September 2009 Newsletter

An Inspirational Quote

"Persistency in thinking health, in imagining or idealizing yourself as healthy, vigorous, and symmetrical, is the cornerstone of health and beauty."

Prentice Mulford

How To Recover From Adrenal Fatigue
by Paula Owens, paula@totalfitness.net

Adrenal burnout is one of the two main factors that leads to a damaged metabolism.

Many people have heard of insulin resistance, which can lead to type II diabetes if left unchecked, but perhaps even greater numbers are experiencing adrenal burnout and don’t even know it.

Ask yourself – Do you experience?

• Asthma, bronchitis, frequent colds

• Bloating and/or swelling

• Blood sugar imbalances

• Body fat levels that don’t lower in response to sufficient physical exercise and excessive abdominal fat – a spare tire around the middle

• Chronic heartburn or indigestion

• Crave salt and/or sugar

• Decreased or zero sex drive

• Dizzy when standing up suddenly

• Elevated LDL cholesterol (excess cholesterol is manufactured in times of psychological stress and

dehydration)

• Have to have a cup of strong tea or coffee in the morning to get going

• Inability to tolerate or handle stress; exercise intolerance

• Insomnia

• Irritable; hopeless; panic attacks; depressed

• Low blood pressure

• Severely cracked, painful heels?

• Tend to be a night person

• Tendency to “need” to wear sunglasses; sensitive to light

• Tenderness at low back under the 12 th rib area

• Thin, dry skin and brittle nails

When your adrenals are depleted and chronically overworked, they’re unable to produce sufficient amounts of hormones. DHEA is a precursor to the hormones, estrogen, progesterone and testosterone. Insufficient DHEA contributes to fatigue, bone loss, muscle atrophy, decreased sex drive, depression, achey joints, and impaired immune function. Before menopause or andropause, our adrenals produce 40% of our sex hormones. After menopause or andropause, the adrenals produce 90% of the sex hormones.

If you are wondering if you have a damaged metabolism, ask your Total Fitness practitioner about lab tests to help you determine your level of adrenal function.

If you are one of the many suffering from adrenal fatigue, here is what you can do about it:

Nutritional Recovery for Adrenal Fatigue:

Avoid –

• Alcohol, coffee, caffeine, soda (diet included) and carbonated beverages

• Commercial salt and instead use Celtic sea salt

• Dairy products

• Dieting and long periods without food

• Foods you’re addicted to

• Foods you’re sensitive to (wheat, dairy, soy, corn, eggs and chicken are common allergens)

• Fruit juices

• Liquid with your meals

• Preservatives, junk food, fried foods, hydrogenated fats, processed foods

• Skipping breakfast

• Sugar, white flour and refined carbohydrates

Include –

• Address digestive dysfunction

• Celtic sea salt to replenish electrolytes depleted from chronic stress

• Chew your food thoroughly

• Combination of fat, protein and carbohydrate source at each meal.

• Eat regular meals at regular intervals

• Eat within an hour of rising

• Filtered water with Celtic sea salt

• Food sensitivity testing

• Green drinks

• Healthy fats (nuts, seeds, avocado, olive oil, sesame oil, coconut oil)

• Herbal teas (chamomile, passion flower, valerian, licorice root)

• High intake of organic protein

• Liver detoxification

• Organic foods, locally grown foods, cage-free and grass-fed when possible

• Raw foods – consume 50-75% of your foods in their raw state

• Sea greens

• Vegetables

Lifestyle Recovery for Adrenal Fatigue:

Avoid –

• All forms of tobacco

• Computer, television or exposure to bright lights after 8:00 p.m.

• Energy vampires; toxic people, places and things that drain you of your energy

• Lotions, soaps, toothpastes and shampoos that contain chemicals, dyes, etc.

• Prolonged periods of direct sunrays

• Turn off the news

Include –

• Address unresolved emotions

• Conscious thought patterns

• Deep breathing

• Guided imagery

• Keep a journal

• Laughter

• Mantras or affirmations

• Massage therapy

• More rest and quality sleep – get to bed by 10 p.m.

