Medications such as antibiotics, sleeping tablets, painkillers and anti-anxiety medications have become an hourly prescription. Unfortunately, when medication is readily supplied for dis-ease within the body, it can lead to an over-reliance on the ”quick fix” rather than treating the root of the problem. Particularly teamed with the busyness of modern life, it can be tempting to reach for the easy solution to take away the ache or pain. The problem with this way of treating is we can forget how to look after our body and can neglect the preventative work required for a reoccurring problem. So, the first line of defence comes in the form of a tablet.

A key philosophy of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) is the unique individualised treatment approach, taking into consideration all aspects of the individual. Here we investigate health history, environmental challenges, lifestyle factors, nutrition and mental emotional wellbeing. A large emphasis of Chinese Medicine is on preventative care and treating the root cause of symptoms before they progress into disease.

There is hardly anything as good for our health as regular exercise. Exercising regularly makes a huge difference in your health.

Whoever engages in sports reduces stress, delays aging processes, strengthens the body and prevents numerous diseases. The entire organism will benefits from it as movement strengthens muscle tissue, bones and joints, boosts metabolic processes and immunity and improves mental clarity.

With so many exercise options and workouts being offered these days, one can easily become overwhelmed about what to do. To get moving and break free from a sitting routine is actually quite easy but finding what’s right for your body and mind isn’t. We all have different body constitutions so finding an activity that you enjoy and that nourishes you is key to your health well-being.

Perhaps more than anything else in our lives, the foods we regularly eat help determine whether or not we will become ill, or remain healthy into older age. We seem to know all about fats, carbohydrates, proteins, minerals and vitamins, but no matter how advanced our knowledge on food is, there are always studies that introduce something new and diet theories that get debunked. With so many healthy diet theories flying around these days, it can be hard to know what is actually good for our bodies. What do our bodies really need?

Chinese medicine has a completely different view of food, one that's been established for thousands of years. It has successfully been used as a therapeutic method of disease prevention and treatment around the world. Instead of viewing meals as a breakdown of proteins, carbohydrates, and fats, Chinese culture reflects an awareness of the healing qualities of food as a kind of folk wisdom. What we regard as complicated is practiced on a daily basis in China, for example, the simple balancing of hot and cold: cold weather is balanced by eating foods that have a warming effect on the body, such as ginger tea, garlic, fennel, oats, lamb, salmon, etc. Hot weather is balanced by eating cooling foods such as raw fruit and vegetables, cucumber, watermelon, salads or, barley.

This knowledge of the healing qualities of food was practiced and treasured in our own culture until recently, but has gotten lost in the trend toward “fast food.” Similar connections between food and medicine have been made since antiquity.

Hippocrates recommended “Let food be your medicine and medicine be your food.” Hildegard von Bingen, the eleventh-century German visionary naturalist and healer, used foods for healing by devising energetic classifications that are surprisingly similar to Chinese food classifications.

At Escapada, we simplify healthy eating for you by applying the precious, long-standing principles of Chinese nutritional medicine. We all come with a unique constitution and therefore it is absolutely necessary to take “you” into consideration when deciding what’s healthy and what’s not. Food is pure nourishment for every cell of our body, that can be used to strengthen specific organ functions and treat various signs and symptoms. Our individualised health consultation and plan will explore a dietary plan that is just right for your and your health.

“A nourishing and balanced diet can support and address yourunique constitution to protect you from disease.

— Maeve & Emilia

ONE SIZE DOES NOT FIT ALL

How do you feel after eating certain foods? Just like we all have different personalities, we also all have different body constitutions and thus different needs. The best diet is one that works for your unique constitution and takes into consideration your signs and symptoms. Listen to your body and eat only foods that make you feel really good. When digestive issues occur,  it signifies that your digestive system is overwhelmed.

START THE DAY WITH BREAKFAST

Breakfast revs up the body after a night's sleep, giving us energy and nutrients to face the day. By morning, we are ready to "break the fast" after a stretch of not eating. The blood sugar (glucose) we need to power our muscles and brains is normally low when we wake up, and breakfast helps replenish it. But if we miss the day's first meal, the whole system gets stressed, throwing off the normal circadian rhythm of fasting and feeding. Eat to ignite your digestive system when Stomach and Spleen are most active according to the Chinese medicine organ clock - between 7am - 11am.

EATING AT REGULAR INTERVALS

Traditional Chinese medical wisdom around diet concurs with the adage “Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a pauper.” Long fasts and skipping meals is said to weaken the Spleen and lead to deficiencies in the body.  Instead, your should eat at regular intervals as the earth element (Spleen and Stomach) loves a routine. Eating at about the same times every day can help the gastrointestinal tract to perform optimally.

SEASONAL EATING

Eating according to the seasons is very important as our bodies also go through cyclical changes throughout the year.  Pretty simple advice - fill your plate with mainly fresh lightly cooked vegetables, grains and seeds that are in season and you find at your local farm or health food shop. Your body will thank you.

COOKING AND EATING MINDFULLY

Taking time to cook and eat with joy is important, so slow down and chew your food fully. Celebrate the food that is giving you life. Mindfulness can help boost your digestion and make you feel better all around. This new awareness can also help you tune in to any food sensitivities or foods that may not be best for your body. Try to avoid eating when you are stressed-out or aggravated as this can negatively impact digestion.

CUT BACK IN THE COLD RAW FOODS

Too much cold foods can slow down our physiological processes, and create dampness, and put out our digestive fires, so a Chinese diet tends to stay away from things like ice water, smoothies and too many raw salads. Opt for room temperature water, slightly steamed vegetables, and if you are craving those crunchy raw salads, have a cup of nice warm soup or bone broth first in order to aid digestion and improve your sense of well being.

