Invisible Influences on Health with Dr. Sharon Stills!

The information provided in this podcast is educational and not intended to diagnose or treat medical conditions.

Dr. Donnie Wilson struggled for decades to solve her numerous health issues and heal her body. But with focused determination, she healed herself. And in doing so, she discovered the Dr. Donnie stress recovery Protocol. On this show, you're going to hear from doctors, nutritionists, and Experts along with Dr. Donnie, who will give practical advice and wisdom to help heal your body. This is how humans heal.

Hi, it's Dr. Donni, and I am here today with my good friend and colleague, Dr. Sharon Stills. Dr. Stills is a naturopathic physician, or really naturopathic medical doctor because she's in Arizona, and that's what naturopathic doctors are called in Arizona. Sharon and I have known each other. We graduated from naturopathic Medical School right about the same time, so. So we've been on this journey together over the past 20 years of being naturopathic doctors and seeing patients and learning from our patients. And so I'm really excited to talk with her today and have you get to learn from Dr. Stills as well. So welcome. Thank you for being here.

Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. It's always fun to do a podcast and share and help educate everyone, but when you're doing it with someone, like you said, who you've been friends with for, like, 20 years, is it possible? Yeah, but it is possible. It has been 20 years. And so it's cool to be here with you. So thanks for having me.

You're welcome. You're welcome. And I know you help patients with so many different health conditions, from women's health to support during and after cancers, who, I mean, you name it, sleep and stress and so on. And so, you know, it's one of the things I think you and I have in common is to think through what's the common thread that helps people in a lot of different health situations. And so today we wanted to touch base or talk more about the. More on this emotional, spiritual level and even energetic level, you know, like that aspect of healing beyond the physical, beyond the nutrients and diet, what other aspects of healing. And so maybe just give us your quick impression of why do you feel like that's important in the healing process with your patients?

Oh, what a fun question.

I think it's so important because I think that in the way we've been. I don't want to say brainwashed, but I'll say brainwashed. You know, the way we've been trained in conventional medicine, just society, is that if we are Ill, there must be a pill we need to take. And so we're just trained to not even really empower ourselves or think about the things that we have so much control of in our own lives, whether it be thoughts we're thinking or the food we're choosing or the activities we're taking place in that we just kind of like, go along. And it's not until we get a symptom, and often it's a severe symptom that we can't just push through that. Then we're trained to go, oh, I'm really sick. I can't function. Let me go to the doctor and let me see him or her for two and a half minutes and get my prescription and go to the pharmacy and fill it, take the pill, suppress the symptom, and then just go on our way. And that, that's really. That is not. You know, I love the name of your podcast, How Humans Heal. And that's certainly not how humans heal. That's how we suppress and, you know, don't avoid. We avoid what's really going on. And so I think it's so important that we really empower ourselves and take.

Take, you know.

Take responsibility for the things that we can do. And so it's not just the pill that we see and we take. And I don't know if you find this, but I find this a lot with patients who are coming to see me that even though they're coming to see me and they want, like, a natural alternative, you know, they are. They've been through the pill taking and they're tired of it not working or it creating side effects, but it's going to come in with that mindset of, like, what magic vitamin are you going to give me? Doctals. And, you know, I love to give vitamins. I mean, if I moved my camera and went over to my vitamin cabinet, you'd be like, do you have food or do you just have vitamins? And, you know, I take so many pills a day because they supplement what I'm doing. But, you know, how we really heal is a lot of things that we just don't really see. And like, for starters, our breath. And so breathing is such a phenomenal way to enhance the healing response and healing in our bodies. And I feel like a lot of people. So I hope those of you that are listening, you know, if you're one of those full that you're like, really take this serious seriously. Because like I was saying about patients who come in. So, like, I'll give A treatment plan, as I'm sure you do. And you know, it'll be like, these are the tests you need, these are the vitamins you need to take, these are the foods you need to eat. These are the, you know, activities I want you to do. I want you to start meditating, I want you to be sleeping regularly, so forth. And I feel like a lot of patients, because they've been trained in that traditional way that they don't really take the meditation, the breathing exercises, they don't take those things as seriously. They're like, I'll take 17 different vitamins, but oh. And so I really want people to like, shift that. Like, sometimes I even think I'm gonna say to patients, you know what? You're not getting any vitamins until you start meditating, until you start sleeping, then you can have vitamins. But until you start doing the things that really start help the body to heal, I'm going to cut you off. So I think, you know, there are all these things that are invisible that have such a deep impact on us. And so breathing and meditating to me is like the best medicine around. I was lucky enough to take part in a. It was a fellow student's research project my first year of medical school and he was doing a mindfulness based stress reduction research project. And I was friends with him and I know I love to meditate. I've been meditating for years already. So I signed up to do it and it just changed my life. It changed the way I looked at medicine and how we really heal. And if we think about stress and all the symptoms. So we do.

