Jaime Hartman (00:06):
Welcome to the AIP Summit Podcast, your go-to resource for taking control of your autoimmune health, presented by AIP Certified Coaches. Hi, I'm Jaime Hartman.
Marie-Noelle Marquis (00:17):
And I'm Marie-Noelle Marquis. And we're here to equip you with the tools, knowledge and support you need to effectively use the autoimmune protocol.
Jaime Hartman (00:25):
And today we are sharing insights from our colleagues on the healing power of connecting with nature.
Marie-Noelle Marquis (00:39):
If you've listened to any of our previous episodes, you've already heard us say that the autoimmune protocol is not just a diet. As AIP Certified Coaches, we teach AIP as a total lifestyle with six key pillars, diet, sleep, stress, management, movement, connection with others, and connection with the natural world. This episode is being released on April 21st, and that means that tomorrow is Earth Day. So this is a great time to dig into this topic.
Jaime Hartman (01:08):
That's right. In this episode, we're going to be bringing you the audio from a live webinar that featured a panel of experienced AIP Certified Coaches sharing their own experiences in using nature to promote healing and answering submitted questions from the audience, including what are the biological changes that nature actually fosters. So they get into the science and answering some practical questions like how can we connect to nature when the weather isn't conducive or when we live in urban areas or have a limited ability, limited mobility, limited ability to walk. We will be revisiting this topic at our next monthly webinar, which will be on May 6th, 2025. If you're interested, you can find a link to register and to submit your questions in the show notes, or you can go to our website, aipsummit.com. Now, if you're hearing this episode and it's after that date, it's after May 6th, please know that we did record it and we added it to our archives, which all members of the AIP Summit Community have full access to.
(02:08):
And if you're not a member and you are hearing this during the month of April or May, we've set up a special offer that will give you your first two weeks for free as a special Earth Day celebration gift from us. The link to that offer is found only in the show notes for this podcast episode. You can't find it anywhere else, and it expires at the end of May, 2025. So again, this special exclusive offer gives you two weeks of free access to the AIP Summit Community, after which you'd be charged the low monthly membership fee for as long as you'd like to stick around with us. All right, now without any further ado, let's dive in.
(02:49):
Right. Hello and welcome. This is recorded on May 8th at 3:00 PM and our panelists are here. I will introduce them to you in just a moment. The content that we present in this session is for informational purposes only. It is not intended to be a substitute for medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment, and you should always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. All right, we're going to introduce ourselves now, and I will start if you don't already know me. My name is Jaime Hartman. I am the organizer, the founder of the AIP Summit. I am also a national board certified health and wellness coach and a nutritional therapy practitioner. And if you want to learn more about what I do, you can go to my personal website, which is called Gutsy By Nature. I'm going to ask each of the panelists now to introduce themselves, excuse me, and we'll start with Yamila.
Yamila Cruz-Martinez (03:51):
Hi, I'm Dr. Yamila Cruz Martinez. I'm from Puerto Rico. I'm a chiropractor and have postgraduate studies in functional medicine and nutrition, and I'm also an AIP coach since 2017, and today was the release of my first book. It's called Without Diet, with Habits in English. I hope I translate that well and where I actually talk about the autoimmune protocol diet and just lifestyle in general to have a better health. Thank you for having me. That awesome picture of me that I am a volunteer in some community gardens, so I found it appropriate to have it for today. Thanks for having me.
Jaime Hartman (04:36):
Thank you. All right, we've got Jan next.
Jan Steele (04:41):
Hello everyone. My name is Jan Steele. I'm a nutritional therapy consultant and a graduate of the Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts. I'm also a lifelong celiac and I'm the site host for the AIP retreats in the south of France So I live in the south of France where I run a 100% gluten-free bed and breakfast and teaching kitchen. And periodically we host people to come through to be on various gluten-free diets, one of which is the AIP.
Jaime Hartman (05:15):
And then finally Mickey.
Mickey Trescott (05:17):
Hi everybody, I'm Mickey Trescott and I'm the author of a few AIP cookbooks. The latest one, you see a picture on your screen, the Nutrient Dense Kitchen. I'm also the curator of Autoimmune Wellness, which is now an archive, but if you guys have been searching for any AIP information or recipes, the Autoimmune Wellness website is definitely a great place to look. And I co-teach AIP Certified Coach with Jaime here. It's nice to be here.
Jaime Hartman (05:50):
Thanks, Mickey. Alright, so now you guys have met everybody. Those of you who are attending live, if you have at any point any additional questions for us that you'd like to ask, you can put those into the q and a and we'll see if we have time to answer them. But this is our agenda. We had some really great questions submitted in advance. So we're going to try to tackle each of these. You're going to see this screen coming up. It's sort of my timekeeper as we go through to make sure we're covering all of the questions. But the first question that we're going to try to tackle, or I'm going to ask all of the panelists to tackle, is the primary ways that each of them connect with nature. And it was Jan who suggested that we start with that. So I'm going to have her start by answering that question from her perspective, and then we'll have Jamila and then Mickey answer it, and then we'll go into all the other questions.
