There are two major mindsets that you can bring to your life, the Cause mindset and the Effect mindset. If you’re on the Cause side of the equation, you’re on the side of the equation where you accept that your actions create your life. You understand that you’re responsible for everything you create in a joyous, exciting, loving way.

But if you’re on the Effect side of the equation, you are passively accepting everything that happens in your life. Your basic view whenever anything happens is that you didn’t cause or create those events or experiences, someone else did them to you.

It’s very interesting when you come across this in real life. You’ll hear people say things like “He did this to me.” And the two questions you need to ask when you hear this, or say it yourself, should always be, "Who’s driving the bus?" and "Who is in charge of the results you produce?" Think about this for just a second. If you’re on the Cause side of the equation then you’re the one who is going to produce any results. Whereas if you’re on the Effect side of the equation then you’ll always have excuses why you didn’t get the results you wanted.

The Effect mindset will result in your becoming stuck. It really isn’t a mindset that’s satisfying or rewarding in the long term. However, a large number of people in the world today seem to have this mindset. No matter what happens, people are always very quick to put the blame on something outside of themselves when something goes wrong.

To help you to live with a Cause mindset, you should complete the vision activity below (see ‘Action Step – Future Visioning’). This will help you to tap into a 'healthier version of you,' giving you a new and more inspired focus for your life.

There is a great old book called The Western Guide to Feng Shui. The book revolves around the theory of de-cluttering to allow space for new things in your life. In it, the author talks about how the amount of physical clutter a person has in their environment can be a general reflection of their emotional burdens as well as a barrier to change and progress. This idea is just as true today, and there is a whole new movement espousing the idea of minimalism as a way to clear out emotional and mental barriers to health and happiness.

‘Fat houses’ is a term that describes the way in which people’s homes have become so cluttered with the dross of a materialistic society that they are simply bursting at the seams! And even worse is the fact that all of that clutter is affecting people’s emotional and physical wellbeing, and they don’t even know it. So not only are people becoming fat, lethargic and suffering from more sickness than ever before, but so too are their houses!

Recent findings show that people who live in cluttered environments are more prone to experience anxiousness, guilt and depression as a direct result of the amount of clutter. But instead of de-cluttering and clearing their environments of everything they don’t need, people will move house, add rooms, or hire and buy storage units to store their unwanted burdens. And this, in turn, only causes the problem to escalate.

Top Tips

1. When you create space in your life and home, new things can come in
2. Good health is guaranteed with a one ingredient pantry
3. Make de-cluttering a regular activity and enjoy increased energy and peace of mind

The truth is that most people would like to have less clutter as much as they want to have better health. Perhaps if people knew that the key to one was the other, they would be motivated to get clearing! On average, people’s homes have 1 - 3 cluttered rooms. And because clutter is a very obvious cause of 'sickness symptoms' for many people, you need to start DE-CLUTTERING your life one step at a time.

Over the coming weeks you need to work to de-clutter all of your environments including:

1. Your home
2. Your work areas
3. The inside and outside of your car
4. Your online spaces (your inbox is causing you more grief than you know)

Commit yourself to doing a room a week or a cupboard a day, and start getting rid of all the “stuff” that is cluttering your life! Sell what you can sell, throw away what is no good to anyone else, and give to charity what’s too good to just throw away. This is a guaranteed way to increase your energy and calm your mind, and it may even kick start your weight loss.

And the next time you go to buy something, take a moment and ask yourself whether it’s a need or a want and how long will it be before it becomes clutter.

To learn more about fat houses, watch a 20 minute video on the internet called The Story of Stuff at: http://www.storyofstuff.com. It will make you think twice about what you spend your hard earned money on.

KEEP PAPERWORK IN THE KITCHEN SORTED

Many people handle mail and bill-paying in their kitchen, which makes it easy to misplace a bill or lose track of what's due when. That’s why it's more important than ever to get organised. Find an area in your kitchen (or office) where you can go through the mail as it comes in, filing bills away in the order they’re due. Find an organising system that works for you, even if it's just a few different coloured folders for unpaid and paid bills to make your priorities obvious.

KEEP YOUR BENCH TOPS CLEARED

Have you ever noticed how beautiful the kitchens look in model homes? Just standing in them makes you feel good. This is all about the uncluttered bench tops. It's as if having room to work gives you room to breathe easier as well. So start at one end of your countertop and work your way to the end, removing anything you don’t use on a daily basis. If you do have too many appliances in your space, consider buying a combination machine that does a variety of tasks, such as a Thermomix.

