Check out my newest program description in the video below. Enter your email in the box to the right or below to request an invite if you’d like to learn more about the program…

I just invented a new funny game and subsequently a new term. Are you ready?

Here goes.

What is your Spirit Vegetable?

Your Spirit Vegetable is the vegetable or edible plant that you can call on to give you power when you need it. You can ask your Spirit Vegetable for guidance or insight.

It’s what spinach was to Popeye. What polyjuice potion was to Harry Potter. What mushrooms are to the Super Mario Bros. What snuff was to my friends Grandma. What kale is to most health coaches. What flat-leafed parsley is to me.

This vegetable gives me energy like nothing else when I add it to my green smoothies. It makes me relaxed and centered.

What’s yours?

This is what you are about to discover:

Attention All Holistic Practitioners, Healthy Eaters, Nutrition Nerds, and Regular Cleansing and Detoxing Participants Who Are Ready To Stop Struggling With Their Nagging Health Concerns and Get It Handled Once and For All!

Finally Revealed in my ALL-NEW, Content-Rich Free Tele-Training…The Intestinal Ecology and Fermentation Secrets That No One Else Is Talking About!!!

“Fermented Food As Medicine: How to Recommend the Right Cultured Foods to Create Physical Breakthroughs in Your Clients’ Health”

When: January 31st at 12 noon Pacific, 3pm Eastern

Important: Special bonuses available for those who are live on the call or listen before this evening.

These factors are shared in this power-packed teletraining. Here’s what I’m bringing to the table:

• How to support your clients by learning the medicinal qualities of Fermented Foods so you can recommend the RIGHT foods every time.
• Learn what kinds of physical breakthroughs can be created in your clients’ health.
• How to maximize your clients everyday eating habits so they can extract the most nutrition from the food, improve their digestion and skyrocket their energy levels.
• The gateway to sensory empowerment and how you can access this so you can fully trust your senses to tap into your innate healing powers to heal yourself, your family and your community.
• Learn how some fermented foods can exacerbate health concerns while others can completely support healing.
• Why balancing your intestinal terrain is a lot like balancing your life…you can utilize these techniques to create a home environment that makes you thrive.
• How rebuilding can reduce inflammation, end digestive trouble and help you stabilize your weight (up or down).
• How to know for certain if you have an imbalanced gut ecology and what to do about it.
• The top 3 causes of intestinal flora imbalance.
• A clear explanation of what the biological terrain really is.
• The fastest way to improve your intestinal terrain right now with only one simple addition to your diet.
• Sneaky ways you may be sabotaging your overall health and what you can do today to break free of these habits to enjoy the freedom from low energy, cravings, and under-active immune system.
• The most valuable information about REBUILDING your intestinal ecosystem that you’ve ever heard.
• Exciting details about my ALL NEW Fermentation Mastery Home Study Program. I’ll share how to know if this program is right for you, what to expect by enrolling, how the training is unlike any training you’ve seen, and how you’ll benefit from getting LIVE coaching from me—and a few other BONUSES only available to people who make it to this call. But I must warn you…Fermentation Mastery is only for nutrition enthusiasts who are serious about learning how to balance and restore their gut ecology while taking their nutritional knowledge to the next level. If that’s you, then don’t waste any more time – register for this free tele-training now where I’ll include these details. I can’t wait to give you all this exciting content and training in this training call!!!

You can tell…. I have so much incredible information to share with you that will permanently change your experience by creating total control of your health. There will be so many ah-ha’s during this call, you’re going to want to bring a pad of paper and a pen. Once you register, you’ll automatically receive the call-in info in your inbox.

I got an amazing question from a fellow health coach just the other day.

“I made a huge batch of cultured veggies and they came out soggy and boy, are they pungent. I followed Donna Gates’s recipe in the Body Ecology Diet, Version 1. I shredded the cabbage in the food processor and made a brine in the blender. Maybe I should have sliced the cabbage instead of shredding? Is the absence of salt the reason why they are soggy? I would love to enjoy but I just don’t like the taste and certainly can’t ask clients to eat it. Any tips? Thanks much!”

