Posts tagged Lifestyle
New Contest for the month of JULY!
Jul 1st
Welcome to our Source Salba® and Astoria Mills sponsored contest.
This month, when you sign up for the Better Being newsletter directly on the right hand side of this blog post, you will automatically be entered into this months contest for a chance to win:
- An entire years supply of Salba
- The Astoria Mills entire line of Gluten-Free baking products
- Ann’s book “Better Being”
Every month, I will be giving away over $250 worth of whole food or natural product prizes!
Salba® is a fantastic stealth way to get Omega 3′s, Fiber and Antioxidants into your daily meals, snacks and smoothies.
Astoria Mills has created a brilliant Gluten Free 7 step “system” to enjoy delicious breads, cakes, flapjacks and so much more.
Sign up for my exclusive recipe book and enjoy the benefits of healthy whole food living……the Better Being way.
My July contest starts now and runs until the end of the month. I will be selecting the winner who will be notified by email!
Be sure to join the Better Being facebook page and check back here for contest updates.
100 Tips to a Better You!
Jun 29th
Here are 100 great tips that I hope will help you promote better being in your life!
After you read this list leave a comment and let us know what you thought of the list.
Have you ever tried any of these tips before? What is your favorite tip?
Enjoy the tips!
- Eat before bed?!? If you have problems falling asleep, eat a handful of walnuts before bed. You are boosting your fiber and essential fatty acids along with the amino acid tryptophan — a natural sleep-inducer.
- A cold and flu trick! Use a pair of cotton socks and a pair of wool socks, soak the cotton socks in cold water, wring them out and then put them on your feet. Put the wool socks on top and then go to bed. This will help get the body fluids draining and moving and decrease congestion or inflammation in the sinuses and head. Who knew hydrotherapy could be done with socks?
- Manage Stress. We all have stress in our lives but identifying that we are stressed is the first step to managing it. Then look for ways to decrease it constructively: deep breathe, have a walk, have some “me time” and eat good food! The world also looks a lot rosier after a good night’s sleep (new mom’s know this one best).
- Build Your Confidence: Identify your abilities and weaknesses together, try to build on them and do the best you can. Don’t worry, nobody around you is perfect so why should you be?
- Make Time for Family and Friends: These relationships, if positive, need to be nurtured. Share life’s joys and sorrows with those close. Invest time and energy in to those who are positive and loving around you.
- Give and Accept Support! Be receptive to help when you need it and put your pride away (superwoman is a fictional character …and who would be caught dead in that outfit?). Know when to ask for help, know when to give it, and most importantly: know when to accept it.
- Be aware of the Money Pit! Financial problems cause stress. Over-spending on our “wants” instead of our “needs” is often the culprit. Ask yourself: what do I really need and why do I need it? “Retail therapy” is expensive and short lived, so opt for something that is a better investment in YOU like a good meal or a brisk walk. Your body and wallet will thank you!
- Volunteer! Being involved in community gives us a sense of purpose and satisfaction that paid work cannot. Sometimes this “reality check” can go a long way in reducing stress and creating happiness.
- Find Strength in Numbers! Sharing a problem with others who have had similar experiences can help you find a solution. Talk it out with friends, family, support groups… or even a cab driver!
- Find a support “blog” on the internet and you will realize that you are definitely not the only one with similar issues.
- Express Yourself! Express your feelings of anger, sadness, joy and fear in constructive ways. Keep a journal of each mood and when sad, angry or fearful reread your “joy journal” for reminders of what happy experiences you have had. What seems terrible today can seem trivial tomorrow.
- Peace: Think about who you are and what makes you really happy. Try to balance what you can and cannot change about yourself. We are often the most critical of ourselves but we all have great skills and attributes and just have to remind ourselves of what they are (keep a journal of them in case you forget!)
- A wholesome thank you! Buy whole foods (whether canned, frozen, or fresh from the farm) and use them in place of processed foods whenever possible. Your body will thank you!
- Don’t be so corny! Try to reduce or eliminate foods and drinks made with corn syrup. Corn syrup is a calorie-dense, nutritionally empty sweetener that studies indicate are worse for the body than sugar! Corn on the cob is great: corn syrup isn’t!
