As the saying goes..."you cannot pour from an empty cup". Join us for a unique retreat that addresses mind, body, & spirit in the fullest way...we will even address the clutter in your home. Let's  face it, clutter affects our spirit when we have a cluttered house full of stuff that is not sparking joy. Then that physical clutter pours over into every other aspect of our lives. Including the food choices we pick for our bodies and the chemicals we allow into our home. Learn effective new ways to detox, renew and reset! Join us in the beautiful, newly remodeled Casa De Luz retreat spaces for a wonderful afternoon that will leave you ready to fulfill your ideal lifestyle in 2019! 

A half-day women’s holistic wellness retreat designed to help you live your best life from the inside out with 4 workshops: 
Optimizing Wellness with Radhika: Regain vibrant health in the new year
Learn how to implement simple tools and wellness strategies that will help you :

• Sleep better
• Be more present and resilient
• Improve your gut health
• Feel energized, lighter and vibrant through the day and more!

You will leave with a better understanding of detoxification, mechanics of digestive health, and go home empowered with new rituals to immediately implement healthy changes to your lifestyle.

​Essential Oils and Toxin-Free Living
Lisa will share the benefits and properties of various essential oils and explain how they naturally support your body systems vs. creating toxicity. Learn how to keep toxic chemicals out of your home and body and transform your environment into a relaxing spa-like atmosphere. Then she will lead a simple DIY workshop for a toxin-reducing bath soak you can take home with you to get a head start on your new go-to self-care ritual!

KonMari for a Clutter-Free Home Sanctuary
Erin will teach you how to transform your cluttered space into a spacious home sanctuary filled with joy. By letting go of the physical clutter that's no longer serving us, we process unhealthy attachments to the past, tune into what brings us joy, get to know ourselves more intimately, and anchor more deeply into the present moment.

Intuitive Vision Boards
In this final workshop, attendees will be guided by their intuition to create their own unique vision board to inspire them to pursue their ideal lifestyle in 2019, 

About out the presenters:

Radhika M., Holistic Prana Radhika is a former executive turned health and lifestyle coach. She is a certified Health coach, Bulletproof™Coach, Certified Human potential coach and trained yoga teacher. She works with busy professionals to enhance their energy, improve mental performance and upgrade their lives - mind-body-energy. Her unique lifestyle formula empowers her clients to deeply connect with their cravings, desires, and inner truth so that they achieve the whole self-upgrade they’ re after.

Lisa Embree, Common Sense Corner for Vibrant Living Lisa embarked on her wellness journey several years ago after suffering from typical middle age ailments. Shingles was her last straw and she started to dig a little deeper. Although Lisa has always been a bit of a “tree-hugger” she had many more toxins to dump. She is a reformed candle freak and now exclusively uses Young Living Essential oils to cultivate a zen atmosphere in her sacred space! Lisa is passionate about sharing with others how thy can make healthier choices for themselves, their families, pets, and the environment.

Erin Mursch, Organized for Good Erin combines her passion for order with a mission to protect our one and only planet in her work as a professional organizer and one of Marie Kondo's trained home tidying consultants. Since 2014 she has been helping Austinites conquer their chaos by organizing homes and small businesses, and in 2016 Organized for Good was born to help turn "one's trash into another's treasure" through partnerships with local non-profits and a commitment to divert as much junk from landfills as possible.

Today is a bittersweet day. Some of you know my mom passed away on November 15, 2017. The official diagnosis was advanced  melanoma which was diagnosed in December 2015. I say official because as we learned along her journey, disEASE of the body and imbalance begins many, many decades before. Of course once that dysfunction in the cells turns to cancer, especially an aggressive one like melanoma, you have a tough battle ahead and my mom was one hell of a warrior! She would have been 79 years young today. I miss her every day and I get really sad when I think how she isn't physically here with me, although I feel her spiritual presence daily.  Some days the oddest things will get the tears flowing.

Renewing my Costco membership last week was one of those odd things. As you may know, they allow one additional person on a Costco membership. My mom was my additional person so when they asked to confirm she was my extra account holder it hit me very hard that she is no longer physically here. I had to work hard to prevent the ugly cry while standing in the customer service line. I laughed (and cried) about it when I got home to tell my family because they all knew how much my mom loved going to Costco at the last possible moment... right before closing...usually on a Sat. Sorry Costco employees but thank you for always allowing her in the store to shop. 

Anyone who knew her always commented on her endless energy & vibrancy but here's the thing...my mom was often VERY tired but she had such a feisty spirit that she usually found a way to battle through the fatigue and take it up a notch or 10! That’s how she would show up at Costco right before closing plus the million other things she would get done for herself and others.  Some days she'd fight that fatigue with only a few hours of sleep- which clearly isn't a wellness principle she would want to promote and it is something she struggled with her entire adult life.  Call it a strong work ethic, perfectionism, feisty, amazing or I think it was just good ole resiliency and a desire to live fully.

