Yesterday I was browsing the Internet and reading about all the articles about relaxation when feeling stressed out; working out to release tensions; eating well to fight sad mood…. And I realized that all these articles where “fighting “ a problem without addressing first and properly the cause.

It seems to me (very humble opinion… and I must say opinion also of some professors of university and researchers!!) very important to dig into the problem, the sadness or the stress to confront the real origin and so “fight” it, or better said, treat it accordingly to the personal issue. Most of the time we shortcut to go to the solution: it feels easier and faster to forget and wash out the unhappy condition for a quick fix.

Assess the problem, confront the sad feeling, and dig into the negative to expose the triggers of the unhappiness.

When we have a physical issue like pain in a specific part of the body or a stomach bug, we are scanning what we were doing before or ate earlier to find the origin of the problem. It’s something that feels natural to do. So do the same when you’re feeling unhappy!

Already being aware of this is a first step toward happiness/well being. Recognize that you are not feeling ok. It is already a lot! Recognizing a condition is a stress reliever by itself.

You can now breathe through your entire body and understand that you aren’t feeling happy because… you are not happy! And it is fine. You cannot be happy all the time! You cannot feel emotionally euphoric every second of every minute of every day! Hiding your feeling and living in a “perfect world” is not realistic.

Welcoming your feeling and emotions, whether they are positive or negative, is the way to live happier and to be more satisfied.

Sit quietly and ask yourself why you are feeling this way? What is happening right now to make you feel like this? Are you experiencing changes in your life, body, or relationship? Are you pushing too much in an area of your life (work, work out, relationship, well being, family)?

Whatever question you want to ask yourself is welcome here! You are the one that know yourself the best so you are the most competent person here to question yourself!

If you need to write it down, go for it. Journaling is a good activity to express yourself fully and sincerely. Allow yourself a real pause taking the time to reflect on your feelings. This is what taking care of you mean.

Once you have done this inner scan, you can then use methods to calm down.

Simple breathing technique or relaxing yoga pose enable to let it go mentally and physically and to quiet the body and mind softly positioning you in the now. And being aware of the now is a good feeling factor. And of course after that… go for a nice walk outside.

Maybe going for something more intense with more adrenaline and effort, like a good run or a boxing class, will be your way to close the subject at this moment and clean/refresh your mind.

The concept is, once you have confronted the emotions/ feelings, do something that make you feel great, relaxed… happy.

A bath can also work well 😉

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A sentence helps me a lot to calm down and to pose a different view on stressful personal situations.

“ You are the one who is creating your own reality”.

 So if you want to be happy, watch at the moment with happiness in the eyes. Or at least stop watching at it in a negative way.

Everything is happening at this right moment for a reason. And even though sometimes it can feel unfair or very hard, it has to be like this; so better to embrace it and go forward. Easier to say than to do it but, really, it becomes easier with practice!!

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Don’t forget that welcoming emotions, pleasant or unpleasant, will make you feel better on long term.

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Sharing with you my happiness in the bowl!! Appreciating these simple meal moments deeper each time and being so grateful for the chance I have to be able to eat so pretty and balanced each day.

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One of the first lesson I teach my client is to understand the importance to feel the position, being aware of their body in the pose, and of course the right one in whenever they are doing: workout, stretching, yoga, running, standing up or sitting down!

It is a matter of safer practice and better productivity. You practice the correct movement, without risking hurting yourself, and your performance increase because of the right execution. Engaging your core allows this. That is why I call this the core posture!

I read two days ago an article on Self website about the explanation on what yogi mean when they are asking you/us to “lengthening the tailbone down and drawing the ribs in”[1].

It makes me realize that indeed this can be complicated to understand or to picture it and that is the core posture.

I cannot insist more on the importance to practice correctly any exercises or movements. It is like a long-term investment on your health (hello low back problems) and a big factor on performance advancement.

So what does that means concretely?

• “Lengthening the tailbone down” = squeeze your butt in neutral position, slightly retroverted position (contrary of anteverted that means arched/curved position of the butt)
• “Drawing the ribs in” = suck the stomach in engaging the abs
• Finally, those two movements are done while lengthen the spine and to do so imagine a thread coming out of the top of the head and dragging you up.

I love showing that to my clients because it allows them to go to another level of practice and well-being.

