Below is a selection of Tracy’s top 10 favourite cookbook and eating systems that can help you change your life and set you on a path to total health. They say it takes 21 days to break a habit. We’re not sure if that’s true for all people, or if 21 days is too much of a commitment to make when starting out.  So here’s what we suggest. Commit to making 3 healthy meals this week- 1 breakfast, 1 lunch & 1 dinner. The following week, set your goal at 2 of each. On week three aim to plan out 3 healthy meals of each and maybe throw in a snack or two- 3×3 = 9 moments where you’ve taken your health into your own hands and made a choice to change your life for good. Start today, make a conscious choice. As always we’re here to help you along the way.

1. reFresh ~Ruth Tal

Created from the award-winning meals served at Toronto’s “Fresh” – a chain of three dynamic and gorgeous downtown restaurants, the recipes in this book offer its readers a variety of inventive ideas for soups, salads, sandwiches, rice bowls, marinades, and sauces and dressings. The book also calls attention to the health benefits of various menu items including helpful information on nutritional supplements that can be incorporated into the recipes for an added boost.

2. The Art of Raw Living Food ~Doreen Virtue & Jenny Ross

This book celebrates the fresh and delicious items from the Costa Mesa, CA restaurant 118 Degrees. As you flip its pages, the colours of fresh, raw ingredients will entice you to visit local markets, or fruit and vegetable stands to find the most fantastic produce to create these tempting dishes at home. 

3. Green for Life ~Victoria Boutenko

We all know we’re supposed to eat more greens, but for many of us, the thought of chomping down on a Kale leaf or having a spoonful of wheatgrass is less than appetizing. I her book, Green for Life, author Victoria Boutenko gives us a tonne of ways to “eat our greens” in a much more enjoyable way –  by blending them with fruit!

“In more than thirty-five years of practice as a psychiatrist affiliated with the Harvard Medical School, I have learned one thing very well: Human behavior is very hard to change. Now Victoria Boutenko is persuading me otherwise… Thirty days of green smoothies will change how you feel and how you feel about your self. That’s no small achievement for one small book. “ – A. William Menzin, MD, Harvard Medical School

 4. The Thrive Diet ~ Brendan Braizier

The Thrive Diet is a long-term eating plan that will help you achieve optimal health through stress-busting plant-based whole foods. It’s an easy-to-follow diet that will help you understand why some foods create nutritional stress and how other foods can eliminate it, giving you a lean body, sharp mind, and everlasting energy.

Fully researched and developed by Brendan Brazier, professional Ironman triathlete, The Thrive Diet features: the best whole foods, a 12-week whole foods meal plan, over 100 easy-to-make recipes with raw food options that are all free of  wheat, gluten, soy, corn, refined sugar & dairy, including exercise-specific recipes for pre-workout snacks, energy gels, sports drinks, and recovery foods

5. I am Grateful ~ Terces Engelhart with Orchid

In “I Am Grateful”, co-founders Terces and Matthew Engelhart present their view of life and their business philosophy. Terces also presents her own story of personal healing, sharing with the reader her recovery from food addiction while explaining the benefits of an organic lifestyle.

The book’s gorgeous, full-color photographs accompany easy-to-follow recipes from the cafe’s most popular items, making it easy for readers to prepare live foods at home. Recipes include such cafe favorites as “I am Luscious”, a satisfying raw cacao smoothie, as well as juices, soups, and appetizers. There are also entrancing entrees like “I am Elated” spicy rolled enchiladas and delicious desserts including “I am Amazing” lemon meringue pie with a macadamia nut crust.

6. How it all Vegan ~Tanya Barnard & Sarah Kramer

When it first came out in 1999, How It All Vegan! was one of the go-to sources for people exploring healthier and environmentally friendlier dietary options. In the ten years since, veganism has become a much more mainstream diet.

The tenth-anniversary edition of How it All Vegan! includes new recipes, as well as updates and advice that better reflect the new vegan reality; it also includes a colour photo section and a new introduction by co-author Sarah Kramer, who speaks personally and passionately about the impact of veganism on her life over the past decade.