Jan Steele (06:40):
Sure. So for me, I know for a fact that nature has a huge impact on my health, just broadly, my mental health, my physical health. So I'm very happy to live in a very mountainous kind of river valley place where I live most of the time under the sky, which is to say outside. So I live in a huge stone house that is often more cold indoors than it is out outdoors because this is the south of France and climate is quite good, but these houses are wonderful for keeping the cold. And so as of about March, there are days where you would rather be outside than be inside, because inside it's actually cooler than it is outside. So it's wonderful. It pushes us to go outside. We eat lunch for sure, sometimes breakfast, and now that it's May, we are able to eat most meals outside at this point.
(07:35):
And I notice a huge difference on my wellbeing because of that. And I recognize that there are choices that me and my family have made for ourselves that have put us in this place. And one of them has to do with the immediate availability of nature. One of the ways in which I'm really exploring and getting to engage more closely with nature lately is by exploring edible nature. And so that's looking for the plants, the wild plants that grow around me and figuring out ways to incorporate them into my diet. Because plants that grow without the assistance of humans, which is to say without fertilizer, without extra watering, without anything, they just grow in the wild. That's going to be your most robust form of the plant, which means your most nutrient dense form of that plant. And so part of it is I'm Canadian, but I'm now living in the south of France.
(08:32):
And so this is vegetation that I'm not necessarily totally familiar with from childhood. And so it's a good way for me to come to feel like I'm part of this environment by learning to identify the different plants that are growing here. And many of these plants may grow back where I was from as well, but I was never really paying attention as closely at that point. So I'm starting to, what it does is it makes you pay attention and you see the seasons change in different ways through those plants. Everybody can probably identify a dandelion when it's in flower, but what does it look like in January and what does it look like in September and what does it look like in the middle of the winter? And so I'm starting to dig into that a little bit more. And so by virtue of that, I'm feeling more and more connected to nature.
Jaime Hartman (09:22):
Thank you. Yamila, what is the primary way you connect with nature?
Yamila Cruz-Martinez (09:27):
Well, I grew up in an island and I was fortunate enough that at that time we didn't have cell phones or anything, so I always been an outside outdoor girl in the rivers countryside, the beach of course. And I love camping. And now that I have my beautiful dog. So we do a lot of adventures outside and that brings me a lot of joy and mental clarity and just emotional decompressing from everything, just even the smells. Right now I live in an apartment, so I don't have a backyard, but I have my little garden here and I'm being getting a lot into medicinal herbs. I remember my grandma and my mom used to have these different recipes of like, oh, you have a, I dunno how you say in English, like a booboo. You did something, so let's put this herb there so it can help your muscles or your cold, et cetera. So I'm been reading more about it, and that also helps me not only connect with nature, but also help my patients see more naturals and less chemical ways can alleviate their symptoms or even cure some of them. Right, without saying that.
Jaime Hartman (10:49):
Thank you. And then Mickey.
Mickey Trescott (10:52):
Yeah, so these days my primary way of connecting with nature is through gardening, both inside and outside. So I started with some herbs in a window sill when I lived in an apartment, and now I've got a tree in my house behind me and I've got a vegetable garden outside. So every day in the winter, I live somewhere that it rains eight to nine months of the year, which is wonderful for the plants, but it's not great for actually getting outside, which I know we will talk about today. I can come down and look at my friend, stand back here and admire his new leaves and see if he needs any fertilizer or any water or anything. So yeah, I really love gardening both inside and out. And most recently, especially now that the weather's improved, planting things in my yard that I can eat. So berries are really my favorite food on the planet. And so I've got strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, and it gives me something to research, a hobby, something to do, and then also something to enjoy eating. And then it gets me outside even in the rainy months when I might not really want to go out there. I know that everybody needs a little pruning or something to facilitate growing great and having that harvest in the summer. So that's what I'm really enjoying.
Jaime Hartman (12:17):
Thanks, Mickey. And you can keep yourself unmuted because the next questions for you. So this question was one of our submitted questions. This came from Nikki, and it is, what are the biological changes as a result of connections with friends and with nature?