• Personal down time every day

• Surround yourself with like-minded people

Exercise Recovery for Adrenal Fatigue:

Avoid –

• Excessive exercise

• High-intensity cardio (releases cortisol)

Include –

• Brisk walking with arms swinging

• Lift weights using free weights, kettlebells, sand bags, barbells and dumbbells and/or bodyweight training such as push ups and pull ups

Supplement Recovery for Adrenal Fatigue:

Avoid –

• Synthetic supplements

Include –

• A nutritional program personalized for your precise individual metabolism. Although there are many supplements commonly used for adrenal stress, what your body needs can change depending on your level of stress and how quickly you address the lifestyle factors that are at the core of exhaustion. A good basic supplement to start is Destressing Formula. Order yours today by visiting this link: http://www.totalfitness.net/1ShoppingCatalog/nutrition_products.html#destressing_formula

This month’s webstore special is $5 off Destressing Formula.

Ask your Total Fitness practitioner about lab tests or kinesiology to help you determine what nutrients your body is missing to get your metabolism to work right.

Many people exercise for years with little to no results. Practitioners who only work on fitness alone may also be wondering why their hard work seems to produce no results for their clients. That is why we at Total Fitness take an integrated approach – it is what is actually necessary to get results.

THE GOOD NEWS

Although adrenal fatigue is common, you can restore and recover. It normally takes 4 to 6 months to fully restore adrenal balance. Testing is easy. Take control and responsibility of your health. Your health can be regained by taking action and incorporating the fours powers – nutrition, lifestyle, exercise and supplements. Remember, it’s a journey.

For more information, read The Power of Four – Your Ultimate Guide Guaranteed To Change Your Body and Your Life. You can order your copy by visiting this link: http://totalfitness.net/1ShoppingCatalog/CDs.html#Power_of_4.

The Importance of Oscillation
by Catherine Carrigan, catherine@totalfitness.net

One of life’s great gifts is having friends of like mind.

Having friends of like mind feeds our soul, challenges us, supports us, makes us bend and grow.

This article is a direct result of my conversations with my good friend Tom Biancalana of Chicago, trainer extraordinaire, a man who thinks nothing of biking 30 mph, a skater, an artist and thoughtful soul.

What I have to say is also a great follow up to my good friend Paula Owens’ article about adrenal stress.

And my message is pretty simple. When we do something over and over again, it ceases to be a stimulus. The reason that many people are chronically stressed is that they have never learned the concept of oscillation.

If I were a first-time lawyer, trying my initial case in court might be thrilling. The pump of adrenalin as I face the court might be stimulating. But if I continued to do that same thing over and over, especially for 12 hours a day, 5 to 6 to 7 days a week year in and year out without adequate recovery, then the result is like flat lining, a term developed in hospitals for cardiac arrest.

All living things have rhythms. Your heart rhythm can be measured through your EKG. Your brain rhythm can be measured in your EEG. In Chinese medicine, when we live our lives in harmony with these natural rhythms, our triple warmer acupuncture meridian stays balanced and we experience good digestion and metabolism and normal adrenal function.

One of the reasons that I have always loved yoga is that my practice restores balance to my nervous system. We make an effort and then we rest. We flow with challenge and then we rediscover our interior selves.

Even in traditional exercise, physiologists are finding that interval exercise is often more beneficial to the whole body than sustained activities at the same pace, especially when practiced over and over again, day after day.

Your mind needs variety. Your body needs different kinds of stimulus. Your soul needs new challenges.

The relentless demands of corporate life, the 24/7 news cycle, the glow of a computer screen for insomniacs, all these things degrade the value of our existence because they fail to maintain balance in our nervous system, the result of which is chronic exhaustion and burnout.

