HIGHLY SENSITIVE PEOPLE — The Healthy HSP Page

Most HSPs I've talked with over the years are not only very much aware of the subtleties in their environment, but also have a very precise awareness of their own bodies. Part of that comes with being so sensitive, they immediately can tell when something is "out of tune" or hurting. Headaches, muscle and joint pains, and general malaise are all indicators the body sends out that change is needed, and HSPs are more prone to pay attention, rather than just shrug something off or take a couple of aspirins.

But the flip side is that because of the way their brains are wired, the highly sensitive person is also very likely be so intensely involved in everything they are doing, they tend to ignore taking good care of themselves physically. So even though they are hurting, they often put off things like taking proper breaks, exercising, making it a point to eat a healthy, balanced meal or may even skip a meal because they don't have time right now.

The truth is, to be your healthiest and most productive, especially as an HSP, you need to make it a point to take good care of yourself. The biggest secret to achieving happiness and health is to keep your body and your mind in harmony. The HSP who keeps his physical state, mental outlook and spiritual values in balance can feel better and reach success far more easily, and life will not seem so challenging or painful.

You Are What You Eat

Good nutrition is of paramount importance. Your body needs the right amounts of nutrients, including protein, carbohydrates, vitamins and trace elements. Feeding your sensitive body with cheap or adultered foods, or GMO-type "frankenfood" is like pumping watered-down gasoline into your car. It'll ruin your engine very quickly.

I'm not saying you have to go to extremes or anything, like becoming a vegan or vowing to eat only raw foods. This is just a matter of using common sense to avoid indulging in excess or eating too much of questionable foods. You can still have the occasional Big Mac, just don't finish off a whole bag of party chips with it. And add more helpings of wholesome foods to balance things out. Don't skimp on breakfast and then nosh down a couple of Danish on your coffee break. Take an apple or a pear or an energy bar to tide you over.

My experience counseling others tells me that making small but positive changes in your diet is an HSP's first line of defense in learning to use your trait to your fullest advantage. So make it a point to cut down on fast goods containing lots of saturated fats and sugars, and start eating more whole grains, chicken, fish, along with plenty of vegetables and fresh fruit. Switch over from high-sucrose soft drinks to 100% fruit juices, or even better, plain filtered water, and lots of it. Water is the best thing for your body. A well-hydrated body will not get fatigued easily, and will more quickly flush out toxins and byproducts of digestion. Like a finely tuned Maserati, your highly sensitive body will start to run cleaner and leaner and help you to showcase your HSP trait.

Other improvements you can make to your diet can include supplements from the health store or online sales like Amazon. Remember, modern industrialized farming methods are designed around efficiency and cost-savings, and leave many of our foods sadly lacking in the minerals our bodies require. By supplementing your diet with concentrated vitamins, peptides and raw elements you ensure getting the basic molecules of life your body is craving.

Honor Your Highly Sensitive Body

The second major area you need to address you've heard over and over but it's true: regular exercise is important, because it keeps the body flexible and energized, strengthens heart and lungs and aids in flushing away toxins from your muscles and organs. Now by exercise I don't mean you have to become the next Jack Lalanne or Arnie and spend your days in the gym, because gentle exercise can be anything from workout routines to simply taking a good long walk in the morning or during your lunch break. The secret is to keep your arms and legs in motion. Riding a bicycle, swimming, a fast game of badminton or just taking the stairs instead of the elevator, every little thing you do will make your body happier. Make it a point now to focus on your favorite activity and make a commitment to yourself that you will set aside a specific time each week and devote at least a half-hour towards getting your body into better shape.

I promise you, you'll feel so good you'll immediately want to start scheduling more.

Finally, I want to talk about the elephant in the room, and that's stress. Not the good type of stress you get from healthy exercise or meeting challenges in your life. Dr. Pat Allen calls that eustress. and teaches that it creates bursts of adrenaline that energize the body but get quickly flushed out as the situation is dealt with. I'm referring to the bad stress that goes on and onl for days on end, chronic stress that comes from fretting, worrying, or struggling to do too much too fast or deal ing with toxic people or situations. This type of stress turns adrenaline into toxic levels of cortisone, which then does so much damage to your body and mind you can think of it as "Public Enemy #1" and has been linked with fatigue, sleep problems, depression and general "burnout"; it also cripples your immune system and can directly lead to physical breakdown and diseases.

