The GIPHN Score - Finally a clear definition for healthy foods

This morning I was reading Seth Godin's "The Big Moo" - this is fantastic book about being remarkable and sticking out from the crowd and is full of golden nuggets on growing your business in a successful way.

So this book inspired me to invent "The GIPHN score" to help us all know what foods are good for our health. GI stands for Glycemic Index, PH stands for "potential of hydrogen" ie how acid or alkaline a food is to the body and N stands for how nutrient-dense the food is.

I plan to add in a chart with the GIPHN score for foods. For example, chocolate would have a very low GIPHN score as although it has a medium GI, it is very acidic and pretty lousy when it comes to nutrients! This helps us be clear when the media tells us about how certain foods are good for us but this info doesn't give us the full picture. An example of a food with a high GIPH score would be juiced celery and apples mixed with supergreens: it is a medium GI, highly alkaline and jam-packed full of nutrients like vitamins and minerals and protein.

Keep posted for more on this subject!

Tips to Improve your Health Mentally, Physically, Spiritually and Emotionally

Health is a large topic and can span fitness, nutrition as well as relationships, doing work we love, keeping our mind active etc etc. Here are just a few tips and resources to get you enhancing your health in each of the 4 areas: Mind, Body, Spirit and Emotions:

Mind

1. Learn how to do Sudoku. It it really easy and gets you thinking. Watch out as it can be quite addictive. I have heard that there is a great game called Dr Kawashima brain training on Nintendo that enables you to play mind games for 10 minutes a day.
2. Learn a new skill, for example, a new language - Japanese is a fun language to learn and there are free lessons in London.
3. Read Michael Gelb's book "How to think like Leonardo Da Vinci" - it is a great book as it is full of ideas on how to get the most out of your mind, including Tony Buzan's favourite subject, mind-mapping and great exercises to work through to get your mind working

Body

1. Fitness: It is important to keep yourself active. Buy yourself a pedometer so that you can monitor how active you are on a daily basis. There is a great one that you can plug into the computer and you have daily targets and text messages to encourage and praise you: http://www.fitbug.co.uk
2. Nutrition: We all know what we should be eating in our hearts even if the media tells us that suddenly coffee and chocolate and alcohol are actually good for us!! Yes, everything can be reasoned as being good for us in some way, but it is important to ensure that the large bulk of what we eat is fruit, vegetables and whole-grains. Make sure you get your daily 5 portions of fruit and veg and at least a litre and a half of water and you are on the right track.
3. Sleep / Rest: this is a vital area that a lot of us cheat on. We all feel better if we get the required sleep at night. Also, it is important to get breaks during the day and also at certain times of the year to get a break from and a fresh outlook on our work.

Spirit

1. Meaningful relationships: look at the relationships in your life and ask yourself 3 things that you love about each relationship. If you cannot find 3 things, are you hanging out with the right people? It is important to have meaningful relationships in your life with people who share your values and who are honest and help you make the most of your potential.
   
2. Get out in nature - this really helps you get in touch with the universe and marvel at what a wonderful planet we live on and it gives you the right perspective on life.
   
3. There are some great resources out there to help you improve your spiritual health:
   Spiritual Cinema - get a monthly DVD with short films that introduce you to spriritual concepts
   The Celestine Prophecy by David Redfield - a fictional story which introduces some very interesting spiritual ideas that will get you thinking
   What the bleep do we know!? - this is a film that will get you thinking about what is possible metaphysically
   The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron - tap into your sprituality and creativity with some great exercises and examples

Emotions

1. Meditation: this is a great way to calm the mind and get in touch with your emotions rather than being overwhelmed by them. If you are like me and cannot sit still, try the computer game, Wild Divine - this game has wonderful music and exercises and you can only progress through the game if you have slowed down your breathing and heart rate.
   
2. Morning Pages: this is a great way to soothe your soul and deal with stress. Write 3 pages in a journal each morning as soon as you wake up and write whatever you fancy. This will leave you calm, focused and ready for the day whatever it throws at you!
   
3. Express emotions: it is important to get in touch with all your emotions, whether they are passion, excitement, joy or unhappiness, disappointment, anger. There are many tools for this whether you use morning pages or talk to your friends. Another great resource is spiritual cinema (mentioned above) as you see films that enable you to feel emotions like sadness and happiness. The best way to improve your emotional health is to experience emotions and try out the whole range.

Good luck with improving your health in all these areas and I would love to hear how you get on with these and if you have found other things to help you in these areas.