Here are a few ways you can include the concept of oscillation in your life:

1. Rest one day every week.
2. Set aside one workout every week for restorative activities, including yin yoga or restorative yoga, qi gong or a quiet walk in nature.
3. During your heavy workouts, push intensely for short bursts and then back off.
4. Keep an hour of your day completely unscheduled to give yourself a chance to reconnect with your true self.
5. Meditate.
6. Set up a four day rotation for your diet so you don’t eat the same thing for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
7. Do something you have never done before. Take up a musical instrument, learn how to dance. If you are not having fun in life, what is the point any way?
8. Visit an Alexander practitioner and change the way you habitually sit, stand or walk. Lack of physical exercise and stuck postures show up in our bodies as chronic neck, hip or knee pain.
9. Get out of your rut at work. Try something you don’t even think you can do, just to realize that you are always safe at a soul level.

Have your adrenal function scientifically tested. If you have burned out adrenal glands, chances are you aren’t just physically tired, your soul needs something different also.

Is Your Self Image Real? Part 2 of 3
by James Williams, james@totalfitness.net

In last month’s article I talked about how most adults and teens don’t usually believe they are innately beautiful.

We are born inherently happy, loving and complete. As babies, we do not care about our looks and can’t even recognize ourselves in the mirror! We just know we are beautiful! Our parents and society then condition us to think of beauty as being only about how we look, and that we are only beautiful if other people tell us so - if they tell us at all.

Whether we receive compliments about out looks from others, a handful of derisory comments, or no compliments at all about our appearance, from then on it becomes easy to over-identify the concept of beauty with the physical body.

Eventually we become attached to receiving verbal praise to feel good about ourselves and only feel the emptiness inside when the compliments stop coming our way.

In a marriage, the compliments usually subside when the attraction and desire fade. When relationships are founded on attraction it creates a temporary emotional high. This high is not true love according to author Anthony De Mello. It is desire. After the high comes the fall, and the fall can last until divorce or death. It is during the fall that we no longer hear the compliments about our appearance and start to doubt ourselves, unless we truly know in our heart that our appearance is not who we are.

If you’re someone who rarely received verbal compliments about your appearance as a child then the emptiness comes earlier in life. They’ve been misled by societal programming to look to others for validation of their beauty.

Some people, and this is rare, finally know in their heart that the emotional security they seek from others is what they’re missing in themselves. They discover that feelings of happiness have to be self-generated and that beauty cannot be verbally bestowed by others. They understand that they mistakenly confused happiness with receiving compliments about their looks.

You are not to blame
Do not blame yourself for not knowing how to recognize your own inner and outer beauty. All you’ve been shown is that beauty is something others bestow on you, like a crown. Your beauty is something that radiates from within you, no matter what you look like. It is revealed, in part, through the help you offer others, and your ability to take care of your needs and your body.

When you take the time to do the small, daily activities that keep your body healthy, you look youthful for your age and you feel energetic. You stand out from the crowd by radiating warmth, love and a strong sense of knowing who you really are. You also become more effective at helping others and have energy left at the end of the day to keep on smiling. In other words, you become a walking advert for true beauty.

Have you been shown how to cultivate your inner beauty? Probably not, so do not be sad if you do not know how - in fact be happy that you have come to this realization that you are so much more than the body.

Here’s how you do it: You get in contact with your beauty when you live in the moment because then you are completely happy. Happiness puts a smile on your face, lightens your heart and makes you look younger. When you live in the moment you’re also more likely to act in ways that radiate inner and outer beauty.

Whose values do you live by?
Take the realization that you determine your own beauty, and then let go of needing to have other people or magazines tell you what they value. Your life is not enhanced by the tension and apprehension of wondering what other people think of your looks. Drop the tension and validate your own beauty. You don’t need others to do it for you. Recycle those old Vogue, Elle, or Runway magazines. Live your life by your values and not those of magazine editors, fashion designers, your spouse, or friends and family members - all of whom readily tell you what they think of other people’s looks and the clothing they wear. Why does society give fashion experts and the media the role of God to judge what is or isn’t beautiful. Can you see how people suffer when they don’t match up to these ever-changing, opinionated ideals?