This great little exercise where you close your eyes and you just imagine a stressful situation. It can be one that you're really having. Maybe it's a job situation or relationship situation and you start to feel that in your body. Like, what are you feeling when you imagine the stress of your divorce or your job loss, Money stress or physical illness or whatever it is, Family stress. We all have some kind of stress in our life, you know, otherwise we'd be dead. You know, life is.

It's not about getting rid of stressed. Exactly.

It's not about getting rid of the stress. It's about, you know, learning to respond rather than knee jerk react. And so you feel that in your body and then, you know, we get feedback. You know, what did you feel mentally, what did you feel emotionally, what did you feel physically, what did you feel spiritually? And people, you know, we're all different, but we also have a lot of similarities. And so you feel your heart racing, you're sweating, you're clenching your teeth, your hands, you know, in the pit of your stomach, you feel fearful, feel angry. And so it's like all these feelings, when you start to think about them, you feel disconnected from yourself. These are like the symptoms that patients come in complaining with when they have cancer, cardiovascular disease, or digestive issues. And so you really get that physical experience. And then when you can learn to mindfully breathe and mindfully meditate and be present in your life, then you can start to have those symptoms subside. So you really can breathe your way to healing yourself.

I love that. I love that your computer is talking to you.

I know. I'm trying to turn it off.

I know. I've had lots of experience with meditation, too, and meditation trainings. And I think I like how you're describing it as such a way for us to be able to create space, not just in. In the day to take the time to meditate or breathe, but the space it creates in our mind and our mindfulness so that we can have more awareness for what's going on. You know, it allows you to step back and there's. There's also the peace that just happens without us trying. You know, like, there's no trying involved. It's actually the opposite of trying. It's the.

It's.

It's just the being. And sometimes it feels like, how is that even possible? But you. In order for it to be possible, it just requires getting yourself. And I was going to say sit still, but not even a lot of times. My best meditation is when I'm walking or doing something. Active meditation doesn't have to be just sitting with your eyes closed. It can be a meditative state of awareness in the moment. Right?

Absolutely. It's easy. Sometimes I say it's easy to be the Zen master in your monastery on the mountain meditating all day, but come down off the mountain, you know, come into real life. And so, like, when I meditate, I tend to close my eyes when I meditate, when I do my formal meditation. But then there's always that moment of, like, opening my eyes towards the end and just breathing and, like, bridging. Remember that meditation is not just the formal practice that's important, but meditation is really what you're doing all the time, in every moment. Mindfulness, I mean, the definition of mindfulness is paying attention on purpose, moment by moment, without, you know, being mean to yourself and beating yourself up because, you know, anyone is listening. Like, I hear this a lot Maybe you hear this too. Oh, I tried meditating. I can't do it. I'm not good at it. My mind doesn't sit still. And that is meditation. No one's gonna sit down and just be the Zen Buddha. It's just like, you know, I always use, it's a simple analogy, but no one's gonna go to the gym and be like, yeah, let me bench press £500. You have to work the muscles to work the mindfulness muscle. And so meditation is, you know, initially.

