Thank you so much to everyone who came to the first class of the winter Qi Gong session. There was a mixture of beginners, some expert practitioners and even a few out-of-towner’s and I think everyone would agree that the room was buzzing with vibrant Qi! While this is a six week class feel free to drop in when you can and don’t worry if you can’t make all of the classes. The main focus of the classes is to practice so just come when you can! I did a 5 minute introduction to the concept of Qi Gong but if you would like to know more I will be uploading a video on YouTube that goes into a little bit more depth in the next little while so stay tuned. If you haven’t already done so please feel free to ‘like’ our Facebook page or subscribe to our newsletter to get updates, info and inspiration. I look forward to seeing you all next week and thank you for helping build a great “Communi-Qi!” -Jeffrey...
Meditation is an amazing, effective and accessible form of self-care. I’m not sure why everyone isn’t doing it. Seriously. It’s simple, easy-to-do and has an enormous impact on your body. It’s a powerful tool that can really improve your health. If you don’t believe me….try it! Stress is one of the biggest causes of illness, it affects all our systems and essentially makes the body start to ‘shut down’. Chronic stress actually causes part of the brain to ‘shrink’ over time and this affects our short-term memory and thought processing. Have you ever noticed that during moments of high stress you tend to forget names, words and dates? This is normal and happens to most of us. It is just one of the many ways that stress affects the body. The physical effects of stress show up fairly quickly in the form of frequent colds, flu, headache, fatigue, muscle tension, insomnia, and high blood pressure. Unfortunately this is when many people resort to pain-killers and sleeping pills…but they don’t think of meditation. Meditation truly is one of the best health remedies around. It has strong effects on the body physically and mentally. It’s like taking a multi-vitamin for the body and soul. Physically it helps: Lower blood pressure Reduce pain Improve sleep Increase energy Strengthen the immune system Mentally it helps: Improve memory and concentration Reduce anxiety and depression Improve mood Reduce stress Increase creativity There are so many benefits from such a simple practice and it’s accessible to everyone; it doesn’t require fancy athletic gear, going to the gym or taking expensive supplements. It’s so simple yet one...
As often as I encourage people to practice meditation, qi gong, or mindfulness I am met with “How do you do that?” I usually respond, “Oh, just check YouTube, there are tons of guided meditations.” I had a look around and while there are many videos some of them can get a little complicated. I think a practice should be simple then we are more likely to practice it regularly. Well, I grabbed a microphone, danced around, then recorded a very simple meditation that anyone can do. I had office and desk workers in mind so you can do this in the middle of your work day. Try it out, let me know what you think! ~Think...
I thought I would take a moment to update you on what has been going on in the clinic and the website. As you may know I write little articles or ‘blogs’ every week or so and I have a massive list of topics that I want to eventually get to. My goal is to be able to reach and help more people with simple and highly effective health tips. I am limited by the hours in the day to be able to see people 1 on 1 but using the internet makes all that information accessible to anyone at anytime. The problem has been trying to decide which articles to focus on, as I have no shortage of ideas! I am working up the courage to post some videos of some of my ‘rants’ that I inflict upon patients in clinic but I am not used to seeing myself in video. I’m getting there! There is a tool called Google Analytics that allow a person to analyze their website to see where their visitors are coming from, what they are looking at, and what pages are looked at the most. Don’t worry, I can’t actually see who you are just general information. For example, I notice that there are a lot of visitors from Victoria, Toronto, California, and for some reason Mexico! There is a tool that shows what people search on Google that brings them to my website and this has been very interesting. Here are the top 3 searches: The 3rd most common search is “acupuncture Victoria BC.” That’s not too surprising. The second most common...
A couple of years ago I saw this lecture by Neuroanatomist Jill Bolte Taylor about her experience having stroke. It’s about 20 minutes long and I found it quite inspiring in an unexpected way. I love hearing perspectives that balance the scientific and the ‘esoteric’ in the real world. If you want to prevent having a stroke eat your salmon, flax, and sardines. It keeps the blood thin and prevents clotting. ~Think...
