Creating Your Health: Gardening: a holistically healthy hobby

Creating Your Health

Welcome to Creating Your Health! My Blog to introduce my business, Creative Arts Counseling and Consulting and to post ideas, links, resources as to how one can create their own health. I'm Chris, a Licensed Creative Arts Psychotherapist, and Licensed Mental Health Counselor. I see clients individually, or in groups, couples, and families. I work with children, adolescents and adults with mental health issues. I specialize in working with those recovering from trauma, eating disorders, mood disorders, and various other Women's issues. I am available for consultation and provide workshops on various topics to groups and organizations. Most recent topics include: " The Shadow in the Workplace", "Moving through Bereavement"--Creative Arts in the grief process; "Movement in the Classroom".

My clients include those who choose to work from either a mind and/or body approach to wholeness!

Use of the arts: dance, music, art, drama, poetry, allows for access to the unconscious realm. Simply put, Change takes place first in the Imaginal Realm. If you can't imagine it, how can the change manifest?

My approach to health is a holistic one, embracing the mind, body, and spirit connection and is deeply grounded in psychological theory and orientation. Stay tuned...More to come as the blog progresses.

Christine Matteson
LCAT, LMHC, ADTR, NCC
Licensed Creative Arts Psychotherapist.
Independent USANA Health Sciences associate
Healthy Living Consultant
Team Northrup

contact me @ cfmatteson@hotmail.com
for more information.

Monday, June 22, 2009

Gardening: a holistically healthy hobby

Gardening is Healthy!
Growing up, my mother worked at a local flower/garden shop, and many of my favorite memories of her are of the two of us weeding, and tending to the flowers. It's when I felt the closest to her. I absolutely love all of tasks associated with gardening, (only wish I had a bigger space..ahh some day), but even if you don't have a spacious yard, you can always garden in window boxes, or containers. Gardening is cool, too! The stores are filled with all sorts of tools, plants, and many other accoutrements for this "growing" hobby of interest.
Here are just some of the health benefits: 1. it's exercise! digging, planting, weeding...builds endurance, flexibility, and strength. 2. burns calories. I read that 1 hour of gardening is almost the equivalent of jogging 3 or 4 miles! 3. You get the nutritional benefits of growing fresh vegetables, fruits. 4. It is a stress buster! I love using the gardening metaphors; (ex., clearing, getting rid of the spent, dead
leaves to make room for new growth). In a quiet corner of the garden we can bury the worries of the day. 5. It increases your property value! 6. It's good for the environment. Trees and plants help to clean toxins from the air and produce lot of
oxygen. 7. Getting outside, enjoying a bit of the sun (safely) can give your body some of the vitamin D that it needs. 8. Gardening can be a meditation, teaching us much about beauty, love, natural history, lasting values, and
the seasons of our lives.
So the health tip of the day: get outside and tend your gardens!; and if you don't have one, consider some container planting (it's how I plant my tomatoes), and visit your local gardens and farmers market for fresh vegetables, fruits, and many options for creatively landscaping your outdoor environment!
Have a great day!
~Chris

"Gardening is a labour full of tranquility and satisfaction; natural and instructive, and as such contributes to the most serious contemplation, experience, health and longevity. - John Evelyn, 1666

Creating Your Health with USANA Health Sciences and Team Northrup

What is USANA?
USANA was founded in 1992, and is a company with integrity and vision that manufactures the highest quality science-based nutritional products and skin health products. Comprehensive nutrition from the inside-out! To view my USANA Health Sciences Website, click:
http://www.cmatteson.usana.com/

What is Team Northrup?
It's a group of entrepreneurial women and men who are philosophically aligned with the work fo women's wellness pioneer, world renowned author, and one of the country's
most respected authorities on women's health....
Dr. Christiane Northrup.
Founded in 2003, this unique team has joined together
to build a lucrative global health and wellness home-based business, while also helping others around the world to improve their health.
"You have the ability to create vibrant health and vibrant wealth! Join Team Northrup and me in making this vision your reality. Begin today." ~Dr. Christiane Northrup
What will your life look like in 5 years if you keep doing what you are doing today? To see if you qualify to be a member of Team Northrup, fill out the short survey, and check out my USANA website.
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Creating Your Health