Grabbing your wandering mind and bringing it back to the breath. And maybe in five minutes, you got through, like one breath without thinking about what you're going on vacation next or, you know, what you forgot to do or oops, I should that to him. And I didn't say that or that is it. And it also is an act of loving kindness to not beat yourself up. I find a lot of people, you know, then they get hard on themselves instead of just being present in the moment and just allowing it to be what it is and allowing it to be a journey. I agree. Like, I love walking. Meditation is just like one of my favorite, favorite ways to meditate or getting to a labyrinth and doing a labyrinth meditation. I think those are just great ways. Or even when I'm cooking, I love washing the dishes and just being really present and feeling, you know, I'm weird. I'm like, no, I love to wash the dishes. Don't help me go away. And so, you know, feeling the water.

It'S those repetitive tasks that can be. Because you, you don't have to think about it really. You can just do it right, like you're saying, and just allowing to be the experience, you know, you can't do anything else while you're really washing the dishes. That's what you're doing.

And I love what you just said. It reminds me of I do hot yoga. And one of my teachers would always say, don't think, just do. And like. And that's. So I practiced Bikram for many, many years. And in Bikram, you do the same 26 postures every day. It's the same, same thing. So it's like, it is, it's like puts you into that meditative state so you don't have to think about is it. You just kind of know, you know, going into warrior, I'm going into this. This is what's happening. And so it's a. Yeah.

And I think that's why for some people, even something like gardening, you know, some things that we we may not even. You may not even really realize that you're meditating. You know, when you're in the moment so much with this task you're doing, and when whatever thoughts are coming to your mind, you might notice it. And then it goes. And then the next thought comes and you let it go, and you're just really paying, you know, in the moment with what you're doing. Maybe some people. That's artwork or painting, right?

Yeah, it could be coloring. It could be. You know, there's some music. There's so many different ways. And I think mindfulness and breathing and healing through the breath is really just being present and being present with your emotions. I think that so many people have been, like, misinformed that it's not okay to be angry. It's not okay to be jealous. It's not okay to be sad. Those are bad emotions. You know, we want to be happy, we want to be full of love, and we have all these emotions. There's a great poem, the Guest House. I love that poem where he just. I'm not even trying to, you know, pretend I'm roommate. I'll ruin his poem. But, you know, he just speaks about all these emotions coming to your home. And, you know, don't shut them out. Let them in, welcome them in. Let them be in your home. Because it's when we feel these emotions that we can actually process them and give them space to exist that then they can float on by. It's when we resist or ignore, suppress that they stay with us and they cause problems. And so we're talking about, you know, invisible. If we think of it from a traditional Chinese medicine perspective, all the acupuncture meridians, which we can't see, but have such a huge impact on our health and the connection between emotions and our organs. And so feeling anger and how it affects your liver. And, you know, when you take a patient. I mean, I've taken many patients through, you know, cleansing out their liver and just having, like, anger be part of that process of what they're releasing through the toxins. Because anger is emotion associated with the liver or someone. You know, right now, nowadays, there's a lot of fear going on. There's been a lot of change in our lifestyles, and so. And fear affects the kidneys. And so, you know, and the kidneys is the seed of our health, according to Chinese medicine. And where our jing, our life force, is developed. And, you know, that's where it comes from. And so there's all these things. So a lot of it really is emotional and what we're thinking. And I work with a lot of cancer patients, and I always say, like, I know we are. We're healing. When the patient, like, comes to me and says, you know, and sometimes it's months in, you know, even a year in, and, you know, they're like, Dr. Stills, I am so happy I got this cancer. And you're like, huh? And they're like, you know, it gave me the gift. It gave me the gift to realize, you know, I wasn't following my passion. I wasn't having harmonious relationships. I wasn't. You know, whatever it was, it was some emotional things. Like when they get that. When they get the message from the illness, I kind of a little happy dance because I'm like, all right, you know, we're. We're getting there.