Without executing the right posture you can do plenty of abs exercises and never see a result; or you can stretch all day and not feeling any stretch and, certainly making it worst for your body.

Some movements are executed daily and that emphasize even more the necessity to engage the core in every moment in life.

Learn to feel the right posture for the right effect is something a professional can teach you and with the practice and experience you will learn how to feel it and then find the right posture alone.

I really like this article in Self because it shows the importance, in that case for yoga, of a correct execution that is not always the case. Sometimes you will have to curve your buttock and some other time like here you will have to find a neutral position.

The important point is to know where you need to feel the effect of the movement and this way you can try to feel by yourself the correct posture.

For example, this stretching:

• If like in the superior pictures you have your back falling to the floor in a round way, you won’t feel really the stretch (at least on the first steps of the stretch) and you can hurt your low back;
• On the second line of pictures, you can see that my back is slightly curved; I am looking in front of me and my buttock is like pull off from behind (imagine a thread pulling me from the back); Only once in that position, I can begin to come down keeping my back alignment. I feel the stretch already on the first picture and I feel it deeper as soon as go down just a little bit and I am not hurting my back.

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Whatever you are doing, always be aware of your movement, your position, and your posture. This is the first step for safety practice and well-being.

And remember: when you are standing up, try to have a neutral position 😉

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Of course finishing with colors and happiness form my pretty green smoothie

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[1] https://www.self.com/story/drawing-in-your-ribs-yoga

I am literally in love with this beautiful picture place named Instagram. I really enjoy it for the beauty of the picture, the information I can grab, the idea on wellbeing / decoration / mindfulness to inspire me, and of course the community that always support me and that I fell I participate to it too!

I read yesterday a nice article [1] that was saying that “studies have found that time spent on social media – particularly photo-based platforms – is associated with poorer self-esteem.” [2]

I am not onto looking after perfection and I wasn’t touch so much as they say in the article by the need to compare myself; I even would say that I am seeing IG like a big community for support and learning and so I am pretty positive about it! I never received bad comments and ultimately I feel empowered by the women I am following. So, why was I feeling the need to shut down for a while my account?

Lately, I get tired and lost in the same time. I lost myself in the post, comment and, following, and I felt it wasn’t expressing my true self anymore. I put pressure on myself to post, to keep in touch, to connect… and I don’t really feel happy and motivated anymore doing what I was doing. I needed a change but before that, I needed a pause from social networking. I needed to do what I was doing for myself and only for myself. I needed to stop losing time to film/ select/ write/ post and enjoy this new free time to enjoy the moment and family. And it’s what I did!

The first day was like a release. The moment I posted on my account that I decided to stop my IG for a week, I felt a huge amount of peace coming from within and happiness. And I breathed deeply watching at the lake. I felt so much energy coming back to me.

The next days were also pure bliss and surprisingly I never felt the need to connect to check something on it! It was also a bit energizing not to have to post a thing! Ehehehe no duties!!

I also take advantage of that time to reflect more on my life at that right moment and to rest my body. As I didn’t have to post my daily workout-yoga, I may have practice less. On the other hand I take more time for meditation and journaling, as for self-care bath and a lot of walk by the lake!

Balance is the central word in life. This time allows me to focus on topics that I needed to consider more and find more balance with my body and mind.

As funny as it is, 2 days ago was the final day for my “no IG week”. I didn’t come back on this day because I didn’t desire it. And as a matter of fact, now I say to myself I could go back to it, I felt sick and without energy.

I don’t know if this is link to that but sure thing, I decide to connect less and to post only when I feel the need-envy to do so.

So right now I want to share things that make me happy, like my beautiful açai bowl, or the beautiful clouds of my morning wall, but feeling so weak I may wait a little bit before coming back to IG.

I though my ego was speaking to high when I decided to express myself on that matter; who am I to think IG need me so much? Or better who am I to think that people can be interested on my issue?!! But then I thought that others may feel the same or can be interested in this topic, and I needed to speak out. I think it is always interesting to read the experience of others and sometimes it makes us realize things that we weren’t really thinking about.

So here it is just my very personal experience and my learning about a week without IG:

• more time to read-walk-share moment with others;
• more time for personal thinking
• more awareness of the now
• deeper true and enjoyable practice
• feeling of release and freedom
• coming back to the real me
• pushing myself less strongly
• lack of the community support

Again this is my personal experience and my personal way to live my IG. It is also a good lesson for me to manage my IG in a more peaceful way.

