Last bit of big love from The Healthy Cookie.

It all started with a tummy ache and it comes to a close today with vibrant health, blissful happiness and more change than I ever thought anyone possible of. This, my love, is my final post for The Healthy Cookie.

The time, has come and I greet this with mixed emotions. This site began because I was pissed off. I was angry and needed an outlet. I was angry that after 19 doctors and being told that what I was feeling was in my head, I was at last diagnosed with a physical condition. This site tracked my healing, my health, my learning- my life over the last 21 months. I have been attached to it but I do feel it has served its purpose for me and that it is time to let it go.

As I embark on my professional career as a nutritonist, I feel like that phase of the journey has ended. Throughout the process I tried my best to stay focussed on my primary purpose which was to get healthy and stay that way- the outcome has arrived and I am moving forth on to the next adventure.

I am now making as much noise as I can to help get everyone else healthy.

Why do I choose to end it here?

Tomorrow is June 5th. June 5th marks exactly two years ago (to the day) that I had my check-up with the doctor who was the first to recognize that there was something really wrong with me. June 5th marks the day that I found a doctor who looked past my teary eyes and acknowledged that whether my sickness began in my head or in my body- it was real. June 5th doesn’t necessarily mark the day that I began to get better. I did get worse before I got better. But, I do feel it marks the beginning of a chapter in my life that initiated great transition.

I have been busily getting myself set up as a nutritonist. In the process of getting organized, I went through my old files and got rid of whatever I didn’t need. In this clean up, I came across a two-inch thick folder that was crammed with all sorts of medical stuff; biopsy reports, blood work, referral letters, phone numbers and a little torn piece of newspaper.

I unfolded this newspaper to discover my horoscope. The date on this horoscope was September 2nd, 2006. That was one week before I began this blog. September 2nd was the day after I had returned from my initial visit to LA. This was only three days after my diagnosis had finally come and the decision had been made that I would pack up my apartment, put my belongings in storage, postpone nutrition school and move down to LA for three months of acupuncture. September 2nd was the day that, up at my cottage with my family, I had a complete break-down, tearfully declaring that this was all too much for me. This apparently was also the day that I tore my horoscope out of the paper and kept it.

This is what my horoscope said:

Scorpio (Oct. 24-Nov.22)
“Change, when it happens, comes very quickly. Suddenly, your present becomes dramatically different from your past, and your future will be dramatically different, too. You are in the midst of a metamorphosis that is preparing you for an inspiring new direction in your life”.

Well if that isn’t a little bit of crystal ball magic…

The last two years have been the most amazing life education I ever could have received. On this website, I wrote about the lessons I learned along the way. I wrote about sickness and health, about healing, and food. I shared the philosophical teachings I was receiving as I discovered the powerful impact meditation and yoga were having on my life. I shared my life experience relating to nutrition school, relationships, and love. I had sunshine and rainbow posts and frowny storm cloud posts. Mostly I wrote what I felt and believed. Often people agreed and were affected positively and sometimes people disagreed, unsubscribed or wrote me nasty emails. That was their journey. This was mine.

Despite all that I have shared in the 107 posts I have written- the biggest lesson I have learned and that which is proven to me over again is the simple truth that everything happens just the way it is supposed to.

When something seemed bad at the time, it was only because I was looking at the little wee picture. I am now able to see what was in the works and I hold firmly to the realization that getting sick was the best thing that ever happened to me. Getting sick put my life on course.

I have every confidence that the universe gives us exactly the right experience that is needed in order for us to grow and evolve. I have every confidence that things happen exactly as they are supposed to, when we are ready, and that resisting such change, resisting experiences, resisting or working against the flow of nature, will only lead to our own suffering. Bad days are, of course, allowed (the good with the bad remember). We don’t have to love the bad days, but accepting them as part of our total experience makes them easier to live through.

This feels like the end of the journey. I began this writing very sick. I began writing during a summer where all I could eat was the water left behind after boiling root vegetables. I am now healthy and happy and feel calm and content with what I am doing. I continue to welcome into my life the goodness that keeps coming from being in the high vibrational frequency that accompanies this feeling of contentment.

As I have begun to experience closure on two years of dramatic transition, as I settle in to what is as close as I have ever come to a ‘normal’ life, all the people who have been such a big part of the last two years, seem to have made contact in the past two months, as if the closure was being provided for me. This is not to say they are now no longer going to be a part of my life, I just feel very strongly that their role in my life will now change.

I won’t name names as I will most certainly leave someone out. But you know who you are. You are the people who stayed in with me on Saturday nights making soup, reliably made me laugh Sunday evenings, had beautiful babies for me to play with, made regular phone dates to catch up, hung a big yellow hammock and taught me more about myself than I ever wanted to know or admit, made me CDs of melancholic music, put healing needles in me, studied with me, practiced yoga and rode bicycles with me, meditated with me, took Sundays off to escape, adventure and watch sunsets, and best of all, you are the people who hugged me, loved me, and accepted the changes as they came.

