You Thought You Left These Behind When You Went Natural…

The grass is always greener on the other side right? You went natural thinking that finally everything would click into place and you would live nappily ever after. If you are one of those ladies who gave up relaxers for reasons unrelated to loving natural hair, you were probably surprised that some of the things you […]

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Culture Clash Hair Extensions And The Natural Hair Movement

Every so often I get some insight into how products are targeted to black people around the world. It’s never made me uncomfortable that the people behind these products are not usually black themselves, recently I had cause to pause for thought. I only ‘buy black’ when the product in question is both convenient to […]

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This Smell Good Detox Makes Your Fragrances Smell Even Better

As summer quickly approaches, one of the dominant thoughts that pops up in my mind is initiating a pre-summer detox process.  Typically, as temperatures rise, our internal processes become more active.  We sweat more in an attempt to try to keep cool.  Our oil production increases causing a spike in breakouts.  I try my best to take a proactive approach an initiate the detox before summer hits.  This helps to spare me from unnecessary breakouts.

2018 will be no different! But, this time around, I want to heavily focus on enhancing my natural scent.  My motive for this is because I find myself drawn to fragrances with extremely light, exceptionally natural scents.  Unlike the fragrances of yesteryear,  newly developed perfumes are often light and underwhelming.  Like "no makeup, makeup," fragrances of today are designed to simply enhance our natural scent.  Best of all, they collaborate with our natural pheromones creating our own alluring smell.

If you'd like to enhance your natural scent, here are some tips to incorporate into your regimen.
At the most fundamental level, the most effective way to begin this detox process is to increase your water intake.  We typically drink water to help quench our thirst.  Drinking when you're thirsty does nothing to promote detox.  You're simply consuming water to remain alive.  If your urine is very yellow in color, you aren't drinking enough. Simple as that.

I often fall into the trap of drinking to satisfy thirst.  Now I challenge myself to drink for "cleansing purposes."  Meaning, consuming enough water to dilute my urine and stimulate my digestion.  When we shower, we cleanse our skin with water.  When we drink up, we cleanse our internal body with water.  Taking daily showers is a must.  In the same way, we should drink enough water daily to cleanse from the inside.

Once we're consuming enough water, we can incorporate liquids that promote further internal cleansing.  The two, easy to drink options that I love are lemon water and chlorophyll drops. It's also a good idea to trade in your processed snacks for fruits & veggies with a high water content. I'll be drinking copious amounts of lemon water all summer long.  Last year, I figured out that if I drink enough of it throughout the day, I start to develop a natural citrus scent.  This is ideal for me since I'm drawn to fragrances with citrus notes.  Citrus, to me, is the perfect spring/summer scent because it's the epitome of crisp freshness.

Drinking for detox purposes is cool and all but when I really want to promote internal cleansing, I scheduled a few rounds of infrared sauna sessions.  Sweating in an infrared sauna is one of my favorite ways to quickly detox.  I suggest you treat enjoy multiple sessions to experience the most benefit.  If you couple sauna sessions with adequate water intake, you'll really amplify your internal cleansing.

My motto for summer is to "sweat before you sweat."  Meaning, sweat out the impurities ahead of time, so by the time you're sweating on the beach, it's cleansed and pure.  My goal is to sweat without fear of giving off an unpleasant odor.  This isn't difficult to do if you have a proper detox regimen in place.

When we remove internal toxins through sweating, our natural pheromones become more noticeable. 

Lastly, I detox the surface of my skin. Your skin is where your fragrance will interact with your body heat.  The last thing we want to is to have layers of dead skin, lotions, and sweat residue comingling with our expensive fragrance. This is why I'm adamant about scrubbing to exfoliate our bodies.  Scrub your skin and scrub it often.  Better yet, scrub after sweating to create an even greater impact.

I don't know about you, but I'm trying to smell good all summer.  Soon, I'll be adding a few new scents to add to my collection.  Some of them are pretty pricey.   I want the complex notes of my perfume to blend seamlessly with my natural scent.   If you love light, barely there fragrances as much as I do, a pre-summer detox routine is absolutely essential.

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The Many Benefits Of Honey In Our Hair

You don't often think of honey as a hair care product but surprisingly when added to your hair, honey can impart sheen and softness. The most important property of honey with regards to hair is that it works as a natural humectant attracting moisture to otherwise dry strands. In this way it acts much the same as […]

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Activity Based Eating. The Strategic Approach to Indulging without Gaining Weight.

Working for myself from home has been absolutely amazing.  But, there is one drawback that was kinda unexpected.  If I'm not careful, I can easily pack on pounds that seemingly come out of nowhere. 

