By Shabnam Ahsan
Essential oils are becoming more & more popular as they are easy to fill your life with fragrance & health. We can use it in various ways.


For therapeutic use


1… Put one drop of peppermint oil in one glass of cool water & drink slowly as a remedy of digestion problems
2…If you are suffering from sleep disorder and spend hours laying awake, put few drops of lavender, Rose Geranium or Clary Sage oil or combination of it at a tissue paper & put inside our pillowcase so that you can smell it. You will fell asleep quickly & sleep soundly
3… Lavender & tea tree oil are great for scratches, beestings, minor burns, & cuts & headache, so keep it in your first aid box. It is the best companion in your hiking & camping.
4…If you are having cold or sinus problem, put 3-7 drops of eucalyptus essential oil in a bowl of steaming hot water, cover your head with a towel & inhale the steam. Stop immediately if you feel irritation or discomfort.
5…To get relief from painful menstrual cramps put 3-7 drops of essential oils in a bowl of steaming hot water, dip a cloth, wring out, apply to area, repeat when cloth cools.


Cleaning


6…Put one drop of lemon,orange or mint oil to the final rinse of fridge cleaning
7…To clean the air rather than mask smells of smoking or coking in the home,use few drops of lemon,orange,cinnamon,lavender,tea tree,rosemary or eucalyptus oil on cotton ball & put it at the corners of the room.
8… Put 3-8 drops of your favorite essential oil in the water of your bathtub for a soothing & fragrant bath.


Household Uses


9…Put one drop of your favorite essential oil on a cold bulb. When you put on the bulb, the room will fill with the fragrance along with the light. Do not use it with halogen lights.
10…To avoid the unpleasant smell of paint, put 5 ml of your favorite oil to 1 gallon of paint.
11…To keep moth away put few drops of lavender at cotton ball & place it in cloth closet.
12…put 6-8 drops of your favorite essential oil in 600 ml of water in a fine spray bottle & use it as room freshener.
13…To make your clothes fragrant put few drops of essential oil to water in a spray bottle & spray before ironing.
14… Put a few drops of your favorite essential oil on a piece of cloth or paper & wrap it on top of a jar of sugar & leave it for a week. After that use this flavored sugar for your tea, baking or sweet dishes.
15…Put 5-8 drops of your favorite essential oil in a humidifier or in a bowl of boiling water to create a warming atmosphere.
    Ok friends now its your turn.Tell us your favorite use of essential oils

                 This once a week beauty bath will make you a relaxed and gleaming beauty.

Carpal Tunnel Begins in Your Neck Not in Your Wrist
by Pamela Adams D.C.
If Carpal Tunnel Syndrome comes from typing on the computer
all day, why didn't people who typed on typewriters get Carpal
Tunnel Syndrome? Because there was no computer screen to
draw their heads forward, their chins tilted up, necks strained.
Typewriters were placed lower than desks and typists tilted their
heads down not forward.
The culprit in Carpal Tunnel pain, the Median nerve, exits the
spinal cord from the lower part of your neck, travels through neck
muscles under the collar bone to the front of your shoulder bone,
then makes its way down your arm, past your elbow to your wrist
where it passes through the Carpal Tunnel and into your hand.
That's a long way to go, and the nerve can be pinched anywhere
along the route causing pain in your wrist and numbness in your
hand and fingers. The very first and most common place it gets
pinched is in your neck. You can wear a wrist brace, buy wrist
rests, get an ergonomically correct keyboard, take painkillers, or
have surgery and it won't help until you change the position of
your head when you work at the computer.
Of course, it's not only computer workers who suffer from Carpal
Tunnel symptoms. According to research from the Occupational
Health Project at the University of Maryland, workers in the
following occupationsare most likely to develope the syndrome:
1. Assembler
2. Laborer--non-construction
3. Packaging-and-filling-machine operators
4. Janitors and cleaners
5. Butchers and meat cutters
6. Data entry keyers
What is the common-denominator among these occupations?
Workers must hold their heads forward and down and reach
forward with one or both arms repeatedly.
Learn to keep your head on straight, whatever you do. If your
head is supported by your spinal column and not the poor,
overworked muscles of your neck and upper back; if you position
yourself so that you don't have to reach with your arm, you'll go
along way towards relieving and preventing symptoms.
Here are some suggestions for computer users:
1. The computer monitor must be placed directly in front of you.
The top of the monitor should be no higher than eye level.
2. Keyboards should be placed low, so that arms can hang at
your sides with foreams at right angles to upper arms and wrists
straight.
3. Feet are flat on the floor; weight is on the sitting bones.
There should be a slight arch in your low back.
4. Your breastbone should be lifted, creating a lengthened
space between the navel and breastbone. This brings your head
back to an aligned position.
5. Placement of the mouse should be a close to the body as
possible so there's no reaching. It's better to use a ball,
because fingers are designed for small, precise movements,
shoulders are not.
6. A timer set to ring every fifteen minutes or half-hour is a
good way to check on your posture.
7. Sleep on your back, not sides, until symptoms subside. Use
a flat, thin pillow.
The following exercise is meant to be done once every hour
during the day, and, lastly, in bed just before sleep: Lying on
your back with hands clasped behind your head, elbows resting
on the floor or bed, tuck your chin into your neck as if to make a
double chin. Keeping the chin tucked in,
gently press your head back into your hands. Hold for a count of
ten. Then relax your chin and neck and take a couple of deep
breaths. Do a total of three presses in a set. Do one set only
every hour


