Do you ever wonder why there is so much office stress? Think about the different ways that your job can cause you stress. You may have to face busy roads and rush hour traffic in the mornings. Maybe you have a boss that puts a lot of pressure on you and never seems to show appreciation. Maybe you have co-workers that you don’t get along with or that you don’t feel pull their own weight.

Office stress does not have to rule your life.

Breathing with an inhale of 4 seconds and then a slight pause and then exhale for 4 seconds and then a slight pause can really make a huge difference in your mind, body, and spirit. HAve fun with this and practice often leads to bliss and relaxation beyond measure.

Adding Kava can help you find a natural balance. While job stress is common and to be expected, there are some ways you can reduce it. Certain health and lifestyle changes, as well as adding Kava to your diet can contribute to your office stress relief.

How Job Stress Affects You

Stress affects you in many different ways. It affects you physically, emotionally and mentally and each person handles their own stress in a different way.

Office stress can:

Lead to metabolic disease and increase the risk of heart disease and diabetes.
Increase risk of obesity.
Lead to depression, mood disorders and problems with anger management.
Lead to sleep disorders.
Contribute to alcohol or tobacco addiction.

Prescription medications can sometimes temporarily relieve the sensations you have and the symptoms of stress but it doesn’t actually treat the stress. Many people find that the side effects of prescription medications are worse than simply struggling with the stress. But there are other options.

Kava for Office Stress Relief

Office stress relief can be achieved with the help of Kava. Kava comes in the following forms for your convenience:

Capsules
Liquid
Tincture
Beverage
So there is always a way to work it into your diet and routine.

The breathing techniques can be with you always 24/7 365 days a year.

Aside from shutting down that computer and giving yourself ample time to stretch and relax, there are plenty of natural sleep aids. It’s important not to become dependent on sleep aids, even natural ones, but to find the root cause for your sleeplessness.
Nevertheless, some sleep aids worth trying are:

Massage Therapy can soothe even the most stressed out person. Low lights or candle, warm essential oils and skilled hands rubbing out any tension or stress out of the muscles

Valerian: a mild herb that helps you fall asleep without morning grogginess.

Kava: the ground up Kava root is used by Hawaiians to make a relaxing brew. I personally use this one and it works every time for me.

Herbal Tea: try peppermint, chamomile, hops, passionflower or lemon balm.

Diet: cut out caffeine, alcohol, and sugar, especially later in the day. Especially before 8pm rolls around

Melatonin: a natural sleep-inducing hormone, taken in pill form before bedtime.

Aromatherapy: try essential oils of lavender, chamomile or ylang ylang.

Soft Music or Meditation Podcasts: When I listen to a meditation podcast lying down, I’m always asleep before it’s over!

Be sure to research your choice so you prevent possible drug interactions or side effects.

Is the economy beating you up? It’s time to get creative. Next time you have an ache or pain, forget about a costly trip to the drugstore and test-drive some of your grandmother’s remedies instead. It’ll save money and be gentler on your body and the environment. Recessionistas (and gents), welcome to the DIY medicine cabinet.

1. Stop Bleeding
You’d think it would burn, but a sprinkle of cayenne pepper on a cut will quickly stop the bleeding and actually relieve the pain.

2. Toothache
There’s nothing so bad as the shooting pain of a toothache. You don’t want to ignore a tooth problem, because an infection that close to your brain can be extremely dangerous if it spreads. But in order to reduce swelling and pain while you wait for a dentist appointment, try putting a few drops of clove oil on your tooth and gums, and bite down on a smashed piece of garlic (which has excellent antibacterial properties).

3. Rashes and Allergies
Prescription and OTC antihistamines can cause some serious side effects. Before you head for the strong stuff, try green tea, which contains compounds with antihistamine properties. You’ll need to drink 2-3 cups a day to get the full effect.

4. Athlete’s Foot
It’s a foot fungus, and it stinks. Air those piggies, then soak them in salty water, wash them with garlic juice, or soak them with diluted white or apple cider vinegar. All of these things will help kill the fungus.

But you have to be persistent, consistent, and diligent: No matter what treatment you use, do it a few times a day and stick with it until at least a week after you think the symptoms are gone! Fungus excels at hiding out and coming back when you least expect it.

5. Acne and Sensitive Skin
First, you really have to look at your lifestyle, because imbalances in your health can show up in your skin. But in the meantime, wash your face with oatmeal. It’s a gentle exfoliant and draws out oil and impurities.

6. Ear Infections
Ear infections can become quite serious and cause permanent damage, so please see a doctor if your ear ache has become severe.

But if you feel like your infection is mild and at the beginning stages, put a few drops of garlic oil or white vinegar into your ear canal and lay down on the opposite side to let those drops do their work. Garlic and vinegar create an environment that won’t support the bacteria causing the infection. Repeat a few times a day until the symptoms disappear. (If your symptoms last longer than a few days, you should definitely see a doctor!)