Mickey Trescott (12:31):
So I wanted to take this opportunity to just to share the Japanese practice of shin rin yoku because the Japanese have honed in on what they call forest bathing as a health practice and have actually studied it a lot. So a lot of what we know about the biological changes that go on inside our bodies when we connect with nature actually comes from this body of research. And so you can see on this slide I've summarized some of the research from a systematic review. If you're a sciencey person, you want to read about this, I highly recommend to this paper because it talks about the overview of many, many studies that have been done on the individual components, and I've listed them here. So things like decreasing blood pressure, decreasing heart rate, increasing heart rate variability. So this is the space between each heartbeat, which can actually be a marker of recovery and resilience, decreased stress hormones, so things like cortisol, epinephrine, modulated immune function.
(13:36):
So we know that as people with autoimmune disease, some of us know that having a ramped up immune system is definitely not a good thing. We also know that having an underactive immune system is not a good thing, but forest bathing has been shown to kind of balance that out, increased antioxidant indices. So this was something that I thought was interesting. I hadn't come across this in my prior research about connecting with nature, but this paper talked about how there had been some studies showing that some of the enzymes that are antioxidants within the body, so things like glutathione, superoxide dys, mutase have an increased function as a result of people being outside in nature. And that is obviously very good for the body, improved emotional states, and then decreased anxiety and depression.
(14:30):
So you guys can see that forest bathing is something that has been studied. And the next slide I wanted to highlight a single study that compared what happens when a group of people go to a camping trip. So this specific study was a Japanese study where they had people go for a camping trip for a weekend. So three days and two nights, they took a lot of markers, health markers before they took the trip and then right after the trip, and then they also followed up in 30 days. And then as a control, they had another group go on the same duration of a trip to a city. So they were tourists in a big city. And what they did was they compared the results of these two groups and they found that the people that went to the forest had an increase in natural killer cell function.
(15:23):
So natural killer cells are a specific component of the immune system that do a lot of work. I guess that's how I will describe it so we don't get too deep into an immunology rabbit hole, but they're a good marker of immune function. They also saw a decrease in adrenaline, which is a primary stress hormone. And one of the most interesting things that they found is that because these people went out to the forest for a weekend, they continued to have those benefits for 30 days after the trip. So it wasn't like they went to the forest and then their immune system and their stress hormones were down for a couple days. It actually persisted for that 30 days, and they did not see any of this with that group that went to see the city. So there are some really great physiological benefits to forest bathing or connecting with nature, whatever you want to call it, and they are long lasting. And so I think that's all really great evidence that it's something that we should do if we care about our health.
Marie-Noelle Marquis (16:35):
That's an amazing study. I love this so much. I grew up on the east coast in an area of Quebec that is known for its national parks, forests, lakes, and I grew up in the eighties back when you were outside until sundown. And whenever I just think about being in the forest, I can honestly just feel it in my bones what it feels like, how grounding and relaxing. I live in Los Angeles now in a very urban area surrounded by buildings, and I should definitely have an indoor garden because I can honestly say that I can go six, seven months without being in nature. And I know that's absolutely horrible and I know that it plays a role in my autoimmune health 100%. But I wanted to talk about food in nature really quick. So I don't know if you're like me and you're right now thinking, okay, I need to book a camping trip.
(17:28):
But one of the hurdle as we all know is what food can I bring with me on a camping trip doing AIP or even just what snacks can I bring with me on a day trip to nature? Well, how about some urban DIP food and snacks? I was going there. So as many of you know, I am the founder of an all AIP dedicated food company that ships delicious food right to your door called Urban AIP. We offer heat and eat individual meals, which you can definitely bring with you on a camping trip. They arrive flash frozen and it can be warmed up on the go, but we also have some really fun grab and go items, which would be perfect to bring with you in nature. So some of those items are our new breakfast meat buns, which are basically a complete AIP breakfast wrapped up in one little delicious bun.
(18:14):
You can warm it up and take it with you on your hike. They come in four different flavors and we focus on making sure they have 10 to 12 grams of protein per bun, seven grams of prebiotic fiber. There's actually a lot of veggies in the dough, healthy fats to promote sustained energy as well. And you can pair those with a cup of bone broth, which is perfect for your nature trip too, and that will double your protein servings. Voila. And some other convenience stacks we offer at urban EIP are a hundred percent AIP compliant crackers, and we are just launching pate. So you can grab some fruit pate crackers and you have the perfect balanced snacks you can enjoy when you find that perfect spot to sit down and take in Nature. Urban's mission is to bridge the gap between healing and convenience and support you on your AIP journey on those days when cooking and meal prepping just might feel like it's too much. And if you're listening to this episode, simply use the code nature at checkout for a special discount. All right, Jamie, back to you.
Jaime Hartman (19:13):
The next question comes from Lori and Yamila is going to answer this one. The question is, how does being in nature calm the nervous system and what happens in our bodies when we're in nature?
