Showing posts with label cleansing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cleansing. Show all posts

Saturday, 1 May 2010

DIY Cleanser

In my effort to get in touch with all things natural and organic, (and with the inspiration of a lovely friend of mine who is living in organic heaven, check out her blog: A Modern Girls Life) I thought I'd give a DIY homemade cleansing mask a whirl!
I've done a bit of reading around the subject and have spent many a lunchtime in Perfect Potion being told about the benefits of goats milk yoghurt, mashed up fruit and avocado for hydration and cleansing my skin. In fact Perfect Potion have DIY masks that contain a powder that you must mix with oatmeal and yoghurt.

This afternoon's efforts I think have paid off. I made a poultice like substance consisting of:

1. tablespoon mashed up avocado;
2. tablespoon of goats milk yoghurt; and
3. A good squeeze of lemon juice.

After a steam (sticking my face over a pot of hot water with a towel over the whole thing) I applied the green mush and left it for 15 or so minutes then removed with warm water. My skin is visibly more hydrated and I can tell because I have very dry skin and all I have to do is splash my face with water and it will get all tight and scratchy. But not this time - it's quite amazing really.

Verdict: Definitely give it a go! It's made my skin soft, radiant and hydrated, and it's made me hungry!

Thursday, 22 April 2010

Sherpa

As mentioned I've been going to see a guy. Not just any old guy but a seriously gifted and amazing guy, about my new journey into myself. Actually, the journey really started with a visit to him who I call my Sherpa. He is a smaller guy, with almost elvish qualities; a lightness to his step, innate calmness and vivid, knowing, crystal blue eyes.

Initially I thought I was going for a run of the mill massage with a bit of a phsycology session of talking and analyzing and that was about it. But what I got was so much more; the word "Hope" springs to mind.

For my first session with the Sherpa we talked for over an hour yet it felt like such a brief moment. We touched on some fairly deep issues during that time but what was so poignant for me was that he picked up on precisely where my thought patterns were and conversed with me on that same level so that everything made sense. I was so moved and felt strangely at ease in his presence. Those who know me well understand that it takes a while for me to get to know someone new, to open up and truly be myself around them so this was a novel experience for me, on many levels.

The second session with the Sherpa was again an incredible awakening. We did "body work" and for those who have never heard that term before I completely sympathise (there is a whole world out there devoted to body work in all different forms of therapies that I have yet to discover). Essentially the Sherpa kneeded the blockages in my body that were holding tension and bad energy. Now I'm not going to go into the theory of this for this post but lets just say I'm only just beginning to realise how my body truly works and how destructive I've actually been to it over the years.

I left this session feeling tingly and teary. The massage had dredged up and released blocked energy that had been lying dormant, needing an escape for an incalculable time. And I felt releif. That I've found a way to understand myself that makes sense to me, that I believe in. That I've found someone who understands me too and could finally begin to guide me through myself, to myself (hense the name Sherpa).

For the last week suceeding my second session I feel a little lighter. I'm noticing subtle changes in my body, I no longer feel bloated and I think I've lost a kilo or two without even being aware of it. I'm not craving cigarettes and I don't get the urge to binge on chokkie cake very five minutes. There are subtle changes in the way I think and feel too. I am watching my thought patterns, keeping tabs on them and when I am dedicated I turn my thinking around to a positive affirmation.

Session three is happening tonight and I am so looking forward to some more cleansing.

Willingness to change


Most people have heard of a book called “You Can Heal Your Life” by Louise L. Hay. If you haven’t, I suggest you get acquainted, if like me you are interested in why the things that happen to us happen.

I have been feeling recently as if the past has been repeating on me a little, having found myself in a situation that seems very similar to one I’ve already had. And let me tell you, this situation wasn’t the best. In fact, it was the single most disappointing experience of my life, and now to have it recurring on me raised a number of significant questions: what am I doing that is creating these situations? I am the common denominator in this so what is it in me that needs this situation? How is it that I can subconsciously create a situation my mind tells me I don’t want? How can I be so misaligned? And importantly, what can I do to fix this imbalance and harness this power for positive outcomes instead of negative ones?

A wise man once said that to expect a different outcome from doing the same thing is insanity. I know I had to change my life, my mind desperately wanted to change my circumstances so I knew I had to look inside and change my core values and the way that I treat myself and feel about myself.

In this vein then, reading Hay’s book was a watershed moment for me. Up to this point I had read a number of incredibly powerful books over the years; I carried Eckhart Toll’s “The Power of Now” in my bag to work everyday in London, my dad had given me “As a Woman Thinketh” by James Allen years ago. But I feel that “You Can Heal Your Life” provides something more for me right now. It explains the dynamics between our thoughts and feelings towards ourselves and then goes on to provide the next step of explaining how to go about creating the change you want through affirmations and other exercises.

Hay makes it real. And simple. She links physical disease with thought patterns to the extent that we are all accountable for our own state of health. This alone is an interesting concept to me and one that I’m excited to do more reading around.

The book holds so many valuable lessons but for now I am focusing on the willingness to change. The willingness to release any old patterns of thought. The willingness to change my way of speaking and the way I express myself, as only then will I be able to create the change in my outer physical circumstances.

These notions have been around for absolute centuries. Ghandi in his incredible wisdom said “Be the change you wish to see in the world”. But I feel like we get so caught up in “internet mode” (everything and anything and anyone available at any time = life overload) that we forget these basic truths.

In my own situation it is obvious that with the repetition of this particular situation I have not actually instilled any change, despite trying my best efforts. My aim has been all wrong – I need to change what is inside me and how I feel about myself to be able to attract a different, positive result. To work on this, it is as simple as affirmations. In particular the affirmation “I am willing to change”. I’ve been saying it over and over, first thing in the morning, in the mirror to myself, at any moment in the day. And I feel like I am willing to change. To take the next step.