A Key Element for a Healthy, Happy Brain (and 5 steps to take now)

The gut-brain connection is extremely powerful, which means that a huge part of having a healthy mind is having a healthy “gut”.

If you’ve ever felt butterflies in your stomach when nervous, or nauseous when scared, you KNOW your gut is sensitive to your emotions and stress. And the reverse is also true. The health of our gut has a direct effect on our brain and mood. Poor digestion from too much processed foods, bad food combinations, or poor elimination (ex. not pooping properly) can have a huge negative impact on your mood, energy levels, mental clarity (and more!).

SO if you want to have a healthy, happy brain, you need to start by having a healthy GUT! Here are 5 steps to get you started…

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FEED YOUR GUT – Prebiotics, Probiotics, Symbiotics, Postbiotics

By now you’ve probably heard of probiotics and are hopefully taking a supplement or making the conscious effort to eat more unsweetened yogurt, raw fermented sauerkraut and other fresh fermented probiotic-rich foods.

Maybe you’ve even heard of prebiotics – those healthy FIBERS that help to grow the healthy probiotics in our gut.

But maybe you haven’t yet heard of postbiotics. And/or maybe you’re unsure about the differences between these “biotics” and WHY it’s important to understand them.

So today I’m breaking it down in simple terms to help get you started on a path towards better GUT HEALTH. AND I’m sharing my #1 TIP to boost your digestion and overall health, something anyone can (and should) do which doesn’t require supplements.

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Is Your Gut Keeping You from Balanced Hormones and Weight Loss?

I work with a lot of people that are seemingly healthy, but struggle to lose those last few pounds. Often, they get tired most afternoons (and rely on coffee), have occasional skin issues, and some digestive issues. That’s when I usually detect that its related to their hormones. The problem then becomes that most doctors just have people treat these hormonal imbalances by taking more hormones, instead of figuring out WHY their hormones are off in the first place. (For ex., you have acne so you get prescribe the pill). But almost always, when there is any hormonal imbalance, there is an issue with the gut.

The first step to achieving optimal health and healing from the inside out is improving your gut health.

An unhealthy gut affects your body’s ability to produce the right quantity of hormones - including cortisol, thyroid hormone and sex hormones. A healthy gut is needed to fully absorb and metabolize nutrients from the foods you eat, which are necessary for the proper production of hormones (and for stress reduction!).

And if you're stressed and your hormones are off (for example, you're producing too much cortisol and/or not enough thyroid), this leads to symptoms such as: weight gain, anxiety, fatigue, as well as imbalances in your sex hormones, menstrual health and infertility.

So what can you do to improve your gut health and achieve hormonal balance, get more energy, better skin, stronger immunity, and weight loss?

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