We are getting to, you know, there's this healing happening, not just on a physical level, but this emotional, spiritual level of processing. Sometimes it's right. It's processing stresses from the past. And I love how you're mentioning other traditions of medicine, like Chinese medicine. And when we look at these other traditions of medicine, we see that there is this emotional, spiritual aspect of it. And we don't often see that in kind of Western, conventional medicine. But when we look at Chinese medicine, they're looking at emotions and how that matches up on the physical body. Same with even like homeopathy. You know, there's. Which is very. It's the medicine still used very much in India. You know, it's on a. It's going to be looking. Taking into account a person's emotional state and sorting out the remedy, the homeopathic remedy, based on that. Let's talk more about that.

Yeah, I mean, I think homeopathy. I don't know how it's happened, but it's gotten such a. Like, it's like the black sheep of the family lately and natural medicine. And it just perplexes me. I don't know why. I don't know if it's just an FDA thing trying to outlaw. They don't like things that actually work. But homeopathy is a beautiful medicine, and it absolutely, like you said, totally use the state, the constitution of who a person is and the emotional state they're in to help them heal. And so how. You know, I think in mainstream Western medicine, you know, they kind of have tied together like irritable bowel. I think they'll kind of admit, you know, well, you have some stress, but they never really go anywhere with it. And that's such a disservice because we are so, you know, you can't separate the mind and the body. I mean, it's why I created, like, my red program.

Well, it's just my take on the mind body. And so it's like the R stands for reinvent your health, and the E stands for explore your spirit. So it's like the R is your physical body, the E is your mental, emotional body, and then the D is about to bring your sexy. Because I just feel like, you know, once you've got your mind body together, then you can kind of go have fun and play in the world and share your gifts and be your best self, but you can't really heal by not addressing the emotions. And it's not to say that, like, you know, I'm sure you've had too, like, you know, sometimes you have a patient come in and, like, they're chronically ill and you just find out, wow, they needed some zinc. They were really low in zinc. And, like, you gave them zinc and they're like, oh, that's amazing. I'm feeling great. I don't get my cold every two months. And that's cool. So it's like. And that was just their kind of thing. But I think for the most part, most people, there's some sort of emotional component in it. And I think a lot of us, I forget the exact numbers. So don't. Don't quote me on this because I'll probably. But, like, if we have 50,000 thoughts a day, I think, like, you know, 49,500 of them are subconscious, so we're not even really aware of what we're thinking. And what I have found and the work I've done on myself and the work I do with patients is that our inner child, our little self, who is decided what our storyline is going to be by about the age of three.

That'S who's running the show. And so however you were raised in, whether you were nurtured or whether you feel if you cried and they didn't really come take care of you and you didn't feel like your needs were being met, that's kind of the. The ideas and the decisions you made of how the world works. And then what we tend to do is we tend to recreate that and play that out. And so I like to give, like, I gave my inner child a name. Her name is Cher. Cher. And I even have a teenage version of her because I think there's different forms of the inner child. But if we don't really go back and look and do the work, then we're missing a big invisible piece of what's affecting us.

And so that's me, because it's, in some ways you could also look at it as what was your experience in childhood? What were also stressful experiences in childhood. And most of us do have some, you know, stressful experience that could be along the lines of experience of abandonment in childhood. And in some ways I think that it, it helps with our psychological development to experience that. But there's also a piece of it that has needs to, that's an area for growth for us too throughout our lives. And if we're not aware of it, like if we're not conscious of those patterns from our childhood, those things that our subconscious is trying to solve still now as an adult, but it's really something that subconscious has been trying to solve since childhood. If we're not aware of that and present with ourselves enough to make space for it. Like that's what you're saying by, you know, naming it an inner child and giving it a name, you're saying, hey, I'm giving it awareness. I'm aware of that process in my psyche, in my mind and giving it the space to develop or process or grow as it's intended.