7. Sore Muscles and Bruises
After a hard afternoon of rowing with a friend, I resigned myself to a few days of burning muscles and soreness. But my friend saved the day with a tube of arnica cream. He rubbed it on my shoulders and voila, instant relief and absolutely no aches the next day. The humble arnica flower makes an incredible cream that no medicine cabinet should be without. Use it immediately to speed up the healing of bruises, sprains, sore muscles, and other general aches. Epsom salt bath and a great massage therapist to tune up sore tired and lactic acid build-up from working out.

8. Flatulence
Some foods, like beans and raw veggies, are more likely to cause gas, but if you find flatulence to be too common of an occurrence, try taking a digestive enzyme with your meals. You can find these at any health food store.
In the meantime, make use of digestive spices such as ginger, anise, peppermint, coriander, and dill. You can make tea with these ingredients or incorporate them into your food.

9. Dandruff
Have you looked at the ingredients in dandruff shampoo? It seems like they contain almost everything in the Toxic Ingredients You Must Avoid list. Better to try something natural first before resorting to chemicals. Many people swear by rubbing aloe vera gel onto the scalp (leave it on for 20 minutes than rinse it out). This will certainly help with dry, itchy scalp.
Another remedy is a rinse with apple cider vinegar. Try these remedies a few times before deciding if they work for you. Even dandruff shampoo requires regular use to see results, so give the natural stuff a chance!

10. Headache and Migraine
Try rubbing peppermint or lavender oil on your temples and the base of your neck; sniffing these oils may also help.
Rub a fresh cut lemon or lime on your forehead. Feverfew is a good herbal remedy for headaches.
Have a little caffeine by way of green tea, and don’t forget to use an ice pack for 20 minutes to dull the throbbing.

11. Indigestion and Heartburn
It almost goes without saying – but consider why you’re getting heartburn in the first place. Did you overeat? Too much grease or spicy food? Eating late at night? Scout out the cause and try to stop this before it happens. Then, put down the antacids.
The belching, bloat, and heartburn caused by indigestion come about because you don’t have enough stomach acid to do the job right. A spoonful or two of apple cider vinegar will help break down the excess food that is causing you trouble and bring your stomach back to balance.

12. Constipation
First, drink more water and eat more fruit and salads. You’re backed up for a reason and taking lots of laxatives is not the answer. Meanwhile, drinking a few teaspoons of olive oil mixed with a bit of orange or (diluted) lemon juice can help things get moving.
Another surefire remedy is 1/4 teaspoon of epsom salts drunk in 1/2 a glass of water. Sometimes calorie restriction or avoidance of healthy fats (such as the good fats found in fish, nuts, and avocados) can worsen constipation.
And though it’s counterintuitive, some people relieve their constipation by actually cutting back on grain consumption! True, grains contain fiber, but some people don’t digest grains very well. Other causes of constipation include stress, depression, inactivity, and nutritional deficiencies. If your constipation is chronic, it may be a sign of a more serious problem, so please seek medical advice and adjust your lifestyle.

13. Sore Throat
Sore, scratchy throats are usually a sign of a cold or flu coming on, so you don’t want to ignore this symptom, but you can relieve the pain by gargling with warm salt water a few times a day and then drinking a soothing honey-lemon tea.

14. Burns
So you bumped up against the stove again? Ouch. Rinse first with cold water, but then immediately apply aloe vera gel to the burn. Best results use lavender essential oil neat or undilutes right on the burn reduces or eliminates scarring and lots of antibacterial properties in the oil.
For those of us who don’t have aloe in the house, slice a potato and rub its cool, soothing juices all over the burn.
And honey, with its antibacterial properties, is also good topical ointment. If you can catch the burn immediately, mustard is also reportedly a great salve.

15. Nausea
The classic cure for nausea or carsickness is ginger tea or candied ginger. You can chew on the stuff raw, if you like, but it’s so spicy and strong it might just make you feel worse.

Sniffing real peppermint or lavender oil can also help.

Give some of these remedies a try – and share your own tried-and-true treatments, too.

Chances are you used a lotion containing aloe vera to soothe it.

For decades aloe has been used to heal sunburns, minor cuts, burns, and wounds. But you probably didn’t know that aloe’s health benefits extend much further than that.

Here’s just one example:

It can help support balanced blood sugar.

A double-blind study in the journal Phytomedicine split 78 people into two groups. One group was given aloe vera daily. The other was not. After just six weeks, those taking aloe were better able to balance their normal blood sugar by 43%!

The group that didn’t take aloe had an average blood sugar increase of 2.4%.

