Although it is not goodbye, it is a bit of a "see you when I see you".

 I am going to be leaving Guelph as my full-time home base in May of 2010 to be with my person as she embarks on her journey towards becoming a Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine.  As such it is my Mission to leave my mark on the Guelph Community before I depart.

As such here is my proposal, my mission, my manifesto, my experiment:

With a written commitment from you to me and me to you I want to take a maximum of 6 of you to a place of incredible change and empowerment.

I want to be a (minimum) twice per week presence in your culture to provide guidance and help you take control of your health and accelerate you on your journey to your goals.

For this group that is ready to invest in their health I will provide my services on a strictly by donation basis as you assess the value of our interactions.

Finally for this group we will track your changes via as many metrics as we can produce based on your assessments and seek to produce the 500% ROI that most corporate wellness programs can produce.

Whether you are a small business owner, a stay at home parent or a member of someone else's workforce, at the end of the day it is your health that will impact your success and advancement.

 Help me help you and for the next 6 months help me leave a lasting impact on the health, wellness and vitality of Guelph so that when I make my return visits I know I have left the community in healthier hands!

 In the health I dream of for us all,

Scott Tate 

Dear fellow concerned individuals,

I am writing this to give you an increasingly realistic picture of myself, my goals and dreams and how I feel the present and on-going Codex push can help us all achieve our goals.

It is my mission to make a cultural shift in our understanding of and focus on health and wellness as a core cultural component, over war, over politics to create a cultural pride in longevity, vitality and the human ability to perform and overcome.

Our collective definition of primary care has to include meal and movement planning with amble application of functional exercises and functional foods (to combat stress and strain and promote health).  Our culture has to include access to good, clean, organic foods, spices, herbs and all the bounty mother nature naturally provides.

We need to take back control and ensure that our pervasive lack of education does not lead us to cede more of ourselves, mother nature and our human potential to a selfish greed and fear machine.

We are loosing this war of gradualism, aided by a (potentially) unwitting media.  They flock to the next big story and fear-factor event and when a story about a European Court Ruling from 2005 that  "Strictly prohibit(s) information about disease being treatable by nutrients and (includes a) call for future supplement dosage restrictions" happens with no major uproar, those in control know they can push the envelope a little further.  Bills like C-51, 52 and recently C-6 in Canada are evidence of such potent gradualism.

What is needed is a top-down and bottom-up media message to make this gradual affront to our health and wellness big news again.  Climate change and global warming has been sold to us as the focal point for our efforts to change as a global community but I put it to you that our efforts towards securing our healthful food goes beyond any control we might have over the weather. We need to rally our efforts and forces and look at the way our culture is valuing and choosing food, or how it is being valued and chosen for us.

I have a growing number of people interested in supporting our efforts to educate and disseminate information and I am excited to take the next step with you.

In health and happiness,

Scott Tate

This book (Learning Strategic Change, Cambridge University Press, 2008)  by Flamholtz and Randle, among others, provides great insight into what it requires to make changes and what drives us and corporations to make changes.

As an individual interested in promoting both personal and corporate cultural change with regards to wellness as something to be invested in, I found this book very telling and encouraging as I seek to legitimize the role I want to play in promoting health and wellness cultural changes.

As far as drivers for change that the authors identify, I can see wellness falling under the guises of "getting closer to the customer" and "improving overall organizational effectiveness"- two of the three main objectives for organizational change they identified.  I believe it is the climate of our society, more savvy to the impact of health on our progress as a whole, that has the potential to take our potential for performance and productivity to another level entirely.

Promisingly, the case studies Flamholtz and Randle used indicated an understanding from management that change required both time and resources to be effective and lasting, highlighting the following lessons to ensure productive and positive achievement of change goals:

1. Successful change typically requires more than one "leader." This could include people to "sponsor", "bless" and "execute" the initiatives required.

2. Management systems and corporate culture are key levers in the change process- particularly when the magnitude of change is transformational.

3. Find ways- through symbols (including the language used)- to communicate and reinforce the change.

4. Communicate, communicate, communicate!

5. Don't be afraid to ask for help.

6. Change requires resources. 

7. To the greatest extent possible, involve those who will be affected by it in planning for and implementing the change.

8. Change requires a total commitment by its leaders- they can't give up.

And neither should you!!

Whether you are an individual human or corporate entity these principles and lessons hold true for making changes.  We are designed to learn, grow and evolve- or suffer the consequences of living below our true abilities and potentials.

In both the corporate and individual settings this means existing with a lack of connection to your community, internally and externally.  Choose to be engaged in change and build a system for success by investing in your health and wellness and ensure a different level of commitment and participation in whatever changes you are planning to make for your continued growth and evolution.

How to IGNORE HYPE and STAY HEALTHY!

Common Sense-Based Health Tips that Work… with no Side Effects!

This is not so much an article as a compendium of information I have

gathered over the last months as the media hype over swine flu rips

through our collective psyche. I have boiled the best of the best into this

format so you can whip out a piece of paper, jot these down and get to

work now on using common-sense practices to stay healthy today and

tomorrow during the next (name an animal we farm)-flu outbreak,

pandemic, epidemic of fear-based dis-ease marketing.

1. Turn the channel every time anyone talks about the swine flu, say “I’m too healthy and strong to get it” and don’t stress.

2. Remember that the ‘common’ flu is just as if not more lethal than the swine flu!

3. Wash your hands and don’t touch your face… as much for the flu as for your skin health and beauty!

4. Gargle twice daily with warm salt water.

• Don’t give ‘stuff’ you don’t want a nice place to live and don’t burden your immune system!

5. Use a Neti Pot to clean out your nasal passages.

• We live in a polluted environment and likely have chronically inflamed nasal passages.