I will be keeping the site up a little while longer but any new writing will be sent out with my monthly nutrition updates. You can sign up for my newsletter here if you haven’t done so already.

Slowly, but surely this blog will be dismantled. My goal is that when the last of it is down, my book will be complete. My book will compile a lot of the writing that appeared on this site, along with some recipes and some other loving goodness. The book already has a name, but for a change, I will keep something to myself. The intention has been set. That means the book will happen when the time is right. Everything happens in its own sweet time.

I feel like I should be signing off with some great inspiring words of wisdom. I don’t have any. What I do have is health and happiness and the understanding that there is truly no greater gift in the whole wide world. I hope that through my writing over the last two years, I have conveyed that and perhaps provided some message that has helped you to incorporate a little more of both into your life.

So perhaps what I can leave with are a few things that I know for sure:

• Happiness is anchored in the present.
• Health is our own personal responsibility
• Positive change comes from positive action. Negativity results from aggressive reaction.
• What we feel and experience today is the direct result of what we did yesterday. If we want to change our experience tomorrow, we must start the transition today. The greatest hindrance to achieving change is sticking with the ever repeating known.
• Absolutely anything on this earth, anything in this great big wide universe, is absolutely possible.
• Never ever ever take for granted the warmth of the sunshine and the brilliance of rainbows.

The ultimate goal that I set when I began writing has been achieved. I am a Healthy Cookie.

All my love and in great health,
Meghan

Will flax be illegal? According to C-51 it will be.

I have written a lot in this blog over the past year and a half about sunshine and rainbows, looking on the bright side of things and always doing my best to encourage you to be your best, to smile at strangers, to take things lightly when possible and let life unfold as it may. As much I encourage everyone else to do this, I try and do the same.

But then there are times when I get angry. Right now, I am angry.

There is a Bill, Bill C-51, being sped through legislation that essentially will make what I do for a living a criminal offense. But I’m a nutritionist you say. That’s right. With this Bill and the slightest word change- the entire natural health industry is in trouble of being dominated, like everything else relating to health and disease, by the pharmaceutical Industry. The following summarizes the little change that has huge impact:

“Among the changes proposed by the bill are radical alterations to key terminology, including replacing the word “drug” with “therapeutic product” throughout the Act, thereby giving the Canadian government broad-reaching powers to regulate the sale of all herbs, vitamins, supplements and other items. With this single language change, anything that is “therapeutic” automatically falls under the Food and Drug Act. This would include bottled water, blueberries, dandelion greens and essentially all plant-derived substances.”

It would become illegal for me to recommend any food for its therapeutic function. Does that mean that ground flax seeds will no longer relieve constipation or that turmeric no longer eases inflammation? Of course not. I just can’t say so. Does it mean that pharmaceutical companies may go the way of ‘agricultural’ companies like Monsanto (which is really pharma as well) and start trying to patent food? I wouldn’t be surprised.

This Bill would make it illegal for me to state that I use food as medicine for its healing properties. It would be illegal for me to either recommend or sell any type of food or supplement for therapeutic purposes. Does this make it illegal for me to give chicken soup to someone when they’re sick? I think it just might.

I believe that there should be some regulation as to who can and can not recommend and sell supplements. I do not, however, think it should be up Health Canada, the FDA or any other governing body controlling this. So yes, this regulation and the fact that it is moving through at an extra super fast speed makes me angry. What really angers me are statements such as the following that I have not been able to find anyone else’s commentary on. (The following comes directly from the bill)

2.3 The purpose of this Act is to protect and promote the health and safety of the public and encourage accurate and consistent product representation by prohibiting and regulating certain activities in relation to foods, therapeutic products and cosmetics.

So that sounds innocent enough right? But it goes on to state the following:

3.1 (1) No person shall tamper with a food, therapeutic product or cosmetic — or its label or package — with the intent to

(a) render the food, therapeutic product or cosmetic injurious to human health; or

(b) cause a reasonable apprehension in others that the food, therapeutic product or cosmetic is injurious to human health without themself believing that it is so.

So then, the government believes Vitamin C to be harmful and dangerous but approving such things as aspartame, margarine (and other hydrogenated carcinogenic oils), Genetically Modified food, and oodles and oodles of chemicals to be used in the growing of our food to be rendered harmless simply because it is governed and went through an approval process. This Bill would make it illegal for me to recommend or sell multi vitamins, and I could have my home raided without a warrant for doing so, but it is still perfectly legal to sell cigarettes at any old variety store as long as the purchaser is of legal age.

4. No person shall sell or import for sale a food that

(c) is injurious to human health;

(d) is adulterated; or

(e) was manufactured, processed, prepared, preserved, packaged, stored or conveyed under unsanitary conditions.

Again, where do GMOs fit in? What about the farmed fish being imported from China? And hello? Since when was CocaCola and McDonald’s not injurious to human health? I’m just asking….

And finally- 12. (1) No person shall advertise, sell or import for sale a therapeutic product that does not have a market authorization or is not a designated therapeutic product.