- Green is #1! Try to start each dinner with a mixed green salad. It will help reduce your appetite for higher caloric foods, increase your fibre and water so food can be easily digestible. It will automatically add veggies to your meal and will help flush through everything else to improve bowel movements and a healthier colon.
Easy Yoga to Help Create Authentic Communication, Love and Support
Apr 10th
Featuring Ann Barnes, author of Better Being. This video is a demonstration of one Kundalini Yoga position, designed to create authentic communication, love and support. Visit www.beabetterbeing.com for more great yoga videos, recipes, and discussions.
Easy Yoga for Headache Relief
Apr 10th
Featuring Ann Barnes, author of Better Being, and Yogi Kita. This video is a demonstration of one Kundalini Yoga position, designed to help relieve headaches. Visit www.beabetterbeing.com for more great yoga videos, recipes, and discussions.
Easy Yoga for Purification
Apr 10th
Featuring Ann Barnes, author of Better Being, and Yogi Kita. This video is a demonstration of one Kundalini Yoga position for Purification. Visit www.beabetterbeing.com for more great yoga videos, recipes, and discussions.
Favourite Mom Quotes Part 1
Mar 25th
“Poverty is hereditary – you get it from your children.” – Phyllis Diller
I would rather have had the ‘poor’ experience of having my children, than living in a big house with lots of “stuff” ( although I had NO idea how much room children’s toys and baby items take up!). A friend once told me that her children were her jewels and didn’t need any diamond rings…I thought that was lovely!
“If evolution really works, how come mothers only have two hands?” - Milton Berle
I love this quote! I have often asked my kids: “do I look like an octopus?”. But really how helpful would it be to have another hand or two – or just someone to do laundry! 
“I know how to do anything – I’m a Mom.” – Roseanne Barr
Way to go Roseanne….after giving birth naturally both times I said to a friend that I could run Microsoft as nothing is as focusing as being in excruciating pain! As a Mom it means you have to run a business (household), be a: janitor, professional chef who makes 3 meals at once, party planner, chauffeur, psycho therapist, coach, and zen yogi (so we don’t scream AHHHHH at the top of our lungs on a daily basis!).
“A suburban mother’s role is to deliver children obstetrically once, and by car for ever after” – Peter De Vries
Sad but true….it is pretty hard to be “green” when you have to drive from mall to mall just to get the basics. I feel badly driving so much but aside from riding a horse, really don’t have a choice.
“It’s not easy being a mother. If it were easy, fathers would do it.” – The Golden Girls
This made me laugh. Can you imagine if men menstruated or gave birth? There would be international conferences on the difficulties of it and university degrees dedicated to how to cope.
“If there were no schools to take the children away from home part of the time, the insane asylum would be filled with mothers.” – Edgar Watson Howe
Sometimes the thought of being in an asylum with a full-time cleaning staff and all three meals made for me seems more appealing than getting the kids ready for school in the morning.
“Any mother could perform the jobs of several air traffic controllers with ease.” – Lisa Alther
Balance is key to being the multi-tasking goddess that motherhood requires. It is like walking a tight rope over Niagara Falls while holding a bag of groceries, car keys and a gym bag while your phone is ringing and it is the kid’s school.
“Mothers of teenagers know why animals eat their young” – Unknown
This is funny. I don’t have any teens (yet) but I remember my Dad telling me when I was 14 that if he dies of a heart attack it was my fault. I was so terrible at the time. My poor parents!
“Raising a kid is part joy and part guerilla warfare.” – Ed Asner
How true is this? Try taking misbehaving kids on the subway at rush hour and really know what it is like to be in full on survival mode!
Becoming a Farmer…
Mar 25th
I used to go to my city gyms to work out. You know the drill: you get to the super stylized locations of fitness and feel really pumped and charged. That is until you get to the change room. At this point it is a 50/50 chance of seeing a bronze Goddess with fake boobs nonchalantly and very visibly changing out of her bum-floss aerobic wear and you end up feeling like a bag of….well, you know. With the wind quickly stripped from your workout sails you get to your machine and attempt to get fit in 30 minutes or less.
