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By Henry, April 24, 2009 6:27 pm

Take care of your personal hygiene

Ok you’re looking sharp in that suit you just got altered to fit perfectly. Now let’s take a look at personal hygiene. Yes you brush your teeth and shower everyday. Good start but there’s more! Once again, it’s in the details.

It’s all good stuff not just for work but also for your personal life. Your significant other/better half/date will really appreciate it. Your body will appreciate it too. Take care of your body and it’ll take care of you.

Here’s a checklist of things you should be mindful of.

Shave:
If you have a mustache/goatee/beard, be sure to keep it trim and neat. Otherwise keep it clean and shave! You don’t want to look like you just rolled out of bed. That five o’clock shadow is also going to tear up the collars of your shirts.

Hair Care:
Whether you have short or long hair, you need to have it cut on a regular basis. If you’re waiting until you look like Shaggy from Scooby Doo you’re waiting too long. Cutting your hair isn’t just about keeping it trimmed. As hair gets old, it starts to dry at the ends, split, and get fizzy. Cutting off the old hair will make it look healthier and allow it to grow.

Be proactive and keep you hair looking good all the time by getting it trimmed before it starts to get wild. Short hair should be cut every 3-4 weeks. You can go a bit longer with long hair but, again, watch the split ends.

Wash your hair regularly and use a real shampoo. Soaps tend to dry out your hair. I recommend organic shampoos that are free of harmful chemicals like sodium lauryl sulfate, a possible carcinogen. Trader Joes has a couple of shampoos that are affordable yet free of these chemicals.

Use a styling gel, pomade, etc to keep your hair tamed and styled throughout the day.

Deodorant:
Use deodorant to keep body odor under control. But avoid antiperspirants that prevent you from sweating. Sweating is a normal bodily function. It helps regulate the body temperature due to heat, exercise and stress. Antiperspirants contain a toxic aluminum based compound that pose serious health risks including Alzheimer’s and breast cancer. Deodorants, on the other hand, only take the odor away by killing the bacteria that causes it. I’ve personally been using the natural mineral crystals for years and it works great. Check out www.thecrystal.com

Clean clothes:
Wash your clothes regularly and iron them before wearing. Shirts should only be worn once before washing. Pants can be worn several times. This varies depending on how dirty they get.

Have a stain removal pen handy to keep stains from setting in before you have a chance to take care of it. It will save you from buying new clothes or wearing ones with stains on them. I personally like the Tide to Go Instant Stain Remover pen.

When you clean your clothes, follow the care instructions on the label. It’ll extend the life of your clothes and keep them looking great. Separate your lights and darks so you don’t have that new red t-shirt turn your white dress shirt pink. I tend to add an extra rinse cycle to my loads. One rinse isn’t enough to get all the detergent and dirty water out. It also prevents your white shirts from turning gray too quickly.

Don’t over dry your clothes as it will shorten their lifespan and generate more wrinkles. Take them out while they’re still a tad damp. And definitely never leave clothes in the dryer longer than they have to. If you have the option, hang them up to air dry. It’s more environmentally friendly, energy efficient and it’ll save you money.

If you do need to get clothes dry cleaned, make sure to go to a place that doesn’t use the common dry cleaning agent perchloroethylene (aka perc or PCE). It is a central nervous system depressant and a known carcinogen. Inhaling its vapors can cause dizziness, headache, sleepiness, confusion, nausea, unconsciousness and death. If you don’t have a choice, be sure to remove the dry cleaning bag outside. Let your clothes air out for at least a day but preferably four to five days before wearing them.

Nose and Ears:
Trim those nose hairs and clear out your nostrils. Visible boogers aren’t very sexy. Wash your ears and clean them out regularly with a q-tip.

Skin Care:
If you have dry skin, use a moisturizer. There’s stuff for the body, stuff for hands, stuff for the face, stuff for around the eyes, etc. If you’re just starting out, go with something general purpose for the whole body. I have dry skin so I apply moisturizer immediately after I shower. I tend to use a lighter body oil during the warmer months and a heavier body butter during the colder months. I like the organic stuff with a subtle natural scent. You’ll smell nice without having to use colognes/perfumes that are often carcinogenic. And if you do use fragrances go subtle. Less is more and some people have allergies.

Check out the skin care section of local Whole Foods. They usually have a bunch of products you can sample to figure out what you want.

Also, check out the all natural products by Golden Path Alchemy. They use Chinese and Western medicinals and botanicals in their products. You’ll love it.

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By Henry, March 9, 2009 9:44 am

I love dark chocolate truffles.