I don’t even really get what that means. Most of the Bill is very wordy anyhow. What I do know is this; the government has major control over our food supply (raw milk anyone?), profits off of the pharmaceutical industry and I believe is realizing what the public realized a while back- natural healing methods work as both preventative and treatment. The government wants in on it.

Reading books like Michael Pollan’s ‘In Defense of Food’ and Marion Nestle’s ‘Food Politics’ clearly illustrates where the government and general population have gone awry when it comes to taking care of our own health. Where we went wrong was listening to what the government said we should be eating and trusting the chemical laden foods they approve as safe, eating in line with their food pyramids and Recommended Daily Intakes (RDIs) of nutrients.

I think the biggest challenge I have with this Bill, and likely the reason I haven’t been willing to give it much thought, is that I don’t believe this will actually happen. I know it’s possible, but I just can’t believe our government would pass a bill that would ensure the health of this country continues in a downward direction. But then again- why would I assume differently? When I got sick two years ago and couldn’t find a doctor to help me, my family paid for my natural healing route which included acupuncture, supplements, herbal remedies, whole foods, and yoga. With these natural therapies I stayed off prescription medications, out of a hospital bed, out of the operating room, and away from any leaves of absence from work. I saved the government thousands, maybe tens of thousands of dollars. When I submitted my expenses for tax purposes and was granted a refund of close to $3,000.00, it only took three months for them to realize their error and ask for the money back… and of course they charged me interest

If this Bill is passed, it will dramatically alter the way we, natural/holistic practitioners, have to practice. I have no doubt in my mind however that we will manage. That we will find ways to get what we need for our clients, for our families and for ourselves. Unlike the pharmaceutical industry and the government, our commitment to the health industry is about making and keeping people healthy, not making our shareholders happy. Laws such as these make our jobs more difficult, but government approval to promote certain chemical based foods such as margarine as a means of reducing heart disease, has already done that.

I promise my next post will be back to sunshine and rainbows. Until then- I encourage you have a read through the Bill and make your voice heard.

Stop Bill C-51

Canada’s Ongoing War on Freedom

Big Pharma Pushing to Criminalize Supplements

Facebook Group: Stop Bill C-51

Everybody needs a nutritionist… even a nutritionist.

The first thing most people say to me when we sit down to have a consultation is “I think I eat fairly well”. The trouble with that statement is that eating well is a relative thing. And also- I am not sure that any of us really know what ‘eating well’ means anymore.

I spent this past week a the Canadian Holistic Nutrition Conference listening to about half a dozen different speakers, meeting with product reps, and speaking with other nutritionists.  Many of the speakers had conflicting ideas on what constitutes a healthy diet. Two of the speakers actually sited the same study, but used it in completely opposite arguments. So if nutritionist are confused about what to eat, I can only imagine how the public feels.

Everyday there are new studies coming out about what to eat, what not to eat, what will save us, and what will take us down.

In my opinion, it is not even so much what we are eating that makes the difference but more so where, how, why and when we are eating it.  Very few people these days take the time to go to the store, buy groceries, prepare a fresh meal, sit down at a table and enjoy the food. Most often we are doing a million things at one time and eating just happens to be one of them.

We are so preoccupied with the what- that we seem to have forgotten the vital importance of the where, how, why and when. Are we at our desks, in front of the tv, or in the car? Is our food coming from a restaurant, a microwave, a deep fryer? Are we eating because we are sad, lonely, stressed, bored? And are we having our first meal at 3:00 in the afternoon and our last meal at midnight?

I do believe that we all inherently know what we should and should not be eating and the best ways in which we should be enjoying our meals. Sometimes, though, it helps to have some guidance, some support and some motivation.

As I wrote about back when I was in St. Lucia, I was eating to my little heart’s content. With a piece of bread and butter in one hand and a glass of wine in the other, I knew what I was doing. I knew what these foods were doing inside me and I knew how that would make me feel long term if I kept it up. I was also fortunate that I knew what to do to get myself back on track, and I now am.  I did however go and see a nutritionist.

I didn’t go see someone because I needed help. I went, mainly because seeing this nutritionist is a patient requirement of my doctor. Despite knowing as much as I know, I learned from her. It is much easier to give someone else advice than to give yourself advice. We looked at my diet, noticed some macronutrient imbalances and she made recommendations for me. I left there with a packet of information, most of which I was already familiar with, and a collection of recipes. I was motivated! I came home, cooked up some new things, added new foods into my diet and a week later, I am already feeling wonderful.

Nutritionist are great people to have in our lives. I am happy to have one and I am happy to be one for others. Just like we all have dentists and doctors, many of us may have physiotherapists, massage therapists, psychotherapists, naturopaths, and personal trainers, I think we should all also have a nutritionist.  Whether we know what we should eat or not, a little motivation and a little guidance goes a long way. No matter how well, we think we might be eating, we can always learn from someone else.

I am officially opened for business! My practice is all set up and I am busily collecting new clients. Want to be one of them? Go to www.meghantelpner.com for more information on my services and to find out a little more about what a nutritionist can do for you.

