Hi folks,
This week I have been mostly…
Listening:
To the new album by Andy Shauf called The Party. If you like The Shins or Grandaddy you might enjoy this.
Contemplating:
The concepts that I am trying to communicate most clearly to my clients with regard to Chiropractic care:
1. There is a natural force within us that constantly heals and repairs us. We call this Innate Intelligence.
2. There are things that can confuse or interfere with this intelligence. We call these things Subluxations.
3. Our purpose is to address your Subluxations and help you return to a natural state of healing and health. We call these Adjustments.
Watching:
The build up to the McGregor vs Mayweather boxing match on Sunday. Whatever your views on combat sports and who will win, I appreciate the stoic philosophy and the positive mindset that Conor McGregor has espoused in his rise from nowhere to superstar in four years vs the legendary technician.
“An injury is not just a process of recovery, it’s a process of discovery.” - Conor McGregor
Eating:
A lot of super squidgy, stinky, raw cheese. August tends to be the month when friends come to stay and this time brought with them my favourite cheeses. The stinkiest was some unpasteurised Reblechon. My fridge may not ever smell the same again. The fact that this cheese is made from raw milk makes it taste better and is possibly better for us as it has more natural, and greater numbers, of bacteria in it which may be good for your ‘microbiome’ (the sum total of helpful symbiotic bacteria that populate your gut and your skin). The idea that full fat cheese is bad for us is highly questionable and in my opinion has been largely de-bunked; fat is essential and good fat is good for you.
Exercising:
Been revisiting the Bear Crawl. A great exercise for all joint mobility, balance and co-ordination. Good for core and spinal stability also. Here is a link for a beginners form of the exercise.
Have a great bank holiday weekend!
Simon
Finemore's Five For Friday (2)
Hi folks,
Welcome to the second instalment of Finemore’s Five for Friday, my weekly roundup of the five things I can’t stop doing this week, I’m enjoying or are simply on my mind.
This week I am mostly listening to...
The Feelies : Crazy Rhythms (Chiropractic band in the most appropriate sense) - great post punk poppy sound. This is their debut album; spring is on the way. Listen to them on Spotify here or check out the album on Rough Trade here.
This week I am mostly reading...
You are the Placebo by Joe Dispenza : an amazing description of the power of self healing that we all have access to from miraculous recovery to changes in the thoughts we choose that allow us to take the first steps in a preferred direction. Joe advocates meditation as a ‘way in’... here's the link to the book.
There's also a great podcast on the same topic from the Ice Man, Wim Hof, psychologist Stanley Krippner (85 yrs young) and Chris Ryan Phd that you can listen to here.
This week I am mostly appreciating...
The sound of vinyl - analogue in a digital world is rebellious. Dig ‘em out.
This week I am mostly exercising...
My low back stabilisers and Gluteus Medius integration with an exercise called ‘Flying Aeroplanes’ - one of my favourites : great to do when cleaning you teeth. Try it. Here is me doing it on YouTube.
This week I am mostly pondering...
The cultural specificity of productivity and progress. Are these concepts just cultural norms and is the idea of continual growth an illusion on a planet of finite resource?
In the podcast below Wade Davis (Ethnobotanist, explorer etc) mentions the fact that as late 1910 it was legal for white immigrants to shoot and kill ‘indigenous Australians’. It was considered that indigenous Australians were 'not human’ as they were not ‘productive' in normative immigrant terms.
In Indigenous Australian culture it was sacrilege to change, destroy or build upon the perfection of nature. Nature above all had to be appreciated and respected which resulted in the perceived lack of ‘progress’. This murderous clash of culture has stuck with me all week. Great podcast.
Have a great weekend and see you soon.
Until next time,
Simon
PS - Would love to know what you think of these or if you've got any questions you'd like answering send them through and I'll do my best to oblige.
Finemore's Five for Friday (Last Friday that is)
Hi folks,
Welcome to Finemore’s Five for Friday, my weekly roundup of the five things I can’t stop doing this week, I’m enjoying or are simply on my mind.
This week I am mostly listening to...
GRANDADDY - pending the release of their get-back-together album, I can't stop playing their single 'Evermore.' I love the synth sound as it opens, looking forward to seeing them live at the Roundhouse in London on the March 3rd (tickets still available). Dance or nod appropriately. Listen to Evermore by Grandaddy on Spotify.
This week I am mostly eating...
Kale from Cusgarne Organic Farm. Love this stuff. Just throw it in a covered pain with plenty of grass-fed organic butter and some chopped organic garlic. Salt and pepper to taste. Eat. Here’s a 5 min omelette with kale, mushrooms and eggs all from Cusgarne and all organic. Yum.
This week I am mostly appreciating...
How we all have power over the course and direction of our lives and the fulfilment of our dreams. The thoughts we have determine our perceptions, our dreams and our actions. If you want your life to take a new direction then you must think a new thought to gain a change in perspective and a change in your actions. We have the power, to change the way we think, be careful how big you dream.
“You are only as young as the last time you changed your mind.” Timothy Leary
This week I am mostly reading...
Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. It is a personal account of Dr Frankl’s experiences during WW2 in Auschwitz and other concentration camps. This might sound like a heavy read but his description of human resilience and the power of perception in the face of death is uplifting and inspirational.
This week I am mostly exercising...
