Cultivating Individual Health

So this being the cold and flu season the usually commercials and commentaries about wellness abound.  Haven't commericals been proclaiming this the "worst cold and flu season in years" for years?  Along those lines, I walked in on my parents the other morning to them watching "Good Morning America" which was highlighting different cold fighting elixirs.  Not all of them were fluff, but many like "Airborne", which I did not see featured in the GMA piece, have been proven to be insubstantial.

My older daughter Malte is in kindergarten, so she comes home with whatever is incubating at school.  This school year she has had three colds thus far.  I have resisted them all, but the last one, after it had been in the house for weeks; first with Malte alone for a week, then Ruth and Rya got it for a week, then I got a little of it.  Now even though I say I got it, it is a mild version, no copious mucuos, just a little fatigue, a little hoarseness.

I attribute this mildness to two things.  One, I must applaud the Melaleuca Multivitamins I take, they really have helped I think.  Though I eat local/seasonal/organic, I am sure there are some gaps in my nutrition that is filled by this really good multivitamin--you can check them out at www.melaleuca.com.  The other thing I have done which has been equally important is keen observation of digestion.  I have been eating a late breakfast, waiting until I am actually hungry for breakfast which can come as late as an hour or two after rising.  And then I take a late lunch, again waiting until I am actually hungry.  Then dinner depends on my hunger level, it might be a well spiced Indian dish, or fruit, or just some tea.  But the point is that we often eat because it is time, instead of listening to the digestion.

It is easy to miss meals and be thrown off by it, getting out of sync with ourselves, because we get past it.  So one wants to watch out that we aren't throwing ourselves off.  But because the digestion is really the regulator of mucuos production (if you overeat or bog digestion down mucuos production goes up).  So if we tend the digestive fire well, it can help us ward off pathogens, and minimize mucuos production when we do have to battle a cold.

So with all the miraculous things out there to help us battle the "worst cold and flu season in years" just remember dailing in your digestive power is actually the best thing to prevent or minimize sickness.