Graduation Day!

Yes, I have returned from St. Lucia and just in time too. Today was my graduation ceremony from the Institute of Holistic Nutrition. And I did consider skipping it and staying SL a little while longer- but then- who would have delivered my valedictorian address?  Sorry the video is a little fuzzy. The ceremony took place in a cinema and it was a wee bit dark in there.

Fat and Happy and Breaking All The Rules

My stay in St. Lucia went by so fast that when the time came for me to go- I just wasn’t ready.  So here I am. Still here. Still happy. Still loving the sunshine and rainbows. I will be home next week.

Eating three meals a day at a resort has apparently been taking its toll on me. I am getting fat. Yes. Fat. And I am perfectly a-okay with that.  It has been a super fun process.

Three and a half years ago, when I stayed at this resort with my mother for my 25th birthday, I was not well. I couldn’t eat anything without getting sick, and worse than that, I was afraid to eat. I spent a week eating only steamed vegetables and rice. Come to think of it, I spent nearly four years eating only steamed vegetables and rice.

Over the past 9 weeks that I have been here, I have slowly begun to realize that I can now eat whatever it is that I want… in moderation of course.  It is extremely difficult to stick to any sort of health regime when living at a 5-star resort with healthy buffets, yummy wines and amazing desserts available any time of day. So yes, I have been eating three big meals a day, treating myself to cakes and cookies and drinking wine and loving each and every second of it.

I have been breaking all my rules of healthy eating. All my rules but one- sometimes when something is good for our spirit, it is good for our health. There is no point indulging if we are going to feel guilty about it. So I indulge and I enjoy it and I smile. My not worrying about each and every little thing I eat, is good for my health.

A friend had once said to me that coming out here would give me a good dose of reality. I would be removed from my little nutrition bubble and be exposed to the way ‘normal’ people eat. He was right… at least about this.

I would say that 80% of the people I meet with, meet with me because they are unhappy with their weight. Most of them look perfectly healthy to me. When the symptoms of Crohn’s got worse for me, I went on this extreme detox program where I lost close to 20 pounds in under a month (a lot for me being only 5 feet tall). The sick thing was how many people, including the personal trainer that I was working with at the time, told me how great I looked. That’s enough to screw up anyone’s self image.

As I got healthier and began to gain the weight back, I was very conscious of each and every pound. I have never been a skinny girl- never really wanted to be. I have at last come to embrace each and every pound (and the few extras collected while down here) as a sign of my good health. For me, it is a sign of health that I have the capacity to gain weight. I may have gone a touch overboard while being here, but I am no longer afraid to eat, to try new things, or to treat myself, once in a while.

Of course though, everything I say here must be taken with a grain of salt (no pun intended) as I am quite sure that my idea of indulgence is still far from the way the average person eats.

When I go home at the end of the week, I will be back to my old healthy eating. It has nothing to do with how much I weigh, or how tight my jeans might be. It is about how I feel. It has always been about how I feel. Nine weeks of indulgence- eating too much, having a drink now and again, sneaking in an oatmeal cookie, not sleeping nearly enough… well- it has taken its toll. I am ready to get back on that healthy train. I am ready to get back to my fighting weight- not for the sake of actually fighting the weight but about getting back to a place where I feel my absolute strongest and healthiest.

My life at home is very different than my life living at a resort. For the last 9 weeks I have been feeding my spirit each and every thing it desired and it has been blissful. I know that I could not live like this forever but I wouldn’t want to. I have had a tough four years with my health, and I honestly could not think of a better way of celebrating my journey than by indulging in a glass of wine, while watching the sunset with good friends and an ocean breeze.

I can not stress enough, and I tell each and every person I consult with that if we are going to treat ourselves, we must treat ourselves with the best. The best butter, the best cheeses, the best wine, the best bread, the best chocolate, the best pastries. The best the best, the best… of the things that are the worst for us. We must enjoy them with good company, in a good environment, with a good mood, a good toast, a good celebration. We must make these indulgences count. We must ultimately enjoy them. If that piece of chocolate cake will make us feel guilty, or that second trip to the buffet will cause us to make excuses- the negative feelings we have about ourselves or about our actions will be more detrimental to our health than the actual indulgence itself.

There is no harm in treating ourselves once in a while. Once in a while that is. Overindulging our spirit, for too long, will leave our physical body in a less than optimal state.

During this amazing time in St. Lucia, my spirit has been thoroughly nourished. I am now ready to get back to the leafy greens.

A Place of Brilliance

I can’t believe that my time here is half way past already. Of course I can also say that I still have half left, but the last three weeks have gone by far too quickly. When guests tell me they’re leaving, I am always so surprised. Seems to me that they, and myself, have only just arrived.

I have settled in well and am loving my little life here. I wake up every morning and walk out onto my little patio to brush my teeth and enjoy how good it smells and how wonderfully warm it is even first thing in the morning. Every morning, the gratitude is ever present.

