Review: The Slow Down Diet By Marc David

Happy New Year! Making a health and wellness resolution is the new tradition of New Year, so here is a book on diet that I highly recommend. This is by far the best book on healthy eating I’ve read (and I’ve read a lot), serves well any time of the year for all age and gender groups.

Although The Slow Down Diet: Eating for Pleasure, Energy, and Weight Loss is about healthy eating and full of case studies of weight loss, it NEVER discusses numbers such as calories, fat grams, etc. Pretty unique, huh? Instead, the author, who is a nutritionist and psychologist, writes how our mentality affects the process of digestion and overall metabolism.

What you eat is NOT what you get

He skips the part about numbers for a good reason — because it’s largely meaningless. Just because you eat, say, 40 grams of protein or 1000 mg of calcium, doesn’t mean you receive that much of protein or calcium. If your metabolism is down, you cannot assimilate what you eat. And if your metabolism is down, you cannot fully burn what you eat — which leads to weight and other health problems. Further, there are various hormones that determine how the calories get utilized.

Our metabolism is different from one person to another, and it changes within the same person. This is why dogmatic approaches such as “We must never eat any animal products.” fails. Yes, eating plant-based diet is helpful for many people, but there is no one ultimate best way to eat.

For instance, if you eat under stress, worrying about work, money, relationships or eating on the run (I heard some people eat in the moving vehicle!?), your sympathetic nervous system becomes dominant and your adrenals produce stress hormones like cortisol and insulin. Sympathetic nervous system drives the blood to your muscles, not to your midsection where your stomach is. This made sense when the stress was caused by a bear and we had to run as fast as possible.

So our bodies are designed to sacrifice digestion when we are under stress. It was okay when the stress was short term — we could eat and digest after we got away from the bear. Today, however, we are under constant stress, so our digestive system, too, is routinely stressed.

At the same time, stress hormones work out another reactive strategy in our body — it stores fat. It’s kind of like us restricting spending and trying to save money under bad economy. Studies show that the same persons eating the same diet can gain or lose weight and fat depending on the stress level under which they eat.

8 factors that improve your metabolism

The author discusses eight factors that affect our metabolism:

1. Relaxation
The above explanation is only tiny part of stress response in our body. There are more, like bone loss with stress. So slow down and relax. Eat like the French and Italians, blessing the foods and enjoy the company of your loved ones. Consciously breathe deeply — it gets you to relax. (And I say, don’t fool yourself thinking that eating in front of the TV is relaxing. It’s not.)

2. Quality
Foods contain not just known nutrients but also more organic information. This is confirmed by quantum physics — every matter is energy and information. And this information in the foods affects our metabolism. So eat the best quality foods that convey good information to your body. Fresh, organic, whole foods that are prepared with love. If you choose to eat meat, choose happy, humanely-raised animals that are free of growth hormones, antibiotics, and stress.

3. Awareness
30-40% of digestion is due to cephalic phase digestive response (CPDR), meaning your recognition and awareness of the foods. So don’t multitask, be present when you eat. Enjoy the look, smell, and taste of your foods. This naturally controls your appetite.

He also writes about the “brain in the gut”, enteric nervous system (ENS). Our head brain doesn’t tell the gut how to digest — our gut brain figures it out and tells some more to the head brain. We can be the best nutritionist for ourselves by trusting our own ENS.

I guess slowing down and eating high quality foods helps boost your awareness of eating. So these factors work in tandem.

4. Rhythm
Our metabolism change according to the circadian rhythm, so eating to the rhythm helps our body. It’s best to eat the largest meal at lunch, not dinner. Eat breakfast to jump start your daily metabolism, eat substantial lunch, and eat light dinner well before bedtime. And sleep well — remember, stress makes you fat.

5. Pleasure
Enjoy your foods. Eating is inherently pleasurable — we are wired this way. When we eat (without the sense of guilt and shame), endorphins are produced, making us feel happy, and — take note — endorphins also burn fat. Our pleasured body also produces a chemical called cholecystokinin, boosting digestion and telling the body when to stop eating. (So, counter to common belief, good pleasurable meals don’t make us eat endlessly. It has natural appetite control system.)

Eating for pleasure doesn’t mean you want to party with sugary foods, caffeine, and alcohol. Health is the ultimate pleasure factor. (The author does emphasize including healthy fat to boost the sense of pleasure.) Also, bring in more pleasure and joy to your other areas of life. This reduces the need to seek pleasure only in foods and thus prevents overeating.

6. Thought
What we think and feel about foods affects our metabolism. Our thoughts in the cerebral cortex (the higher brain) are transmitted to the limbic system (the lower brain), causing feelings. Then the hypothalamus in the limbic system sends out messages to various parts of the body, regulating sympathetic / parasympathetic nervous systems, hormones, etc.

Do you have a friendly relationship with foods? Or are you loaded with negative beliefs about foods — leading you to negative consequences? (Remember The Biology Of Beliefs by Dr Bruce Lipton?)