Yamila Cruz-Martinez (19:26):
Yes. So a lot of things happens to our bodies, so I'm going to be naming a few of them. So one of that is it'll enhance the parasympathetic nervous system. So that is the part of the autonomic nervous system responsible for the body rest and digest to be calm. So when you're in a natural environment, this system is activated, which promotes relaxation and reduce stress. And we know that we live in a very stressful lifestyle, most of us right now. Another huge thing is the improvement in heart rate variability. And if I pronounce something wrong, please let me know. So HRV is the measure of the variation in time between each heartbeat, which is controlled by the autonomic nervous system. So that is the part of your nervous system that you don't have to think about it, right? Like you're not inhale, excel, inhale, exhale, you just do it.
(20:26):
So higher HRV is associated with better cardiovascular fitness and resilience to stress. And we know at least in the United States, the number one cause of death is heart diseases in men and women. So research also indicates that the time spent in nature can increase the HRV demonstrating a physiological response that supports stress recovery and emotional resilience. So even if you're in stress, just looking at nature can decrease those palpitations, those heartbeat levels. Huge one is with the nervous system, the impact on brain activities, especially on the prefrontal cortex. So they have been using brain imaging in research and investigation, and it has shown to reduce the activity in this area during exposure to natural settings suggesting a decrease in negative patterns, what we call rumination. And we are like, oh, this is not going to be good. I'm not going to do well. So this change start to contribute to a decreased, like I say, negative pattern, but also improve emotional state.
(21:42):
So it can increase serotonin and neurotransmitter associated with feelings of happiness. And serotonin is super important, especially for a lot of us with autoimmune diseases, well for everyone, but for us, because it increased the HPA axis output, so it's hypothalamic pary adrenal axis, it involved the central nervous system that is the brain with the spinal cord and the endocrine system. So hormones adjusting the balance of hormones in response to stress. So stress is the result. Stress results in the hyper palam, that part of your brain stimulating the pit thyroid gland to release hormones that further cause the adrenal glands to release cortisol, which we most of us know as the stress hormone. Also, cortisol is very important for us, right, the right balance. And they also found that amygdala activation decrease after a walk in nature. So your amygdala is a very small part of your brain, but it's a major processing center for emotions and other brain abilities, memories, learning.
(22:56):
And in your senses when it's overactive, you can feel more fear and anxiety. So a lot of people that have huge anxiety and depression, they feel some disbalance with their amygdala and in the research that they were doing, they say even just looking at nature can improve cognitive functions like attention, memory and executive function. And the last thing, of course, it reduces cortisol. So even spending times a few minutes, green spaces can lower cortisol levels by 21% at least. So we all know, like I was saying, how stress can impact our bodies. So high levels of cortisol may interfere with production and function of thyroid hormones among other things. So nation overall just help us activate neurotransmitters and different parts of our brain and central nervous system that will help us calm down.
Jaime Hartman (23:59):
Thank you, Yamila. The next question Jan's going to answer it comes from Lisa and it's how to connect with nature in the winter months. She says, yes, I can bundle up and I almost hear this. Yes, I can bundle up. I know that's what you're going to say, bundle up. I could do that. She says, however, I really feel the difference when we experience weeks of no raise of sunshine. So Jan, take it away.
Jan Steele (24:23):
Yes. Well, having grown up in Vancouver, which is known for weeks on weeks on weeks, on weeks of rainy gloomy days, this speaks to me. But so this question deals specifically with an important part of nature, but I think maybe not the whole picture. So it deals with sunshine, and I think sunshine is definitely a huge and very important aspect of one of the things that nature brings to us. And so for sure, those weeks with no rays of sunshine, I don't know many places on the planet where there are literally no rays of sunshine. I think that we can always try to get out. And even if it feels really gloomy, going outside is still probably going to be a better idea than staying indoors, especially if you can sneak away over the noon hour. It's not always possible for people. And different peoples have different responsibilities that you either have control of your schedule or you don't.
(25:26):
I understand that in the case that you don't, you might want to consider getting one of these light therapy and tablets that can offer sunlight in a different form. If you're feeling like seasonal affective disorder is really beginning to affect you, that is a real thing. Don't suffer through that. And one of the great things about living in the modern world is that we can recognize the inputs that our body requires. And if our lifestyle is no longer providing them, now we can use technology to start compensating as best we can for these things. So make use of the technology that is available.
(26:10):
If you don't have control over your schedule such that you can get outside from time to time despite the gloom, then maybe bringing some sunlight, even if it's artificial into your world, is a way to go. Infrared saunas are also an interesting way to get some benefit. It's not specific to light, but the infrared is mimicking part of some of the rays that the sun provides. And so there are benefits that are similar to what the sun does to our bodies. If you have an infrared sauna or just a paddle of lamps, then that's one of the techniques that people use as well.
Jaime Hartman (26:47):
Okay, Jennifer asked for some tips for connecting to nature when weather prohibits it over a long period of time. Mickey's going to answer that one.
