Moral of the story: Don’t shop when you are hungry! When you are hungry everything looks tempting, and you end up bringing home items, you really don’t need. The key is to slow down long enough to make a list, and maybe even have a healthy snack. Just don’t let your unchecked cravings rule the day, whether you’re shopping for dinner, skin care, the perfect partner, that house, car or the the life you want!

It is the same regarding our personal safety. Self defence trainers agree that intuition is possibly your best technique. Women are born with this gift to sense danger. We need to use it. If you notice something that makes you feel uncomfortable, go with it and get out of the situation. Your unconscious may be picking up on something you consciously are not aware of.

We are all born with this ability. However we can fine tune it, to make it really work for us. The way to do this is, identify places you know very well and spend a lot of time at, like your home, office or favourite mall. Then try to find 3 things in each of the places you have never noticed before. This will help train your mind to pick up irregularities. Start doing this with places you visit less often. As you get along, you will become more aware of your environment and train your intuition in the process.

Once you pick up a message from your environment, Act on it and use it to make decisions. This is a wonderful way to protect yourself and also to notice opportunities.

Chronological Age:

The length of time since birth which forms the basis of many peoples views on how ‘young’ or ‘old’ they are. But this can be contrasted with biological age.

Biological Age:

This is the physical age of ones body. If a healthy diet and exercise is maintained, body organs and processes may appear to be those of a much younger chronological age. The opposite also applies.

Social Age:

This is defined by the habits, behaviours, interests and attitudes of a person. People in their sixties may share the attitudes and interests of their children and identify with people with chronological ages of 20 to 30.  Ever heard the expression ‘young at heart’. Act young, be young.

Psychological Age:

This refers to our adaptive behaviours and the way we cope with situations. If you do not become fixed in your attitudes and are able to change and adapt to different situations your psychological age may be that of an adventurous twenty something.

Trying to describe age is subjective. Hence the concept of functional age has come into favour. Functional age is obtained by measuring performance on the above four  ranges.  This is a useful way of thinking about age as it defines us in our actual ability rather than how long we have been alive.

Can you calculate your functional age? The good thing with this, is you can take steps to improve it. Lets share some ideas on how to improve functional age.

Furthermore, if one does this mental exercise for two hours, it would mean burning off a pack of Hula Hoops (175 calories), bag of Maltesers (186), a Cadbury’s Creme Egg (173), or a bag of Jelly Babies (180), the research said.

Mental agility expert Tim Forrester from brain training website cannyminds.com, which published the claims, said, “Our brains require 0.1 calories every minute simply to survive.”

“When we do something challenging such as a puzzle or a quiz we burn through 1.5 calories every minute,” he added.

Eight-time World Memory Champion Dominic O’Brien said brains need work outs just as much as bodies do.

“Just as you need to continually exercise your body to stay fit and healthy you also need to exercise your brain and memory to remain mentally agile,” he said.

The brain function
According to the experts, doing a mental exercise burns calories in the same way as a physical workout does.

To justify the unusual claim, the researchers explained how the brain functions. They said our brain is made up of millions of nerve cells called neurons which transmit the messages to and from the body.

To relay the messages, the neurons produce chemicals called neurotrasmitters that need glucose, calories and oxygen to work effectively. Thus, the more challenging exercises you undertake, the more energy the brain will require and the more calories you will burn.

A spokesman from the British Dietetic Association said, “When thinking hard, the brain needs to get its energy from somewhere. It can get this energy from burning calories.

“The brain is like any other body part-if you are working it hard you will need more calories to work well.”

Thinking harder will not make you thinner
The experts have warned that thinking harder or taking up mind games should not be taken as a potential way to shed some extra pounds. You still need to do physical excercise and eat healthy.

Although the brain uses more energy while doing difficult puzzles and quizzes involving mental exercise, it only breaks down the glucose molecules in blood and not the fatty tissue to do so.

Losing pounds will still need a healthy diet intake and a regular fitness regimen, they said.

What is an alcohol?

An alcohol is a compound where a hydroxyl group (-OH) is bound to a carbon atom or carbohydrate like sugar. The hydroxyl group makes the alcohol more polar. That means it gives the alcohol an electric charge.  This hydroxyl group also enables alcohol to easily attract water.

Why alcohol is harmful to the skin?

Alcohol draws water out of skin cells. Image from Organic Apoteke

 Alcohols in skincare products draws water out from skin cells. Hence alcohol dehydrates skin cells. These cells which are normally plump due to being filled with water (almost 80 % of the cell is water) are tightly packed together to form a protective barrier. The skin is an organic which has many functions of which the following two are the most vital:  

1. Preventing moisture loss from the body and also preventing too much of water from entering the body, like when we take a shower. Can you imagine what would happen if we absorbed all that water?
2. Preventing bacteria and environmental toxins from entering the body.

However when the alcohol draws out water from the skin cells they shrink, think of a grape that is dried to become a raisin. When the cells shrink spaces around the cells gets larger. Environmental toxins and bacterial that normally will not be able to enter the skin can do so now due to the spaces being larger.

Close up of Dehydrated cells, showing the spaces between the cells that enable toxins to enter. Picture from Organic Apoteke

Recent studies suggest that a large number of people with chemical sensitivities are actually allergic to alcohol. Furthermore alcohol in compromising the skins integrity, exposes the deeper layers of the skin to environmental toxins, that may otherwise be unable to penetrate into the skin. Hence alcohol is also a sensitising agent.

Alcohol also stimulated melanocytes which can result in hyper pigmentation of the skin and increased age spots.  

All alcohols, organic grain, alcohol denat as well as fatty alcohols such as cetyl, ceteryl, stearyl, benlzyl and phenoxyethanol have the hydroxyl group and have the ability to dehydrate the skin. Obviously the larger amount of alcohol in the product, the more dehydrating the product.

I would love to have your questions and thoughts.

As I went on compiling the list – I met with various people who shared their gratitudes with me, and I then realised that I needed to add many of theirs onto my list, as I overlooked so many things that make life truely wonderful.

So I decided to start a list and would really appreciate if you could add on.  I realise that daily, I overlook things that I should feel truely grateful for.

Here goes.

I am grateful for:

1. A warm house that keeps me out of the winter cold.

2. Good health

3. Knowing there will be a meal when I’m hungry

4. Surviving the recession

5. Having a loving family

6. Having a family

7. Having friends to share joys and woes with

8. This beautiful planet that provides us with all we need

9. Intelligent people to look up to and be inspired

10. My mistakes as they have taught me so much

11. The driver who swerved to avoid a puddle and ensure he did not splash me

12.

Happy Thanksgiving, Share the Joy!