7. Sweet Gratitude ~Matthew Rogers & Tiziana Alipo Tamborra

Sweet Gratitude is a cookbook with a message: raw desserts aren’t only healthier for both people and the planet, they can also be every bit as tasty (indeed, sinfully so) as their mainstream counterparts. Tiziana Alipo Tamborra and Matthew Rogers, both master dessert chefs at the pioneering San Francisco-based Café Gratitude, present a tantalizing table of after-dinner or any-occasion delights. Illustrated with gorgeous color photographs, the recipes range from simple and quick to advanced and detailed, showing how versatile commonly used fruits and nuts are for whipping up innovative and beautiful desserts.  Ideal for anyone looking for healthier dessert choices as well as a valuable resource for people with special dietary needs including those who cannot consume dairy, gluten, or refined sugar, Sweet Gratitude shows readers how to craft what may be the most elusive item in the culinary canon: the guilt-free dessert!

8. Ani’s Raw Food Kitchen ~ Ani Phyo

This is the ultimate gourmet, living foods “uncookbook” for busy people. You don’t have to sacrifice taste or style to reap the benefits of raw foods. These delectable, easy recipes emphasize fresh, animal-free ingredients and how to include more organics into your daily diet.

Chef Ani offers delicious raw, animal-free versions of: breakfast scrambles, pancakes, chowders, bisques, and other soups, cheezes, mylks, lasagna, burgers, cobblers, pies, and cakes, and more. Included are recipes for dishes such as Stuffed Anaheim Chili with Mole Sauce, Ginger Almond Nori Roll, Coconut Kreme Pie with Carob Fudge on Brownie Crust, Mediterranean Dolmas, and Chicken-Friendly Spanish Scramble. Make your own kitchen more living-foods friendly with Chef Ani’s tips on Essential tools, Key ingredients, Stocking your pantry, and How-to kitchen skills.

9. The Kind Diet ~ Alicia Silverstone

Like many celebrities before her, actress Alicia Silverstone has put together a book that she says reveals the secrets of her great looks and knockout figure. In The Kind Diet, Silverstone attributes her health and beauty to her totally organic, vegan diet, free of “nasty” meat, dairy, white sugar, and processed foods.

In The Kind Diet, Silverstone, a passionate animal activist and conservationist, says a plant-based diet is not only good for your body but also saves animals and is one of the “greenest” things you can do.

10. Vij’s at Home, Relax Honey ~ Vikram Vij & Meeru Dhalwala

Pull up a chair—Meeru and Vikram invite you to dinner. In Vij’s at Home: Relax, Honey, Meeru Dhalwala and Vikram Vij show you how to prepare the recipes they eat at home, from vegetarian dishes that go from stove to plate in less than 45 minutes to seafood, poultry and meat dishes that come together in 20 minutes then cook while you help the kids with their homework or sit down with a glass of wine.

Designed for flavour, versatility and convenience, virtually every recipe can be adapted to suit your palate, your dietary preferences or your on-hand ingredients. Clear instructions, stunning photographs, a conversational tone and a paperback format make this an affordable must-have for every kitchen—for first-time cooks to more experienced chefs.

“The fountain of youth is right between your ears!” says, renowned author and neuroscientist Daniel G. Amen. In his new book titled, Use Your Brain to Change Your Age Dr. Amen introduces 10 remarkable patients’ true stories and what readers can learn from them, resulting in a breakthrough, easy-to-follow anti-aging program that shows you how to:

• Boost your memory, mood, attention and energy
• Decrease your risk for Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia
• Eat to live longer
• Reduce the outward signs of aging and make your skin more beautiful
• Reverse brain damage due to injury, strokes, substance abuse, and toxic exposure
• Make better, healthier decisions to dramatically increase your chances of living longer and looking younger

Readers will also learn the importance of blood flow, gaining extensive advice on vitamin supplements, extracts, hormones, sunlight, and stress-reduction in Dr. Amen’s 20 Brain Tips for Increased Blood Flow, Skin Health, and Sex Life: the trifecta for a youthful glow.

This book is an amazing resource for people trying to understand the role of the Brain in our overall health and function.

Over the last 20 years, Dr. Amen has performed more than 70,000 brain scans on patients from 90 different countries. From this research, he says the brain typically becomes less active with age and more vulnerable to memory problems and depression. Yet, with a little forethought and a brain smart plan like the one’s we develop for our patients here at Gaia, it’s possible to slow or even reverse the aging process in the brain.