My mom's feisty personality was such a paradox to her life because rest is clearly vital especially when recovering from illness. BUT,  I also truly believe if she wasn't so feisty she would have died decades earlier. That high vibrant life force is what kept her going for as long as she did but as with most things in life, balance is key.

​Most of her friends & family were shocked when she was diagnosed with cancer saying, "She is so healthy & followed a healthy lifestyle. How did this happen." (Which she did compared to most Americans especially once she quit smoking in her 40's) but my mom also had a lot of chronic illnesses starting with thyroid and digestive problems occurring in her 20's. She smoked for many years which clearly added insult to injury.  She did work hard at adopting new healthy living principals each year and I'm still in awe of her tenacity. She truly did the best that she knew at the time. 

 As I'm sure many of you experience, it's sometimes hard to know which "healthy living principals" to incorporate.There is so much conflicting info! It's frustrating to learn that we were flat out lied to regarding food recommendations and of course the cigarette companies misleading marketing.  I won't hash out all the lies here but here's a few articles about sugar and cigarettes to remind you that sometimes the recommendations for our health is made with a very big influence from big food/big business/big pharma and not our best interest. 

 I LOVE learning about this stuff but ​I get overwhelmed too. I remind my family and myself, there is NO "ONE" " RIGHT" diet or lifestyle choices for ONE person. The human body is complex and although it would be nice to have a simple answer (a magic bullet) that will never be possible because once you figure out what diet or healthy living principles work for you, then your bodies needs change.  I think a big key is to be in tune with your body and to follow a few "Common Sense Principals" (you knew it was coming right) ;)

I try to focus on the common themes that most of the wellness experts do agree on and not so much the conflicting view points:

• Eat real, whole food vs. processed, fake food. Don't worry if it's paleo, raw, vegan or a combo. 
• Drink more water than energy drinks, soft drinks and alcohol . Don't worry too much if it should be alkaline or not. (A basic water filter- Berkey is our favorite - is a good idea though because most cities are polluted with tons of junk unfortunately because yep, big business was put ahead of some common sense). 
• Use more natural "God made" plant based products vs. synthetic "man made" chemicals. Don't worry if it's Young Living or another essential oil company but if you do want to learn more about Young Living contact me. ;)  
• Exercise more, watch less tv/social media. Don't worry if it's cardio, weights or yoga...it's better than no movement at all. 
• Get more than a few hours of sleep each night and don't show up at Costco right before closing. 
• Have more fun...worry less.
• You get the idea...

My mom's body had some subtle and not so subtle messages over the last few decades and of course hindsight is 20/20. ​She would want me to tell you, do everything in your power to promote wellness in your body and the earlier the better because it's really hard to turn things around once disease sets in.  If you have a serious chronic condition I encourage you to check out www.Chrisbeatcancer.com or Gerson.org because then you do need to get into the details of things and do some extensive research and soul searching. There is a steep learning curve with Gerson Therapy that honestly we didn't hit very often and we didn't start it until almost a year after her diagnosis. That's a whole other post but we absolutely heard and saw amazing results with Gerson for many folks with many chronic conditions not just cancer.

My mom really had a full life and I'm so grateful for my 50 years with her and the journey was epic even it it was cut a bit short. Unfortunately though, every day, daughters (& sons) lose their mom's (& dad's) way to soon and even worse parents lose their young children/babies to complex diseases. There are no simple answers. There will always be some debates about what foods, exercises, products are best but do step into your common sense corner and listen to your body, decrease your toxic load where you can  and most importantly focus on a fun and love filled journey.  

Happy Birthday Mom. I love you and miss you. #EPICDAYSAHEAD, xoxo, Lisa

​

I've never been great at thinking of unique gifts especially when it  comes to hostess gifts.  Sure it's nice to bring a side dish, a bottle of wine or a bouquet of flowers but why not pair one of those gifts with a bottle or two of amazing essential oils from Young Living?  They are gorgeous, smell good & they promote wellness and who doesn't need a little extra help with wellness this time of year?  There are plenty of oils to chose from because Young Living offers over 150 singles and blends of oils!  There are several oils that are perfect for the Fall. My favorites are: Peppermint with Orange or Tangerine, Nutmeg, Cinnamon Bark & a favorite to many folks any time of the year...Thieves.

Thieves is a popular blend of Clove bud oil, Lemon peel oil, Cinnamonbark oil, Eucalyptus leaf oil,  and Rosemary  leaf oil. Not only does Thieves smell amazing but it is a powerful blend of oils to support our immune system. So if you imbibe in a little too much acidic foods and beverages, a little Thieves oil blend after dinner will be a welcome guest!

Let me know if you have some unique gift ideas that promote vibrant living in the comments below. Contact me if you want to learn more about these amazing oils & products so you can order at a wholesale price. 

We wish you and your family and friends a peaceful and love filled Thanksgiving.