DECIDE WHAT YOU REALLY NEED

Ask yourself what's really vital to the day-to-day workings of your kitchen. Go through every cabinet and every drawer, determining which kitchen appliances, cookware, and tools you rarely use. How many frying pans do you really need? Throw away any broken, chipped or disused gadgets and appliances or donate them to your local charity.

CREATE YOUR KITCHEN TRIANGLE

Not everyone has that ideal ‘working triangle’ in their kitchen, formed by the refrigerator, stove/oven and sink/dishwasher. But that doesn't mean you can't organise things in a way that makes your kitchen space more workable. When you first moved into your kitchen, you may not have had the chance to strategically think about which kitchen items should go where. This is a great time to do that, and to consider the best places for the following items:

> Glassware and cups (best near the refrigerator or the sink/dishwasher)
> Kitchen utensils (near the stove)
> Pots and pans (near the stove/oven)
> Spices and herbs (in a cool, dark cabinet near where you use them most)
> Coffee mugs (near the kettle and tea and coffee cupboard)
> Measuring cups and spoons (near where you do your baking)

USE ORGANISATION TOOLS

For very little money, you can add a few sensible drawers and cabinet organisers to your kitchen. Tools such as vertical dividers can help organise biscuit sheets and cake pans, and well-placed shelves can double your storage. You can also use plastic drawer dividers to organise your tangle of utensils. And for a few dollars, you can keep key cleaning supplies in an under-the-sink caddy.

DISPOSE OF THE JUNK DRAWER

If you're thinking of designating a drawer where you dump things that don't belong anywhere else, don’t! Once you start a junk drawer, it takes on a life of its own. Space is valuable in kitchens, so don’t clutter it. If you have to have someplace to dump out-of-place items, put them in a box or plastic bag that you keep somewhere out of sight. If after six months you haven't gone searching for any of the items in this area, it's a good sign that everything in the bag can be passed on.

TOUCH THE PAPERWORK ONCE

Once you start piling up paperwork on a desk or bench, there's no turning back. This type of system, or lack thereof, will probably result in lost papers or missed deadlines. And that’s not mentioning the amount of time you waste trying to find one specific piece of paperwork in the stack. To avoid this, the first rule is to keep paper in the kitchen to a minimum. And the second rule is to only touch it once. As soon as they arrive, sort your papers into categories (takeout menus, coupons, recipes ripped out of magazines or newspapers) and store them using some sort of organiser system - coloured folders might be useful again for this purpose.

SHELVES CREATE MORE SPACE

Just by installing one shelf in your garage, pantry, or office, you can free up valuable space in your kitchen. A shelf in another area is the perfect place to keep appliances and large cookware that you don't use very often. Be merciless and banish any rainy-day appliances to this new home.

PURGE YOUR PANTRY

Next you need to go through your pantry and throw out unhealthy food items and those past their use-by date. You might be surprised at how old some of them are. Look through those cans and packages of stuff you thought you would use last year, but didn't. You can donate these unopened items to charity if they’re still in date. And don't forget to look in the very back of the shelves and cabinets, because this is where bags of hardened, dried coconut and stale crackers tend to loiter.

DECLUTTER YOUR COOKBOOKS

If you like to cook, this will be really difficult for you to do. But it’s probably necessary as well. If you have a cookbook you haven't opened in a few years, it may be time to donate it to your local charity. If you aren't actively using some of your cookbooks on a regular basis, but you want to save them as a reference, find a place to store them so they aren't cluttering up your kitchen. And if you’re keeping an entire cookbook for only one recipe then create a folder of your favourites, photocopy the recipe for your file, and sell the book or pass it on.

If you truly want to be in total control of your health then you must be in total control of the ingredients you use in your meals. This means that packaged foods are completely off the grocery list because there are too many loop holes in the food label system that put your health at risk. For a comprehensive understanding of this, just do some research on food labels and health concerns.

If you prefer to know that you’re always doing the best for your health and the health of your family, you shouldn’t buy packaged foods with more than one or two ingredients in them. This means no instant noodles, no instant meals, and no sugary cereals. And if you need to purchase something packaged, make sure the company is ethical and that all ingredients are real food and not chemical substitutes. If you follow this rule, and plan well, the result will be a pantry that’s simple, but amply stocked to make any type of food you could want from desserts to main meals. And when you have a pantry like this you don’t have to worry about additives, preservatives, flavourings, hydrogenated vegetable oils or genetically modified foods. All the food you eat will be whole and in their most natural, healthy state.