Using our thorough Brain Assessment process & technology, Dr. Thomson and her team want to help you Use Your Brain to Change Your Age. Read the book and call us to inquire about our Brain Health Assessments.

1) When was your first yoga class and what was the experience like for you?

My very first yoga class was in Calgary, 1971. It was with an elderly teacher from India who taught
very traditional yoga with emphasis on Kryas (cleansing techniques) but at my young and tender age
did not have the full appreciation for these techniques as I do now. Years later I met my first Iyengar
teacher who had a profound and lasting effect on my practice. I was primarily focused on how yoga
could improve my running but in short order began to experience shifts that gave my life a new
dimension that I had not experienced before. My practice took me to a place of understanding that
yoga runs so much deeper than form (Asana) which I had naively come to identify as the essence of
yoga. Today yoga is for me, as much about being yoga as it is about doing yoga, on and off the mat.
It’s all yoga.

2) There is a lifetime of learning with yoga. As you continue your studies in yoga, what has been the most inspiring or powerful learning experience for you?

The most profound learning experiences in yoga for me have come as a result of relating what
happens to me on the mat, with what happens to me when I am off the mat.

The parables for life are written all over the practice of yoga: When we have the presence
and clarity of mind to “get those” we also begin to operate from a place of clarity. When we
operate from this place of clarity we have an increased ability to follow our choices to their logical
conclusions and consequently make better choices.

How I do one thing can resemble how I do everything: Our struggles on the mat, (and what and
where we default and implode to), are very similar to what happens off the mat and how and where
we are triggered by our everyday life challenges. We all have patterns and it is up to us to begin to
recognise them from a place of self love and compassion so that we may manifest those necessary
changes. This is how we evolve and grow into everything we are destined to be. Maslow called this
self actualization.

3) What is something that people would be surprised to know about you?

My parents were “quasi gypsies” in the most loving and responsible ways. I was born in Djakarta
Indonesia, and spent my youth growing up in Holland, Argentina and moving to Canada at the age
of 10. I spent eight years of my adult life living in the Cayman Islands working as a dive instructor,
massage therapist and yoga teacher and another two years living and working in Hong Kong. I
moved back to Edmonton in’05 and here to Canmore in November of 2011. I am now home!

4) What makes you smile lately?

My wife Michelle and I feel like we are on our second honeymoon here. We often marvel at how easy
this move was for us, and are still in a constant state of awe at the stunning beauty of our new home.
Sometimes I will be out walking somewhere, stop in my tracks, look up (wake up) and be gobsmacked at
this little slice of paradise. That’s when a silly ear to ear grin creeps across my face and a voice inside my
heart screams YES!… life is grand!

Henri teaches:

Mondays: Yin- 9:30- 11am & Yin- 7:30- 9:00pm

Tuesdays: Hatha- 1:30- 3:30pm

Sundays: Gentle- 10:00- 11:30

Dr. de Leon has high academic credentials as well as practical skills that have been sought out world-wide. He has attained a PHD in Clinical Psychology and in Holistic Medicine. He is also trained in bioenergetic and polarity therapy, hypnosis, radionic homeopathy and Ryodoraku electronic acupuncture.

His other academic pursuits include PsychoEnergetic study, body-mind psychoyherapy, 32 years of martial arts training, 23 years studying Hindu Tantra in India and Kashmir, 23 years studying Buddhism, 25 years studying shamanism and healing, trained in Bali’s Shamanism, student of  the Brazilian healer and Macumba King,  Ivan Thrilla, Jewish and Christian Kabbalah studies, Eastern and Western esoteric studies, training with several Chinese masters in Chi-Kung or energy management.

His main master is Sifu Peng, Vancouver, Canada. And training in herbal Chinese medicines with Sifu Chow, Vancouver, Canada. Several spiritual lineage titles have been bestowed on Dr. Carlos de Leon.

Dr. de Leon’s main interest has been researching techniques for the development and expansion of awareness. This has given to him the opportunity to get in touch with diverse masters, healers, psychics, yogis, contactees, etc. And, when possible, he has explored field research with them.