About The Author
Dr. Pamela Adams helps undo the habits that cause you pain. She is the author of “Dr. Adams’ Painless Guide to Computing” and a complimentary ezine, Self Health News. For more health tips and information, visit her website http://www.PainlessGuides.com

http://www.safecomputingtips.com/articles/carpal-tunnel-begins.html

Achieve Fitness by Choice, Not by Force

By Meetu Nadir

Although, a majority of people understand the need to lead a healthy and fit lifestyle, only a few follow the routine in their everyday lives. This is especially true in case of women, who consider exercise to be a tiring and boring activity and hence they shy away from a regular workout. But, what most woman are not aware of, is the fact that exercise does not necessarily require them to spend hours on a treadmill, or do push ups or any other such things that might freak them out.

In fact, fitness can be achieved by combining work with play. It is important to remember that exercising basically involves making you body move. So, for women who don’t want to spend time at a gym, exercising can be as simple as going for a walk, playing their favorite sports and games or anything else that requires body movement. Making any sports activity a part of their daily routine, not only ensures that the women remain fit but also makes them have some amount of fun. And the icing on the cake is that even friends and families can also become involved in these sports activities. Now, what can be more enjoyable if one gets to spend time with family and friends, in addition to remaining fit?

Another way for ladies to keep themselves fit, is to work with children. The task of keeping up with children is a great way to mix exercise with parenthood. Small babies often keep their parents on toes as the parents move them and their paraphernalia all day. Even minor activities like carrying an infant, walking him or her when colic strikes, pushing a carriage and then a stroller, and even dealing with endless rounds of laundry, keeps parents and especially moms, in motion.

However, when children grow up and become more self-reliant, parents take that as a cue to sit down and rest. But soon the physical inactivity starts taking its toll and the women, whose day was spent, running around their children, suddenly become fatigued by just waking in the garden. This is perhaps the first indication that they are loosing their fitness and need to look into the matter seriously.

But what happens when children grow up and like to spend more time with their friends. Don’t worry as there are still plenty of other methods that women can adopt to remain fit, including trying their hands at gardening, or maybe mowing the lawn, or perhaps organizing a regular walk around the block with friends. The choices are endless and one only needs to have the zest to choose an option that appeals most to their personality and then make it a part of their daily routine.

So, it can be easily said that to keep fit one does not necessarily have to go t a gym against one’s wish. This will anyways not work as a person can be forced to do something only for a certain period. But to maintain a routine of fitness for a lifetime, people need to choose a means that appeal to their nature, which will ensure that they carry it out through their entire lives

Meetu Nadir
Freelance Writer
http://www.meetusreflections.blogspot.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Meetu_Nadir
    .

Stop Taking Me For Granted
By Jeff Scott

Have you ever had those words said to you? Ouch! It is possibly true, but hurtful none the less.

