Yoga in the Hood

What inspired the Yoga in Hood Parks movement came out of a longing to spread Yoga to the innercity. I want the people who need Yoga doing Yoga… In this city especially, it’s mostly white college kids and white women, some white guys knocking it out too… But I know it’s power and poor people need Yoga more than anything… Who’s working the fucked up jobs, no healthcare, well Obamacare now right? But really, Low income folks need Yoga more than anything else… You know the adage – - “health is wealth.”

Neighborhoods and health

*I LOVE THIS*



Neighborhoods (or residential areas more broadly) have emerged as potentially relevant contexts because they posses both physical and social attributes which could plausibly affect the health of individuals (125)

Place of residence is strongly patterned by social position and ethnicity (125)

Behavioral and stress processes operating at the level of individuals are also dynamically related: stress can result in the adoption of unhealthy eating behaviors as coping mechanisms, and some behaviors (such as physical activity) can buffer the adverse effects of stress (126)

The impact of neighborhood conditions on health is likely to be modified by individual-level characteristics. For example, some individuals may have characteristics that make them more vulnerable to adverse neighborhood conditions, while others may have the personal and financial resources that allow them to overcome deficiencies or hazards in their neighborhoods (126)

Research on neighborhoods and health is closely connected to work on residential segregation and health and work on housing on health (126)

Why We Stay In Relationships Way Too Long

The fact that you’ve spent a lot of time together doesn’t mean that you have to spend your future together.

When broken down into it’s most raw, unfiltered essence: we’re afraid. Fearful of being alone. Because we think “alone” will leave us vulnerable and potentially deemed unlovable. This is not true, of course. But when comfort, as we know it, is threatened, our survival nature can quickly overtake intelligence and irrational behavior reins supreme. And in this case we stall a long overdue separation.

Breaking up can be a crushing experience.
But staying together for the wrong reasons will nonetheless dismantle you.
Just more slowly.

If you’re in a relationship that’s run its course, take a deep breath and give both of you the freedom you deserve.

MindBodyGreen

Michigan health outcomes by county

http://www.countyhealthrankings.org/app/michigan/2013/rankings/outcomes/overall/by-rank

Living on right side of county line means more life, better health

-Gladwin County has the highest percentage of smoking adults (31 percent); the lowest rate of smokers is in Ottawa County (11 percent)

-Saginaw County has the highest rate of obesity (40 percent), but even in the skinniest counties (Ottawa and Washtenaw), a quarter of adults are considered obese.

-Lake County has the highest teen birth rate, at 64 births per 1,000 females ages 15-19; that’s more than four times the teen birth rate in Livingston and Washtenaw counties (13 per 1,000).

Despite being the home to five of the state’s top-10-ranked hospitals, Wayne County ranks last in health outcomes such as poor physical and mental health, low birth rate and premature death.

By contrast, Washtenaw, with the state’s top-ranked medical facility (University of Michigan Hospitals and Health Centers), is ranked fifth. (Leelanau County is tops in health outcomes.)

“This is about changing economic opportunity,” Udow-Phillips said. “Health is about poverty. And the best way to get people out of poverty is education.

“If we invest in early childhood education, health issues (will improve)” eventually, she said, because education is positively correlated with better jobs and better health.

“This is a long-term issue,” Udow-Phillips said. “It’s not going to be solved by hiring more doctors.”


http://bridgemi.com/2013/04/living-on-right-side-of-county-line-means-more-life-better-health/

Healthy Food Access Portal

Welcome to the nation’s first comprehensive healthy food access retail portal.

http://www.healthyfoodaccess.org/

The Decline of Communities Could Explain America's Health Problems

http://www.theatlanticcities.com/politics/2013/03/how-decline-communities-explains-americas-health-problems/4889/

Filmmaker Byron Hurt on His Hopes for Soul Food Junkies

http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/blog/filmmaker-byron-hurt-on-his-hopes-for-soul-food-junkies

TOOLS FOR HEALTHY FOOD ACCESS

Improving Access to Healthy Food

Communities across the country are working to expand and improve healthy food access through grocery stores, small stores, farmers' markets, and urban agriculture. This series of tools offers concerned residents, policymakers, business leaders, and advocates ideas and strategies for improving access to healthy food in underserved communities, based on the wisdom and experiences of local communities.

Healthy Food Retailing

Grocery Stores

Corner Stores

Farmers' Market

Urban Agriculture

Coping with Anger in a Healthy Way

Anger rallies people. It creates energy and motivation to rebel against dysfunctional political or social systems. It also motivates groups to go on strike say, for higher, well-deserved wages or to defend human rights. On a personal level, anger can be good if it's expressed in a focused, healthy way rather than using it to punish or harm others.

Anger is one of the hardest impulses to control because of its evolutionary value in defending against danger.

What factors make us susceptible to anger? One is an accumulation of built-up stresses. That's why your temper can flare more easily after a frustrating day. The second is letting anger and resentments smolder. When anger becomes chronic, cortisol, the stress hormone, contributes to its slow burn. Remaining in this condition makes you edgy, quick to snap. Research has proven that anger feeds on itself. The effect is cumulative: each angry episode builds on the hormonal momentum of the time before. For example, even the most devoted, loving mothers may be horrified to find themselves screaming at their kids if they haven't learned to constructively diffuse a backlog of irritations. Therefore, the powerful lesson our biology teaches us is the necessity of breaking the hostility cycle early on, and that brooding on the past is hazardous to your well-being.

For optimal health, you must address your anger. But the point isn't to keep blowing up when you're upset rather--it's to develop strategies to express anger that are body-friendly. Otherwise, you'll be set up for illnesses such as migraines, irritable bowel syndrome, or chronic pain, which can be exacerbated by tension. Or you'll keep jacking up your blood pressure and constricting your blood vessels, which compromises flow to the heart. A Johns Hopkins study reports that young men who habitually react to stress with anger are more likely than their calmer counterparts to have an early heart attack, even without a family history of heart disease. Further, other studies have shown that hostile couples who hurl insults and roll their eyes when arguing physically heal more slowly than less antagonistic partners who have a "we're in this together" attitude.


http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/emotional-freedom/201102/four-strategies-cope-anger-in-healthy-way

The Hidden Costs of Fast Food

Incredible! Please read.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/will-allen/fast-food-bad_b_1514960.html#s968333&title=Our_health_suffers