Dr. de Leon has written eight books on awakening. He has been asked to present at several international conferences and in 1982 a crew of the CBS TV network of the United States traveled to Mexico to film his work with children in the development of extra-ocular vision and psychic abilities. He is the creator of Ontogony, a program of tools and teaching to improve health, mental clarity and promote spiritual growth. Dr. de Leon is the founder of the International Institute of Ontogony Research and Development, Vancouver, Canada 1991. He is chairman of the Psychotherapy and Transpersonal Ontogony Development Association A.C.. in Mexico City.

He has a large group of students in Mexico, Spain, Canada, Greece, Israel and Guatemala.
For a complete listings of Dr. Carlos de Leon’s study and work, please view his complete CV here.

Experience the transformational power of music, meditation and Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan. This 3-part series will combine yoga, guided meditations and mantra with live music to create more abundance, joy and healing in your life.

The beautiful melodies of the mantras will inspire you to share your voice and open your heart.

REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN!

Cost: $1000 + GST | $1100, plus tax after March 1, 2012

Deposit: $300 upon registration.
Full Payment: by March 15, 2012

Refund Policy:
Full amount less $150 admin – before February 14
* 50% after February 15
* No Refunds after March 15, 2012

Registration is on a first come first served basis.

1) Surya Namaskara (Sun Salutations): Designed to build heat in the body, sun salutations are an excellent way to get your heart pumping and blood flowing to your extremities, which is great if you suffer from poor circulation.

2) Virabhandrasana II (Warrior II): Standing postures are a great way to start your internal fire and Warrior II is one that makes you feel strong, balanced and alive.

3) Setu Bandha Sarvangasana (Bridge Pose): When it is cold out, we tend to tense our shoulders and tighten our muscles to protect ourselves from the elements. Practicing backbends will help to open tight shoulders and create lasting warmth from the inside out.

4) Kapalabhathi (Breath of Fire): As we tense our muscles to protect ourselves from the cold, we restrict our lung’s capacity to breathe full and deep. Deep breathing helps to clear the mind and helps to keep our body healthy. The Breath of Fire is a breathing exercise that is especially good when it is cold out. A very cleansing breath; it helps to cleanses the respiratory system and the nasal passages, generating heat in the abdominal area and throughout the rest of the body. Usually practised in a seated position with legs crossed, it consists of a rapid, repeated forceful exhalation and a passage inhalation through the nose.

5) Savasana (Relaxation) : Winter can challenge our sense of well-being. As the cooler temperatures keep us indoors more often, it can be hard to get enough vitamin D, exercise or even fresh air, all things that are more easily accessible in the summertime. To maintain a positive outlook and stay energized during winter, relaxation and meditation are valuable tools. After doing your heat building yoga postures, get on some warm socks, gather a soft blanket and lay down for a warm cozy Savasana. Focus on one body part at a time, allowing the muscles to soften until your whole body is relaxed. As your body relaxes, your mind will follow. For extra warmth, you can fill a hot water bottle and place it on your abdomen or at your feet under a blanket.

With internationally renowned teacher, Nicki Doane

Nicki Doane teaches yoga internationally, graced the cover of  Yoga Journal magazine and has inspired thousands of people around the world with her down-to-earth and accessible approach to yoga. We invite you to experience her teaching in an intimate setting a she offers an in-depth evening of yoga, philosophy and self-reflection.

It is becoming increasingly obvious in our world today that Sustainability is no longer an option but a much needed reality. How to create that in our own lives and yoga practice is what this inspiring Vinyasa Fusion workshop has to offer!

Vinyasa Fusion combines the breath and flow of vinyasa style yoga with alignment principles that support healthy “postural integrity” and personal awareness in the practice. As our practice is a representation of our lives, we will explore how this sustainable approach to our asana practice helps us to create and sustain balance in our self, our relationships and the world around us!

All levels are welcome!

Nicki Doane had a wanderlust that led her to India in 1991 to study yoga. She went to Mysore to meet Sri K. Pattabhi Jois and immediately realized she had found her teacher. Nicki started teaching in 1992. She is an authorized teacher of Ashtanga Yoga. Although rooted in Ashtanga, Nicki’s teaching goes beyond the traditional. Nicki teaches at yoga studios and conferences across the globe and is featured in two Ashtanga Yoga DVD’s from Gaiam Inc. and recently produced her own series of Maya Yoga DVD’s in collaboration with her husband Eddie Modestini. Check out Nicki’s site.