It’s usually during an argument. Of course it’s a subjective point of view, but usually not without some validity. It sounds like you don’t care. But it is sometimes quite difficult to tell when it’s happening. Often the only time you know you have taken someone or something for granted, is when something dramatic happens in your life.

The reason why we do this is because it has become part of our daily routine and we are virtually operating on autopilot. And if this includes how you treat your partner, then you could be swimming in dangerous waters.

But really, routines are not always bad things. We have so many things in our daily life that if we were to think of all of them, we wouldn’t get anything done. If we had to think every time we cleaned our teeth or got showered or got dressed, life would become a nightmare.

Imagine having to think how to drive our car when we go to work. Going through what has to be done before we start the engine, checking where the indicators are, how to turn on the lights.
It would be just like the first time we ever got in the car and were shown how to do all these things by the instructor.

So routines cannot be avoided if we wish to run our daily life efficiently. But again, taking things for granted can rob your life of so much pleasure and excitement.

We all get used to the sun coming up in the morning. It’s not a big deal, or so we think. It happens every day and we never give it a thought. We get used to the trees and flowers, to the fresh air we breathe, the change of the seasons, the sound of birds singing. But just imagine for a moment if were deprived of any of these routine happenings. Imagine if you couldn’t hear the birds sing, because you were deaf or locked away in some stinking jail in the middle of a wilderness where there are no birds even if you were set free.

And what about the change of seasons? Do you complain when the summer ends and the autumn days bring cooler weather. Just think, if you lived in the middle of the Sahara desert you wouldn’t be aware of the time of year because every day would bring unremitting sunshine and there would be no plants or trees coming into blossom or losing their leaves.

There are thousands of aspects to your life that you probably have never given a second thought to for many years.

So stop now and think about your life. Do a mental exercise and go through all the different aspects like, your health, your family, your employment, your friends, your home, your possessions, your country. Think what it would be like if you didn’t have them. Realise how lucky you are.

The author is a retired business man who is passing on the experiences of life he has gained over many years. See his new site at Leather Car Seats and also Chicco Car Seats.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jeff_Scott

Heart disease is America’s number one killer of both men and women. Regardless of gender, high cholesterol puts everyone at increased risk for heart disease. But there are some important and simple steps you can take toward keeping cholesterol in check and improving overall health.
Start with food. Your diet is an important factor in controlling cholesterol. A healthful low-fat eating plan, combined with regular physical activity, is key to heart health. In fact, new National Cholesterol Education Program guidelines recommend that one in three Americans need to make diet changes to lower their risk for heart disease.
Foods high in soluble fiber, like oatmeal, beans and peas, barley, and many fruits and vegetables (such as apples, oranges, and carrots) are now recommended to help lower cholesterol levels.

The best way to increase your HDL, “good” blood cholesterol, is to stay active and trim away excess pounds if you are not already at a healthy body weight.
When it comes to LDL, the “bad” cholesterol, your food choices are key. A heart-healthy eating pattern — a diet that’s high in soluble fiber with moderate amounts of fat and cholesterol — can make a difference and can help reduce LDL levels.
To lower LDL, try eating more foods high in soluble fiber. Studies have shown that oatmeal helps to lower LDL cholesterol, without lowering HDL.
Eat foods from all five food groups — And eat a variety of foods within each food group. That way you will get a full benefit package from food.
Remember breakfast — A perfect time to enjoy fiber-rich foods and fuel your body for the day ahead. Enjoy oatmeal, or other whole-grain cereals. Top a bowl of whole-grain or fiber rich hot or cold cereal with fruit and nuts for additional fiber.
Pick high-fiber snacks — When you need a quick energy boost during the day, reach for a high-fiber treat. Popcorn, fresh fruit, raw vegetables, or nuts are convenient and healthful choices.
“Fiberize” your cooking style — Substitute higher-fiber ingredients in recipes. Swap up to one-third of the flour with quick or old-fashioned oats when you bake. Add extra vegetables to casseroles, soups, salads and pasta dishes. Use brown rice instead of white rice.
Eat at least five servings of fruits and vegetables daily — When possible, eat the skin — it provides fiber, too!

source:http://www.fitnessandfreebies.com/fitness/cholesterol.html

By Bill Mansell

• Always wear rubber gloves when you plan to do any household work or gardening. If your hands are exposed to too much water, soap, detergents, dirt or chemicals then, the skin of your hands can become wrinkled and rough.
• Ideally, you should moisturize your hands at least 4 times in a day, especially after washing them. Even if you do not have time make it a habit of moisturizing your hands before you go to bed at night. This is just as important as brushing you teeth before you go to bed, every night.