Mickey Trescott (26:57):
Yeah, and I definitely live somewhere in the Pacific Northwest like Jan who grew up in Vancouver. It's dark and it's cold, and sometimes when it rains, it does not stop for two or three weeks or even a month. So I have a lot of experience here. And the thing that I'd like you guys to think about is thinking about your indoor environment. So Jan had some really great recommendations about managing the light exposure, which is one element of the outdoors, but there is a concept called biophilic design where you can think about the interior environment and how to use that to facilitate your connection to the outdoors. Very simple. Biophilic design philosophy includes lots of windows, good ventilation, natural lighting, and some of the materials that are used to build a structure. Some of these things we don't have complete control over, but sometimes we do.
(27:54):
And thinking about them can actually help solve this puzzle of how do we connect to our environment. So some ideas for you are things like house plants, like I talked about before. I started out as an indoor gardener and an apartment because I didn't have a lot of access to the outdoors and I wanted a hobby and it really made me happy to have house plants. Some people like to buy cut flowers. Another thing you can consider is being near a window. So sometimes where I live, it's green in the winter, we don't get a lot of snow, but it's just the conditions are such that we can't go outside all the time. But positioning yourself near a window, maybe you can arrange your workstation if you can get near a window or you can have your morning coffee or your breakfast somewhere that you're getting some of that light through a window, you maybe have a view of a yard or something green would be great.
(28:51):
Maybe you can plant a bush in front of your window that faces towards your neighbor's house. That's something that I've done in my own yard. So thinking about that, diffusing essential oils that are natural and found in the forest. So the Japanese have actually done studies on these different components of biophilic design in order to try and figure out which one is most effective at producing the results of forest bathing. So they've tested things like viewing nature on a screen or in photographs, they've tested light therapy, they've tested diffusing essential oils, wood finishings, and how that makes people feel the lighting design. And it shouldn't be surprising that all of these things together give the effect of forest bathing, but also each those things in isolation to a small extent have beneficial effects. And so I've linked a study here that you guys can look up if you're interested in this.
(29:52):
And this is one of the tables from the study that just talks about some of the concepts that have been shown in research and then how that could be applied to interior design when someone is thinking about improving their interior environment. And a lot of this is also geared to healthcare spaces and public spaces, which I think is great. So I notice a lot of public buildings and libraries and hospitals are now being built with more plants and windows and diffused natural lighting. And that's all because this is a trending topic in interior design. But I think if you guys think about this in your own life and in your own home, whether you live in a small apartment or if you live in a house with a yard where you maybe have more control, you can consider improving your connection to the outdoors just in how you structure and arrange things.
Jaime Hartman (30:49):
Thank you. Mickey. I know when I first learned about this from you, I really put some thought into how I was going to make my arrangement for my office. So it's different than what I'd had before. And so what I have outside of the view of the camera is that there's a patio door out here in front of me and there's a window right here to the side. So I'm at least on two sides. Even when I'm working down in my first floor kind of basement office, I still have a little bit of natural light coming at me from both sides. And it is a simple thing, but it was just really a very deliberately done, and it looks silly in the room. The desk is kind of sitting out in the middle of the room, but I don't care. It works for me and it makes me more productive and a healthier person. So that's one little thing that I've done directly in response to that. All right, the next question Yamila is going to answer, and it comes from Kim, and it is what are recommended ways that people who live in densely populated urban areas can connect with nature and use it to help them heal?
Yamila Cruz-Martinez (31:52):
Yes. So one of the things that I used to live in Colorado, and we know that there can be very bad winters there, but some of the great things that you can do is participate in community gardens. Right now I participate in a couple of dances and it's an agroecological group. So I was looking for different in the internet, and I saw that in most major cities and even small towns have community gardens, and I even shared some pictures there in Toronto. I tried checking in different in London, New York. So they have community gardens and you can go to their website and you can just meet people like that, just grow your own food. And the best thing is that when it's harvest, you can have the full of nutrients, vegetables, and fruits that you also plant. And most of them will be without any chemicals or pesticides like they use in the commercial crops. Plus you meet other peoples that have affinity for green spaces. So community gardens are a great way. Also create a green living space.
(33:11):
Just bring home to nature to your home. Like I was saying, I live in a small apartment, but I try to have plants all around. It's not the same of course, but at least you have that. I dunno, that feeling there, you can put it on the balcony, on the window, sills, bathrooms, every place that you want. Planting flowers, herbs, you can use those for mason jars and have it in your kitchen. And then you can get the oregano, the parsley or anything that you like, so that way you also have it in a more natural and not commercial ones. Visit local parks and green spaces. I know at least Colorado have a lot of parks and walking distance in most of their towns. So many other cities in the United States and Puerto Rico not so much, but at least you can go to the beach. You can just have a walk there if it is not raining like it is today. But that also is connecting with nature.