—Christine

Here is the link to the recipe to which Christine refers:

http://bodyecology.com/articles/cveggies.php

Christine, first off, congrats on the attempt. Fermenting your own foods is an exciting adventure into a new realm of food preparation…preservation to be exact. The only way to learn is to try.

Based off your results, I can share a few of my expert sauerkraut-making tips:

• I rarely recommend adding water or brine to any sauerkraut because it dilutes the flavor tremendously and isn’t necessary if you are making it properly.
• Never use starter when making sauerkraut or raw cultured veggies. Based on my research, I have found that it impacts and changes the final probiotic strains. The best probiotics for you are found in sauerkraut that is WILD fermented without starter culture.
• It is best to ferment in a crock and not in a jar where you are putting a lid on. Lacto-fermentation shouldn’t happen in a air-tight environment unless you have an airlock, which allows gases to escape the jar.
• If you choose to use the whole cabbage leaves as a way to ‘fill the remaining 2 inch space” it is imperative that you keep the leaves covered in the brine. You may have to push the leaves down daily for a few days until they stay put under the brine. This is one of the main causes of mushy kraut when yeasts start feeding on the cabbage leaves that are poking out above the brine.
• I’m curious how long you let yours ferment. Three days is an exceptionally short amount of time for fermentation. I recommend at least a week and often 2-4 weeks before jarring it and placing it in the fridge.
• I must say, that saltless sauerkraut is not easy for the beginner to make. It is a more advanced technique of sauerkraut-making, and has wayyy more failed attempts than salted sauerkraut. Yes, salt has a huge impact on crunchiness. But with practice (and a better recipe) you can make saltless sauerkraut that is delicious.

Thanks again for the great question. Good luck in your future sauerkraut-making adventures.

If you want any additional support so you can share this healing food with your clients—including recipes and probiotic know how—feel free to check out my Fermentation Mastery Home Study program.

In Module 2, I cover everything you need to know about sauerkraut-making including which health concerns are best healed with cultured veggies and which are exacerbated by them. You can jump on over here to check out Fermentation Mastery.

You know how good you feel on a detox? Have you ever noticed that you never feel as good OFF the cleanse as you do ON the cleanse? Well, here’s the thing…there are specific things you have to do to maintain your energy levels and continue the cleansing effects.

Have you ever wished that someone would sit down with you and tell you the inside scoop about gut chemistry so you can take your health to the next level without having to take pills, choke down more supplements, or spend months or even years on a special cleansing diet?

Why is no one telling you the real deal?

Here’s why…

Because up until now, helping the gut meant taking proprietary probiotics, pharmaceuticals and pills. Even the herbal and alternative worlds have been emulating the allopathic medical system by taking things to ‘kill Candida” or taking “special probiotics formula with trillions of live cultures.”

This allopathic paradigm that sickness comes from the outside sets people up to get even sicker in order to heal themselves. People are tryng to force organisms to live in their intestines by flooding their gut with probiotics without ever finding out what they need to thrive. It’s like introducing wolves back into the wild without even paying attention to the fact that their habitats have been destroyed.

This paradigm also has people believing that in order to get well, they have to kill a germ, parasite, virus, or bacteria inside of them, which will make them sicker first and then better. The way doctors treat cancer is like taking a forest with diseased trees and slashing and burning until there is only soil and smoldering stumps. At least the diseased trees are gone, right?

Wrong. This paradigm is the same mode of thinking that has the industry pasteurizing all of our food, prescribing antibiotics like it’s going out of style, and recommending hand sanitizer everytime you touch something.

It is time for a paradigm shift.

Instead of focusing solely on the germs, we simply need to restore the proper environment in the body so that the right organisms will thrive and naturally keep pathogens away. Even Louis Pasteur (you know, the one who invented pasteurization) had a change of heart. As he said on his deathbed, “The microbe is nothing. The terrain is everything.”

Rebuilding the proper biological terrain is the most important step in reversing and preventing disease.

How do you do that?

Rebuilding is easy! What I’ve got for you is the missing link for the nutrition nerd in you that breaks down step-by-step all the factors needed to properly balance your intestinal terrain so you can have the energy, immune function, and digestive fire to take control of your health.

