positive effects upon your lipid profile, reducing your risk for type 2 diabetes. And because of their bountiful antioxidants, blueberries are one of the best fruits to protect you from premature aging. Blueberries have also been shown to alleviate inflammatory intestinal conditions, such as ulcerative colitis.

Plus, berries contain concentrated amounts of the disease-fighting phytochemicals found to boost your immunity, prevent cancer, protect your heart, and prevent seasonal allergies. Berries are lower in sugar than many fruits, so they are less likely to destabilize your insulin levels yet will add a nice sweetness and flavor to this smoothie recipe.

Pineapple

Pineapple contains an enzyme, bromelain, which aids digestion, reduces inflammation and swelling and may have anti-cancer effects. Rich in antioxidants like vitamin C, pineapple also provides immune support and is an excellent source of manganese, thiamin, and riboflavin, which are important for energy production.

Spinach

Spinach is rich in vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants, including folate, vitamin A, iron, potassium, calcium, zinc, and selenium. Spinach also contains flavonoids that may help protect your body from free radicals, while offering anti-inflammatory benefits and antioxidant support. As reported by the George Mateljan Foundation:8

“While this mixture of conventional nutrients gives spinach a unique status in the antioxidant and anti-inflammatory department, it is the unusual mixture of phytonutrients in spinach that ‘seals the deal’ in terms of its antioxidant and anti-inflammatory components.

In terms of flavonoids, spinach is a unique source of methylenedioxyflavonol glucuronides, and in terms of carotenoids, it’s difficult to find a more helpful source of lutein and zeaxanthin. The epoxyxanthophyll carotenoids neoxanthin and violaxanthin are also welcomed constituents of spinach leaves.”

Cucumber

With vitamin K, B vitamins, copper, potassium, vitamin C, and manganese, cucumbers can help you to avoid nutrient deficiencies that are widespread among those eating a typical American diet.

They contain an anti-inflammatory flavonol called fisetin that appears to play an important role in your brain health. Cucumbers also contain polyphenols called lignans, which may help to lower your risk of breast, uterine, ovarian, and prostate cancers.

Plus, cucumbers are made up of 95 percent water, making them an ideal hydrating and cooling food, and an excellent addition to smoothies (especially during the warmer months).

Coconut Water

Hawaiians call coconut water "noelani," which means "dew from the heavens." It is a clear, light, refreshing liquid (95 percent water) extracted from young, green coconuts that have not reached maturity. Coconut water is:

Rich in natural vitamins (especially the B vitamins), minerals, and trace elements (including zinc, selenium, iodine, sulfur, and manganese). Vitamins are necessary for the enzymatic reactions your cells need in order to function. Full of amino acids, organic acids, enzymes, antioxidants, and phytonutrients. Rich source of electrolytes and natural salts, especially potassium and magnesium. Light, low-calorie, and low in sugar but pleasantly sweet—contains about a fifth of the sugar of other fruit juices, like apple or grape juice, as well as containing a little fiber to moderate absorption. Rich in cytokinins, or plant hormones, which have anti-aging, anti-cancer, and anti-thrombolytic effects in humans.

Coconut water also has an alkalizing effect on your body, which can help correct the cumulative effects of acidifying foods that make up most diets today. Fresh coconut water is also one of the richest natural sources of electrolytes and can be used to prevent dehydration from strenuous exercise, vomiting or diarrhea.

The Best Part About Smoothies: You Can Use Whatever Ingredients You Have On Hand

When making smoothies, you don’t have to stick exactly to the recipe. If you have raspberries instead of blueberries, for instance, or want to change it up by adding in some raw milk or kefir, you can do that. In fact, it’s a good idea to switch up your smoothie ingredients regularly to ensure you’re getting a wide variety of nutrients in your diet. Other healthy ingredients that work great in smoothies include:

Raw organic pastured eggs High-quality whey protein powder Coconut oil Coconut milk Organic psyllium (for added fiber) Seeds (try alternating between chia seeds, flax seeds, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, and sunflower seeds)

For one of my favorite smoothies, I put a giant scoop of the banana Miracle Whey in a one-quart glass mason jar, and then I add two raw organic, free-range eggs. Then I add in some coconut milk. When combined with the banana-flavored whey, this mix imparts a heavenly flavor of coconut banana. Coconut is a great source of MCTs, which are medium chain triglycerides. MCTs are the best low-glycemic fuel for your muscles after exercise.

Thus, the coconut milk further enhances the fueling impact of Miracle Whey, which also contains MCTs. To increase the fiber content, I then add in a teaspoon or two of organic psyllium and, to top it all off, I add some seeds, such as chia seeds and pumpkin seeds. I prefer to blend this altogether using a hand mixer (for ease of cleanup), but you can also make it in a traditional blender. You can tailor your own smoothies to your own taste, using the fruits and vegetables you prefer, and adding coconut water, coconut milk, raw milk, raw yogurt, or kefir, for instance.