For an HSP, it is vital to learn the key techniques to coping with stress and worry. There are a wide variety of things you can do, including simple breathing exercises, meditation, and yoga which is a full system for relaxing the body and mind. A quick online search or an hour in your favorite bookstore will lead you to a wealth of books, DVDs and CDs on the subject, or if you are the "hands-on" type of HSP you can attend workshops and courses that will guide you in healthy, restorative practices you can start attending.

There is an oriental proverb that the longest journey beings with a single step. The first step you can take is to acknowledge that you need to make changes right now, towards becoming healthier and fitter. Here are some tips to help you improve your health and help you to reach a new and improved you.

FIVE STEPS TO TAKE TODAY TO BECOME A HEALTHIER HSP:

Write down your goal: You want a healthier life; you are determined to reach a clearer state of mind. Post a note where you will see it every morning. It will become your reality very quickly.
Start with single act: Decide you want to learn all you can about improving your health and emotional state. Check out one new source of information, whether the internet, books, DVDs, clubs, gyms or a support group. The more you know about the keys to health, the faster you can put your new knowledge into action.
Do something to prove you mean business: Take an hour to go through your kitchen cupboards and refrigerator and discard anything that does not seem "healthy" now that you know what to look for. Be ruthless! If you see anything that is not in harmony with your new, healthier self-image, toss it. Just doing that will make you feel healthier!
Get a large planner calendar and pin it up in your kitchen. Mark today, when you chose to begin your new lifestyle. Keep notes on it, or even better start a journal by hand or on your computer. Write down your thoughts and feelings about your goals and what you are doing to achieve them. And list any "bad habits" you have like smoking or drinking, and draw a big black line through them to signify you've quit. In a few months you can look back and see all the positive changes that you've made, and celebrate!
The biggest bad habit to give up is negative thinking and defeatist selftalk. Make it a goal to program your mind with positive thoughts and frequent affirmations. Talk to yourself the way you would encourage a friend, to boost your self-confidence. And be sure to give yourself an "attaboy!" every time you make another step of progress. Be your own best friend to help yourself through any tough times which you're sure to encounter during the early stages of creating the "New You."

Something Every Woman Needs To Know

It's been said recently that "50 is the new 30," and in many ways people are remaining vital, active and maintaining a youthful vitality into their middle years. But no matter how positive your mindset there are realities to aging, and I coach that it's best to face any uncomfortable truth with knowledge, understanding and acceptance. Yet for women, "taboo" topics associated with aging still remain, and one has always been menopause.

That's why I was very pleased recently to watch a new documentary on this subject that tackles what every woman needs to know about menopause, while also being fantastically entertaining. It's called Hot Flash Havoc, and as their press kit makes clear, "If you have a vagina, or know someone who does, this is a must see movie."

This documentary draws heavily on research from the Women's

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Health Initiative (WHI) study released in 2002, which is now known to have misreprsented that hormonal replacement therapy prescribed to millions of women to treat uncomfortable symptoms of menopause could increase risk of heart attacks and cancer. The publicity surrounding these dire conclusions created confusion and outright fear throughout the health care community, and caused millions of women to needlessly abandon treatments and subject themselves to age-related discomforts.

Now, additional years of research have clarified matters, and this film sheds a powerful light to dispel confusion on a sensitive issue, offering in-depth interviews with medical experts and poignant stories shared by real women.

In short, it has the power to be a life-changing experience for every woman and provides information about dealing with aging that will empower women entering the"Second Act" of their lifves, and help them to make educated health care decisions, and also reveals a variety of common medical symptoms that are not always rcognized as related to menopause by doctors whose education is weak in the area of women's menopausal health.