If you have questions on how the Promos work, please send me a message. You don't want to miss out on these amazing freebies! Bring on #thanksgiving #Christmas #holidaygatherings #frankincense 

Last week I was in a yoga class & the instructor said something that summed up exactly what I've experienced in my wellness journey. "If you listen to your body when it whispers, you won't have to hear it scream."

YES! This is exactly what I have experienced but unfortunately I learned it the hard way (I waited for the screams) & I bet many of you have taken a similar path. It's not the easiest path but it is the one many of us travel. 

Let me explain why this spoke so LOUDLY to me with a little different twist to this concept. Obviously, prevention is key (& a lot easier) but many of us (or people who we know & love) are going down the all too familiar path of "chronic" illness or what we think is "normal" midlife ailments so we think, why bother at this point? AND as you detox the junk, you often feel worse. Who has time for that?!

This is called the Herxheimer Reaction (aka: HELL), but as you detox the junk from your life you also tolerate them a lot less so you never get this huge build up of junk hopefully again. Your body is stronger & standing guard & not just laying dormant for every toxic assault. It really hears the whispers!

Well this kinda pissed me off early in my wellness journey. I ate some crappy onion rings at Six Flags (old habits die hard & I didn't bring enough of my own quality food) & within minutes I had a migraine headache. This was before I knew anything about Young Living essential oils so I was on my own for this little lesson. I'll spare you the fun details but the next several hours were a challenge especially since I was the only adult to drive home my mortified teenage daughter and her 2 friends. Good times. ;) 

Later I thought, well that sucked...I use to eat like crap a lot & I could handle it. Or could I? My body had been  whispering for a few decades but I ignored it so finally it YELLED with high blood pressure, weight gain, insomnia, shingles...the list goes on. I tell you this not to discourage you, but to remind you how awesome our bodies are and if we listen to the whispers (&/or the screams) & we decrease the toxic chemical load we expose it to daily, it will whisper back "thank you". 

Unfortunately we are exposed to TONS of toxins daily. Some of them we can control easily but many may be out of our control. Let's focus on the ones we can control. Eating organic food as often as possible and purified water are two really important steps but sometimes that is harder than it sounds. We can however control the toxins we let in our homes & the products we put on our skin!  Our skin is our largest organ so let's protect it very carefully! 

I've been pretty "green-living" for my home cleaners & pest service for decades but oddly enough I  just started paying attention to the toxins I was putting on my skin (including my make up) in the last few years.  Lots of common sense I know. ;) We trust what is sold in a store is safe but often times it is not. Read more here from the EWG- Environmental Working Group. 

You can make many of your products & cleaners with DIY ingredients & the amazing Young Living essential oils but if you are not a DIY person (or are short on time), YL has released many new amazing products. Here's the link to all the new products. The make up line is AMAZING!!

Prevention is much easier than dealing with the affects of toxic overload. At some point your body with scream at you if you continue to let toxins in so I invite you to be pro active and start taking steps to live a less toxic life. Contact me if you want to learn how to incorporate Young Living's Essential Oils & products into your wellness routine. You and your family's health is worth it! 

Brace yourself Mama's...it's almost May! It's  gift giving time for all the special moms, teachers & graduates in your life and the schedule  ramps up with end of school year activities. Make the gift giving easy, practical & AMAZING with a few of these gift ideas. 

Give the gift that keeps on giving! A wholesale membership with a Premium Starter Kit for your Mom, Grandma, Aunt, or Special Friend! I'm glad to do a virtual class for them if they live out of town. 

Young Living just released 2 new products just in time for May gift giving. The bath bombs are amazing & come 4 to a pack...with no yuk chemical toxins. The coconut-lime body butter would be a special treat for anyone on your May gift list. 

Stress Away Roll-On
This makes a super nice gift because the 10 ml roll on comes in a super cute gift box. It smells amazing & makes a natural perfume replacement. 

Swell Water Bottle with a Vitality Essential Oil or 2
Who doesn't like a Swell bottle? Plus their founder, Sarah, seems pretty cool too! Well it will be doubly nice with some Young Living Vitality Essential Oils! Grapefruit, Lemon, Lime, Citrus Fresh all come in the Vitality Line which means they are appropriate for internal use & they come in the economical 5 ml size. Cute & useful!

Diffuser + Starter Kit
Dorm, sweet, dorm will be a lot sweeter with a diffuser.  Give your favorite graduate a healthy start to their new independence with their own diffuser and premium starter kit. A little peppermint will help them to get to their 8 am classes & lavender can help them get a good nights sleep. Purification blend...well because it's a dorm room and mom isn't there to tell them to clean their room! Any graduate will be grateful for the amazing 11 oils to get their first semester off to a great start. 

Lava Beads
These aromatherapy beads are pretty and keep you balanced.  They are grounding, promote strength, bring stability in changing times, and drive away anger. Here's a link to one on Etsy. Pair it with some "grounding" essential oil blend from Young Living.