Plus, when you have a one-ingredient pantry, you’ll find that your pantry suddenly seems huge. The basic elements of a one-ingredient pantry include all spices and dried herbs, all nuts and seeds, legumes, flours, grains, salt and sugar. Once you start with this idea, you’ll be amazed at how little you need in order to make every meal in your recipe books.

Where I would like to be in 6 months?

What is your biggest goal for each of these areas? Remember GOALS need to be I AM SMART (Inspirational, Motivating, Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Risky and Tangible).

• GOAL BRAINSTORMING:
• 6 MONTH GOAL:
• MILESTONES (INTERIM MEASUREMENTS)

What milestones could you create to ensure you stay on the path towards achieving your goals?

Go to your Health Tracker & click on the ‘set a new vision’ to record what you would like to achieve.

Most people will say they’re healthy, but deeper questioning will reveal a list of 'Sickness Symptoms'. Their complaints might sound like these:

I’m very healthy except for the blood pressure and cholesterol tablets I have to take...

I’m very healthy, but I find it hard to walk upstairs...

I’m very healthy, but I get headaches...

I’m very healthy, but I get indigestion and constipation quite a bit

And so on... 

As part of your health program, you need to record in your health tracker under self evaluation your ‘Sickness Symptoms’. List any regular aches and pains, the medications (prescribed and un-prescribed) that you’re taking, and any of the small things that are niggling away at you. Go from the tip of your head down to your little toes and write down everything that gives you grief or discomfort. This list shouldn’t be just about your physical appearance either. Make sure you include how you feel emotionally from day to day and how well the different systems in your body are functioning.

At the end of the program you’ll do a review of this list and be amazed at how far you’ve come and how well the program works!

After each step in this program, make sure you evaluate how you’re feeling and write down any general observations about the program or your condition. That way you can look back when you’re further along in the program and clearly see how far you’ve come.

Go to your Health Tracker and click on the How I feel Chart and fill it out

 

Your pantry doesn’t need to be the size of the kitchen to be useful. In fact, you actually don’t need to stock a lot of food at all. With just the basics you have everything you need to make food that is nutritious, health-harnessing and delicious!

After you’ve decluttered your kitchen and pantry, you need to decide how to stock them going forward. Are you going to commit completely and create a one-ingredient pantry and start a new way of living or not? This can be a difficult choice, after all you probably spent a lot of money on the foods in your pantry. But you have to decide what’s more important, losing some food-like products, or your health.

If you’re truly committed, emptying your pantry is easy. Just get a couple of large rubbish bags and throw out any foods that are refined, processed, or contain additives including excess sugar and sodium. Then you can restock with one-ingredient foods - the foundation for a healthier you!

If you want to clear out your pantry slowly, start by removing the following staples:

× White salt

× White sugar 

You can replace these items with the healthier options in the shopping list below.

And now that you’re committed to eating real food, it’s time to go and buy some! The next time you go shopping for groceries, you need to focus on the following food categories and ignore all the rest.

FRUIT & VEG 

The best place to buy your fruit, vegetables and herbs is at your local farmers' markets, These are very popular and can be found in most cities and regional towns. They may not be accessible for people who live in remote areas, so if you have trouble, just do the best you can with what you have.

DRY GOODS 

There are a number of interesting dried foods you can try, and some of them are beyond delicious. Try seaweed salt, rapadura sugar, inca inchi oil, coconut oil, vanilla pods, camu camu or inca inchi protein. And if you need a little extra goodness or nutrients in your diet, look out for colloidal minerals, green powder, and probiotics. See https://changinghabits.com.au/shop/ for a great range of dry goods.

DAIRY 

Try to buy local for your milk and dairy needs and avoid anything that’s overly processed. With a little research, you’ll be able to learn which dairy products fit this description and which should probably be avoided.

MEAT 

Be careful when you buy meat. It can be hard to tell what’s safe and organic and what’s stuffed with hormones and chemicals. Try meat from your local butcher, farmers' market or discerning grocery stores. It might take a bit of time before you can find a source you trust, but it’s really worth it for the better taste and the health benefits.