When you are free of the need to receive approval or praise for how you look from others, and don’t need to live up to the ideals and opinions of others, you are free to appreciate and love who you really are. All it takes at least once a day is for you to look yourself in the eye in the mirror, put your hand on your heart, smile and say, “I know I am radiantly beautiful.” If you’ve lived your life based on other people’s values, now is the time to start writing some new ones.

Catherine's Biodetox Shake Recipe
by Catherine Carrigan, catherine@totalfitness.net

In a blender, mix:

4 ounces blueberry pomegranate goat kefir

4 ounces coconut milk

1 to 2 scoops Biodetox

2 tablespoons Immunomax

1 to 4 tablespoons flaxseed

½ cup organic frozen berries

What’s so healthy about this recipe:

• It’s important to start your day with protein. This is a quick, easy way to start your day, loading up on hypoallergenic protein, natural anti-inflammatories, immunoglobulins that build your immune system, natural cancer fighters and antioxidants.
• I recommend goat kefir because cow’s milk is a common food sensitivity. Even if you do tolerate cow’s milk products, rotating your diet with healthy alternatives is a great idea. Kefir has twice the acidophilus as yogurt. Goat kefir is high in tryptophan, an essential amino acid that calms the nervous system.
• Coconut milk contains lauric acid, a nutrient found in mother’s milk that is anti-viral, anti-bacterial, anti-microbial and anti-fungal.
• Biodetox is one of our best selling products. It supports the organs of detoxification, heals the gut and lowers inflammation in the body. It is hypoallergenic and safe for people with multiple food sensitivities.
• Immunomax helps to heal the intestinal lining, boosts the immune system and provides a good source of non-dairy protein.
• Flaxseed contains lignans, which act as both phytoestrogens and antioxidants. Daily intake of flaxseed helps to balance hormone levels for women of all ages.
• Organic frozen berries are loaded with antioxidants, the anti-aging, cell-rebuilding nutrients. Strawberries and blueberries are low glycemic and two of the healthiest fruits on the planet.

To find out more about Biodetox and Immunomax, visit this link: http://www.totalfitness.net/1ShoppingCatalog/nutrition_products.html

Our Guardian Angel Dog: Honey Boy

One hundred percent of the money from our August yoga class went to support the Atlanta Pet Rescue, www.atlantapetrescue.org.

Last year, we also donated all August yoga moneys to the pet rescue and the class voted on whether or not to become the guardian angel for a dog or a cat. Alba Adrian cast the tie vote and we sponsored a pussycat that had been at the shelter for nearly a year.

Shortly after we became his guardian angel, Cranky Francie at last found a new home and has since become fat, fluffier and happy.

Our excellent luck has improved even more!

Alba suggested that since we picked a cat last year that this year we should become the guardian angel for a dog.

After looking over the long list of worthy nominees, we selected Honey Boy and he was adopted the very same day we picked him.

You can see Honey Boy’s portrait here:

http://www.atlantapetrescue.org/www_ver2/angels.htm

Great Deals For Total Fitness Customers

This month’s webstore special: Get $5 off each bottle of Destressing Formula. Use the coupon code DESTRESS when you check out. To order yours, please visit the following link:
http://www.totalfitness.net/1ShoppingCatalog/nutrition_products.html#destressing_formula

Also, with every webstore order, get a FREE set of affirmation cards from Sue Maes, either Train Your Brain or Slimmersize Your Brain.*

We wanted everybody to be aware that Family Health Enterprise is offering low cost mammograms. Having worked with numerous clients with cancer, we know how important it is for women to get regular mammograms. Even many employed people lack health insurance and therefore are not able to take advantage of this important service. To set up your appointment, please contact Dorothy K. Gallaway, a certified family nurse practitioner, at familyhealthen@bellsouth.net or call 404-635-1300.