This ‘control’ is actually your ability to connect fully to your senses and know how to trust exactly what messages are being conveyed. If you’d like to try your hand at developing your senses and enhancing the magical powers that are your birthright, then check out Fermentation Mastery.

As you know, I’ve been gluten-free for almost 10 years and dairy-free for 5 years. I rarely eat sugar, and eat very little concentrated sweeteners. So how in the heck do I go about preparing a Thanksgiving meal?!?!
I created a full-meal plan for healthy eaters who love Thanksgiving food and don’t want to miss out on the fun. I even got my entire family to make this meal with me last year!!!

The recipes are almost entirely vegan (not including the turkey, of course)

Summer’s Simple Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free, Sugar-Free and Almost Vegan Thanksgiving Includes these recipes:

• Miso Gravy
• Pumpkin Pie with Thyme (adapted from Matthew Kenney, Everyday Raw)
• Gluten-Free Stuffing
• Sauteed Greens with Spicy Garlic Chi
• KISS Sweet Potatoes Smoked Delicata Squash
• Cranberry-Apple-Ginger Juice
• Salad with Tahini Dressing and Sauerkraut
• Cranberry-Sauerkraut Salad
• Simple Turkey Roasting

As Thanksgiving approaches, I’m taking an inventory of my life to see what I’ve accomplished this year. I’m grateful for my accomplishments. I create lofty goals for myself at the beginning of each year and take time to reflect upon the things I’ve done and celebrate those. This is what excites me and turns me on.

Here’s the list of my accomplishments:

• I launched my Nutrition Geek Detox and enrolled over 30 people in it this year alone.
• I raised my private coaching rates and reduced the number of individual clients that I work with by half.
• I discovered that my mission is to see people develop unshakable connections with their bodies and get so smart about food, nutrition, and their senses that they no longer have to look outside themselves to things like pills.
• I directed, scripted, and developed the curriculum for my most awesome training series – Fermentation Mastery – and had this professionally filmed and edited. I created a virtual training program where I sent out Fermentation Kits to all the participants. It was AWESOME!
• My health is INCREDIBLE and better than it’s ever been in my entire life. I feel energetic almost every day and I know how to schedule in down time to keep my battery charged. I’m realistic about what I can take on and what I need daily in order to stay majorly on top of my game. My digestion is superb, my allergies and chemical sensitivities are gone. My weight is stable and I don’t walk around feeling hungry or deprived. I exercise regularly without struggling to get to the gym. In fact, I jump out of bed just to get there on time. I eat incredibly healthy most of the time, but I enjoy eating out and eating baked goods, too. And I don’t finish the whole pint of ice cream in one night anymore. In fact, it takes at least two and sometimes 3 or 4 sittings to finish the pint.
• I spearheaded the OlyKraut fundraising campaign that is still going strong – and got an amazing filmmaker to create a beautiful short movie that shows how we bust out hundreds of gallons of sauerkraut every month.
• I have been asked by one of the largest chain of grocery stores in the Pacific Northwest to supply them with raw-unpasteurized OlyKraut.
• I was asked to speak on stage in San Diego and Philadelphia this year with Holistic MBA, my mentors who continue to inspire and stretch me.
• I was courted and seduced to contribute four of my fermented foods recipes in Kevin Gianni’s newest book, “Cultured: How to Make Fermented Foods at Home” with Donna Gates and other amazing superstars.
• I was asked to become a contributing faculty at a Healing Institute (I haven’t decided, yet.)
• I quit my day job and became a full-time entrepreneur fully supporting herself financially. WooHoo!

Wow, that sorta felt like bragging. I guess it is a little of that. But really, this is a celebration. I’m using this moment to feel full gratitude and nothing else for these successes!!! Through and through. Breathe in joy. Exhale relief. Inhale gratitude. Exhale tension. Inhale safety. Exhale fear.
These are the goals I set for myself. And here they are. I’ve reached them.

Hint: If you never take the time to appreciate where you are and where you’ve come from, you’ll never get the satisfaction of ‘getting there’. Why? Because you decide where ‘there’ is.