• You can also use your face exfoliator on your hands. This will help to remove any dirt and dead skin cells, and nourish and rejuvenate the skin of your hands.
• You can scrub your hands with bath salts, after washing them with soap. This will leave your hands squeaky clean. Do remember to slather some moisturizer on your hands afterwards.
• If you have oily hands, you can try rubbing cornmeal on them after washing them with soap.
• Go in for regular manicures (professional or homemade) to keep your hands and nails in good condition.
• Drink lots of water and fresh fruit juices. Eat a balanced, low-oil diet.
• Exercise regularly. If you are healthy and fit, you skin will have a healthy glow.
• If the skin of your hands is dry and flaky—you can massage a little petroleum jelly on your hands before you go to bed at night. After you do this, you may wear thin cotton gloves. Wake up in the morning and enjoy the soft feel of your hands.
• A quick, easy-to-make homemade scrub for your hand will help. Here’s the recipe for a rejuvenating homemade hand scrub:

Ingredients for the homemade hand scrub recipe

• White Oats- 1 tbsp.
• Honey-1 tsp.
• Water-½ cup

5 Natural Common Cold Beaters
by: Jacob Mabille
The aptly named common cold hits nearly every one of us on a regular basis and once a single family member has it, it can spread quickly and viciously. While the cold itself is relatively harmless it still presents almost crippling symptoms. The common misconception is that you can fight a cold, essentially getting on with your life and trying to ignore the problem. This is much more likely to prolong the agony as a pose to beating it. In preference to turning to the pharmacist there are natural ways to reduce the recovery time and relieve the nagging symptoms of a cold.

Rest

The misconception that exercise will help to sweat out a cold is misleading. The body needs to be able to fight the cold infection and by exercising or being excessively active you are reducing its capability to do this. Resting allows the body to fully combat the cold virus. The immune system and various immune functions within the body are strengthened or generated during sleep. It is these that will help your body beat the cold.

Water

When suffering from a cold the body is susceptible to becoming dehydrated. In order to prevent this it is absolutely essential that sufferers drink plenty of water. The recommended eight glasses of water a day is the absolute minimum that you should be aiming to drink when suffering from a cold. For this reason, water can help to further strengthen the immune system and subsequently beat the infection.

Vitamin C

It may sound something your mom or your grandmother would try to convince you but it is widely believed to be true. However, too much vitamin C can cause diarrhea and possible even kidney stones. Many proponents of vitamin C as a cold remedy would argue that 1,000mg every hour is not damaging and will help to reduce the time a person suffers from a cold. However, it has been medically proven that 250mg has the same positive effects as any larger dose with fewer and less severe side effects. The best way to obtain this level of vitamin C is through fruit juices because this also provides a good source of extra fluid.

Garlic

Garlic is another age old herbal remedy for colds. It helps to strengthen the immune system and is also a good antiviral. Putting garlic in meals will help to prevent colds and can also reduce the suffering time of patients. The best way to consume the garlic is freshly ground and raw. Many people would find this a struggle, especially because a lot of people eat as many as three or four cloves as soon as they show symptoms of a cold.

Elderberry Extracts

Elderberries may look harmless but to the cold virus they are far from it. It is a powerful antiviral as well as being a highly effective prophylactic. As an antiviral it can help to stave off the actual infection causing the cold, and its prophylactic properties strengthens and rejuvenates the immune system. Elderberry and blueberries are among the best varieties of fruit a cold sufferer can eat for these very reasons.

The Immune System Role

You will have probably noticed that almost all of these remedies are strongly based around the strengthening of the immune system. This is because there is essentially no cure for the common cold and we are forced to rely on our bodies to fend off the infection. In order to do this, the immune system needs to be as strong as possible and the stronger it is the less suffering will be required.


source:e-healtharticles.com