Becoming Sunshine : Fine-Tune Your Health and Happiness, Harnessing Key Lessons from the Sun

The original catalyst for life on Earth, is re-emerging as the catalyst for necessary change in how we live today and intend to safeguard our future. In a time when convenience, shortcuts, and consistent pursuit of success saturates our society, we are losing sight of that which is in plain sight, and allows us to continue to survive and thrive. Welcome center stage — the sun.Becoming Sunshine begins as a historical examination of our human evolution around the sun, and transforms into a practical multidisciplinary guide for achieving an optimal state of being. This book takes a unique look at how the sun shaped our understanding of the world and most importantly jump started life on Earth. Our biological processes are intentionally crafted in accordance with the sun's energy... perhaps the sole purpose to imbue within us a sunshine disposition? Knowing we are anatomically designed and sustained on sunshine, will not only inspire but also guide us to become sunshine.Overstimulated and overwhelmed, our society is plagued with a plethora of mental health issues, devoid of purpose due to the poor design of our lives. Becoming Sunshine encourages us to live a sun-centric lifestyle. What does this mean exactly? Using the sun as a guiding light, we will get back to our core, to what makes us human. Getting back in tune with the sun allows us to see how everything is inextricably linked. We will explore how our exposure to sunlight, sleep quality, choices in nutrition, to frequency of movement has a compounding effect on mental health and mood. We have the ability to enhance or hijack our cognitive function. Through research and personal experiences I have seen how even the initial awareness of the interconnected nature of these elements is transformative for many people. By moving from the unforgiving climate of Munich, Germany to Barcelona, Spain, integrating nutrient rich foods, and adopting a more consistent exercise regime, Isabella went from feeling consistently depressed and plagued with the chronic disease, rheumatoid arthritis, to having one of the most positive mindsets I have encountered. She is now almost pain free with her sun centric lifestyle. She changed her environment and prioritized proper nutrition, low impact movement, and daily sun exposure and now looks at life and health in a whole new light.This book integrates findings from a variety of sources, research from notable neurologists to stories from Olympic athletes, to trace the unifying thread between our daily habits and overall wellbeing. Our cognitive, emotional, and physical health is linked to our relationship with the sun, to what we eat, to how we sleep and how we move. We will explore why approximately 42 percent of the United States population is vitamin D deficient, 1 out of every 3 Americans is sleep deprived, and 80 percent don’t exercise enough, and how all of these deficiencies drastically affect our lives. These are just three areas many of us neglect because we are not aware of how they can affect us. The patterns we have fallen into have developed into a lifestyle that runs counter to how our bodies and minds were designed to thrive. Developing an awareness of what we need at a biological level and how that translates to daily routines is the crucial start in becoming sunshine.Whether or not we believe we are born with a sunshine disposition, does not preclude us from achieving individual health and happiness. The search for the “happiness gene” has lead to psychologists and medical professionals to conclude that only 30 percent of our baseline happiness is determined by genetic code. The other percentage? It’s up to us and the life we create.The journey begins now, to gain awareness of our partnership with the sun, knowing that we have the tools to flip the switch and cultivate a sunny disposition inside of us. It all starts by following a biological roadmap provided by our guiding light – the sun. Read more