In full disclosure, these things weren’t all peaches and cream every step of the way. I could tell you a list of things that went wrong that would probably be longer than this list. ??But that’s not what it’s about. ??It’s the time to acknowledge how far I’ve come.

And I got here because I made some BIG ASS GOALS for myself. I actually wrote them down. I saw visions of myself in the future making a difference in people’s lives and creating the world around me that I want to live in. I recommend you take the time to do this.

Because everyone has big dreams and goals.

But why do some people reach theirs and others do not?

Because those of us who do reach them have a ‘why’. We have figured out what the Big Why in the Sky is. ??Even 5 years ago, I was still getting my final certifications in Integrative Nutrition from Columbia and IIN.

And I was still sick. I was working out my digestive struggles. I was trying desperately to get rid of environmental allergies that plagued me every Spring. I was searching for answers, anything, that would give me momentary relief of the heartburn, chemical sensitivity, clogged liver, bad skin, persistent post nasal drip, and either diarrhea or constipation every day.

My Big Why in the Sky was to get my health into an impeccable state so I could help heal others without feeling like a fake or a phony. I wanted to have full integrity in my health coaching practice and this motivated me to make big goals for my health, life and business.

But then there was a giant leap forward. Everything totally fell into place once I figured out the right way to heal my digestion. And with all of these pieces in place, things shifted nearly overnight for me.

That has completely opened up a new world for me. And so has teaching this strategy.

Now, I can function at a high level and no longer have to use my poor health as an excuse for not being able to get things done.

Now let me tell you what happened next.

I had no more excuses. And this was VERY uncomfortable. I had nothing in the way of reaching my goals anymore – and I was terrified!

So this is how I dealt with it.

I had to work everyday through feelings of fear, that I almost shut myself down. I had to take cold showers in the middle of the day and exercise to keep myself breathing. I kept holding my breath because I was so scared. Scared of getting what I wanted!

Sounds kinda crazy, I know, but this story is not uncommon. In fact, my teacher, Debbie Ford, when she became a best selling author and reached a place of great success, reached the most depressing time in her life. ??Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not depressed or anything like that, but I’ve had to move through a lot of terror this year in order to reach my goals.

But the game-changer was when I realized that I needed a new BIG WHY. I had fulfilled my health goals and needed to make a bigger impact.

So after some soul searching and lots of listening, I came up with a few big beliefs.

    1.    The healers are going to heal the world.

Every individual is infinitely powerful. Each of us has so much potential as healers and creators. Like the tiny mosquito, one person can make an incredible difference. I could go on and on about this, but here it is in a nutshell: Our people need leaders that can take them through this next transition of society and the environment. It is going to take the most intuitive, creative and articulate people to guide us through this giant global transition.

    2.    Personal healing is the ultimate path to tapping into personal power.

Health concerns are one of the biggest limiting factors when it comes to individual power. There are so many people who WANT to make a big difference, but they are still dealing with REAL EXCUSES like their health, money, and safety.

By facing these real excuses and handling them, there is nothing left but action, change and leadership.

    3.    My business is all about helping people heal themselves so they can heal our society and create meaningful lives for everyone.

And ultimately this means people fully reclaiming their senses, trusting their inner guidance, learning to follow their intuition and trusting their own ideas.

My mission is to see people develop unshakable connections with their bodies and get so smart about food, nutrition, and their senses that they no longer have to look outside themselves to things like pills. I’d like to see people realize that there is nothing actually wrong or broken with them and that their innate healing power is a skill that they must develop and nurture until it becomes so strong that something amazing happens.
?YOU’VE GOTTA GET CLEAR ON YOUR BIG WHY

It would be beneficial to write down some of your Big Why’s right now if you’d like. Even a couple years ago, all I wanted to do was be healthy and live a simple life. Yoga every morning, lots of self-care, great food, I dreamt of a personal chef and many other extravagant ideas.

But once I healed my body, I didn’t want to spend all that energy trying to be healthy. I was already there. Surprisingly, once my focus was off my own health, it shifted to the big picture. I take incredible care of myself, but it is so easy now, it doesn’t take much time at all.

WHAT’S YOUR MISSION?

If you’re dealing with health concerns, then you’re mission is probably a lot like mine was: lots of self-care and just trying to get it gone.

