5 reasons to drink coconut water & a side of me you haven’t seen!

Hi there beautiful!

I hope all of you had a lovely holiday! I whipped up a lil spread for William & Oliver {our lovely care taker & friend}. The menu consisted of the following. 

• Fresh squeezed orange juice
• Young Thai coconuts
• Jackfruit
• Fresh watermelon
• Loquats
• A big salad 🙂
• My special anti-inflammatory guacamole
• Organic salsa
• Baked root vegetables {butternut squash}
• Non-GMO corn tortillas
• Raw chocolate bark

It was a beautiful day with the ocean, Oliver & the doggies!

Today I wanted to share with you my all time favorite way to hydrate! Its with coconut water! Notice that its not one of those white young Thai coconuts! This is do to so many of them being dipped in formaldehyde! Thats right! I avoid them like the plague! Here is why I LOVE to drink coconut water! 

1. It’s high in beneficial magnesium and potassium!
2. It contains copper! An essential mineral you don’t hear about to often that everyone needs!
3. Coconut water contains A LOT of antioxidants to ward off free radicals!
4. Got cytokines? Whats that you ask? Cytokines are compounds (found in coconut water) that slow the aging process and have been known to fight off cancerous cells.
5. Its a sweet treat thats actually beneficial and low cal!

I hope this article entices you to begin drinking more coconut water! Just be sure and get it from a reputable source! I never trust a tetra pac or a white coconut unless I’m in the Caribbean!

 Love the Mexican coconuts!

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A side of me you haven’t seen! 

I’m hoping you find benefit from the above information. I love coconut water and drink it daily!

I wanted to share with you a place where I am very candid! It’s a side of me you won’t find on my Youtube channel or here in my news letter. Its called Snapchat! Its a free social media platform for sharing 10 second videos and photos! Here is a little clip of a day and a half on my Snapchat show at the bottom of this email! Enjoy!

Oh and of course, here is the link to follow me there! I can’t wait to see you over there! Be sure and send me a message to say hi! 

Heres the link ~ http://www.Snapchat.com/add/andrealeighco

Home is wherever “they” are!

Today I was driving to yoga and came to the biggest realization of my life! I’ve been deeply entrenched in a feeling of aloneness not to be confused with loneliness as there is a big difference between the two. This has never come over me before. It went away this past weekend as I spent time with lovely people but sometimes stays when I’m in a room full of others.

I find this to be not only an odd occurrence but also the saddest feeling that has ever come over me in all my years on this Earth. I’ve been asking myself some pretty real questions lately. How could I possibly feel this when I’m surrounded by people who love me? Maybe I’m missing my family? Maybe I need to get out more? I mentioned in a video a few weeks ago that I believe its a lack of meditating on Gods word or “prayer”. Although I do believe this to be true I think I found the missing link today.

Prior to yoga I sat in silence for about twenty-five minutes. I then prayed that God guide me in the direction I am meant to go. The exact path that I am meant to travel even if it differs from the plans I originally had for myself. I asked that “his will be done”. 

On the way to yoga it hit me. “This isn’t my home” I said out loud! Of course this was followed by “where is my home then”? Its certainly not back in Ohio. I never have felt a pull to go back other than the desire to visit family. Its not San Diego! I never have felt that this was the area for me. No way is it Hawaii! I wanted to return to SD from the second I got off the plane there. I’ve fallen in love with Santa Barbara and have never been to SF, maybe its one of those two places.

Then… my answers were all placed perfectly before me! 

Home isn’t a place at all! The “alone feeling” isn’t coming from actually being alone or not receiving enough love. Home is a “feeling”, a “sensation”, a memory while its being created in that very space in time! 

Home is reading a book curled up in my favorite spot on a rainy Sunday! Home is the feeling of relief when you pull into the driveway after a long road trip. The beautiful soft smell of your mother on one of her visits. Its where I can decorate the Christmas tree 5 times until I feel it looks perfect! Where salads can be eaten out of mixing bowls with no judgement:) A quiet kiss on my forehead from the man I love or an annoying yet charming dog wanting me to throw “the shoe” over a balcony into the ocean 1000 times! Its the warmth of the strongest arms I know wrapped around me or the breath of that same person breathing on the back of my neck before sliding his hands around my waist. A pink toothbrush inside a jar of coconut oil in the bathroom, and the sound of my boyfriend’s key in the door on Monday evening when I’ve decided to stay over an extra day. My “husband with fur attacking me with kisses and bites every morning! Home means curling up against someone when both of your breaths suddenly become one before drifting off to sleep.

Home has been many places for me over the years, but its comforts are defined by simple, blissful moments like these. Never however had it become more clear to me than ever before that “home” was not built from brick and mortar! It’s wherever “they” are!

 

 

Don’t forget to get a little Vitamin D!

The weekends are a time to create memories with those you love and the people you are just beginning to love! Live, laugh and play this weekend and don’t forget to get a little vitamin D!  Have a fantastic Saturday everyone!

“Love The Ocean and You are Safe.” A Prayer Answered.

April 19, 2013

As a fitness model, I always went through “an off season”. This was a time when I would let my diet and exercise lap in order to gain a bit of weight only to lean out a month later for a magazine shoot. I guess you can say that the last 6 months of my life has been “an off season”. My body and health, (what I am most doted upon for) decided to wage a war with something I was being exposed to environmentally or ingesting. This in turn caused a plethora of health robbing events to take over my body leaving me with a skin condition and 15lbs of what I call “inflammation weight”. Today I gave up. I say I gave up because at 9am I was in the parking lot of my grocery store, face in hands sobbing. “God help me”, I literally cried out to him. “Put the right people in my path today to help me through this” I asked over and over again.

Keep in mind I’ve spent over $10,000 and gone to 3 different natural paths, one medical intuitive, a live blood cell analysis specialist, an acupuncturist and finally an MD. After all of this and thousands of dollars spent, no one could give me a straight answer as to what was wrong. Not to mention that I am quite savvy myself with all of this in case you have not noticed. If they did say it was this or that I would eliminate the culprit only to have symptoms return a week later.

So here I was in the grocery store parking lot looking like the local blonde bombshell sobbing weirdo! When I prayed this prayer…
‘God, I need your help! Please lay your healing hands on my body. “Please put the right people in my path today to help me find out what I am having a reaction to. Please restore my body to what it was just 6 months ago. I love you Jesus fill my heart and body with the joy of your unmatched love”.
I felt a peace and calm come over my entire body and the following words kept replaying again and again in my mind.

“Love the ocean and you are safe” These words came to me, through me and turned my tears into laughter. Surround yourself with love from one or from many who you know will be supportive and swim everyday in the ocean.

I now had my prescription and as the day unfolded he put those people I asked for in my path…A friend getting me a visit with the best group of doctors in San Diego. A girlfriend’s sweet text of how everything will be OK. A new friend and former doctor giving me sound advice. The most beautiful array of pastel roses that I have ever seen as I returned home and finally an answer as to what has been causing this difficult experience all along.

This truly was a prayer answered.

It reminded me that after the off season, I am always 100 times better than before. Thank you to everyone who had a role in this day. You were put in my path today by someone bigger than ourselves and I am grateful for each and every one of you.