But the research on this amazing plant doesn’t stop there…

Japanese researchers conducted a clinical trial of 70 people. They found that daily intake of aloe vera helped reduce levels of fasting blood sugar and glycated hemoglobin.2 Simply put, this is a measurement of how high your blood sugar has averaged over the last 90 days. It’s a test we use for earlier diagnosis of diabetes.

Here’s something else you may not know about aloe. It’s also been used to help with:
Supporting normal cholesterol
Alleviating everyday aches and pains
Digestive health
Kidney health
Why aren’t the remarkable health qualities of aloe talked about more in the media and mainstream medicine?

But the astounding multiple health benefits of this plant have been known to us for centuries.

In fact, aloe’s health benefits were first documented in Egypt over 3,500 years ago.

Dr. Ivan Danhof, one of the world’s top experts on natural herbal remedies, had this to say about aloe:

“If aloe vera were to be discovered today and its remarkable properties investigated, it would be hailed as the ‘wonder drug’ of this century.”

Bottom line: Why wait until mainstream medicine catches on? You can get the benefits of aloe starting today. For best results, take 200-800 mg a day.

But not all aloe vera is the same. There are different ways it’s prepared. I prefer a “cold-pressing” technique for extracting the beneficial compounds found in aloe.

Al Sears, MD

Garlic is an anti-bacterial and anti-viral, it kills off bacteria and yeast in the colon.

Drink 2 oz. of Aloe Vera juice 2x daily

Aloe Vera juice is an all-natural restorative for all the internal organs
Drink 8-10 glasses of purified water with Nutri-biotic (liquid or caps).

Nutri-biotic Grapefruit Seed Extract kills off yeast and bacteria throughout the body.

Drink 1-2 cups of Pao d’ Arco tea daily or the equivalent in caps or powder.

Pao d’ Arco is an infection fighter and it helps restore intestinal balance.

Add 1-2 Tbl of Psyllium husks to a glass of juice or rice/soymilk  daily

Psyllium husks are pure fiber and they help to “sweep” the colon clean.

Take 1-2 Tbl of Bentonite clay after meals.

Bentonite clay adheres to the walls of the intestines allowing fiber to give a deeper cleansing

Take 1 Tbl. of Acidophilus or Jarro-dolphilus after meals.

The bacteria in Acidophilus helps to restore the “friendly flora” in the intestines.

Minimize Mucous forming foods: dairy, red meat, fried foods, and iced drinks.

Herbs to cleanse and detoxify

Charcoal tablets from the health food store taken immediately following meals with water.

1/4-1/2 cup of

Baking soda with baths can help with
rash and eczema.

Cascara Sagarda is non-habit forming laxative.

Good For Lungs

Eucalyptus Oil

Boil Water and then turn off the heat. Add 10-20 drops of Eucalyptus oil. Place a large towel over your head. Place your head about 1-2 feet above the vapor and breathe in and out until the vapors are gone. Repeat if necessary. You may do this as often as you like.

I believe that massage therapy is shunned by the medical community primarily because it is considered an unsophisticated treatment — you don’t need a medical degree to give someone an effective massage. There’s not a lot of equipment involved in massage therapy, it doesn’t have a lot of cool technology, and it doesn’t require years of training. And thus, it is looked upon as something that is below Western medicine, both by doctors and by many patients.

But all of this is a distortion — something doesn’t have to be complicated or cool to be effective as a healing treatment. Massage therapy gets to the fundamentals — that is, the power of human touch, and the spiritual healing potential of one person’s hands touching another person’s body along with positive healing intent. These are timeless principles of healing that don’t require technology to be effective.

Given that massage therapy and therapeutic touch are so effective in helping patients heal themselves, I find it astounding to observe the lack of physical contact between doctors and their patients in clinics and hospitals across the country. Doctors almost seem scared to touch their patients, and in fact, many doctors don’t want to be touched, either. This lack of touch keeps everything at a “safe distance” – it makes their interactions non-personal and sterile. It also allows the doctor to keep patients at a distance, where they can perceive them as patients with patient IDs rather than human beings with souls and spirits and emotions. It is this distance — this chasm between doctors and patients — that contributes to the lack of effectiveness in modern medicine.

True healers are willing to get involved with their patients in terms of understanding them, seeing the world from their perspective, and even touching them in a healing way with positive intent. That’s why our modern physicians are outstanding technicians, but terrible healers. Personally, I would much rather see a massage therapist than a physician, unless I were suffering from sort of radical, acute injury such as an accident in which case, of course, Western doctors and surgeons are the very best in the world. But when it comes to treating chronic disease and maintaining a high degree of health on a regular basis, massage therapy and healing touch offer an outstanding system of healing that I highly recommend.

http://www.massageandbodywork.com/Articles/FebMar2007/handledwithcare.html