The best part of all of this- and this is likely the part that would have come no matter where I was working- is that I love what I do. I love my job and am loving my work. When you hear people say that they love their job so much they would do it for free- I can tell you that I do, and as an intern I am working for free but working no less than I would otherwise.

In addition to loving the work that I am doing here- the people I come in contact with are so appreciative, so respectful, so open to the information being imparted and both guests and my colleagues continually praise my efforts.

I mentioned in a post about how just because you’re good at something doesn’t necessarily mean you should do it. I wrote about this in the context as it related to my job-hopping in advertising and how I kept being told I was good at my job, and should stick with it despite hating it.

My fear at the time I wrote that post, and as I entered nutrition school was that I had at last found something that I truly loved and was passionate about, but worried that I wouldn’t be any good at it. I was afraid that I would be the nutritionist equivalent of the American Idol auditions- those people who think they were born to sing but sound like suffocating squirrels.

The feedback I am getting in regards to my consults, my hotel meal planning, my detox and weight loss program plans, my whole foods and cholesterol lectures, my meditation classes, my giggle, and my white outfits have been so overwhelmingly positive that at the end of everyday when I get into bed, I can’t help but smile- feeling incredibly excited about what I have accomplished that day and the challenges that will come my way.

Though working at a resort is very different from my idea of a regular nutrition practice, there are definitely advantages- the main one being that I get to come in to contact with so many people on a daily basis. This means that I get to answer that many more questions, address that many more concerns and hopefully positively influence that many more people.

I have often praised those who played an important role in my own healing- Dr. Ha and Ping who were my acupuncturists, my meditation and yoga teachers in LA, the instructors I had in Nutrition school… I can only hope that in my passing along the gifts of knowledge these brilliant individuals bestowed upon me, that I might have earned the honour of becoming one of those people in someone else’s journey to health and wholeness.

In one of my nutrition classes, the instructor spoke to us about staying in our area of brilliance. She was speaking in relation to hiring an accountant if we weren’t so up on our tax laws and spending the better part of time actually working as nutritionists. The thinking was that the more we stay in our area of brilliance, the more successful we will be in our careers.

I believe that this is vital in all careers- or perhaps in all facets of life. We must figure out the parts of our jobs, or the areas in our lives where we feel the happiest, the most fulfilled, the most satisfied, the most nourished and the most alive and be with that. Make that which makes us feel full and energized dominate how we spend most of our time.

Why on earth would we want to focus our energy and our lives on tasks, roles, people, or relationships that deplete us, drain us, and exhaust us? A simple question but so many of us do. I did for a long time. I still spend more time than I would like in an office on a computer but I spend more time outside meeting with people and that is what I love the most. That is the role, the task, the position in which I feel energized and nourished by the work that I am doing.

I had lunch today with my manager and as we were walking back up to the spa we ran into a group of returning guests who all warmly greeted him. As we passed them he said to me- ‘That is why I love my job’.

The parts of our lives that afford us such feeling of fulfillment and purpose are ultimately our area of brilliance. For when we are at our best, we will also get the best of others. Why would we want to exist in any other way?

Once in a while, ask yourself these questions:

1. Of the things I do, what nourishes me, what increases my sense of actually being alive and present rather than merely existing?

2. Of the things that I do, what drains me, what decreases my sense of actually being alive and present?\

3. Accepting that there are aspects of my life that I simply cannot change, am I consciously choosing to increase time and effort in activities that bring me up and to decrease the time and effort I give to activities that bring me down?

Sparkling Silver Lining

For the duration of my time working at the spa, I was instructed to wear all white. I have never in my life done very well with being told what to wear (or what to do in general) but I figured that I’d be best off playing by the rules.

For the past two weeks I have been dressed in white from head to toe. Guests and the people I work with keep commenting on the fact that I am always in white. I haven’t a clue why I was told to wear all white. I am the only one in all white but it is all I brought. It does make getting dressed in the morning easy- but since in my world, all colours match- I never had much of a problem anyway. The point being, I feel a bit silly in these flowy white clothes. Like a marshmallow- or perhaps a fluffy cloud. Either way- I told this to my mom and she said that I may look like a cloud, but perhaps, I am more of the silver lining. Mom’s are sweet like that.

As my first full week of working here, actually my first week ever working as a nutritionist, comes to an end, I have remembered what I liked about having a job. Every job- no matter what it is, has its’ perks. As I am not only embodying a silver lining, I also like to look for the silver lining in everything and the perks of a job is the silver lining of work.

I have realized that, though at the end of the day work is work, it is best to find work where the perks are exactly what we thrive on. We all thrive on different things. Whether our job affords us plenty of interaction with others, golf trips, beer nights, travel, great co-workers, great challenge… whatever it is- the benefits have to be suited to us.

I certainly had my challenges the first half of the week when I found myself back in an office setting, sitting at a desk with a computer while outside my window the sun was shining, the ocean was crashing and happy people were laying around vacationing. It took me a few days to come to an understanding and an acceptance of the fact that I am not actually on vacation but here to work. As with most jobs mine involves time in front of a computer. What gets me through the hours I have been spending inside working are the amazing perks of working where I am working.

