Make a list and check it... at least twice a day!

In Malcolm Gladwell's book blink and in Cialdini's Influence, we can begin to tangibly appreciate the power of the mind- for our better or our ill.  

Self-help, health and success books abound with the positives of making lists, but like many other good ideas this day in age the beauty and simplicity of this tool for our health and success has been commercialized and abused, much to Cialdini's warnings.

Where these two ideas converge, mind power and pollution, is in understanding the strength and capacity of our mind.  Enter Santa.

Look what he can do by isolating himself from the commercial nonsense and information overload (read the North Pole) and just make lists and check them twice!

An oversimplification perhaps, but hopefully you get the idea.  The power of the mind is incredibly deep and expansive.  If harnessed and focused it can literally take you to the moon and beyond.

So sit down, alone or with your children or loved ones and make a list each morning.  Make two for that matter, one for those chores and to-do's of daily living and one for dreams and goals, near and far off.  Nurture your dreams, give them this fuel and congratulate yourself for every check-mark along the way. Choose to harness your true and infinite potential.  Choose to take action consciously and unconsciously, choose to stay well.

Our science, however amazing, takes time to develop and relies on trial and error.

In 1919 we had an understanding that the lead and arsenic that was being sprayed on fruits and vegetables never fully washed off and even made its way past the skin barrier.  We also began to understand the toxic effects these chemicals had on us.

It was not until 1947 that this practice was replaced... with DDT.  This was our miracle crop protector.  This now known carcinogen and dangerous chemical was not banned until 1988.

Are we seeing a pattern yet?  Our science and 'progress' is replete with these timelines and stories of innovation leading to devastation, fuelled by greed not a desire to provide.  Agent Orange, DDT, lead and arsenic are still to be found in many of our imports, food and otherwise.

What else is being used nowadays on our foodstuffs and production lines?  From BPA to melamine to that latest terminator pest-herb-life-icide, we simply don't know the long term ramifications.  We can't, not until the proof is in the pudding so to speak which is invariably to late for many of us.

Choose organic and local where and when you can.  Beyond the environmental ramifications of transportation and run-off, eating food is what we are really designed to do, everything else has a cost.  Choose food with real, lasting value, choose to stay well.