My Quadratus Lumborum (low back stabilisers) : Sit upright on the floor, legs straight out in front of you and lift one buttock and walk it forward then the other buttock until you have travelled 10ft, then walk back again. Done (you can hold a small kettlebell to your chest as you do this).
I hope you've enjoyed the first instalment of Finemore's Five For Friday, have a great weekend and I look forward to seeing you soon.
Simon
Our daily bread and Glyphosate - the modern global health catastrophe thanks to Monsanto, agricultural practice and governmental policy.
Glyphosate is known as a weed killer and is everywhere, you can pick up a bottle at your local garden shop (‘Round-Up’). It’s sprayed on our parks, on our fields, on the crops we eat, on our livestock feed. It’s been found in the rain, our water, in the air we breathe. It is commonly found in our urine and breast milk, it bio-accumulates in us and in our environment and is really hard to get rid of. Surely it must be safe? Surely there must have been long term animal and human trials of safety before its global use? Erm...
Depending on what studies your read it has been labelled a ‘probable carcinogen’, an endocrine disruptor at 0.5 parts per million (which can lead to diabetes, hypertension, kidney dsease, thyroid disease, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, autism, fertility issues…), a neurotoxin, a gut health disruptor, it has been shown to be toxic to your liver and kidneys. There are correlations with chronic disease and poor fertility in animals (and humans) and even birth defects and the microcephaly associated by some with the Zika virus.
What is clear is that Glyphosate is a powerful chelator: a chemical that has an ability to remove metals and minerals (that is how it kills weeds by removing essential metals like Zinc or Manganese). This is what Glyphosate does to the soil and ultimately to the animals that live in the soil and those that eat the plants with Glyphosate: livestock and us. Glyphosate is therefore a powerful broad spectrum anti-biotic (it kills the essential bacteria in and on you).
Currently we are very concerned about anti-biotic resistant strains of bacteria in our hospitals because of the consistent over use of anti-biotics, yet we continue to allow millions of tonnes of more powerful anti-biotics to be dumped on our soils, in our food chain and ultimately in us.
When you consider the GMO or ‘Round-up Ready’ genetically modified crops that are designed to tolerate Glyphosate in greater concentrations things get even more scary. Not only has it been shown that there are mutagenic (cancer causing) changes in Rats in response to GMO feed but that there have been recorded large scale effects on herd immunity, fertility and survival of animals fed GMO feed compared to non-GMO fed animals.
Some forward thinking countries are have banned the use of Glyphosate in public spaces and its use in farming. We can only hope that Europe follows suit.
My advice:
1. Buy everything ORGANIC NOW or grow your own.
You can attemmpt to reduce your intake of Glyphosate for you (especially if you are considering having kids) and for your kids by growing your own. The easiest way is to only eat ORGANIC and NON-GMO and you can attempt to grow your own but make sure the land you grow on has not been previously sprayed with Glyphosate because it can take up to 10 yrs for it to naturally degrade.
http://www.cusgarneorganicfarm.co.uk
2. Take Humic Acid as a supplement which may help you to rid yourself of this chelator.
3. Avoid all GMO containing products and GMO fed animals as much as you possibly can.
For more information you can listen to this:
https://www.bulletproofexec.com/don-huber-318/
And read this:
http://www.examiner.com/article/is-it-the-gluten-or-is-it-the-glyphosate
'Health is the soul that animates all the enjoyments of life, which fade and are tasteless without it.' -Seneca
'Adjustment'
“I focus my attention on the interference component
of the subluxation, it is the Chiropractors job to remove interference, not straighten spines"”
Interference
Poor Signal
Chiropractors simply attempt to remove interference to the signalling of your nervous system - a bit like tuning your TV to make the picture crystal clear
Prevention before treatment
“We cannot treat our way out of the cancer problem. More commitment to prevention and early detection is desperately needed in order to complement improved treatments and address the alarming rise in cancer burden globally.”
Chiropractic Healing
“You can’t go mostly Gluten free or nearly Gluten free - gluten can have an effect on your physiology that lasts for days - So either do it properly and make a judgement on how you feel or Don’t make a judgement on the benefits of going Gluten free - In my humble opinion : I would recommend every human being to go Gluten Free.”
Chiropractic Philosophy
In order to maximise the expression of the potential within, we work best when we are free of interference…
there are three interferences :
-Trauma (a car accident)
-Toxins - either too much (cigarette smoke) or too little (vit D3) of something
-Auto-suggestion or thoughts (emotional or psychological stressors)
[after DD and BJ Palmer]
the tenets of Chiropractic
-
We are all self healing and self regulating
-Our nervous systems are the master control systems of us; they are the windows to our worlds
-We must address the cause and not the symptoms of a lack of health
-We must address the person as a physical, emotional and spiritual whole and not the components of a mechanism
“Natural Forces within us are the true healers of disease”
“the greatest force in the human body is the natural drive of the body to heal itself, but that force is not independent of the belief system, which can translate expectations into physiologic change. Nothing is more wondrous than the fifteen billion neurons in the human brain than their ability to convert thoughts, hopes, ideas and attitudes into chemical substances. Everything begins therefore, with belief. What we believe is the most powerful option of all.”
“Miracles happen not in oppostion to nature, but in opposition to what we know of nature.”
“Nature needs no help, just no interference.”
Recent research in the UK reported that approx 70% of subjects tested had evidence of Glyphosate in their urine