(34:15):
You can also use natural materials for decoration. I'm not an artist, but there's this huge plant that I love, I dunno how to pronounce it in English, so I'm not going to even say it, but it's called Alia. And so I tried to collecting some of the flowers and doing some artwork with that. And yeah, that way you also, it's like that earthing or grounding, you work with that material, you decorate your house and that way you also have a feeling of nature. There's also natural reserve that you can look around even if you have to drive a little bit. There's nothing super close. For example, I sometimes have to drive 30, 50 minutes to go to the rivers and connect with nature that way. And if we by some reason don't have that stream weather sometimes in Colorado gets in the negative and it's all snowing.
(35:16):
Even just the sound of nature or looking at pictures of nature or just looking to the window can help you decrease those stress levels. And just connecting with nature is not going to be the same, but studies have shown that still will bring some benefits. And also meditation. You can just meditate and think that you are in Hawaii or someplace warmer. Or if you live in the desert, then you're, I dunno, still at the beach. So that way can bring you some mindfulness and meditation that you can either do inside or if you can at least in your backyard, do it outdoors. And it's always good to walk or bike every place. For example, last year I went to Amsterdam and that's a very populated city, but people walk every or go to in their bike and there's nature around the cannels, but even just being outside walking, even if it's just in your neighborhood, can also do a lot of good. And then then later I provide in the other slides, that's when I was looking for community gardens in different major cities. So New York, Toronto, and London. And then in the other slide is just examples of things that you can do at home that can bring a little bit of nature, like I have an aquarium, vertical gardening, just a little small garden in your balcony or just decorate with plants that can bring some nature in your life.
Jaime Hartman (37:09):
I love this one over here. It looks like it's like a shoe organizer or something. Pinterest, people are so creative. Thank you for sharing
Yamila Cruz-Martinez (37:17):
These. If you look at the internet, there's a lot of awesome activities that you can even do with your kids, which is really cool if you have kids or grandkids. And then incorporate them and have them feel that nature. Just playing with rocks, not throwing them. But
Jaime Hartman (37:37):
Yeah, I mean if it's good for us, it's good for them too. So including them and it is great, great thing.
(37:46):
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(39:25):
Alright, Jan's going to take the next question. It's the last submitted question. It comes from Liz, and it is a common thing that people talk to us about, especially coming from the context of being AIP Certified Coaches. We're dealing with people who have autoimmune diseases, which sometimes are impacting their mobility. So Liz wants to know with limited ability and walking, how do I get out and enjoy nature?
Jan Steele (39:52):
Yeah, well, so for me, I want to just have us recognize that we're in nature no matter what we do. I mean, we're on the planet and the planet is all encompassing. And yes, we do a good job of tinkering because humans are good tinkerers. And so we sort of tinker the nature or it feels like we tinker the nature out of our day-to-day experience because we live in climate controlled environments now and we live in with the electric light. We don't rely so much on the sun anymore. But those, that's not to say that those are things that are necessary. So you can choose to have your lights that will dim at a certain time so that you are getting more natural inputs. Even if you're within your apartment, you can be making sure that you have windows beside which you can sit. And so even if it is minus 20 outside to be sitting beside a window reading a book with a nice cup of bone broth, I guarantee you're going to be having the benefits of nature even though you're not feeling the minus 20 or the minus 30 on your skin and on your body, you are still taking time to appreciate the beauty of what's happening outside and to be engaging with it.
(41:12):
To me, engaging with nature or making sure that nature is part of your day-to-day activity, it's more about attention than it is actually about what you end up doing. I don't think you need to be going on an autonomous four day hike in order to be able to qualify as having spent time in nature. I think if you're living in the middle of a huge city, there will be a patch of grass somewhere that you can notice and then notice where is it growing and why is it, how is it possibly growing in the middle of the sidewalk when it's in this middle of this jungle and it's cement and you see the power of nature when you start paying attention. I think. So I think really broadening the definition of what is nature and recognizing that it's not necessarily about going hiking. For many of us it's spending time with animals.
(42:06):
And so I think there's the benefit of pets. I personally have a couple of donkeys, so we go out and we have to go outside in order to be with them. But having a cat, having a dog, having an aquarium, all of that is paying attention to animals. And animals have a much more natural way of interacting to boot. And so that already just puts us back into that mode. Plants, as Mickey and Yamila and Jaime have all mentioned, the more you can have plants in every single aspect of your living environment, and not just have them but pay attention to them and start small smart, start with one plant that and start with a succulent that is going to ask very little of you so that you won't have the frustration of killing something. Start with a succulent and just observe it over the course of a year and see how it works and see what it does and see how it evolves.