* Digital products excluded. While Supplies last.

Nutrition and Mental Health Radio Show

John Williams, host of EVO Health Radio Show, invited Catherine Carrigan, author of Healing Depression: A Holistic Guide and past honorary chairman of the Depression Wellness Network to be a guest on his show on Aug. 13. You can listen to the show or download it at the following link:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/evo-health-online

EVO Health has one objective; to arm you with latest information on health and nutrition backed by intellectual, psychological, and spiritual support you need to create and maintain evolutionary changes in your health, wellness and life.

You can download the radio show directly by clicking on this link:

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/EVO-Health-Online/2009/07/30/EVO-Health-Radio-Show-NUTRITION-AND-MENTAL-HEALTH-

Upcoming Total Fitness Seminars and Talks

Online

21 DAY TRANSFORMATION TO A LEANER, HEALTHIER YOU!
Boost Your Metabolism, Lose Body Fat, Increase Energy and Transform Your Physique

Paula Owens

This is an online program. An extremely effective program for health, vitality, longevity and fat loss for ALL fitness levels, both men and women.

Includes 3 different fun, challenging, calorie-burning exercise programs with photos for 21 workouts (2 periodized strength training programs and 1 interval program). You'll receive daily educational emails on nutritional strategies, sample menus, recipes, recovery tips, injury prevention and health, wellness and lifestyle tips to motivate and inspire you to the next level. In addition, you'll receive a one hour recorded teleconference with a step-by-step explanation of the exercise program design and all of the exercises.

You will receive the exercise programs, teleconference recording and exercise photos on September 9th via email.

Tuition: $69.00

Visit www.PaulaOwens.com/seminars.html to sign up now!

Tempe, Arizona

Book Signing With Paula Owens, author of
The Power of Four

I will be available to answer your questions on nutrition, fat loss, anti-aging, lifestyle, exercise, hormones, supplements, health and wellness plus more!

For more information, please email Paula@totalfitness.net.

Atlanta, Georgiaa

Detox Your Way To A Healthy Body

Teachers: Catherine Carrigan and Allison Pelot

Join Catherine Carrigan and Allison Pelot in a repeat of this fabulous course about basic principles of detoxification. Find out why detoxification is essential for health and how to take a balanced, sensible approach.

For more information, please email Catherine@totalfitness.net.

Atlanta, Georgiaa

Self Empowerment Technologies©

Sue Maes' fabulous internship

Date: Sept. 28 – Friday Oct. 2, 2009

Time: 9 to 5 p.m.

Location: Total Fitness, 1951 Northside Drive NW, Atlanta, GA, 30318

This is the ultimate self empowerment course! It is an experiential class. It can push you past all your limits, change your habits, move you toward peace and contentment. It has also been used as an adjunct to other therapies to enhance any healing business.

Four Levels

Includes a Comprehensive Manual

For more information see the Brochure.

Yoga and Qi Gong Classes in Atlanta

Yoga Classes:
Every Tuesday and Thursday, 7:30 p.m.
Holy Spirit Prep School
4820 Long Island Drive, Atlanta, GA.
$15 per class or $65 per calendar month.

All the proceeds from August yoga will benefit the Atlanta Pet Rescue.

To get directions to the new location please view this location map.

Qi Gong Class: Every Wednesday, 5:30 p.m.
1951 Northside Drive, Atlanta, GA. $15 per class.

Booking appointments with Total Fitness

To schedule an appointment to find out about a personalized fitness, nutrition or healing program that will help you get results, please contact us:

In Atlanta

Catherine Carrigan catherine@totalfitness.net, Phone: 404-350-8581

James Williams james@totalfitness.net , Phone: 404-350-8581

In Phoenix

Paula Owen paula@totalfitness.net, Phone: 480-706-1158

In London, Ontario, Canada

Sue Maes sue@totalfitness.net, Phone: 519-471-1174

You can also visit us on the web at www.totalfitness.net