To get to the root cause of the issue, I did an experiment where I logged all of my calories and tracked my daily activity. Over time, I noticed patterns forming that served as information that I could use later on.  Once I discovered the pattern, I realized that I could eat pretty much anything I wanted without the fear of putting on too much weight. But this strategy only worked if I applied it strategically.

Recently, I reintroduced this principle in my life again and I quickly lost a couple of pounds.  Since summer is on its way, I thought I share this simple technique with all of you to help you reach your weight goals. 
It all began when I watched a vlog of some random fitness YouTuber.  While taking us along as she filmed her day, she mentioned that she was going out to dinner later with friends so she would be "saving her calories for dinner."  I didn't exactly know what she meant but quickly figured out that she was simply taking a strategic approach to eating.  So instead of eating a high-calorie breakfast and lunch, she ate sensibly throughout the day in preparation for her heaviest meal. Because she proactively ate low calories meals all day, indulging in a high-calorie dinner wouldn't throw off her weight management efforts.

I quickly realized that this applied to me as well.  Because I'm a short, petite woman, the number of calories I can eat in a day without putting on weight is limited.  One highly indulgent meal at a restaurant could provide all the calories I need for the day. After logging my weight for a while, I figured out a way for me to eat high-calorie foods without putting on weight.  All I had to do was be strategic.

On days when I'm home all day, I'm pretty sedentary. The amount of steps I take a day is pretty embarrassing.  Sometimes, I'm busy at home all day and, instead of making dinner, I pick up take out.  This is a huge mistake if my goal is to maintain or lose weight.  Low activity + high calories is a recipe for weight gain.

Then there are days when I go out for walks or visit the gym.  The additional activity raises my calorie requirements.  On those days, we can afford to take in a few extra calories without packing on the pounds.

 Whenever I watch reality shows where women meet for lunch/dinner.  Almost 100% of the time, they order a salad.  I almost never order a salad at restaurants because I want to try the specialties on the menu.   Once I went out with a couple friends for lunch.  Both of the women were heavier than me. Of the three of us, I ordered the fattiest meal.  Secretly, they may have classified me as one of those people who could eat whatever they wanted and not gain a pound, but this is definitely not the case.

The difference between us was that I recognized that I would be eating a caloric rich lunch that day so I managed how much I ate for breakfast and dinner.  As a matter of fact, I asked the waiter to cut my burger in half so I could split the calories between 2 meals (lunch and dinner).  Of the 3 of us at the table, I was the only one with a to-go box. As we talked during lunch they also discussed where they were going for dinner later that evening.  If I would have ordered yet another heavy meal at dinner, I would have certainly set myself up to gain weight that day.

Eating out more than once a day is not a good idea if you're being strategic about your eating.  Eating out multiple times a day might be necessary if you live a busy life or if you're on vacation.  If this is the case, you have to raise your level of daily activity.  So if I'm eating a bunch of junk food, I know I have to get moving, choose healthier options, or risk putting on weight.  When I traveled for work, I fell into the trap of using my meal travel budget to it's fullest. But I soon found myself carrying an extra 10 pounds.  Most of the time I traveled to attend meetings where I would be sitting in a room all day.  There was no need for me to eat so gluttonously.  I was giving my body all these extra calories (units of energy) that it didn't require.  Once I realized what was happening, I opted to buy salads or sandwiches on days when I was in all day meetings and ate heavier foods on more active days.  The weight easily came off without much effort.

Once I figured out strategic, activity-based eating, life became so much easier.  I felt like I could still enjoy indulgent foods (in moderation) without being afraid of putting on too much weight.  On my uneventful days with low activity, I scale back and eat reasonably. Or, if I have the choice of eating a high-calorie lunch vs. dinner, I opt for lunch because I have time to burn some of the excess calories during the remainder of the day.  If you want to try this for yourself, I recommend you first understand how many calories you need a day to maintain your weight. Once you have this covered, you can play around with the timing on when you eat more or less than the typical amount calories you need to maintain your weight.  Let's not eat mindlessly when we can take the strategic approach to help us keep our weight in check.

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Hair Shrinkage: To Deal or Not to Deal?

Shrinkage is an issue that most Naturalistas deal with. However, just as all people are different, so are the opinions on shrinkage. For instance, some hate shrinkage with a passion. I can relate to this, because one minute you are rockin a fierce twistout, or bantu knot out, and people are asking if your hair […]

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How To Achieve The Best Braid Out Ever

Sometimes perfecting a braid out can be very difficult without practice or a great technique. Here are nine steps that you could try in order to acheive the best braid out ever: 1.    Separate your hair into 4 sections for ease of manipulation. Apply your favorite oil to each section before shampooing to add […]

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