March 20, 2020 at 02:00AM by CWC When practicing yoga, it’s easy to get caught up trying to nail each posture, but postures and movement are just one component of yoga. Yoga breathing techniques, or pranayama (prana means “life force” and yama means “control”), is also an essential element of yoga that enhances and deepens your practice. “Yoga without breath isn’t really yoga,” says Reiki master and certified yoga and meditation teacher Nina Endrst. “The breath is the foundation of the entire practice. Marrying movement and breath is what makes yoga such a special and powerful experience. Using the breath as our guide draws us back to the body and the current moment.” “Using the breath as our guide draws us back to the body and the current moment.” —Nina Endrst, yoga and meditation teacher Still, yoga breathing techniques and exercises are often met with resistance, which Endrst believes is because it makes many feel vulnerable since it is often an unfamiliar practice. “We have trouble sitting that close to ourselves sometimes, but that is when deep healing and connection take place,” she says. Whether you’re on the mat or out in the real world, living life, yoga breathing techniques are great tools to have at your disposal for whenever you need to clear and calm your mind and body. So are you ready to experience the magic of breathing for yourself? Here are five yoga breathing techniques to try, the benefits of each, plus tips on how to incorporate
Day: March 20, 2020
Why pros say using peppermint oil for hair is the key to healthy strands
March 20, 2020 at 01:30AM by CWC Peppermint is the flavor you know and love from mint chocolate ice cream, candy canes, and peppermint tea. And the extract can be added to your beauty routine for all sorts of benefits, from your skin to your manicure; however, one of its lesser-known perks is using peppermint oil for hair health. “Peppermint is an aromatic herb in the mint family that’s found in North America and Europe,” says Hadley King, MD, a New York City-based dermatologist. Peppermint oil is extracted from the leaves of the peppermint plant, which contains over 40 different chemical compounds, according to Caren Cambell, MD, a board-certified dermatologist in San Francisco. “The two main compounds are menthol and menthone,” says Dr. King. For your hair, peppermint has been known to stimulate the hair follicles, promote growth, and rebalance the scalp, says Paula Simpson, biochemist, author, and formulation expert. Plus, since it’s an essential oil that has microbial, insecticidal, and anti-inflammatory properties, “it can help with itching of the scalp,” says Dr. King. Keep scrolling for more intel on how peppermint oil helps your hair health, plus how to incorporate it into your hair-care regimen. Benefits of peppermint oil for hair health Various studies have looked into the effects of using peppermint oil on your hair, and the overall findings have pointed to hair growth promoting properties, along with clarifying benefits. Though it was a study on mice, one researcher found that a three percent solution of peppermint oil
If your anxiety surrounding COVID-19 is higher than ever, science says there’s a reason
March 20, 2020 at 01:00AM by CWC Over the course of the last week—since COVID-19 became a legitimate concern in New York City, where I live—my anxiety has been debilitating. For days, I’ve been on the verge of tears—or in tears. My heart is pounding and there’s a knot in my stomach that my usual “calm down” toolkit of exercise, meditation, and a daily dose of prescribed SSRIs (aka antidepressants), hasn’t been able to fix. These feelings have made doing even the smallest things, like feeding myself or getting dressed in the morning, seem impossible. And I know I’m not alone in this. Talking to friends and scrolling through Instagram, it’s clear that we are all stressed and scared in a way that’s hard to conceptualize, and it’s only gotten worse as the streets—in NYC, at least—have begun to clear out and take on an eerie sense of apocalyptic “WTF is going on”-ness. There’s a scientific reason as to why our brains respond to uncertain situations—like a pandemic with no known cure—with anxious thoughts and feelings. “The ability to use past experiences and information to predict the future allows us to increase the odds of desired outcomes, while avoiding or bracing ourselves for future adversity,” reads a 2013 study out of Nature Reviews Neuroscience. “Uncertainty diminishes how efficiently and effectively we can prepare for the future, and thus contributes to anxiety.” Right now, as we’re still learning more about COVID-19 seemingly every hour, there is a lot of uncertainty. “This
Why intermittent fasting has been a staple of long-living Blue Zones cultures for decades
March 20, 2020 at 12:00AM by CWC Blue Zones founder and The Blue Zones Kitchen Cookbook author Dan Buettner has spent his career studying the longest-living people on the planet. Teaching people longevity-boosting habits is his bread and butter, so to speak. His travels and research have shown him a lot about how often people who live long, healthy lives eat and live. While there are definitely dietary patterns that are solidly connected with longevity (ahem, the Mediterranean diet), Buettner has also found something else that many centenarians have in common: a natural tendency towards intermittent fasting, aka limiting eating to certain time periods within a given day or week. “Some centenarians in Blue Zones regions [eat] large breakfasts and smaller dinners,” he said in a recent Ask Me Anything in Well+Good’s Cook With Us Facebook group. “Breakfast was traditionally a time when people would eat after fasting for a long period of time, breaking their fast, and there is research that going back to that tradition has positive benefits, even if you eat your dinner at 6 p.m. and eat your breakfast at 7 a.m,” he wrote. This might not sound like IF, but it’s very similar—the 16:8 plan, for example, has people eat for an eight-hour window during the day and fast for the remaining 16 hours. Beyond being an OG practice in Blue Zones areas, there is research connecting intermittent fasting with living longer. “There is an association between intermittent fasting and longevity, but it’s important to