If you are having difficulty getting information about your change-of-life experiences, or know someone "of a certain age" who is suffering symptoms, it's important that you view this documentary to learn the latest, state-of-the-art answers to all the issues surrounding menopause.

The reviews make it clear:

"Award-winning documentary delves into the sometimes taboo subject with new medical information and lots of humor" —NBC News

"Hot Flash Havoc finally gives women the information they need to advocate for their body, their brain and their well-being. This movie has more potential to improve and reform women's health than 2000 pages of federal legislation." —Fox News

Hot Flash Havoc is the most provocative and revealing documentary ever made about menopause. Watch the trailer below now, or better yet download the entire film and after you've watched it help us to get this important information out. Hot Flash Havoc has spurred the momentum in the medical community to finally compel the government to release more data from the Women's Health Initiative study, and it's now being used to correct past misrepresentations of the study and help improve women's lives.

I'm excited that the producers of Hot Flash Havoc have allowed me to become an affiliate for their groundbreaking new documentary and FTC regulations require I mention this whenever I present any information about important new third-party products and websites for the benefit of my readers. If you want to learn more about the movement, the experts and how this film got to be made visit the HotFlashHavoc.com website.

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Hot Flash Havoc

HOT FLASH HAVOC is enlightening, entertaining, humorous, profound, and is a crash-course in what you need to know about menopause. It has the power to be a life-changing experience for every woman.

This film not only sheds insightful light on the confusion stemming from a decade of misguided facts, but conveys poignant stories shared by real women and in-depth interviews with the world's most noted experts. HOT FLASH HAVOC provides compelling information about menopause that will empower women for the "Second Act" of their lives.

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It's No Joke. "You've Got A Bear Behind"
Is Not Just an Old Vaudeville Routine

Research has shown that 3% of all people suffer from Unwanted Thoughts, and it's especially prevalent among highly sensitive people. I'm talking about wacky, uninvited thoughts. And obsessive thoughts.

And even shameful thoughts.

They appear from nowhere, and for some people it seems there's no way to avoid them. Psychologists even have a name for this, labelling it "White Bear Syndrome," a branch of OCD studies.

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Why "white bear"? Well, the story has it that author Leo Tolstoy back in the 1800s once casually asked his brother to stand in a corner — and not to think about white bears. Well his brother humored him and said not a problem and stood in the corner. He tried to blank his mind, and when that didn't work he focused on other thoughts, and other images.

He struggled to think of anything else....anything except white bears!

As you can imagine, he finally had to admit defeat, exhausted. No matter what he tried he couldn't get rid of the thought. Leo must have been chuckling all day, because as a writer he knew something his brother didn't. That it was an impossible task.

Why impossible? Well, fast forward to the late 1980s when psychologist Daniel Wegner ran dozens of experiments on the idea of "unwanted thoughts" and "thought suppression" which proved that not only can we not suppress individual thoughts, but that participants who tried to suppress the thoughts experienced them even more vividly.

The problem is that for some unfortunate people, the phenomenon of Unwanted Thoughts can seriously hold them back in life.

You can try to bring your will power to bear. You can perform rituals until it feels "right." You check and re-check your mental state. Yet still you obsess about the future. About your relationships, your job, or your health.

The good news is that research has continued into this malady. Wegner discovered there was a way to change your perception, and tentative ways you can control your mind and regain control of these previously chaotic thoughts.

Later research on thought suppression by mental health professionals resulted in even greater breakthroughs and advanced methodologies, that can help thoughts simply "melt away" and cease to be any problem.

So if you are an HSP who suffers from this you might be interested in the very latest finding from leading psychology expert Bradley Thompson. He's perfected a new method of "zapping" all Unwanted Thoughts at source, ensuring they never occur again. It's blown people away across the globe — and he's receiving critical acclaim from his peers.

These are techniques that you can use at home, on your own, without prescriptions or embarassing medical intervention. In short, controlling unwanted thoughts is no longer an impossible burden.

