Inside The Polished Apple

For those following along at home... On June 20 th  I completed my 180 Day challenge-from Winter Solstice to Summer Solstice, I counted down the days until I turned 45 and prepped for my hike of the West Coast Trail in early July. My challenge was to stretch myself daily whether physically, mentally or emotionally. I tracked it with my inchy board so I would have a visual celebration and reminder. While my challenges were nothing of what I expected back in December, I do have a sense of preparation for starting this new season of summer and tackle-ing my hike ahead. The challenge is now complete which means I next have a birthday to celebrate, and then an amazing hike to enjoy just days later. All of it is more then I can digest in the moment and is also a huge accomplishment that I am immensely proud of. And community has supported me along the way! From my 180 Day Challenge Facebook group, to our office community, and all of the groups that surround myself, our fam...

Spring arrived on time this year! I am so happy and relieved to see the sun and to be out in the warm weather-thank you to our Mother Earth! We have been a hive of activity around Elan this past month. We've been at the Just Be YYC market at The Village in Brentwood, The Mom Community Market with Mothering Vine, at a Lunch and Learn with our local service groups Carya and Bowwest (with food from an amazing program for youth, Redefin'd) and hosted our own Women's Wellness evening at Elan. All of these events relied on a number of community partners and supporters: Sage Traditions ,  Bev Wein Citrinity Healing , Lucy Pilch Routine. Natural deodorant. , Pippa Blair Real Organic Solutions , Mizahel Chaplain Young Living, Intuitive Readings & Reiki,  Sandra Catania Horse and Heart Connection , Marilyn MacLean Dr. Theodora Lo One Love Float , Treeka Calm N' Barrel Smiley Seahorse Ceramics Rumina Naturals April is always a special time for us to recognize our Mo...

Its that time of the year again, the weather is getting colder, and that means back to the winter boots and socks. Did you know that socks are the least donated clothing item in Alberta? Even with charitable donations they are in high demand, so we at Elan are holding our annual Toasty Toes Sock Drive. This is part of the Alberta College and Association of Chiropractors fall campaign.  Bring in new socks (Baby to Adult sizes, girls and boys) to the clinic to help others who need to keep their feet nice and warm this winter. It is running from September 1 to September 30th.  Our goal is to raise 200 pairs of sock during the month.

Thank you to Scott Hutchison, Registered Massage Therapist at Elan Family Wellness Centre in Bowness, for this article on the end of summer and recent community contributions!  It's almost over! #summer #gone Back to school is on the mind of most parents by now. Certainly the retailers, but I hope the kids are still lost in the long summer days. Having as much fun as possible in the wonderful weather in western Canada. I want to take a second and thank you all for the great support for Carya on our Patient Day this summer, the 30 lbs of food collected for the Food Pantry Round Up during stampede and the well over 200 books that have gone in and out of our little tiny library. Thank you very much! August 1 st  you will see a little box and some bracelets for sale in the office. Have a look, buy a bracelet. The funds raised are being handled by an amazing young girl facing her own health, the world with grace, dignity and a mission bigger than herself. She needs a bit of...

Thank you to Scott Hutchison, Registered Massage Therapist at Elan in Bowness, for these thoughts on Community!  A few years ago, Josephene came up with this concept of Inside the Polished Apple. It was a nifty idea she formed after a trip to the dreaded DisneyLand. (It wan't that bad actually and we learned a ton about creating and morphing a culture) We get similar impulses and ideas every time we visit europe, but this concept of the external matching and balancing the inside has stuck with us. You see, both Josephene and I come from the perspective that our community, business and home life should be an extension of our family. It should all match or be moving towards being in alinement. We value our family and by extension we should value those mention above. The outside of the beautiful apple should match the tasty insides. But if it doesn't, we see the value in finding ways to culture and nurture the insides to match the outsides. The question of what's In...

Thank you to Dr Robert Clarke, Chiropractor at Elan Family Wellness Centre in Bowness, for this article on Community. Dr Rob practises Network Spinal Care and 12 Stages of Healing Somato Respiratory Integration.    Human nature craves community. For some it’s a small intimate circle of friends, for others it’s a large group of friends, coworkers, relatives and the people connected to them. Regardless of size it is an essential element in our health and happiness. There are books and seminars on building community, but really it’s as simple as, talking to your neighbors, calling a friend or cashier at your grocery store. It’s about reaching out. A fun way to engage is having a potluck; it used to be the way people connected in the past, sharing food, conversation and helping each other. In our modern times we are almost too independent, in the past we had to help each other to survive. Now it is essential for us to thrive. Our successes are better when share...