One important caveat: be careful to not overdo the fruit, especially if you are insulin or leptin resistant (are overweight, diabetic, hypertensive, or have high cholesterol). If this applies to you, I recommend limiting your fructose intake to a maximum of 15 grams of fructose per day from ALL sources, including whole fruit. You’re far better off making your own smoothies at home for this very reason, because many store-bought smoothies contain excessive amounts of fructose from fruit, and perhaps even added sugars on top of that, even though they’re advertised as healthy.

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Prescribing Vegetables, Not Pills

By Dr. Mercola

From 2010 to 2014, more than 5,600 low-income families have taken part in The Fruit and Vegetable Prescription Program (FVRx). This innovative program, created by nonprofit organization Wholesome Wave, joins healthcare providers, farmers markets and children with diet-related diseases, including obesity and type 2 diabetes.

To date, more than 1,100 overweight or obese children have taken part in the program, receiving a ‘prescription’ for fruits and vegetables that can be redeemed at farmers markets for fresh produce.1

In New York, the FVRx program is run in so-called ‘food deserts,’ where fast food restaurants are easier to come by (and often less expensive) than fruits and vegetables. Among 550 children enrolled at two New York hospitals, 97 percent reported eating more fruits and vegetables (as did 96 percent of their families).

Also impressive, more than 90 percent of the families said they shopped at farmers’ markets weekly while 70 percent reported understanding more about the health benefits of fruits and vegetables. About 40 percent of the children also lost weight after just four months.2

It’s these types of simple, innovative programs that can make a major difference in individual lives, public health and the surrounding communities. Even the farmers participating in the program benefit, as they reported selling more produce and increasing their income by close to 37 percent.3

One in Four Americans Eat Hardly Any Vegetables at All

The latest data shows that nearly 23 percent of Americans report consuming vegetables and fruits less than one time daily, with a median vegetable intake of only 1.6 times per day overall.4

Yet, I firmly believe we all need to eat large amounts of fresh, high-quality vegetables every day to achieve high-level health. Most vegetables are not very calorie dense and as a result they probably should constitute the bulk of your diet by volume.

The largest volume of your food should be vegetables. Vegetables contain an array of antioxidants and other disease-fighting compounds that are very difficult to get anywhere else.

Plant chemicals called phytochemicals can reduce inflammation and eliminate carcinogens, while others regulate the rate at which your cells reproduce, get rid of old cells, and maintain DNA. Studies have repeatedly shown that people with higher vegetable intake have:

Lower risks of stroke, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, Alzheimer's disease, and heart disease Lower risks of certain types of cancer, eye diseases, and digestive problems Reduced risk of kidney stones and bone loss Higher scores on cognitive tests Higher antioxidant levels Lower biomarkers for oxidative stress You Can Cut Your Risk of Dying Prematurely Nearly in Half

...Just by eating more vegetables! Eating any amount of vegetables is better than none at all, but the benefits increase with more servings. One study found:5

Those who ate five to seven servings of vegetables and fruits per day had a 36 percent lower risk of dying from any cause Three to five servings was associated with a 29 percent lower risk One to three servings was associated with a 14 percent lower risk

But perhaps most strikingly of all, people who ate seven or more portions of vegetables and fruit a day had a 42 percent lower risk of dying from any cause, compared to those who ate less than one portion. They also enjoyed a 31 percent lower risk of heart disease and a 25 percent lower risk of cancer.

Vegetables had a larger protective effect than fruits. So while consuming small amounts of whole fruit is fine if you’re healthy, your focus should be on vegetables. When broken down by vegetables only, each additional daily portion of fresh veggies lowered participants’ risk of death by 16 percent compared to 4 percent for fresh fruit.

Tips for Eating More Vegetables if You’re On a Tight Budget

Some of the healthiest vegetables are also among the least expensive. Take cabbage, which you can eat on its own or use as a base for fermented vegetables. Fermenting is one of the best ways to turn ordinary vegetables into superfoods.

The culturing process produces beneficial microbes that are extremely important for your health as they help balance your intestinal flora, thereby boosting overall immunity. When fermenting vegetables, you can either use a starter culture or simply allow the natural enzymes, and good bacteria in and on the vegetables, to do all the work.

This is called "wild fermentation." Personally, I prefer a starter culture, as it provides a larger number of different species and the culture can be optimized with species that produce high levels of vitamin K2.