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Yeah, I mean I think it's really important. It's something, it's a project. And so every once in a while I meet a person or a patient who actually had a healthy hallmark childhood. But for the most of us, we have some sort of dysfunctioning that experienced back then that we're carrying. And so like, you know, you may see someone who, like, I'll, you know, have a woman patient who keeps dating unavailable men and you know, so like, you can do the work on her own self esteem and feeling good about herself, but if you don't go back and take pieces of what happened in childhood and what the little girl is trying to work out, then it's really hard to overcome that and heal it and really move through it. And I do believe that a big part of why we're here is work on these emotional journeys and these pieces and to learn and grow. And so it's important if you see something, whether it's you're chronically ill or you're chronically losing your job, or you're chronically having bad relationships, or you're chronically having money issues or you're chronically depressed or whatever, you know, just see keeps happening. You're having issues with your weight. It's really important to like, do some work. And I love, like hypnosis. I love emdr. Lately I've gotten really into the emotional freedom technique. The tapping.

Yeah, I have.

Describe it a little bit for the people who haven't heard about it.

So it's. And I'm just learning to become an expert in it. So by no way am I an expert yet that I'm. I'm learning for myself. So it's tapping on specific and it again is related to acupuncture. And so you're tapping on points where the panels are beginning and I believe, ending. And by tapping on those points, you are sending a message to the amygdala where fear is seated in the brain and you're reprogramming. It's like you're tapping out the fear response and then you're putting in like positive statements. And I've been doing this with a friend now for like the last couple of weeks and we both see such cool changes.

Just like, you know, we've been doing some stuff, focusing around our businesses and it's like it's happening. So I think, you know, I also love emdr. I love meditation, I love retreats and, you know, doing things that take you outside of your comfort zone. And so I think healing can be like a journey and fun and informative and like a life process. And you know, it was Socrates who said, like, the unexamined life is not worth living. And in some ways it's kind of like harsh, but, you know, because everyone's life is worth living. But I really believe that, like, if you're not looking at your life. If you're not learning and growing and asking why, then you're missing a piece of what I believe we're here as, you know, spiritual beings having a human experience in a physical body and especially.

If it can help on the healing path too, you know, because there are times then where we'll see sometimes people, health conditions shift as they do this work. You know, whether it's pain that shifts or other immune related issues or hormone imbalances, you know, like, and I think it's, I'm thinking of it in terms of a resolution of a stress, you know, like, because of course, as if stress is there and it's stuck, then it's going to create health issues. And as we resolve these, even emotional psychological stresses, then it allows the body to shift these patterns. But there may be other things that are going on that we don't, sometimes I think we don't really know how to explain. You know, some of this is so like you said, invisible and such a energetic level that sometimes there is no exact, there's nothing we can see or maybe we don't even have the words for what really happened. But we just know as people who help people on their healing journey that sometimes this is the difference that can make for a person. Right.

Like it's such an important piece to think about. And again, like I said, you know, it's. And I tend to like, I like to, when I take a patient's case, I kind of, you know, take the whole gestalt of them and often I will start with some physical stuff and I'll tell them, look, you have fibroids and.

Let'S look at that and yes, let's do some liver cleansing and some castor oil packs and let's balance your hormones and you probably need some progesterone and so on and so forth. But like at the same time, if that doesn't start clearing it up in a few months, let's also start thinking about your sacral chakra which is like your sexual area and your solar plexus which is like your, you know, feeling of esteem. And so you know, these chakras are invisible but they are visibly making reactions that we are seeing and symptoms and disease. And so you have to start thinking about that and you have to start thinking about, you know, where is your self esteem and where did you lose your self esteem. And a lot of these things, you know, can often be traced back to childhood.

And so, you know, we don't realize it and you know, now I realize it so, like, I have a brand new baby granddaughter. And like, I'm so conscious now of like, what I'm, you know, she's almost five months old and like, what I'm saying to her is gonna be creating her belief system around herself.