Going to work in the morning, I walk along this beautiful road in the early morning heat with horses and cows and an occasional goat roaming around. I am consulting with guests who are relaxed, blissed-out, kind, smiling and patient and that is a gift.

When I leave my office for lunch, I join the guests in the main restaurant, meet new people as we eat together looking out over the ocean. Before going back to work, I go for a quick swim in the sea and walk along the beach to dry off. If I have down time in the afternoon, I can pop into the fitness studio and join in for a yoga, pilates or dance class.

I work with other practitioners who are like minded- we share information and remedies. I spoke to the shiatsu practitioner while we were both waiting for our clients about some nutritional issues and she then offered to give me a massage the following day. On my day off I got a full body massage and then spent the afternoon at the beach. I had dinner that night with a couple on their honeymoon. The husband was a gastroenterologist and we have since exchanged emails as he is quite keen on learning about nutritional support for Inflammatory Bowel Conditions. That may be the best connection I’ve made so far.
When the massage therapists are doing training sessions and need an extra body- I generously lend mine for any sort of massages, facials or wraps. After work today, I joined the guests for tea time and watched some of my co-workers put on a circus performance. Best of all, I get to watch the sunset over the ocean everyday. If I chose to, I can stay at the resort for dinner, where I usually have dinner with some of the management or guests that I met in the day.

At the end of it all- it is a job. Like all jobs- there are elements of the work that I love and certain people I really enjoy working with. On the flip side, I have also been assigned tasks that I would be happy to not have to do and there are also people that I do my best to have minimum contact with. I quickly forgot about the politics of working with large organizations but this experience has again reminded me of the little games that are played.

Jobs and working and doing things we don’t want to do and interacting with people or situations we would rather avoid is simply part of life. There is no way around it. The important thing however is be certain to take notice of all the positives before the negatives. The benefits of any situation- whether it be a job, or a relationship, or an environment- must outweigh the negatives.

It is our own individual responsibility to see the bright spot- to focus on the silver lining rather than the darkness of the cloud. If that silver lining just doesn’t seem to exist- it then becomes our own responsibility to make the changes either in ourselves or in our situation that will enable that silver lining to sparkle brightly in the sunshine.

Must run- have a pilates class to catch followed by pool-side drinks. Another tough day at the office.

The Nutrition Antennae and Truth

Prior to departing for St. Lucia my friend and fellow nutritionist Cora told to me that no matter what, I must wake up everyday knowing what an amazing opportunity this is and to be grateful for and enjoy each and every moment to its fullest.  For the most part, I have been, but when I woke up Tuesday morning with so many mosquito bites on my face that my left eye was partially swollen shut and due to my clogged bathroom sink, found a drowned mouse there to greet me- try as may, I just couldn’t see the sunshine and rainbows in that- especially since I could only really see out of one eye.

 

A roller coaster of events followed. A shiny clean place really close to the resort became available. I packed up and moved out of the old place.  I briefly found myself in the main town of Castries, wandering the streets looking for the bank, the only white person in site dressed in my pristine spa whites head to toe. I met up with the chef who was picking up his car from a ‘body shop’ which was really a tarp stretched out between two trees. The agent never showed up with the keys for my new place. I was temporarily homeless. Rich, one of the senior managers at the hotel, scored me a sweet ocean front hotel room to keep me from sleeping in a lounge chair on the beach. The old landlord called a lawyer who threatened to send the police after me. A day late, I at last got keys to my new place, unpacked and settled in. If this experience is meant to challenge me, my sunshine and rainbows outlook, my equanimity and optimism- this past week has been nothing short of a great challenge.

 

However, after a week of shimmying and shaking and getting my bearings - I know what I have to do.  My nutrition antennae is up, and unlike my Digicel mobile phone, it is getting crystal clear reception.

 

I have this horrible habit of eavesdropping on other’s conversations. Try as I might, I can never tear myself away from listening in on other people’s conversations and I am not the least bit subtle either and since being here- all I hear people talk about is nutrition.

 

Last night, sitting at dinner with Rich and two of his friends, I overhear this woman showing pictures on her camera to another couple “And this is our Thanksgiving Turkey in the deep fryer…”. At another table one woman is telling another about the horrible reflux she gets from taking her vitamins.  This afternoon I was in the ladies room up at the spa when two ladies come in talking about their bowel habits. One saying she goes every day and the other lady expressing envy and sharing that she hadn’t gone in three days.

 

I knew that the guests would be receptive to a nutritionist lurking around. I didn’t realize the locals would also be so full of questions. One trip to the supermarket and it is clear why. Produce costs a fortune and everything else is processed.  Even the rice is parboiled and imported from the US. The spa staff orders Dominos pizza when they aren’t eating the fried foods offered in the staff canteen. There are ads for KFC everywhere and 1 in 3 St. Lucians have type two (adult onset) diabetes.  The health epidemics of North America are spreading as far and wide as Coca-Cola and McDonald’s. Pardon my dramatics but it seems to me that the entire population of the planet is starving- either overfed and undernourished with processed garbage or just plain starving.