No matter which technique you use, you can produce gallons of fermented vegetables for just a few dollars. Another tip is to grow your own sprouts at home. Sprouts are a superfood that many people overlook, as they offer a concentrated source of nutrition that's different from eating the vegetable in its mature form.

Sprouts provide some of the most nutrient-dense food you can eat and can contain up to 30 times the nutrient content of home-grown organic vegetables. They're also inexpensive and easy to grow with very little space and time.

Some of the most common sprouts include alfalfa, mung bean, wheatgrass, peas, broccoli, and lentils—but my personal favorites are sunflower. You can even sprout garlic! Sprouts have the following beneficial attributes:

Support for cell regeneration Powerful sources of antioxidants, minerals, vitamins, and enzymes that protect against free radical damage Alkalinizing effect on your body, which is thought to protect against disease, including cancer (as many tumors are acidic) Abundantly rich in oxygen, which can also help protect against abnormal cell growth, viruses, and bacteria that cannot survive in an oxygen-rich environment

Of course, you needn’t stop with sprouts. Growing your own vegetables is one of the best ways to get inexpensive fresh produce. Replace your lawn or shrubs with a vegetable garden—just be careful about your local zoning laws – or use containers. If a garden is not feasible, join a local food coop or frequent farmers’ markets (many of these now accept food stamps, too).

What are the Best Vegetables You Can Eat?

To a large extent, the best vegetables for you are those that appeal to your palate and agree with you. I highly recommend listening to your body, in that the foods you eat, including vegetables, should leave you feeling satisfied and energized.

That being said, I strongly advise you to avoid wilted vegetables of any kind, because when vegetables wilt, they lose much of their nutritional value. And while I typically recommend choosing organic vegetables as much as possible to avoid pesticides (as well as boost nutrition), wilted organic vegetables may actually be less healthy than fresh conventionally farmed vegetables.

Freshness is a key factor in vegetable quality, so if you can’t grow your own, look for those farmed locally or, better still, farmed locally and organically. My recommended list of vegetables provides a guide to the most nutritious vegetables, and those to limit due to their high carbohydrate content.

If you want more details about the specific nutrients and health benefits of different veggies, we've compiled an extensive review of the health benefits of vegetables in our Mercola Food Facts Library. However, as a general guide, the following list of vegetables details some of the best and worst vegetables for your health.

Highly Recommended Vegetables Asparagus Escarole Avocado (actually a fruit) Fennel Beet greens Green and red cabbage Bok choy Kale Broccoli Kohlrabi Brussels sprouts Lettuce: romaine, red leaf, green leaf Cauliflower Mustard greens Celery Onions Chicory Parsley Chinese cabbage Peppers: red, green, yellow and hot Chives Tomatoes Collard greens Turnips Cucumbers Spinach Dandelion greens Zucchini Endive Use sparingly due to high carbohydrate levels Beets Jicama Carrots Winter squashes Eggplant Vegetables to Avoid Potatoes Corn How to Encourage Your Child to Eat More Vegetables

For some families, access to fruits and vegetables is very limited, forcing them to rely on the processed foods at their local markets. Others realize that they can get a value meal at numerous fast-food restaurants for far less money than it takes to purchase foods to make a healthy meal for their family. The proliferation of junk food extends even into school cafeterias, where children are further exposed to supposed ‘healthy’ meals that are actually comprised of processed meats and other concoctions with very limited, or no, whole foods. That being said, as featured in the documentary Way Beyond Weight, around the globe, there were similar reasons behind many children’s poor eating habits and subsequent obesity:

Not believing the junk food is harming their children Battling with a picky eater and believing it’s better for your child to eat something, even if it’s unhealthy Parents eating junk foods and role modeling this behavior to their kids Giving in to kids’ demands for unhealthy foods to keep them ‘happy’ Lack of access to healthy foods, or lack of education about which foods are truly healthy

If you need help getting your family on the right track, my nutrition plan offers a step-by-step guide to feed your family right. In addition, you can help foster a healthy view of food and self-esteem in your child by:

Leading by example and seek to eat healthy and maintain optimal body weight for yourself and your spouse Refraining from making jokes about your child’s weight, even if no harm is intended Explaining the health risks of poor diet and being overweight to your child, but avoiding comparing your overweight child to other children, including thinner siblings Cooking healthy meals for your family, and letting your child be involved in making dinner and growing vegetables (but avoid making your child eat different food than the rest of the family) Encouraging your child to make healthy food choices and praising them when they do instead of putting your child down about weight or eating habits Instead of using food as a reward or punishment, have healthy snacks available at all times, and explain to your child the benefits they’ll get from eating these fresh, whole foods; use non-food items, such as stickers or special outings/activities as rewards instead ]]>

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