Wow.

And so I'm really conscious of that. And you know, I had my kids in my early 20s, I wasn't conscious of that. So, like, I always tease my kids, like, you know, therapy on me for life. You know, I got to cover it because I create the, create the issue. So I'm willing to help pay for the resolution of it. But it really is, you know, it's eye opening. And there is something to be said about, you know, as we get older, we get wiser. I'm as, I'm 52 now. I'm really experiencing. Oh, that is actually true. But you know, they're like, so the shockers are a whole nother system of these energy wheels in our body that really relate to our organs and our endocrine system. And so, you know, and like Ayurveda medicine. So, like, you brought before all these other ways of thinking in other traditions. You know, take into account, you know, Ayurveda is all about wind and water and earth, and it's so beautiful and poetic and it, and it really works. And a lot of times I find it's funny as I, you know, I mean, we've been doctors a lot. You know, 20 years is a long time to be a doctor and we've seen a lot. And sometimes I find like, we make, you know, we make things difficult. It's sometimes it's like the basics. We know that in naturopathic medicine, like the lifestyle, the thoughts you choose and the actions you take, and that really makes the biggest difference. Like, when I created my RED program, it was kind of like this thing of like, if everyone just hydrated efficiently, drank enough water, if they exercised and moved their bodies, if they got enough sleep, if they made sure they were choosing healthy foods and eating a healthy diet, if they got out in nature, if they practiced gratitude, they practiced meditation, like, half their illnesses would just disappear. You know, these basic foundational things. And like, you know, I'm not a research scientist, but as I was saying that I'm like, gosh, that'd be such a cool double blind placebo study to do, because I just know intuitively, like, you would see good results. And so, you know, and some of those things are easy to do. You know, eating a healthy diet, sometimes that's more challenging, especially if you have an eating disorder or you're having, you know, addictions and things. So I get that, that sometimes the things that are so easy can be hard, but that's where we really need to be focusing. That's how humans heal. I mean, I can't tell you how many times I have seen patients who come in with chronic headaches.

With constipation, with pain, with fatigue, with on and on and on, and they drink 12 ounces of water a day, and they want me to give them vitamins. I'm like, I'm not giving you anything until you start drinking a sufficient amount, you know, at least half your weight in body ounces. I really like when patients are drinking three liters a day to really activate the metabolism and physiology and like, just do that and then come back and tell me.

Well, and I think what it is is that sometimes we're so used to things being difficult and we spoke to, you know, oh, give me something, you know, like climbing a mountain, taking a million pills, you know, like some big intervention. And really, sometimes the simplest thing, like drinking water, which, you know, can be the main, you know, main intervention, so to speak, that's going to make a difference or the main change that can make a difference in a person's health. And like you're pointing out, it's so essential. So let's start with these things that are essential, because the way I say it is they have the biggest likelihood of a positive ripple effect throughout the body. Right? Like, in some ways, we're looking for efficiency. Let's pick the things you can do that's going to have the biggest positive ripple effect, because that's actually a pretty efficient way of healing versus picking something that's maybe going to be positive, but it's only going to be make a slight drip in the pond, so to speak. No, we want the. Drinking plenty of water through the day has the potential for having a huge influence on so many other systems.

Just drinking water, you can, like, start pooping, you can get rid of your headaches, you can have more energy. Or, like, you can, you know, take a ton of magnesium and do castor oil packs and take some white willow bark for your head. You know, you could do all those other things. And like you said, I think sometimes we think like, you know, and sometimes I think like, why are people coming and paying me to tell them to drink water?