7. Story
We all have stories about ourselves. Is your self story filled with love and energy? Or is it a story of a victim? Victim story dampens your metabolism. Change your story to an empowered one and boost your metabolism.

The author further suggests aligning the way you eat with your life purpose. I think this is cool. (You know I’m big on living on purpose.)

8. The Sacred
Even though science hasn’t uncovered the exact relationship between our soul and the body, our spiritual well-being affects our physical health. The author maintains spiritual qualities such as love, truth, courage, commitment, compassion, forgiveness, faith, and surrender are as essential to the body as food and water. They support our metabolism. By contrast, when we choose to, say, carry grudge rather than to forgive, our own metabolism carries its weight.

Dump the calorie equation thinking

The mechanical idea of “(Calorie intake) – (Calorie output) = Weight gain / loss” is so outdated. I hope you are starting to see this.

I strongly recommend this book if you’ve ever had challenges in eating better, if you ever felt your willpower to quit eating certain foods or certain amount wasn’t strong enough (most likely, it has nothing to do with willpower, he maintains), if you have weight or other health problems, or if you want to learn truly healthy way to eat. Gee, that might mean the majority of the population, I guess.

How Akashic Record Reading Changed One Woman’s Life

I received a heart-warming email recently from one of my Akashic Record Reading clients. She generously allowed me to share it, so here it is. I’m keeping it anonymous for her privacy. Other than making a few minor editing such as adding paragraph changes and adding some emphasis for online readability, the email is exactly what she wrote. (Photo credit)

“Dear Akemi,

Almost a year ago to the day I had an Akashic Record Reading and I can tell you that my life is nothing like it was just one year ago. I’ve been meaning to write to you about the profound changes that have taken place in my life so it seems like now is the time to do just that.

I’ve always been quite intentional in life, I truly love life, people and this planet to the core and I suppose as a result I’ve been able to move through this world as I need to, with love, honesty and clarity to do things that some would deem amazing, liberating. However, around the age of 27 after coming back to Canada from working in Africa, I began to live by the conventions of society and thus moved further and further away from true myself.

As the years went by I started to feel increasingly ”stuck” (the only way I can describe it), some would call this ‘normal’ existence but I knew better. Fast-forward nine years to when I had my reading with you. I was in a job where I was so miserable and I knew that I was not reaching my full potential as a human being.

In the reading in Nov 08 you mentioned there were people at work that hated me, you also mentioned the 26-27 year old milestone. I was kind of surprised to hear about the people at work but shortly after it became apparent who hated me – my boss started to harass me and it only got worse and worse. I started to have anxiety, digestive issues, and insomnia as a result. After coming very close to being in a terrible car accident in Dec 08, things really started to shift for me. I took Jan 08 off due to stress and took the time to re-evaluate.

I quit my job at the end of March 09, moved, cleared out of my life in all aspects from relationships to ’stuff’ and past emotional baggage. I felt I just needed a full house cleaning starting with every cell of my body to my physical space, job…..everything. In May 09 I started a new job that was way less stressful with a fantastic boss and a 4 day workweek that involved work that I actually enjoyed. Was it my dream job, I would say No, but it was a significant improvement over my previous situation.

In July 09, the issues over the past year manifested physically and I became increasingly ill. I didn’t see this as a bad thing, just a sign that there was more work to be done. I finished my contract, and am taking time off (Sept 09 to now) to focus on deep healing. Natural healers came my way, with their help, self-care, time off, and spiritual practice I can say that I’m feeling way better than I’ve felt in years.

Needless to say, I’m now so at ease with my life, in my body, mind and soul – I feel whole. Not a coincidence that a few months back I met the love of my life (on a River on a warm sunny day…). We are both astounded to have found each other and a love so deep and profound that we are truly awe struck. We speak of starting a family together, an idea that was once stuffed into a little box and buried somewhere very deep after my separation and divorce 4 years ago.

I’m in such a great place, I don’t even have the words to describe how great I feel, and how wonderful life truly is. I’m able to cherish these precious moments and fully accept the gifts that have been offered to me. I would like for people to know that life is so meant to be happy and joy filled, we are not here to suffer. We are here to experience only wonder, abundance, and joy.

I want to extend gratitude to you for helping me to become “unstuck” so I can once again live a life that is truly and utterly full…!

With greatest sincerity,”

Further, upon reading my eBook “Lightworker’s Guide to Self-Employment” (have you checked it out yet? It’s free ), she is considering on starting her own business. Her second email says,

“Thanks for writing back, I would love for you to share my story on your blog site. Since last writing you looks like I’m going into business for myself! Man, I really don’t have the words for how fast things work out…I’ll keep you posted on that front, really exciting stuff.”

I am so happy for her. It means huge to hear a beautiful story like this from my clients — after all, I started this service to help people.

A note on the clearing process

I think her emails say far more than I can possible write about spiritual healing and Akashic Record Reading, but just an additional note for those of you who may be wondering why she went through seemingly-negative experiences such as harassment at work and physical illness . . .