That’s totally fine. You are where you are at.

And this is what I help people do. Through my Fermentation Mastery program, I go through the entire details to re-establishing the proper flora, healing the intestines, boosting immunity and ultimately developing a strong connection to the body. I have the whole thing laid out and it works like a charm.
In fact, I’m gearing up for Fermentation Mastery right now.

But once, you move through your last health concerns and develop an unshakable connection with your body, your Big Why should shift, too.

You’re mission might be “helping people get rid of Candida and restore proper digestion” or “helping people detox so they can fully live their lives” or “helping women grow healthy babies” or “healing from chemical sensitivity or food sensitivities.”

Whatever your mission is…can change. And it probably will.

WHAT THIS MEANS FOR YOU

It’s time to clarify your mission and your Big Why. I recommend taking the time to open up and ask yourself what are the crazy things? the huge things? the big lofty goals and dreams that feel or seem impossible. Those are the ones I want you to write down. If you can take 2 minutes right now to jot down a couple, go for it. If not, I’ll help you do it in one of my programs.

What a journey! Thanks for reading all of this. This is the ever-developing version of what I’ve got and it’s always changing. Don’t worry, I’ll keep you updated.

I just put myself out there and revealed the things that I rarely talk about with people. Some of you probably totally disagree with what I’m saying and others are probably resonating with it.

I want to ask you a favor — will you please comment in the box below and let me know what your reaction is to what I’ve had to say here. Do you agree? Do you disagree? Do you have other ideas? Do you want me to stick to talking about fermentation and gut rebuilding instead of this stuff? Let me know. ??Thanks a million!

Have you ever wondered if you will take your handful of daily supplements for the rest of your life?

I did.

Watch this video to hear my take on taking supplements forever.

P.S. I must mention. The doors to Fermentation Mastery are closing soon. You have until Monday the 29th to sign up. That’s 4 Days from now. The first class starts at 4pm Pacific. Here’s what you’re going to miss out on if you don’t save your seat: 

•  The coolest package delivered to your door filled with your own fermenting crocks, miso, starters for kefir, kombucha babies and more…

  

•  The opportunity to learn how to ferment your own foods, rebuild your biological terrain, and make your kitchen and pantry sustainable.

•  The gateway to sensory empowerment and how you can access this so you can fully trust your senses to tap into your innate healing powers to heal yourself, your family and your community.

•  Why balancing your intestinal terrain is a lot like balancing your life…you can utilize these techniques to create a home environment that makes you thrive.

• PLUS! The bonus that I haven’t even disclosed, yet! A one-on-one interview with a well-known health coach who wants to share her secrets to staying healthy while running a blossoming business.

By now, you’re probably totally ready to register. You can do that here.

If you want more info about the program: Here’s the Invitation 

Maybe you want more info…I highly recommend listening to the recording of THIS Training Call

Have you ever stepped on a bee and known exactly what it was before the pain even started?

That’s what I did…two days in a row.

Walking through my clover-filled lawn, my sandal flipped the bee right under my foot.

Ouch!!!

As an herbalist, I’m wracking my brain, trying to remember what to do. My foot started throbbing so bad I couldn’t even put weight on it. I forgot how bad bee stings hurt!

After forever (minutes) of searching the herbal shelves in my herb room (office), my herbal education came flooding back into my mind.

Watch this video to see exactly what I used on my bee sting.

Unfortunately the next day I stepped on another bee. But look on the bright side! I got to test my remedy out again and it worked even better because I slopped on the potion immediately after I got stung.

In the comments below, I’d like to hear what other things you’ve tried besides my secret little potion.

BONUS: I’m teaching a FREE Tele-Training this Monday. It’s going to be rad. It’s all about transforming your digestion so you can have beaucoups of energy. And I’m all about fermented food, so I’ll be explaining how to restore and replenish the intestinal flora.

This call is going to be 90-minutes of action packed fun and excitement. Click on over there and register for this free call. Hurry! I only have 100 phone lines available.

P.S. August is coming to a close fast. This means that Fermentation Mastery is only a couple weeks away! Get your invitation now so you can join the other movers and shakers in this life-changing journey.