But, you know, sometimes you need to pay to hear that. And then, you know, and the patients who, like, argue and don't want to do that and like have excuses. And it's like, you know, again going back to the invisible. Like you have a house plant and you don't give it water. You physically see it shriveling up. And if you're a good plant, mommy or daddy, you're probably going to walk by and go, oh dang, I forgot to water you. Let me water you and make you bloom and be pretty again. And so the same thing is happening inside in our cells. It's just we don't see it. And so we have to remember, you know, we don't have to see something that that means, you know, for it to make an effect. That all these things we don't see have such a huge effect on us. You know, for example, WI fi.

Yes.

And the invisible toxins. And so, you know, WI fi is. It's just, there's so much harm to it starting to come out. I know. You know, down the road, I expect it to be something we look back on. Like when we used to think it was okay to smoke cigarettes. And you know, there's a reason they tell men not to carry their cell phones in their pockets. Like if they want to try and have sperm that works to, you know, produce a baby. And so I am, you know, I just really thinking we're so, you know, and me too. I'm not like sitting on a stool way above you guys, you know. I'm addicted to my cell phone too. It's kind of like my lifeline. And everything happens on my phone, but I'm really conscious. I never talk on it with. I only use with the speaker. I don't keep it on my body. I put it in airplane mode as much as possible. I don't sleep with my head next to it. Turn off the wifi at night. So there's, there's ways you can take, you know, there's measures you can take to just start reducing your exposure. And you know, the same thing goes for the food we eat. Like pesticides, it's another invisible. And glyphosate. You know, these are invisible toxins. And you know, the truth is like, pesticides make our. Like if I was just looking at a sprayed apple or an organic apple, I'd probably want to eat the sprayed apple. It's going to look prettier, it's going to be more well preserved and shiny and red and all the things I like. But the truth is, you know, when you eat an apple that's not organic, you're probably eating like 60 pesticides and a good handful of them. Are known or probable carcinogens, but we don't think about those things.

It's hard when it's invisible. I think a lot of toxins. That's the thing people, because it's not something we can really see, it's hard for us to really get, hey, this could have an influence in my body. And you know, and I love this point. Like, you know, what, what can we see? What can we know about in our environment that are, that is basically other stresses on our body? Whether it's why too, too much of WI fi exposure or too much of like a pesticide or insecticides. A lot of times people, you know, you're in the place you're living, maybe there, there's, you know, insecticides being used and you don't realize it. You're thinking at the moment, you're like, I have to get rid of whatever insects. But lo and behold, the same thing that's killing the insects has a negative influence on us.

Well, what I tell patients.

Speak to two things. So as far as the, as far as the pesticides go, I always tell people like if you went to the farm and you saw them spraying with the machines that have the skull and cross bones on them and then they were like, we're done spraying and now we're have a picnic, you know, on the house. Like you'd be like, yeah, I think I'm going to intermittent fast right now and get a feel. And so we have to remember that. We have to remember what's happening. Even though it's invisible in the moment, it's gonna have a very visible effect inside your body. And for, you know, I haven't used chemicals on the lawn or for bugs. I couldn't even tell you how long. And there's a great company. When I lived in Tucson in the mid-90s, I was homeschooling my kids and we went on a field trip and we went to this place called Arbico A R B I C O. And I just always love to give them a shout out because they were like the coolest place. They like, they just have an insect or natural solution for like whatever you're being bothered with. So you can like call them up. I think they have people like call them from all over the world, you know, and be like, I'm having an issue with this infestation. And they'll be like, we're gonna send you this bug to take care of that. And so it's just a natural cycle of life and it's non toxic because you don't want.

Breathing in those chemicals and those toxins. And it's why I tell people, make sure you take your shoes off. I have a shoeless house. And one of the reasons is because you just been walking around outside on the grass and you don't know where they spread and where they didn't. And you want your house to be a sanctuary. You don't want to be tracking that stuff in. And so it's just we have to really, you know, there's a lot of stuff we're talking about here and I don't want people to get overwhelmed because I know sometimes when I go to like environmental medicine conferences, I walk out of there like very depressed because I'm just like, oh my God, we're doomed. And everything we touch is toxic. And so it's, you know, and you don't want to get crazy because then that's going to cause stress and that's going to cause a whole other sort of problems. But you just want to have a consciousness and like do your job to lighten your low. So it's very easy to go to the store and pick the organic apple rather than the non organic apple. Very easy to at least keep your home, your sanctuary, pesticide free, chemical free. I love EWG.org I'm sure you know them, you know, the environment working group.

