It’s the time of year when we make wild and, in the moment, believable New Year resolutions – we all do it. We get started but within the first couple of weeks those same resolutions have already started to fall by the wayside one by one. We berate ourselves and vow to start again, but once the momentum has gone it feels almost impossible to pick it back up again. Other than the odd mavericks, we are all pretty much in the same boat, some don’t even get off...

We all have bad habits, some more than others, but how do we actually change them because it can be more than a bit challenging to just stop doing something that you have done for ages, and you actually enjoy, even if you know it is not as healthy as it should be. Yeah, we could go cold turkey, but this option is not usually sustainable unless we have an ironclad will which most of us struggle with, so it may be best to try something a bit different. Crowd...

Not all change is invited in or even vaguely encouraged, but there are times when we instigate it ourselves, which can make it especially perplexing if we start to wonder if we’ve made the right decision when in our hearts we know we have. Being away from the comfort of what we know can create an odd feeling and one that we probably never envisioned. Take an old pair of slippers, for example, they are super comfy, and even though they are rough around the edges, have long since...

When I first trained as a naturopathic nutritionist I helped a friend lose so much weight that we calculated it had increased her life expectancy by around 9 years which was incredible. What a huge gain for such a great loss! 100 days a year I worked out that 9 years equates to 3,287 days – including leap years - so based on her age – 50 - and the average female life expectancy – 83 – if she hadn’t lost the weight and altered her lifestyle she would have...

But why and how has it taken so long? The stats are bad We have been watching the world becoming increasingly overweight, obese, and even morbidly obese for years, and barely even rumours have come from the top. Hospital beds have been filling up with type 2 diabetes patients – 1 in 4 beds allegedly – and still, they’ve barely said a word. People, young and old, are dropping like flies, fighting cancer, battling alzheimers – thought to be type 3 diabetes – and dealing with chronic heart conditions, still, there’s been...

As I write this I’m 55 years old - 56 this summer - that sounds like a pretty big number to me, certainly when I was younger I thought 55 was ancient, however now I am here I only feel 25, I certainly never feel as old as my number might suggest, even on a bad day! A great question to ask yourself is 'How old would you be if you didn't know how old you were?' If your answer is anything close to your actual age, or God...

Any hay fever sufferer will know just how uncomfortable, and even debilitating, the condition can be in the height of hay fever season. I used to have the worst symptoms including an itchy throat I simply could not scratch, a profusion of sneezes, followed by a runny nose that replicated a running tap. It also came and went without any reason or warning, although on some days it lasted all day and was totally exhausting. Nature always knows best Having always been a naturopath at heart - even before I...

It really is a very good question and one that I will endeavor to answer so you can get to the bottom of your tiredness once and for all – spoiler alert; it is not all about bedtime routines! On my daily commute to London, it seems that half the passengers sleep, whilst the other half are hard at work. I find it troubling to see people sleeping on the morning commute, as they must have only been up a few hours if that! And for those who are...

It seems we can’t get enough of ultra-processed foods, it is believed that over 50% of what we eat falls into this food category – that’s if you can call it food. According to Mark Hyman, renowned American physician, and best-selling author “There is no such thing as junk food. There is junk. And there is food.” The oh-so-clever emotive marketing The biggest problem we face is the clever marketing of these foods that play on our emotions and our innate sense of lack. Take a look at the following...

As we age, walking up hills and taking the stairs are some of the first capabilities that start to decline, and they go downhill fairly rapidly once we start to struggle which is why I advocate taking the stairs as often as you can for as long as you can because by doing so you should be able to continue on for many years No, not the stair lift! You may be way off the age of getting a stair lift, but as with this wise Chinese proverb – The...

Originally a legal term used to set crystal clear rules so that there’s no ambiguity or room for misunderstanding around certain situations, Bright Line Rules can be used to mark clear personal boundaries when it comes to your own actions and behaviours and they work in many areas of your life to produce predictable and consistent results. What even are Bright Line Rules? I first heard of Bright Line Rules through a YouTube video hosted by Tom Bilyeu, American entrepreneur, and serial motivator. He describes them as rules you simply...

I was berated recently by someone for not keeping up with the news and therefore being ‘out of the loop’ in their eyes. I don’t agree and my reply was “The news is toxic and depressing, it makes me feel anxious and fearful. Besides the really important stuff will always filter through, anything else is just negative noise which I don’t need in my life and I feel better for it.” Choose to avoid negativity Many years ago I chose to no longer follow the daily news and I have...

I personally, can’t bear to eat a meal without some kind of fruit and/or vegetables on the side, but it seems I am fairly unique in this. In my book Feeding Good Habits, I write a whole chapter suggesting that meals should feel ‘naked’ if they are void of fruit, salad and vegetables. I even go so far as to say that fruit, salad and vegetables should be the main event on any plate, taking up at least half of the plate, and leaving the other elements - protein...

Kathy Mac – author of Feeding Good Habits For a start, the cost of living crisis is not really a crisis at all. We often label events as a disaster, a nightmare, a catastrophe, a crisis, even though things rarely are. I changed the way I looked, thought, and talked about difficult life events some years ago, by replacing all of the above words with the simple word ‘challenge.’ It suits the situation much better in 99.9% of cases, if not more, and can almost instantly reduce the so-called disaster, nightmare,...

I hear so many horror stories about foods that kids are ‘surviving’ on and it breaks my heart into pieces because I know firsthand it doesn’t have to be like that, I also know many of the problems adults face today started out when they were kids. Thriving, Not Surviving Many parents, often completely innocently, set their kids up for a life of misery, obesity, low nutrition, and food addiction, alongside all the symptoms those things bring with them. None of which are easily fixed – so when I say...

Einstein was believed to have said ‘Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.’ he was right, however, it seems, we still continue to do exactly that – crazy isn’t it? Take the diet industry for instance and look at how the above statement plays out there. The fact that the global diet industry is worth billions and yet globally people are getting larger only proves how little impact it is having. In fact, it is having a negative effect and this is why…… Get...