(43:01):
And maybe it'll flower and maybe it won't and maybe it'll reproduce and maybe it won't, and then move up from there. Or sprouting seeds, even just the biology of, okay, so I'm going to take some seeds that are maybe alfalfa seeds and I'm going to soak them and then let them drain. And then over the course of two, three days you see that they start to sprout. I mean now you've got a plant. I mean it's all of this sort of just engaging with being in the awe of biology and how the world works. The sky, we have access all the time to the sky and whether or not it's clear, but I've been just, I've found the moon cycles to be just so interesting lately. And I mean, yes, I'm in a place where the sky's very dark and so I maybe get a better view of the moon from where I am, but most of us are not even paying attention.
(43:58):
And so if you are coming home from work and it's dark, maybe just gander up and maybe you're in the bus, but that's something that can sort of help punctuate the month and see where are we And oh look, it is a full moon and when was the last time that it was a full moon? And I just feel like those kinds of things really do connect us to our place on the planet. And there is a benefit to remembering that we are just a member. We're just one member of a huge symbiotic relationship that is happening on this planet. And to remember that it doesn't all revolve around us and our decisions that we are often just here as we're just along for the ride sometimes and sort of remembering our small place on this planet. I think that's really, really valuable.
Jaime Hartman (44:50):
And you had this slide too. Did you want to
Jan Steele (44:52):
Say something about this? So this one was I think the last question where you were talking. Do you want to ask the question
Jaime Hartman (44:58):
First? Yeah, I think the last question was about a tip that we had or what we would do.
Jan Steele (45:03):
So my tip would be if you can get interested in edible nature, then try, I mean, it's growing everywhere. So these are some of the things that I've been digging up over the last couple of weeks in this area. So plantain is the plant on the left-hand side there, and the leaves of that are very good for sort of respiratory illness. And so I've made some planting leaf tea. Elder flour syrup is also elder flour. Syrup is great for anything sort of respiratory. And so I've made elder flour syrup this week and then a couple of weeks ago it was the dandelions were all out in flour and so we were picking them and then we plucked them and we ended up decorating some goat cheeses and some cookies with dandelion flour and eating them and it was just a blast. So yeah, I think it's just great to get out and just pay attention to what's growing around you. And maybe it's edible and maybe it's not, but it's a learning experience.
Jaime Hartman (46:00):
Personal question, Jan, the elder flower syrup, is that the same plant that grows elder berries? Is it just the flowers from them?
Jan Steele (46:06):
It is, yeah. Yeah,
Jaime Hartman (46:08):
I've got one growing in my backyard and now I know we can do something with those flowers
Jan Steele (46:14):
Absolutely
Jaime Hartman (46:14):
know that I learned something. Alright, so yeah, so Jan's answered this already. I'm going to ask both of you, Yamila and Mickey also to chime in one tip that they would give a client or a patient who is in need of greater connection with nature. What's one thing you might think to say to somebody, Yamila, you want to go?
Yamila Cruz-Martinez (46:34):
Sure. I know I already, and we all have talked about this, but I think having even a small garden can help a lot. Not only you can have your own vegetables and fruits or edible flowers and herbs that can give you a lot of nutrients that can help anyone either if you have an autoimmune disease or not. Plus they won't have all the chemicals and pesticides. For example, you can have nim oil and use it as a natural pesticide so that way your plants won't get a lot of ants or other nematodes that can be eaten them. Plus I think it's very fulfilling that you planted, you plant that seed, seeing it grow, and then it's like, I know I can't compare having a kid, I dunno, parsley growing, but it's just this awesome feeling of like, oh my God, I did, I took care of that and then I can eat it and I can feed my family and I can maybe even feed other people as well.
(47:45):
So it's like a very feeling not only you connecting with nature, but also receiving something from nature and then that nurturing type of relationship with that. And I think also it's a great way for your family to connect all of you trying to in the garden. So that way it's like a group type of activity taking of the plants. And I generally saying animals are, oh my god, I love them. It's the best thing. I just have my doggy because I live like I said in an apartment, but if it was for me, I will have a soup roaming freely. I don't want them in cages, but plus having a dog, for example, is a great way not to only exercise, but also get outside. You have to take them to pee and poop and then they need that stimulation also of nature and seeing them in nature. One thing that I love about my animals overall, they seem so free and so happy when you just go some nature to the mountains when I go camping and I left him off leash and I'm like, oh my God, I will love to do that. Just rum. Yeah, this is the best thing. So I think we should also learn that about animals, how happy they are to be connecting with something that they are not all the time used to or in their environment.
Jaime Hartman (49:19):
Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. And Mickey, what's one tip you might give somebody?