6. Floss.

• See above, don’t let the ‘visitors’ hang out.

7. Drink warm liquids.

• Flush those bacteria or other visitors into your stomach and let the acid destroy what’s left.

8. Crank up your immune system with vitamin C and Zinc.

• Dr. Vinay Goyal suggests much of the above along with C.

9. Feed your healthy bacteria… listen to your Naturopathic Doctors!

• Garlic, Onion, Leeks, along with good probiotics will help your body stay on top of the fight!

10. STAY FIT!!!!

• Healthy people have a much better immune and stress response so use resistance and cardio exercise wisely to simulate your body not exhaust it!

Two final notes: Have your vitamin D levels checked as they are an excellent indicator of immune and inflammatory health and have a “Flu Buddy” so you can be sure someone will take care of business and life if you do need a day of rest!!

Choose to use that good old common-sense stuff and ignore the hype... and keep your back straight!

Scott 

Can_I_do_this_poster_oct9-hi.pdf (320.41 kb)

CTBW_Newsletter_October.pdf (642.90 kb)

The take home message from the following ramble is to be prepared.  For me this means always moving toward whatever state, mindset, that provides you with the tools to move forward.

In the past month I have been to a wedding abroad, moved residences and offices, experienced a dramatic family health emergency, became a God Father, soon to be twice over, attended lectures from leading minds and all the while have been trying to build my business by building my health and support system, my network.

I believe that being well, feeling balanced, is the ultimate preparedness to move forward through what can feel like the traffic jam that is life.  I also believe that this state is always evolving.  As I learn more I realize that I have so much more to learn about cultivating and maintaining this balance that we all seek.

It has been sometime since my notebook was eased of the burden of my words and their weight in ink and I thank you, my readers, for giving me the fuel to refocus my gaze on this means of expression.

Writing is a valuable tool in my tool-belt for being prepared and coping with life, as is music.  I have attached to this blog an example of where music can take me, and perhaps you, so thank the Sun Parlour Players and see where you can let yourself go.

As Dr. Brian Clemente said this past weekend, the goal is to Trust and Let go.

Stay well,

 Scott

Scott's Sunparlour.m4a (9.86 mb)

Choose to Stay Well is the manifestation of my dream for the health of myself and my fellow community members, both local and global.

Picture your vitality, energy, vibrancy and capacity for achievement when your health is at its evolving peak.  Picture your quarterly check-in with your lifestyle consultant in a nice warm space designed to promote your health.  Imagine the conversation as it flows from looking at your current health from information gathered about your live blood cell analysis, your Chiropractic care, Yoga or Tai Chi progress, blood and urinalysis, even your genetic markers for various factors of health.  Imagine the feeling of exhilarated confidence in your health and health habits, your life and healthstyle.  Imagine having a team dedicated to your success.

Look back at your past months of guided meditations, yoga, personal training, life-promoting food selections, fantastic community outings and events from sports to catered dinners and art, drama and biblio-therapies.

Pause now and realize that there is exclusive spa and retreat-level care and practices at your fingers and that there is a movement and visionary company eager to make you a plan to take control of your health to ensure you live the life you deserve without having to fly a world away to find it under one roof.

 Choose to Stay Well.

I continue to grow and expand my team and circle of care and continue to grow and find new energy welling up every day and in every way!

Try Thai Yoga Massage and drift into your body and awaken alive in it.

Try TBM and listen with fascination to the subtle messages our body gives us.

Try Chiropractic and grow... literally. 

Life is about making choices and taking action towards your dreams, towards happiness.

You wake-up. You brush your teeth, eat your breakfast, or not.  You choose to move towards goals every moment of every day.  Choice and action happen even in what we might perceive as inaction.  Seth Godin has excited me about the potential for me to take real action towards my greater goals and mission.  If you have 18 minutes right now please explore this video and join me in the excitement of how easy it is to make a movement happen and become part of something huge and powerful.

 Seth Godin, on www.ted.org

My Movement is a about making a conscious choice to Choose Wellness, however you define it.

Choose to Stay Well.

How do you join My Movement, My Tribe, My Team? 

Take Action- Make a to do list of 3 bigger items every day.  Have a Goal List of 3-4 bigger goals for each month and review them often during the day.  Post a comment on this site and take advantage of the beauty of social commitment.  Create a journal, or make this page your journal.  Share your journey toward your goals.  My goal is to create a movement, a tribe, a team full of people committed to making a change, first in themselves.

Make this space a place to build and immerse yourself in this culture of change, of choice and of challenge.

Buy a notebook, binder or journal of any kind and start recording your goals and your progress. 

What is the Secret Handshake?

Step 1) Ask your potential fellow tribe member "How's your posture today?"

Step 2) Reply with a laugh and smile "Solid brother/sister, how's yours?"

Step 3) Reply with "Solid" and a resounding high-five... and track your team members elbow with your eyes to get the best high-five effect!

Is it that easy?

Yes, it is living.  We, humans, have been given the ultimate gift of consciousness, of emotions, of choice.  Our mission is not survival like animals, it is happy survival, conscious survival.  Analyze the messages in The Secret, in religions, in the messages of self-help gurus that abound.  It is about being present, setting goals and moving toward your dreams, your ultimate happiness.  This gift of consciousness, emotions and choice is so potent that it can change your cells all the way down to how you express your genes, those things we once thought were the root of our very being.

You are in control. High-five your team, smile, laugh, drink water.  Eat, Drink, Sleep, Think and Play well.

Choose to Stay Well.

I look forward to sharing my journey with you so keep in the loop as I update you on the progress of my Documentary Journal and Film that is in the works.

What are you doing to Join the Movement, What helps you Stay Well? Post your comments or email your inquiries today!