Lessons from Revitalize 2014

Last weekend one of my favorite websites, MindBodyGreen, hosted an online wellness summit. Wow! It was awesome! There were 26 different talks by leading experts in food, fitness, personal growth, and sustainability. You can see video highlights or the whole summit here: Revitalize 2014.

If you just want some key takeaways, here is what I found especially interesting:

• ABC News anchor Dan Harris, author of 10% Happier, gave a very funny talk about mindfulness. He describes it as a superpower that gives you a game changing skill; the ability to respond wisely to stimuli instead of reacting blindly.
• Meditation teacher Charlie Knoles encouraged people to value themselves more. If a friend asks you for 10 minutes of your time you’d give it to them. Why not give yourself 10 minutes to meditate? Find moments of time to close your eyes, sit comfortably, be aware of your breath, and experience your own inner consciousness. Charlie believes meditation can help you achieve any life change, because change requires making good decisions and lack of stress helps you make good decisions.
• I really enjoyed hearing from Dr. Mark Hyman, Chairman of the Institute for Functional Medicine. Some of my favorite quotes include 1) “If you eat crap, you feel like crap”, 2) “Leave the food that man made and eat the food that God made”, and 3) “Sugar is a recreational drug, use it rarely for fun.”
• I learned a lot about the importance of our microbiome from Dr. Robynne Chutkan. I must say I had no idea how important our “gut garden” is! Did you know we have 9 times more bacteria in our bodies than we have cells? Good bacteria is key for health and weight loss. We have more good bacteria when we eat a lot of plants, take less medicine, and come in contact with more dirt. Robynne’s advice is to “live dirty, eat clean.”
• Rich Roll is simply amazing! He is an ultra-endurance athlete who completed the Epic5 Challenge, that is 5 Ironman triathlons on 5 Hawaiian islands in under a week. He gave an inspiring talk: “Life Hacks Don’t Work”. Rich believes we need to stop looking for shortcuts to “hack” our lives. He explains that we only grow through earned investment in experience. Mastery is what makes us feel alive. So we should embrace the commitment, fear, obstacles, and incredible persistence that true success requires.
• Joe Cross, whose movie “Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead” tells the story of his 60-day juice fast, wrapped up by saying, “I’ve never met anyone who doesn’t think fruits and vegetables are good for them.” The knowing part is there, it’s the doing part that’s hard. He believes we can bridge the gap with community. “It’s easier to make healthy choices when you aren’t alone.”

Since I’ve recently started drinking green smoothies, I found it interesting that many of the speakers mentioned smoothies. In fact, so many people brought it up that MindBodyGreen founder, Jason Wachob, ended up asking most everyone he interviewed what they put into their smoothies. Smoothies are a great way to eat more plants!