"We experience our involvement with humanity and recognize that wholeness comes from bringing our individual gifts into community. This occurs in our internal and external communities. We receive gifts from within ourselves and from others. We recognize that all our choices are spiritual ones and affect all beings. Eventually we recognize that our limits stem from our own lack of wholeness. Consequently, we seek to re-experience the rhythm of stage one." ~Dr Donald Epstein, 12 Stages of Healing From the perspective of the 12 Stages of Healing and The Sacred Seasons, Community is the 12th Stage and part of Awaken-receiving our gifts and sharing our gifts with community. Ideally, we are able to move fluidly from Discover to Transform to Awaken as needed and to bring elements of the different seasons together. From our office perspective, what opportunities we have to spend time in community! Our recent June Appreciation Day is a great example-we had many members of the...

We love growing our community of people we meet and get to know-check out these events that are we're either attending or hosting at our office in Bowness.  Join Elan at these events: Spring Goddess Gathering May 6th 1-6 pm. Glamorgan Community Association  4207 41 Avenue Southwest, Calgary, Alberta T3E 1G2 RELEASING TOXIC ENERGY THROUGH FORGIVENESS  Join us   to explore the value of self love and forgiveness. The journey that we are all on brings us through experiences that can often hold a place of repeated destructive behavioural patterns and stored anxiety in the body. It's when we can find a new perspective of those experiences, we can release the pain surrounding those memories and replace that pain with love and gratitude. Space is limited. Thursday, May 10   at  7:00pm (happening at Elan!)  Just Be YYC Mothe r's Day Market Saturday, May 12th 10-4   Hillhurst Sunnyside Community Market.  For information on any of these events, ple...

Thank you to Dr Robert Clarke, Chiropractor at Elan Family Wellness Centre, for this article on Giving & Receiving in the Theme of Community. Giving and receiving, this is what we all crave about community. To belong to something bigger than ourselves. In days gone by it was essential to survival. We may not need it to survive in our modern era, but it's essential to help us thrive. Sharing and helping feeds our souls, it feels great to support others. The important part of the equation is to be open to receiving. This completes the cycle of being in community, it's about building relationships and these need to have balance. If you're fortunate to have some abundance and you're in a position to give to others, allow yourself the opportunity to receive. Maybe you don’t have need of things, then receive gratitude. Be open to the heartfelt thanks of others and even if you're not currently needing help from someone, graciously accept a reciprocal gift if one i...

Thanks to Scott for: Scott's thoughts on Community. #Community is our Theme for July.  As some of you know, I'm the VP of the  Bowness Community Association . We're a lovely and super inclusive organization of volunteers and paid staff that run an ice rink, an event hall and are home to many charitable organizations. We have an amazing staff and a focused mandate to really do our best to honour and improve the connection of people of Bowness. It's awesome and I've met some extremely passionate and engaged folk during my time at the BCA. How I got involved is the result of Reorganization Living. I attended a Transformational Gate in 2014 that put me on a new energy rich model from restorative therapeutics to the much superior model of Reorganizational Healing (ROH). Along with ROH, the philosophy of living congruent to it. From my point of view, a person must find energy rich states and situations to fuel up the body and brain, destabilize old outdated patterns...

It's our month of #community in July!  Slower paced summer days give us a chance to enjoy the people and the places surrounding us, spending more time in community. Here's what we'll be up to in July in Bowness: the Bowness Stampede event, Movie in the Park, cycling through Baker Park, sharing our work in a retreat near town, sipping a coffee and walking around Bowness Park or at the river. And holidays to see family!    I've recently had the chance to experience a few unique things about our community: This past weekend I attended a New Moon Meditation and Yoga Workshop at  Bowga , just around the corner from Elan. Releasing the old, focusing on what we want our next 30 days to be about and creating an intention for this time, is a beautiful way to honour this watery, emotional new moon. Random perhaps, but I also have my hair stylist working out of her home in Montgomery - so convenient and nice to avoid the salons. And last, for our recent 12 year wedd...

A special treat for April-our Women's Wellness Circle this month will include a Salt Bowl Ceremony. Here's more about it from our Community Herbalist Melanie Stevens Isles.  Spring is here for real for real! As an herbalist spring brings so much hope and planning. I grow a shocking amount of medicine in my tiny city lot. Each spring I dream up what new friends I am going to add to my garden and how I will work with these plants and the clients I support. Working with the plants and the dirt in the sun really fills my cup. I know I have to soak it up over summer to get me through the winters. Connecting with the earth is such an important part of our overall health and wellness. Spending time in nature, listening to birds, watching trees, feeling the warm sun on your face all connect us to a source greater than ourselves. This month the Women's Wellness Red Tent event is on April 28 at 7. We will be connecting to the earth and ourselves with a salt bowl ceremon...