Although I now belong to an excellent community oriented gym in our small town, that is more like going to a friendly English pub (as all ages hang out there), I try to get my workouts in while “working the farm”. This translates into small minuscule projects that don’t require a lot of machine operation or heavy lifting. So, I have gladly become the woodpile-girl. I happily schlep these logs to and fro to get the benefit of: an excellent workout, heat for our farmhouse (as I am a cold-a-phobe) and it keeps our front lawn free of wood chips and debris.
Martha Stewart has NOTHING on my wood stacking technique. I publicly challenge her to a wood-stacking duel.
Ann
PS: I now have to have a hot bath as my back is killing me.
Spring Break
Mar 22nd
Spring break is around the corner and it is about time! This well earned time to get away from the slush is a welcome relief! Although I am not heading to the sunny south myself, I am still taking advantage of the opportunity to take a step back and do some fun things.
Gone are my days of hoping on the bus with other university students for a prepaid trip to stay at a cheesy motel in Florida for a week long diet of fried food and bad beer. Instead, this break offers up a family visit to a friend’s cottage and day trips in the area with the kids.
I am going to also take the time to plan out the summer to make sure I maximize what the season has sun has to offer. I also want to work on a few more recipes so say tuned for some new tasty treats.
Comment and send me your stories of your spring break plans.
Last Excess to Ensure Success
Mar 17th
St. Paddy’s Day along with spring break always seemed like great timing to me. They come at the end of the winter months and both usually involve some kind of not-so-good excess. Whether it be food, booze or lifestyle, we all know that too much of anything isn’t balanced. With spring around the corner, both events are opportunities to say goodbye to winter’s excesses and hello to healthy routines.
Around this time of year, I like to reflect on what I did well over the winter, and where I fell off the wellness wagon. But for all of my reflections, the best one to illustrate my excesses are my pants. The pants never lie, and unfortunately mine are providing me with a whole whack of truth serum right now. So it is, once again, back to basics for me. Save the red wine for special occasions, have at least one salad a day, lay off the cheese and get back into a coherent exercise routine. I am taking my Salba daily to ensure that I feel fuller longer and to clean me out. I am getting protein at every meal so that I don’t carb out and sprinkling Mum’s Hempseed on my cereal and salad is an easy way to do this. Coconut oil has replaced my olive oil to help shed those winter rolls as well. I am swapping out grilled cheese sandwiches, which seemed like such a good idea on cold days, with a big spinach salad. My hope is to fit into my pantalones before May 1. Wish my waist luck!
So, with a little work, I am trading in winter’s Excess for spring’s Success.
Let me know your tip or plan to get rid of wintery excess!!
Winter Blah’s
Feb 22nd
I don’t know about you but the colour white, which is usually identified with lightness and serenity, now seems like pure evil to me. It is the fact that every time I look out my kitchen window IT is there. Snow, snow and more snow. I have to admit that I am getting tired of winter and have officially entered the Winter BLAHS.
The cold, the slush, the wet and musty coats, mittens, scarves, and heavy boots are getting tiresome. Going anywhere with the kids seems like a mission worthy of a GI Joe. Warm up the car, then get ready first so the kids don’t overheat, dress the kids: snowpants first, boots next, then coat and finally the requisite accessories of hat, scarf then mittens….by the end of it I am usually in a full on sweat just in time to be greeted with the frosty air. Yes, March, don’t take it personally but you are not my favourite month.
Although the month of my birthday, I recall even as a child wishing that I was the lucky one who had a summer birthday party which included a sunny picnic after running through the birthday sprinkler. My birthday’s slushy outdoor events usually ended in super-soaked snow pants and snow balls that hurt due to their icy centers.
But there is hope on the wintery horizon…April is around the corner and I look forward to all it has to offer. Rain will wash away the white and offer up green new growth with the hope of summer sun to come. Soon the Blahs will turn to Ahhs as soft breezes sweep away the cold’s last remaining residue.
In the meantime, I am stocking up on my essential fatty acids to ensure that I don’t have the emotional dips that an EFA deficient diet can cause. Salba, Mum’s Hemp are helping me on this one.
Comment and let me know your tip on getting over the wintery blahs.