Sometimes, the reading and clearing opens up your awareness rapidly. I think the harassment was there even before she had the reading with me, but she effectively wrote it off from her awareness. After the reading, her awareness stopped doing that and let her face what it is. Which was painful at the time, but was necessary for her to move forward.

Same with the physical health issue. Before she was covering it up from her own awareness, but the clearing let her face it. And you know it’s better to deal with issues at an early stage rather than ignoring them.

Some other clients have reported that they feel emotional — they feel the old negative feelings welling up in them after the reading. And yet others report some changes in their lives that seem to happen without they doing anything “wrong”. Like sudden lay offs and separations.

And still others experience nothing even remotely negative. It’s all good.

How to handle the clearing symptoms

If you happen to be the one who goes through seemingly-negative clearing process (again, it’s only our judgment that makes us think they are bad and inconvenient. . . they are all good, really). The good news is that, troublesome as they may be, these changes are never too hard to handle. Look how she got the temporary job that allowed her to take some time off for healing. Spirits don’t push too hard, like forcing her to become an entrepreneur when she was not ready yet.

Another good news is that these clearing symptoms pass fast if you let them work out, with as little resistance as possible. This client did an outstanding job in this.

Do you have any questions about Akashic Record Reading? Let me know.

Review: The Spontaneous Healing Of Belief By Gregg Braden

I am so glad I found this book The Spontaneous Healing of Belief because it gives scientific explanations on so many ideas I’m familiar with, such as the true nature of reality, our creative power over our own lives and on the world, and the Law of Attraction with the power of feelings. The book also serves as a great follow up on Dr Bruce Lipton’s The Biology Of Belief, by discussing what belief can do beyond our individual body.

Reality as simulation game

Gregg Braden cites various scientific studies to show us that this everyday world we live in is a computer simulation, a virtual reality on a giant scale, in the Universal computer. What we call reality is not real, but only a reflection of true reality.

This idea of life as dream (or, I call it “living movie” in the article linked above) is often mentioned in the various spirituality traditions, and it’s so refreshing to see science finally catching up. (By the way, this idea is present in the Bible, too. It says Adam fell a deep sleep — but it doesn’t say he woke up. So, we can interpret this that we are living in Adam’s dream.”)

The good news is we are not just living in a simulation but we can reprogram the simulation, too. We are the actors as well as the directors in this living movie. We are the creatures as well as the creators. We are active participants, not just a powerless victims or observers.

How do we reprogram the Universal computer program? By our beliefs. By shattering the old paradigm of false limitations and adopting new beliefs. You know, not just wishing, not just wanting to believe, but believing from the bottom of your heart, with all your feelings.

Gregg Braden shares that our heart emits electric and magnetic energies. On the other hand, it is proven that electric or magnetic energies can change the nature of atoms, the building blocks of this world. So when we believe, when we feel the new possibility with our heart, the electromagnetic energy from the heart can change the atoms in and around us, changing the so-called reality.

The Earth experiment

Gregg Braden also discusses what it may mean that this world we live in is a simulation. A simulation is usually used for training. So are we getting trained to better live in the true reality?

This is basically the same of what I call the Earth experiment. Our Higher Selves (also called oversouls) send individual souls to this world to — experience. There is no judgment really. We are here to learn, and mastery of the learning leads to joy.

If you are experiencing difficulty in life, that just means you are at a great learning point — just as when you are in simulation program and facing difficult situation. You can keep trying in your old malfunctioning manner until you figure a new way that works. (I’m sorry if this statement sounds cynical — it is not. I really mean difficulties are great learning opportunities.)

The Law of Attraction and the Field

So we have the creative power. Gregg Braden explains this process by introducing the idea of the “Field”, also called zero-point field, or The Divine Matrix (which is the title of his book that precedes this one)

What we think and feel, what we believe, we can create — we can manifest. This is the same with the Law of Attraction, but I like Gregg Braden’s way of explanation. I always felt LoA is more about creation and the word “attraction” causes unnecessary misunderstanding. I know it works, and now we have a better way to understand it.

Here is a video clip where he explains all this, giving the skinny of this book:

Working the miracles of belief

In this book, he also says,

“Through the healing of our beliefs, we discover how — with the grace and ease that comes from experiencing ourselves as part of the world rather than separate from it. When we do so, we become the seed of life’s miracles, as well as the miracles themselves.” (page 207)

Miracles like reversing dis-eases and living just as long as you want. Gregg Braden is smart and doesn’t use the emotionally-charged word “immortality”, but he does talk about super longevity, saying, “The first 100 years are the hardest.”

He talks about redirecting time, space and matter, so I guess immortality is pretty much in his scope.

So how do you want to rewrite your “reality”? What kind of miracles do you want to work on? Now you know how to change your life and the world. Don’t just sit back and complain. That does absolutely no good. Changing your belief, rewriting the computer program, brings change.

“Whatsoever you shall ask, believing, you shall receive.” — Jesus (Matthew 21:22)

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