Time for a challenge. Whenever we get too comfortable in life we are no longer growing – and I feel the need to push my photography skills forward. The guidelines of this self imposed journey are: one photo a week; no explanations or stories needed; black and white; shot only with my Nikon D800 and 28mm lens. The end. Or, the beginning …
Fall is here. With that comes shifting schedules and potentially interrupted sleep patterns. Kids have to change their nightly routines in order to get up for school on time and our natural rhythms get messed with as daylight grows shorter and the time clocks change.
An easy self-care tool to support your sleep during all this change is to use high quality, pure essential oils.
A popular oil for relaxation is Lavender. [ Don’t get Lavender, Spike – as that is stimulating]
Here are a few ways to incorporate lavender into a nightly, calming routine:
1. Use an aromatherapy diffuser. Add approximately 3-5 drops of pure essential oil per 100 ml of water. You can start the diffuser 30 minutes before bed time to get the scent in the room, and then let it run all night.
2. Make your own linen spray. Add about 20 drops of lavender essential oil to one ounce of distilled water in a spray bottle. Shake well – and spray before bed. Add or remove the amount of essential oil based on your ‘scent preference’.
3. Give yourself a light massage by incorporating the lavender essential oil into a carrier oil such as jojoba or sweet almond oil. Add 15 drops of essential oil per ounce of carrier oil for a 2.5% dilution and massage into your feet, temples and pulse points.
My personal favorite is the diffuser method. It not only lulls me into a deeper state of relaxation … it also makes the whole room smell great.
Let me know if you try any of these and what your experience is like.
Have fun!
P.S. – Massage is another great way to help you relax. You can book your next appointment online by going HERE.
Summer’s coming. This is the time of year to rest and rejuvenate. If you can’t escape for a week, how about an hour? I’ve heard that a one hour massage can be the equivalent rest of one full night of sleep! Could you use a little down time?
When you book and receive your next regularly priced one hour therapeutic massage in June 2017, you’ll receive a coupon for $30 off of your massage in July 2017.
Massage Therapy services are now available at:
357 East Center Street in Manchester
Appointments will be booked Monday through Thursday and Saturday.
When you book online today you’ll be able to take advantage of a limited time special rate to help welcome old and new clients into my new space.
I’ve only ever offered such a steep discount one other time – so act now and let the relaxation begin!
“We are like children building a sand castle. We embellish it with beautiful shells, bits of driftwood, and pieces of colored glass. The castle is ours, off limits to others. We’re willing to attack if others threaten to hurt it. Yet despite all our attachment, we know that the tide will inevitably come in and sweep the sand castle away. The trick is to enjoy it fully but without clinging, and when the time comes, let it dissolve back into the sea.”
~Pema Chodron~
“The core of your
true self
is never lost.
Let go of all the
pretending and
the becoming
you’ve done just
to belong.
Curl up with your
rawness and come home.
You don’t have to
find yourself;
you just have to
let yourself in.”
― D Antoinette Foy
“Don’t forget that the land is always out there, making its way, doing everything it can so you can breathe fresh air; so you can eat fresh food; so you can move and see and feel and think, and it’s on your side. The world is out there doing what it’s been doing way before you came here, it’s firm and strong and it takes a lot to bring it down.
So from time to time, just go outside and look at this spectacle. This pure painting right in front of your eyes. No one created it. No one owns it. It doesn’t want anything. It doesn’t need to prove anything to anyone. It simply is.
So maybe, try a little tenderness. Just give it a chance to do what it can do. Just let it help you
breathe
and eat
and move
and see
and maybe just try to live your life in a way that doesn’t kill this force of nature
that is just trying to give you a world worth living in. A clean world. A fresh world.
Paths, forests, oceans, animals, oxygen, water. That’s all it takes.
Just try a little tenderness towards this world we’ve been lucky enough to build our homes on.
If you take care of it, it will take care of you.”
[Charlotte Eriksson]
“I prefer winter and fall, when you can feel the bone structure in the landscape – the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn’t show.” [Andrew Wyeth]