And I think it's like a process, you know, like it's the same as we're talking about meditation. You can kind of take this in as kind of like a meditative practice where maybe each day or each week or each month you start to work on other areas of your house and your life, you know, where you can go, oh, okay, what if I go to this different store or research this different product? You can go on EWG and research what personal care product might I want to get when I use up this other one. So it can be a gradual process of having this awareness for our environment. It's not something you're going to do overnight, right? It's like just right.

Unless you're like a type A and you're just going to go for it now and that's going to make you feel good, then rock on. But it really is, you know, and we have to, you know, I always use the analogy of like a backpack. We're all born with backpacks and some of us, like myself, I don't have a very strong constitution, so I got this wee little backpack. So if I stay up late and I don't eat organic and I breathe in toxins and I eat junk food like that's it. My backpack has no room, it's overflowing and I'm gonna have to symptoms and be sick. Some people, like the, you know, the grandmother who's alive at 110 and she's rocking on her porch, smoking her Marlboros and drinking her whiskey and she's like, I never been sick a day in my life. You know, she got this huge giant backpack and she can just do whatever she wants and it never overflows. Most of us, you know, are not her and we're somewhere in between. And a lot of the people that are chronically ill do have small backpacks. So all these things that you can make changes make a big difference because if you can lighten the load in your backpack, you can lessen your symptoms and your disease expression.

Sharon, I love this. I mean, this has been so much fun talking through all of this with you. I think it's been, you know, it's a lot of information that I think will help people to understand, you know, even the things they can do that they thought maybe that little change wouldn't make a difference, that these, these, you know, quote, little changes can actually be. We add up to big changes. And I love this idea too, of just learning from other cultures about not only ways that they integrate emotional, spiritual healing, but also how they look at the body as a whole and how we can we have integrated parts and systems in our body that it's not separate, that it's mind, body together, but also all the different parts of our body are communicating and honoring that, you know, and how to honor our humanness and our human needs. I love your plant analogy of, you know, looking at ourselves as part of nature and seeing sometimes just to remind us of what is how as part of nature, what do we need to give ourselves in order for us to thrive and to be healthy so we.

Are part of nature.

Poor little house plants.

How can people find out more about you and connect with you?

Well, they can find me@drstills.com or Dr. Sharon Stills on Instagram or on Facebook. I have a red hot healing page and group. And you know, if they're interested, I have my red deck of cards which you can find@drstills.com they're really inexpensive and they just, they're 39 cards of all these little various tips. And I always say, you know, for a small investment, like even if you just took one tip and you know, there's probably, there's hundreds of tips in there because each card has three or four tips and there's 39 of them. Even just one tip, like, if you stop taking off your shoes, you start taking off your shoes or you drink enough water or you practice gratitude. Like, just one little tip can have such a huge impact on your life. And so that's why I did it. Because my goal is to really. I mean, I know I can't work with every single patient out there. You know, it's not. But there's so many things I've learned from so many years that you know will work no matter whether you're trying to stay healthy, prevent disease, reverse disease, that so many things you can do and a lot of them can just be simple and things that you can do to empower yourself and feel good about.

I love it and I love the. The real message of acceptance of self that you know that any and just making it real in real life, like, here's these fun little cards. They can be just little pleasant reminders to laugh at ourselves and learn from ourselves and just again, be human. Allow yourself to be yourself and learn along the way. So thank you so much for being here.

Thank you for having me.

Yay. It's very fun and I appreciate it. And we'll be in touch, of course. I'll talk to you soon.

Bye, everyone.

Thank you.

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