Mike is a real treasure and we are very happy to have him back again with us this year. With over 30 years in the health food industry and a professional background in science, he is able to strip away the popular misconceptions surrounding the food we eat. Read a review here.

 

Hippocrates, the father of western medicine, recommended using food before resorting to any other medicine, and his principles are just as pertinent today. Letting medicine be our food and food be our medicine is all very well in principle, but what food, and what medicine? Cutting through the hype and fads around food, here is a clear and logical introduction to medicinal foods, ways of preparation and eating for optimum health, using material based on the latest nutritional research and a few thousand years of traditional experience.

 

This will be an enjoyable and informative week, with delicious healthy food and of course optional yoga and meditation classes.

 

During the week we will also look at:

 

1. The Dynamics of Diet

This talk describes how to match your diet to your (internal & external) environment and stay bright-eyed and bushy-tailed wherever you go.

Have you ever wondered how an Eskimo (Inuit) can spend his whole life never seeing a vegetable or piece of fruit and yet can thrive on all that meat and fat, whereas the same diet would not be so good in a tropical climate?

Whether travelling around the world or just popping into town, the food we eat and where we eat it significantly affects the way we respond to our environment.  

 

2. Food Mood and Stress

The way in which food affects our mind, our moods and the way in which we experience stress has been little understood by modern medicine, if not totally forgotten. At some level, however, we know this to be true, for example, that a cup of coffee can wake us up, or that alcohol can loosen our tongue, make some of us violent, or sleepy. Recent research has increasingly confirmed the facts, explained by ancient wisdom, that different foods can affect the way we perceive and respond to our environment, reviving an interest in choosing our foods for the most favourable outcomes, giving us back more power to control the way we react to our circumstances.

 

3. Optimum Nutrition for Optimum Performance

You wouldn’t put tractor fuel in your high performance sports car, so why not choose the foods (fuels) that help your own body to fire on all four cylinders.

 

We all undertake different levels of activity in our lives, placing different levels of demand on our bodies and our internal resources. Serious athletes can significantly improve their performance by simple changes to diet, while those with a more sedentary lifestyle can also improve their form considerably for little extra effort. We do this by looking at the prime constituents of foods, and the way they are utilised and managed by our body systems. With just a few simple guidelines, we can then choose those foods which together present the best mix for our chosen lifestyle. The relationship between diet and exercise is also clearly explained, which introduces the link between poor diet and disease.

 

4. Total Health

This is an introduction to a number of approaches to natural healthcare and their inter-relationships, illustrating their commonalities and their differences and so helping you choose your own way of improving your physical, mental and perhaps even spiritual health. A brief discussion on the nature of good health will then move to some of the fundamental causes of illness. Understanding some of these mechanisms provides clues to ways of treating and even avoiding a large range of diseases and stresses.

 

5. Smart Nutrients

Certain foods wake you up, others make you drowsy; here are some foods and nutrients that under the right conditions enhance the brain’s function. By looking at the way the brain uses its fuel resources we get clues on how to improve and enhance brain function using simple foods and nutrients and avoiding others.

 

6. Some Natural Approaches To Women’s Health

In which we discuss some current research on the nutritional and environmental influences on women’s health. By looking at the major causes of female problems such as cystitis, PMS, menopausal problems, osteoporosis, it is often relatively easy to rectify the condition by using diet and nutritional supplements which encourage the body to do its own repairs and rebalance its hormones.

 

7. Some Natural Approaches To Men’s Health

Very few men will admit to being even slightly ill, often until it is too late, which might be one of the reasons why men have a shorter lifespan than women. As a result of this, until recently, very little has been written about men’s specific health problems. However, they do exist, and effective natural approaches to a range of problems are discussed. Both dietary and nutritional influences will be examined from both the causal and remedy viewpoints.