 

What I have realized being here is that people both want and need information.  Truthful information.  They want options. They want to know how to feel better. That is what I am here for.

 

My role as the nutritionist at the spa seems less to do with actually working as a nutritionist and more to do with being an educator on the subject of nutrition. What is interesting is that this is a health-focused spa, so the majority of guests (or at least one half of each couple) is health conscious. All anyone seems to be talking about is health and wellness, supplements, diets (apparently the Special K diet is all the rage in the UK and might be one of the stupider ones I’ve ever heard of), diabetes and cholesterol. Everyone seems to be sharing the oddest information. Untrue and unfounded information they whole-heartedly believe, without fully understanding, because an ‘expert’ said so.

 

What has become clear since being here and away from my little world of nutritionists, is how little people know and how quickly they buy in to whatever they’re told. They are hungry (pardon the pun) for answers and for explanations as to why they feel the way they do.

 

To do the best job possible while I am here and into my practice at home, all I need to do is simply offer the most truthful information I can so that each individual I meet with will be educated enough to make their own decisions and more importantly, understand why.

 

In the end it all comes down to trust and integrity. When we are seeking information, and when we are looking for answers, what we ultimately want is simply the truth. Whether it pertains to a thieving landlord, a doctor, a spouse, or a nutritionist, we are all just seeking out people we can trust who conduct themselves with honesty and integrity. And like with most qualities we seek in others- we must first embody them ourselves.

Sunshine and Rainbows

Here I am in St. Lucia and every itty little bit of me is smiling- from my feet that got to spend the day in the sand and swimming through the ocean to my hair that is being let free to curl and frizz as it wishes. Everywhere I look I see sunshine and rainbows. I didn’t realize how long I had let it go without seeing either.

I arrived late Friday afternoon and was met at the airport and transported the hour and a half from the bottom tip of the island where the airport is to the tip top northern point where the resort is.

From the moment that hot tropical air hit my face when the airplane door opened, I couldn’t stop smiling. As we drove along the main road my eyes were smiling. They were happy to be seeing so much green lushness. We drove through miles of banana plantations and past little roadside bars and BBQ stops, by women frying plantain and selling grapefruits.

Upon arrival at the Oasis Spa at LeSport, I was warmly welcomed by the manager who took me to my little apartment. I wish I could say where that is but it seems my home has no address. Every time I ask someone I get a different answer. I know that I am at the top of a hill. I know there is a ‘basketball court’ across the way (more like a cracked rectangle of concrete and a broken basket) and a colourful house on the corner- these at least are the landmarks that have been assigned to my location.

As I write this, I am sitting on the front porch to my flat and it is really loud. The dogs barking, the crickets cricketing, the assortment of frogs, the goats, a few mooing cows and an occasional ‘nay’ of a horse…those are the sounds of my neighbourhood. Not quite the noise of the traffic, streetcars, and rattling shopping carts of Parkdale. There is a calmness to all this noise and my ears are smiling. I asked my neigbour Simon, who grew up on the island, about what was making the sound that I can only describe as that of a lamb being suffocated. He told me he couldn’t here a thing.

I went to the resort today to meet some of the people I will be working with. Everyone I have met has been so incredibly kind to me- whether it be my landlord giving me a ride to the resort this morning and leaving mangos and starfruit on my patio table when I returned home, my neighbor Simon offering to show me some of the islan

d’s best beaches or take me hiking in the Pitons next weekend, Tracey, the spa training manager taking me to get my mobile sorted and get groceries or Terry, the guy who drove me from the airport yesterday offering to take me out for a drink… wait that might be something a little different. Either way- everyone has been amazingly kind and generous and it makes me smile from the inside out. Like sunshine and rainbows.

I spent the afternoon lying by the beach and swimming in the ocean. My skin is loving the sunshine and Vitamin D is oozing through me. This evening, I watched the sunset- the first of what I am sure will be many.

I have often written in this blog about sunshine and rainbows. I mentioned that though life cannot always be sunshine and rainbows, it never hurts for us t

o try. I have said that we must take the bad with the good- or rather experience a little bad sometimes so that we can better appreciate the good. Perhaps though we really just need to try and stop labeling something as ‘bad’ or ‘good’ and just let it be.

I am an optimistic person. I do my best to give situations and people the benefit of the doubt. My ex-boyfriend used to tell me that life isn’t always going to be sunshine and rainbows and that I am naïve to think it might be. I know it can’t always be, and nothing will ever be perfect, but I think, a lot of the time, it is really just a matter of choice. A matter of how we wish to view things, or how we wish to label things as ‘bad’ or ‘good’.