Mickey Trescott (49:26):
So my tip is to start with something that you actually like that we've covered a lot of ground. There's a lot of different recommendations here and some people might be listening and thinking, I've tried to have plants in my house and I've killed all of 'em and I've wasted some money and I've got kind of sad about it. And so maybe indoor gardening is not for you. For me, I've realized now that I don't like camping and there are ways in which I can go somewhere to a nature preserve and enjoy a hike, but I draw the line at sleeping on the ground. It doesn't work for me. So I would say just as I would give an advice to someone who maybe doesn't eat a lot of vegetables, I would tell them to start with the vegetables that you've eaten and that you think you like or at least you can tolerate.
(50:15):
Instead of going for the really obscure veggies that you need a palette for, think of that same concept with connecting with nature. Because for some people going, maybe you're someone who likes to go on little trips, and so maybe you can incorporate more nature into your trips. Maybe you're someone who likes to exercise and so you can start exercising outside, but pick the thing that is just already going to be easy because you're interested in it or it layers onto something that you're already doing because we know that things that you make your routine and that you incorporate into your life seamlessly are going to be the things that you keep doing over and over. So that's my tip.
Jaime Hartman (50:59):
Fantastic. I love it. All right, so we are at the end of our time. Final words, Mickey, any final words remind folks of where they can find you if they want to connect with you?
Mickey Trescott (51:10):
Yeah, so you guys can find me at autoimmunewellness.com. You can find my personal website at mickeytrescott.com and I'm on Instagram at mickey trescott.
Jaime Hartman (51:21):
Jan, final words and remind folks of where they can find you.
Jan Steele (51:25):
Yeah, no, my final word would just be keep a really broad definition of what nature entails and don't wait. I think we've talked a little bit about, I think it creeps into all of our language because we are trained to imagine that in order to go outside it has to be a beautiful blue sky, just temperate, not too hot, not too, but that's maybe not the whole spectrum of nature. So even if it is minus 30 outside going out in the minus 30, or even if it is pouring rain, going out with an umbrella or with some Gore-Tex on, but you'd be surprised at the things that you would discover. I think even in those contexts, even just standing by a window and opening the window and if it's pouring rain outside, smelling the rain air is different from a beautiful blue sky day. So yeah, keeping a broad definition of what actually nature does entail and then allowing yourself to explore different aspects that do appeal to you. I can be found at lagoose.fr. Yeah, drop me a line if you can. I'm on Instagram as well. FR is my French version, and then I have lagoose.en as my English version.
Jaime Hartman (52:40):
Thank you. Yamila, final words and remind folks where they can find you.
Yamila Cruz-Martinez (52:44):
Yes, well gracias. Thank you so much for having me. I'm in Puerto Rico, but I see also people telemedicine right now in Instagram. I'm at Body Health BORI health like health. And then my email is super long, basically my whole name, but I can write it on the chat and maybe you guys can see it.
Jaime Hartman (53:11):
Actually. I will make sure people have got it. So you don't even have to take the time to do that. We'll make sure they've got it
Yamila Cruz-Martinez (53:16):
Perfect. So yeah, if you speak Spanish better, but if not, we can speak English. And I also know Portuguese, so that can be that we can work on. And yeah, thank you so much and enjoy your nature the way that you like.
Jaime Hartman (53:34):
Great. And I'm again Jaime Hartman, and if you want to find out about what I do on the personal side of my private practice or any of the things that I do, you can find me at Gutsy By Nature. And then just one more little plug here for how you can connect with all of us. We are all in the directory, so if you needed to go and find Yamila's email address, just go in here and search for her name. It's if you go to aipcertified.com, you'll find us. And you can also search by location and by specialty. And there are like 400 people in the directory right now, 400 AIP Certified Coaches who are all actively practicing and taking clients. So there is bound to be somebody who can meet your needs if you're looking for some more support. Thank you to the panelists, Jan, Yamila, Mickey, and thank you to everybody who submitted questions. And thank you for everyone who attended. We really appreciate you.
Marie-Noelle Marquis (54:29):
Thank you for listening. If you enjoyed this conversation, we hope you will join us live on May 6th when the new panel of AIP Certified Coaches, we'll share their perspectives on connecting with nature and answer your questions again, reminding us that AIP is not just a dietary protocol, but a full protocol with multiple branches. And there are multiple ways to approach it. And through this podcast, AIP Certified Coaches bring you resources so that you don't have to do AIP alone.
Jaime Hartman (54:57):
We'll be back with another episode in two weeks. So make sure you subscribe to the AIP Summit podcast in your favorite podcast player if you haven't already.
Marie-Noelle Marquis (55:06):
And if you'd like to leave us a rating and a review, it will help others find this podcast where we are committed to helping you use the power of the Autoimmune protocol to elevate your wellness journey to new heights.
Jaime Hartman (55:22):
The AIP Summit Podcast is a Gutsy By Nature production. Content presented is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.