LISTEN TO YOUR BODY

It is important to listen to your body when it tells you it is “full” or has had enough. Overeating makes it hard for the Spleen and Stomach to effectively digest food and allocate the nutrients to parts of the body that need it the most. Underrating may leave the body malnourished or dehydrated leading to things such as constipation or slow healing times.

GET UP AND MOVE

In Chinese medicine the root of many diseases is stagnation, and lack of movement and Qi flow, so make sure you get your blood moving. Walks after eating as well as regular exercise can help boost your metabolism and improve your digestive functions.

FINDING THE GOLDEN MIDDLE

At the end of the day, how do we decide what is considered to be healthy and what should be avoided? At Escapada, every food is nutritious, and as long as a healthy person doesn't eat too much of any one food, nothing is unhealthy. We simply want to avoid extremes so as to avoid overstraining the digestive organs. After all, it's all about balance. During your health consultation, we will explore how you need to eat to feel you best.

Modern day living has become a juggling act. When we have a lot of pressures, from work load to personal stresses, we mistake the feeling of being under stress for having energy. You run from early morning until late at night, turning yourself into an energiser bunny! In the microcosm of the world that is our body, it is not uncommon for us to exhaust our energetic and nutritional resources. Between holding down a job, maintaining relationships, and caring for a family, we can often negate the energy we earn from sleep, good food and good company. Our daily needs repeatedly outpace our daily intake of energy and the concept of a healthy lifestyle and self-care, or the meaning of, can go out the window.

Western society has adopted quite extreme views on ‘healthy living’ providing conflicting information and contradictory suggestions for health behaviours. A healthy and fulfilling lifestyle can seem unachievable with the ‘perfect’ lifestyles, routines and bodies that are portrayed everywhere. There is so much information out there and we can become paralysed trying to figure out what is actually good for us.

The more we, the Escapada team, move forward with our careers, the more we gain respect for the long standing and solid nature of Chinese Medicine and Ayurveda. They don’t chop and change information, they live by solid principles which, when adopted, give individuals a life-long individualised health and self-care system. 

At Escapada, we aim to pull you out of the confusion and bring it back to basics in order to help you find that healthy middle-way. Slowing down, reflecting and looking after yourself are essential for your mental and physical health. Enter a space where you reconnect with how you feel both physically and mentally, and everything starts to shift.

“Mindful self-care practices can create a lifestyle medicine to form a timeless self-healing toolbox for body and mind. 

— Maeve & Emilia

ONE SIZE DOES NOT FIT ALL

Have you ever wondered what actually accounts for differences in people? 
Why are some people hyperactive and fast moving, while others exude grace and stillness? Why are some people inherently joyous, while others carry the weight of the world on their shoulders? We all have different personalities and we all have different body constitutions. Therefore, what self care practices or lifestyle choices will work for one person, may be completely different for the next.
Let’s explore this together.

LISTEN TO YOUR BODY

This is an essential approach on any journey towards a self-care/lifestyle plan. What motivates you? What makes you feel happy and healthy? And equally, what aspects of your lifestyle habits are weighing you down, making you feel low and unmotivated? Listen to your body, it will be your guiding force. It has a lot to say, once you listen.

NOURISH YOUR BODY THROUGH FOODS

Somewhere along the way our relationship with food took a wrong turn and eating became something we define as being good or bad. The food is good or bad and we are being good or bad for eating it. Our relationship with food should be an inspiring and positive one, a healing relationship we cannot afford to lose. It is what gives us life and helps us grow. Let’s start a journey with the starting point of food as a source of nourishment and have some fun.

SELF AWARENESS AND REFLECT

Practicing self-awareness and reflecting are key to maintaining your health and preventing imbalance. Reflect on how your body feels on a daily basis. Health is not just an absence of disease but rather a feeling of strength, energy and resilience. Don’t simply accept fatigue, monthly migraines, low mood just because a blood test tells you you’re “healthy”. These are all symptoms of dis-ease and there is something causing it. Be your own detective

SLEEP WELL

Sleep is not important - it is essential. Sleep and health are strongly related - poor sleep can increase the risk of having poor health, and poor health can make it harder to sleep.  Sleep disturbances can be one of the first signs of distress and that the body is out of balance. An old Chinese quote says that “replenishing health with medicine is not as good as replenishing health with diet, but replenishing health with sleep is the best treatment of all”.

STRESS REDUCTION

As a society, we have started chronically living in our sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight mode). We were only ever intended to live in this state, in the short term, effectively to run away from danger. When we are in this mode, our abilities to heal and repair are down regulated to deal with the presumed danger. Stress reduction and management is a critical part of our modern day lives. We will explore small achievable steps that you can build into your lifestyle to manage stress effectively.

ENVIRONMENTAL ASPECTS

We have little control over many of the environmental and external aspects that we are exposed to on daily basis, for example, air pollution or air conditioning. But it is important to take a step back and make small changes where you can. Take time to reflect on things that are in your control. Seek time in nature as much as possible, drink only good quality water and clear out your home of unnecessary chemicals such as cleaning products, detergents and cosmetics and find suitable alternatives.

TAKE TIME OFF

Switching on our parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest) has never been so important in modern day living. Because this is where the body rests and heals and is an essential part of health and preventative medicine. During our extensive health consultation we can explore areas that might need to be changed to allow for self care practices.

FINDING THE GOLDEN MIDDLE

What we strive for, in our Escapada approach, is to help you find a noble middle-way. Pull away from a lifestyle of extremes and unmanageable self-care practices, a nice steady approach with small steps that can be built on. This will give you a timeless, individualised, empowered and self-healing toolbox.