Happy social life everybody

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[1] Glamour USA, September 2017, “50 states of women” article by Shaun Dreisbach.

[2] Jennifer Webb, Ph.D., University of North Carolina, Charlotte.

A couple of weeks ago, I read this quote, and I begun to think what will I do if I wasn’t feeling any fear: fear from going out my comfort zone; fear from what people around could think if I act the way I want; fear to fail miserably; fear not to have the energy to accomplish whatever I could be doing… Fear… Fear … Fear!!!!!

So what will I do?

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First, I will quit my job. Well I know I am not the first to think something like this and a lot of happy persons I have done so and have followed their dreams and passion! I feel so unhappy… and I even don’t know why! Well I know it because I am not doing what I wish I would but otherwise, I have a good job, with nice people, in a big company so… it should be ok. But sometimes your body and your mind just tell you that something is not good for you. And you have to listen to that because it makes you sick if not.

Then, I will flight directly to my home country to be with my family and friends. To enjoy good moments all together, moreover right now, summer time, when everybody will be very close. I will enjoy this amazing time all together. I will really go to see the places and the persons I want to see and no excuse not doing it! I will share real moments with them and enjoy the real life.

Next step: the other part of the family. I will go to the states to visit the rest of the family and feel this part of the world as my home too. I will go to share real friendship on the north with all time friends; because a real friendship, even if forever, needs sometimes a live recall moment!! And better to go in a first stop because Boston can become very fast very cold!! Ahahah and then Florida will be the perfect stop after that!! It’s so far away but it’s such a necessity than it worth it.

Finally, I will be tempted to continue my trip to North Carolina, New York and California, but that would be more a dream that a real act!! So I will come back home, because I will miss so much my love and my kitty!! I need to come back and to share with them all the energy and the positive I have in me now! And begin to work on my future with my heart and soul ready.

Now it’s time to work on my own to find the reasons of this fear, non-action or whatever you can call this “paralysis”. Everything cannot happen right now but working on this, knowing the priorities, and what I really want to do will help me to follow and realize my dreams. And at the end… be happy and make everybody around me happy!

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Need for softness during summer? You don’t know… ask your skin!!

Nothing is better than a nice scrub to revive the skin and let it soft.

It’s a gesture to make a habit, all year around.

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This soft scrub is perfect for sensible and thin skin, face, but also all types skin!

I use to make salt scrub, as my skin is not really sensitive. Thus, I was puzzled regarding this Sugar Scrub!!

How wrong I was!!

This scrub is just fabulous!

It is, indeed, a very soft scrub. If you need a stronger effect, it’s better to use a Salt Scrub. However, the sensation and the effect on the skin after the shower are just AMAZING!! The skin is moisturized perfectly, revitalized, tightened and is so soft!

It’s as to give a second youth to your skin. Really!!

This is the recipe of this breakthrough Soft Skin Sugar Scrub:

You can use the recipient you want; the important is to respect the proportions.

• 1 cup of caster sugar

• 1 cup of olive oil

• 1 lemon zest

Just mix everything and put it in a nice jar.

I really recommend this scrub. Use it at least twice a week and it can be a good complement to a stronger scrub.

Just enjoy!!

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To fulfill the impatience of my favorite readers, this is the recipe for the superb summer light pink smoothie!!

I understand you at 100%! I couldn’t wait either to show you the picture!!

It was so good!!

For 1 glass of smoothie:

• 1/4 melon (I had for this one a yellow melon. It’s enough sweet and not too strong to hide the other fruits)

• 2 slices of pineapple

• 5 medium strawberries

• Coconut water (depending on how you prefer your smoothie: more or less thick). You can just add water too or almond milk if you want something more milky! I like the simple one with coconut water because it is light and real fruits tasty.

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All my smoothies are done with fresh fruits or vegetables. You can use frozen fruits too (vitamins are preserved), but try to enjoy the freshness of seasonal products. It is a better life experience!

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Little tip: It is the little girl’s perfect smoothie l! Do you know a little girl who can resist at a pink smoothie!!

Just add some strawberries in the blender and you will have a pink drink! And a big smile on the little face (even for the bigger one!! hihihihi).

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