Do you suffer from Unwanted Thoughts? If so, here's a link for you to check out Bradley's new website with more information about his treatment:

www.HighlySensitivePeople.com/suggests/StopUnwantedThoughts

Learn how you can stop struggling and feeling powerless, and regain freedom to get your life (and your thoughts) back under control today. With this simple step-by-step plan and a few simple exercises — you'll never have to experience unwanted thoughts again.

I hope that this information benefits some of my visitors, and am happy that Bradley Thompson has allowed me to become an affiliate for his groundbreaking new techniques and FTC regulations require I mention this whenever I present any information about exciting new third-party products for the benefit of my readers.

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For HSPs Who Struggle With Body and Weight Issues

One of the downsides to being a Highly Sensitive Person is that you may be overly sensitive about your physical appearance. Many HSPs are perfectly happy with their bodies, and have no trouble with being "hefty," or over-weight, or even obese, but if you are troubled whenever you look in the mirror, or if you just want to lose (or rather, "release") a few pounds so you can feel healthier and more energetic, then in addition to all my tips above you will need to take more specific actions, like cutting down on calories and making even more significant changes in your diet.

I know that "diet" is a loaded word for many, and rightly so. The whole concept behind going "on a diet" revolves around it being a temporary obstacle and one that you are so relieved once it's over, and you can go back to eating the old way that caused your weight problem in the first place. Not sound thinking, especially for the thoughtful mind of an HSP.

Even worse, most fad diets only have you lose water weight or worse, reduce your muscle tissue. You need your muscle tissue to burn fat, so when you reduce muscle mass it makes things even worse because now you're burning off even less fat! Talk about rip-offs!

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To succeed we need to find ways to make permanent changes in how we eat.

Thankfully, in this technologically advanced world of today, science has not only found that eating fewer calories is a major key to improving your health, but has made discoveries that can help us in achieving that goal. In fact, the four biggest health benefits you could ever seek, including living longer and leading a happier, more rewarding life, can directly derive from eating fewer high-calorie foods.

Here's where it gets frustrating, though. Whether you're an HSP or not, virtually everyone finds cutting calories, especially long-term, to be among the hardest things to keep up. Many people make strong resolutions, but eventually just find themselves giving up in frustration, because it's just so painful to give up all the good food they love.

ThinMist™ oral spray gets results up to 200% faster because it enters the bloodstream within seconds. Spraying it under the tongue 30 minutes before a meal floods your body with critical minerals, amino acids, and natural bio-identical hormones that burn fat efficiently and kicks your metabolism into high gear all day long.

But recently, there has been a cutting-edge discovery in natural appetite control that just plain works without leading to frustration and struggle. If you'd like to know more, check out this very fascinating report based on a recent research article that appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine, which I've linked to at http://HighlySensitivePeople.com/diet-discovery, to learn about a new breakthrough product called "ThinMist" which both helps you burn fat faster, and cuts down those feelings of deprivation and craving that dog you whenever you're on a diet.

This is a simple new formulation that you don't even eat, you spray it under your tongue and enters your bloodstream directly in just 23 seconds, meaning it kills cravings immediately. And what really separates this powerful new approach from even the most powerful weight-loss diets out there is that it makes it easy to eliminate cravings (and the calories that come with them) over the long-term!

It's like being paroled early from the jail of a restrictive diet.

Remember, researchers have pinpointed cutting 25% of calories for 1 year as an "optimal" level for most to reap the complete benefits of a calorie-restricted-diet — and will lead to dramatic weight loss, heart health, and all the other benefits of dropping your weight to a more "normal" level. And if you read the entire article, at http://HighlySensitivePeople.com/diet-discovery, you'll discover exactly how and why this new solution finally makes that easy.

You may be at your optimum weight right now, but I'll bet you know someone who has been struggling to lose weight, so think about how lucky you are not to be in their shoes and "pay it forward" by passing this good news on to anyone you know who has been frustrated with the calorie-restriction battle. They may end up really thanking you for it.

FTC regulations require stating that of course by recommending any website or product for the benefit of my visitors it makes me an affiliate because the Highly Sensitive People website may be compensated financially, and that you should always perform due diligence before making any on-line commitments or purchases.

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