Throughout the month of March we will be focusing the spotlight on a few of our amazing practitioners. They'll be set up in the waiting room to answer your questions, and we'd love for you to come in and find out more about what they do! Take advantage of this opportunity to bring your health questions and learn more about our practitioners.  Our Massage Therapist & Craniosacral Therapis t Lisa   will be here on Wednesday, March 8th 3:30-5:30pm Our Reflexologist,  Sandra , will be here on Wednesday March 15 from 3pm to 6pm Our Homeopath,  Ally , will be here on Wednesday March 22 from 2pm to 5pm Our Herbalist,  Melanie , will be here on Thursday March 30 from 9am to 2pm  

This morning we had a meeting with our Pathways Connect group to discuss articles from the Pathways to Family Wellness magazine. Our chat today seemed to centre on The Social Vagus and creating community. A summary of the article: In this article author and chiropractor Dr. John Edward talks about a turning point in his life. Throughout his career as a chiropractor he had always taught about the two nerve systems, sympathetic (fight or flight) and parasympathetic, which is responsible for balancing everything that enters and leaves the body. While he stands by his long-standing belief that we cannot have health if we live in the sympathetic (stress response) he learned of a surprising study suggesting that spending all our time in the parasympathetic system would wear down one’s health as well. We then learn about the social nerve system, the third branch of the autonomic nerve system. Dr. Edward expresses his personal accounts at the time, going through an emotionally...

Gather with women for a chance to relax and reflect. This evening is a time for connection to self and to a community of women. Magic happens when women gather! The theme this month is gratitude. This is no ordinary gratitude practice. Come with an open heart and open mind and we will explore the ways gratitude can heal. You will go home with a gratitude craft / make and take.  Cost: $20 For more information, check out our  Facebook event .  There is limited space for this event , to secure your spot please contact the office at 403.217.5577 to pay through credit card, or send e-transfers to  drjjuell@telus.net ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Our presenters: Melanie Stevens-Isles  is a community herbalist, she will work with you to bring balance and vibrant health back to your life. By guiding you to connect with your own innate healing abilities together with the herbs you will find wellness again. Her understanding of how plants he...

I had written this for our July newsletter, but we've extended our Community month offer through July~please enjoy my thoughts on community (our monthly theme!) as we wrap up Stampede week!   Not only a favorite topic but also a favorite time of the year! Bowness in July is bursting with community events~from the Bowness Stampede parade, Music in the Park, movie nights, you name it... We try to keep a listing of local events in the office and also post through Elan's Facebook page-make sure you're there to keep up to date! It's exciting that we can tap into our local gatherings as well as the community that is created within the walls of Elan. Did you know that one of the reasons we moved Elan to Bowness was to be a part of this spirit and to help it grow even more? To help support our community both of Elan and Bowness, we've created our Community week, running during Stampede week. Ask us how you can invite your family or friends to join ...

Yee-haw!   It's Calgary Stampede time and Elan had it's first opportunity to have a piece of stampede right outside it's doors.  On Saturday, July 4th, Bowness had it's annual parade and pancake breakfast.  The parking lot outside our office was filled with griddles, hungry parade go-ers, local businesses and community groups, and live music.    We opened the office as a Mom and Babes Sanctuary - somewhere clean and quiet to change or nurse baby.  Here's some photos of the day: Thank you to the Bowness Lions and all of the amazing volunteers that make this event happen.  We always look forward to the Bowness parade day!  

As part of Elan Family Wellness Centre's July theme of Community, here are Sandra Catania's thoughts.  (Sandra offers Holistic Reflexology sessions at Elan) I am writing this piece on my laptop, perched out on my front step. One of the things that I think of when I think of community is our immediate neighbourhood. The folks all around us. But when I think about it, we only know our immediate neighbours by name and only see some of the others occasionally on our bike trips around the block and on Halloween when we make the rounds. In this day of communicating by computers, I believe our online communities to be much more active. We spend so much of our lives connected to our screens, exchanging information and support. And while I do miss some of the real life contact (and do still see the need for it), I have seen and experienced first hand how our great need to find a community or “tribe” to belong to can be fulfilled quickly and with ease electronically. The w...

Our family culture shifts every time we do the drive from Salmon Arm to Calgary- from one home to another.  This time we were freshly arrived from LA and Disney.  Or not so fresh as we didn't clear the airport until past midnight and had 2 drives ahead.  Every drive turns into a life evaluation-great way to end a holiday!  Disney is amazing and as we were reminiscing on our drive, the most amazing part is the absolute solid culture that THEY have created-the intense experience of everything-sight, sound, smell, feel, taste, the consuming, the needing, the wanting.  The hordes dressed in Disney clothes, as mickey or Minnie, as princesses...  And not to worry, we were right there at the princess lunch with our little princess and loving every ride, every character, every show and parade.   But any discussion about Disney culture and their business model seems to lead right into a discussion of our own family and office culture.  And where are we...