I could be grossed out and distraught over my kitchen drawers being filled with mouse poop but instead I just cleaned them out and washed the cutlery. I could dwell on the 3 inch cockroach that greeted me during my middle of the night bathroom stop or I could take a picture to show my friends… those things are just part of the experience. I can’t help but feel that all of the travelling I have done has prepared me in all the right ways for this. In fact, I am now realizing how many experiences in my life have helped lead me to right where I am. Though I could look back and label those experiences as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ as I certainly did while experiencing them, in the end, it seems, they were all just so. No matter now as they helped get me here and for each and every person, experience,

conversation, ambition, idea or insane amount of work that contributed to my being here- I am absolutely grateful.

When I woke up this morning, I decided that despite the dark rain clouds, I wanted to take a walk and get to know my area a little better. As I was walking, it started to rain- the kind of steamy torrential rain that only happens in tropical climates. As the rain let up and the sun broke through- I turned a corner and looked out over the valley towards the ocean down below. Out in front of me- spanning the valley was the most stunningly complete and glowing rainbow. Wonderfully timed- I wished I had my camera but realized that perhaps this rainbow, that lasted no more than five minutes, was meant just for me. It was the most perfect great big “welcome to St. Lucia” banner painted across the sky. Sunshine and rainbows.

Anything is possible. Really. Anything.

The new year often makes us reflect on the past year and look ahead to all the possibility that the future will bring. Last year, I wrote about my Resolution Free ‘07, with a vague idea of what the year would hold. This year I have this optimistic feeling of freedom and in that freedom, I do believe that anything is possible.

Lately, things keep happening that I have been waiting for, or perhaps working towards that are proving to me that anything is possible. All it takes to make seemingly impossible things happen is a little positive thinking, perhaps some hard work, and more than anything, patience that it will all come about when the time is right.

I recently wrote about finishing school and having no idea what the future might hold. What I never mentioned, was that in a little under two weeks time, I will be jetting off to St. Lucia to intern at one of the world’s premier destination spa resorts, Le Sport. This is not just any spa, this is the very place I have been picturing myself working at since 2004.

The story goes like this. On my 25th birthday, my mother took me to this resort. On this vacation, I spoke to my mom about how miserable I was at my job in advertising, how much I hated it and how I had to figure out a way that I could work at a place like this. While at LeSport, I met this practitioner who suggested that with my high energy and calming aura (yes- he said ‘calming aura’) that I should think about training to be a life coach. My response at the time was something along the lines of “as if”. How could I be a life coach when my life was a mess?

Fast forward 10 months and I had just returned from a summer in London, again wondering what to do with my life. I was at a party when I met this guy who, after talking for a brief time, suggested I become a nutritionist. “What? Me? No… I’m in fashion”, I told him.

I am sure I have had dozens of conversations with people that went in one ear and out the other. The conversations I had with these two random guys, however, I remembered for a reason. They were like little fortune tellers that I failed to recognize as such.

At the time, I had no idea, on a conscious level at least, that what they said had any value in my life. I certainly had no idea that I would experience the last three years in the way that I did or that I would now be spending my days sewing up a white wardrobe in order to adhere to the white/cream dress code of this spa that I once expressed a desire to work at. Anything is possible.

Today I trekked over to the Apple Store to have my computer looked at. The walk to get there took me a little over an hour and while I was waiting, I found myself looking around wondering how these people could work here all day surrounded by such high levels of electromganetic frequency (EMF) radiation. As I am thinking this, I noticed myself getting into a bit of a lunging position to stretch my legs from the long walk. Then I noticed that I had gone out in public in track pants, running shoes and a puffy vest. I am in the Apple store, worrying about EMFs, lunging and stretching while wearing sweat pants. Sometimes I don’t recognize myself. I may have a fashion degree but I am a nutritionist and anything is surely possible.

I then found myself doing something else I swore I would never do- buying ‘nude’ coloured panties. I needed something appropriate for underneath all the white clothes I will be wearing while working at one of the world’s top spas. Beige underwear is a sacrifice I can manage and I think I have finally learned to never say never.

With this fresh and shiny year starting off by my doing something that I never thought would happen, my going to work at LeSport (and wearing beige underwear), I can’t help but feel that this is a year of possibility. It is a great feeling. Given what I experienced in the last couple of years that has brought me to where I am today, I have every confidence that it is all happening exactly as it is supposed to. I am where I am supposed to be right now and I will be exactly where I am supposed to be tomorrow. One year or five or ten years from now- I know that I will be in the right place then too.

Whenever we try and control the big things in our lives, it seems to lead to more chaos, more suffering and more dissatisfaction with where we are. If we are able to train ourselves to give up a little of that control, to let ourselves be open to what is presented to us, then our lives will be that much easier to navigate. This does not mean that we shouldn’t have worries or shouldn’t work hard to achieve our goals. It only means that we mustn’t miss out on what is happening in the moment and that we must be certain and confident that what we are feeling, and thinking, and seeing in the moment is exactly right. We can feel sadness or anger in the rough spots and feel joy in the goodness. Mostly however, we must be patient with the process as anything is possible. We just have to be open to letting it happen.

Happy fresh and shiny new year. 2008 is going to be great!
Health, happiness and love all around.