I love to make things. Cooking is one of my favorite ways to do it because food can be creative, spiritual and practical. Cooking is an art form in that you are only limited by your imagination in how you can bring ingredients together to make good food. The final product can inspire and delight the senses. In fact, it is the only art form that can satisfy all 5 senses. The cooking process is like a moving meditation, one that gets you connected to nature and allows your love and energy to flow into your cooking. Your guests will taste and appreciate that difference. Cooking is also practical because, at the end of the day, we all need to eat. And it is always better to eat good healthy food made with love than crap processed by a machine.

Recently I’ve been expanding my cooking into candy making. I have a sweet tooth, especially when it comes to dark chocolate. But I am very picky about quality, flavor and social responsibility. I am also tired of compromising on one of those values as I passively wait to find the right one made by someone else. So what better solution than to make my own?! Read on to learn my recipe.

Great tasting food starts with high quality ingredients. For my truffles, I start with the finest chocolate in the world made by Valrhona. Valrhona is a world renown French chocolate manufacturer founded in 1922. They produce vintage chocolates made from a single year’s harvest from a specific plantation. Valrhona’s chocolate is used by top chefs around the world and their cocoa beans are Fair Trade and, while not organic, they are grown without pesticides. Because they have a wide range of chocolates grown on their plantations in South America, the Caribbean, Oceania and Africa, I recommend you sample and find out the right one for you. For this recipe I will be using their Guanaja 70% dark chocolate, which is a blend of Criollos and Trinitaros cocoa beans from South America. It has a very chocolate taste, exceptional bittersweetness, and stays very long on the palate. It is regarded as one of their best.

Ingredients List:
10 oz Valrhona Guanaja 70% dark chocolate
8 oz Heavy Cream (hormone free or organic)
1.75 oz Organic Butter – room temperature
Unsweetened Valrhona Cocoa Powder
Melon Baller

Directions:
1. Finely chop up the chocolate and put into a large bowl or mixing bowl.
2. Put the butter in the bowl as well.
2. On a medium flame, heat up the heavy cream, stirring occasionally, and bring to a boil.
3. Pour the boiling cream onto the chocolate and butter.
4. Using a whisk, stir the mixture together until smooth. Stir vigorously but you don’t want to beat it because it will introduce unwanted air bubbles into the ganache.
5. Place bowl in the refrigerator to cool for 15 minutes. Then put into freezer for 30 – 40 minutes so the ganache becomes firm. Then remove from freezer.
6. Use your melon baller and scoop out balls of the ganache. Roll them between your hands to make the shapes smooth. Remember these are truffles and imperfections are ok. They don’t have to be perfectly round. Also, the longer you roll them for, the more that melts on your hands. You don’t want that!
7. Roll the balls in a plate of unsweetened cocoa powder (or other toppings such as nuts).
8. Place in freezer for 15 minutes to set.
9. Cover or wrap and then place in refrigerator for extended life. But eat them at room temperature!

Comments (1)

By Henry, February 28, 2009 2:17 am

Photo of a beautiful sunflower in the middle of a sunflower field.

Holism is the idea that everything in the universe is interconnected. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. We are more than just the cells that make up our body. And we exist for more than the simple reason to exist.

We are here on this planet to work out our problems, both with ourselves and each other, and to understand who we are, to realize our inner purposes and to share our deepest gifts with the world. To do that requires us to live holistic lives where we are empowered, inspired and engaged.

Living a holistic life isn’t simply about being harmonious, peaceful or balanced. It isn’t simply about being a granola eating, tree hugging, hemp wearing hippie. Living a holistic life is more about living a full life, one in which we embrace all of who we are — our gifts and challenges, our strengths and weaknesses, and our light and shadow — because all of that makes us who we are. We grow stronger and wiser not by detaching ourselves from life to go mediate in solitude or by ignoring or burying parts of ourselves and our humanity that makes us uncomfortable. We grow stronger and wiser by staying fully present to who we are and by working through the myriad of challenges life throws our way.

In ancient spiritual traditions the lotus is a symbol of purity and divinity. It grows in muddy waters and yet its flowers are refined and unsullied. Similarly our path to wisdom and enlightenment takes us through the shadows of human existence. To know peace we have to know war. To know love we have to know hate. The entire spectrum of life in all its beauty and horror is where we exist.

Our greatest challenge in this life time is figuring out how we can live in this existence with an open heart from moment to moment and to allow our heart’s fullest expression to permeate through everything that we do regardless of what the universe throws our way. At its core this is what this blog is about.

Thank you and enjoy.

Henry