EGGS 

Happy chooks lay healthy eggs, so try to purchase from sellers that give their stock good food and the most natural way of life possible.    

NUTS & SEEDS 

Nuts and seeds can be found at your local health food store and farmers' markets and they’re a wonderful source of vitamins, minerals and essential fats. They also taste great and can be really filling, which helps with hunger pangs.

Following is the grocery list you’ll need for the next week. If you haven’t shopped like this before, call a friend who likes to eat healthy and ask them where they buy their food. And don’t be too concerned about the expense. Going back to basics doesn’t have to be expensive. In fact, when you do it properly it becomes less expensive to eat this way.

Top Tips

1. Buy fresh produce from local producers where possible
2. A big pantry filled with packaged food is not healthy
3. Collect jars and use to store spices, nuts and herbs

Shopping list

GENERAL GROCERIES

• Apple cider vinegar
• Chia seeds
• Arrowroot flour
• Fish sauce
• Almond meal (or almonds to mill your own)
• Balsamic vinegar
• Tomato paste
• Red wine (for cooking purposes only!)
• Slim pasta/miracle noodles
• Coconut milk/cream
• Coconut water
• Tamari
• Mirin
• Black olives
• Quinoa
• Rice
• Rice flour (or rice to mill your own rice flour)
• Nori Sheets

LEGUMES

• Dried yellow split peas
• Dried red lentils

NUTS - ALL RAW

• Almonds
• Walnuts
• Macadamias
• Pine nuts

FRESH HERBS

• Coriander
• Basil
• Mint
• Fresh chives
• Ginger
• Garlic
• Spring onions
• Shallots
• Parsley
• Chillies
• Thyme
• Kaffir lime leaves
• Sage
• Bay leaves

SPICES

• Star anise
• Ground cumin
• Ground coriander
• Curry powder
• Paprika
• Fresh cracked black pepper

DAIRY OR ALTERNATIVE

1. Ghee
2. Fresh parmesan
3. Plain yoghurt
4. Feta cheese
5. Sour cream
6. Cream

CHANGING HABITS FOODS

1. CH Seaweed Salt
2. CH Rapadura Sugar
3. CH Coconut Oil
4. CH Inca Inchi Oil
5. CH Supreme Green Blend
6. CH Probiotics
7. CH Colloidal Minerals
8. CH Camu Camu Powder
9. CH Inca Inchi Protein Powder
10. CH Cacao Melts
11. CH Shredded coconut
12. CH Cinnamon
13. CH Turmeric

MEAT

1. Beef bones (broth)
2. Organic beef mince
3. Lamb cutlets

POULTRY: FREE-RANGE

1. Organic eggs
2. Chicken breast
3. Chicken thigh
4. Whole chicken
5. Chicken mince

FISH / SEAFOOD

1. White fish fillets
2. Salmon
3. Prawns

FRUIT & VEG

1. Your favourite fruits and vegetables in season

There is a range of fruit and vegetables in the accompanying recipe book, including the examples below. Feel free to swap around the fruit and vegies according to what’s seasonal and available where you are. Read through the recipes to find the ones that will suit your budget, season and family needs.

VEGETABLES 

Cucumber, zucchini, broccoli, beetroot, carrot, celery, fresh corn, avocado, silver beet, spinach, lettuce, rocket, onions, red onion, spring onions, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, bean sprouts, mung beans, mushrooms, cabbage, capsicum, sweet potato, potatoes, pumpkin.

FRUIT 

Dates, apples, bananas, lemons, limes, pineapple, passionfruit, blueberries, pawpaw, oranges.

 

FRUITS & VEGETABLES 

It’s important to try to buy seasonal, local produce. Farmers' markets are a great place to buy fruits and vegetables, and support the local economy at the same time. Also, get to know your local fruit shop and ask them the following questions:

> Is this grown locally?

> Is this organic or pesticide free?

> When was it picked?

MEAT / POULTRY / FISH 

Organic is always best, but if you can’t get organic, then look for grass fed beef and lamb. Chicken should be free range and fish is best wild and not farmed. Buy from your local butcher if you can and make sure you ask the right questions about your meat. Remember that healthy animals mean healthy meat.

GENERAL GROCERIES 

It’s important to read your ingredient labels. This will help you to avoid foods that have preservatives and additives in them. Your local organic shop should list all the ingredients of their products on the box. You can also get some good alternatives from the health food section of your local supermarket.